Integration Of Social Media With CRM In Financial Services

Many businesses across industries have integrated social media into their CRM services early on; some better than others.

It’s not only about the adaptation but knowing how to leverage social media to get the best results and accelerate business growth.

It is common knowledge that the financial sector was highly affected by the global economic crises. Most banks and other financial services providers sustained a substantial loss in customer trust and loyalty. Integrating social media into their CRM Finance and putting a considerable amount of effort into social media strategies is one of the ways to rebuild that trust.

Challenges

One of the unique challenges for the entire financial industry is the vast variety of international and national laws and regulations that restrict the integration of social media in a few different ways:

• Internationally operating banks face various laws that restrict them in one or more countries in actually integrating any type of social media with their CRM Finance.
• Industry-specific regulations limit financial institutions in giving financial advice online due to privacy concerns of their customers.
• All of the available social networks have their own terms and conditions that contain regulations on companies’ communication with customers and prospects.

Due to these limitations, banks are reluctant to adopt any kind of social media as part of their communications strategy. Here are a few examples of what financial institutions might be worried about:

• Degradation or loss of brand image. Negative feedback and controversial discussions on social media sites can damage the image of financial institutions. This is why it is crucial to have the right resources, expertise and a strategy in place when employing any type of external social media.
• Waste of energy and resources. Most banks make most of their profit through corporate banking and there is still a predominant opinion amongst the financial industry that social media is more for the individual than for corporations and therefore considered not to be valuable for revenue.
• Social media is only seen as a marketing channel. However, with a good strategy, it can be used for internal career development and recruitment.

Benefits

In making use of social media and tying their CRM Finance to social media networks, banks and financial service providers can get closer to their customers, corporate and retail, and find out how to improve services and products. This will positively impact their revenue if the right strategy is in place. Here are a few selected benefits:

• New opportunities of designing customer-specific offers will emerge through the gathering and analyzing of big data via social CRM service
• Increased customer satisfaction through engaging with clients on social media platforms and easier management; For example: using social complaints management solutions integrated in CRM service
• Encourage P2P (peer-to-peer) Support by establishing discussion forums and communities for customers and interested parties to exchange knowledge and profit from each other. A good suggestion might be to open forums for existing customers via a secure log-in to ensure a higher level of security – This can be an issue when it comes to sensitive financial issues
• Considering banks lose over 60% of customers due to long response times of customer service and also over 30% of financial service customers switched providers in 2012 it would seem wasteful not to leverage social media as a low-cost substitution to re-build strong relationships with customers. After all ‘Social customer service’ costs only 1/10 of customer service provided via phone.

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