Financial Services Companies: It's Time To Start Talking Again

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Financial services companies, everyone is talking about you. You know that. But lately, the drumbeats are getting louder for you to starting talking for yourself.

We know that you’ve had any number of preoccupations—serious and steep revenue declines cascading into budget cutbacks, lay-offs and business reorganizations. But it’s been a year since Bear Stearns and six months since Lehman Brothers, plenty of time for surveyed investors and pundits to reach a consensus: Financial services companies need to be heard from.

Consider the commentary from the last few weeks alone.

"Out of sight can mean out of business," according to Nielsen IAG, which tracked a 13%-plus decline in year-over-year ad spending on financial services and insurance from 2008 to 2007. Spending dropped 23%-plus in the fourth quarter alone.

Citing the data shown in the chart below, a March 19 report from Nielsen links reduced spending to reduced confidence in an organization.

Nielsen IAG Financial Ads Vs. Confidence Image

Eight percent of Americans today have full confidence in banks and financial services companies compared to the 31% confidence level expressed as recently as 2006. That’s according to a consumer poll sponsored by Waggener Edstrom Worldwide (WE)/RT Strategies and reported on March 20. Other findings:

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Tracking The Great Financial Advisor Migration—And Implications for Your CRM

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Dan Miller, Key Accounts Sales Executive for Discovery, is always good enough to update us on the developments in his world of financial intermediaries databases—which the smartest investment management firms use to augment their “organically grown” customer relationship management (CRM) systems. We checked in with him Tuesday after yet another Investment News article about financial advisor migration.

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Financial Advisors Are Still Out There Swinging—What Are You Pitching?

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Even though I didn’t plan it that way, can we think of this as Part 2 to my last post Fresh Ways to Explain the Financial Crisis? In that post I highlighted some innovative props for explaining what the heck has been going on these last several months. But there are other ways to look at how the crisis is being communicated about, and that’s to “listen in” on what financial advisors are saying to their clients.

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Let Your Kids Take You To Social Media School

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One of my favorite Jerry Seinfeld quotes is from when he first became a father. I’m paraphrasing, but it’s along the lines of “Of course, babies are cute. No question. But you know what they’re here for, right? Make no mistake about it. They’re here to replace us. They’re our replacements.”



I thought of that yesterday as I followed a link included in a random email from friend and former colleague Laura Gregg, now with Northern Trust Investments.


Message from Annie Gregg:

Hello Family and Friends, please watch this short video message from Annie. You'll be glad you did!

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