3 Questions to Ask When Cutting Marketing Budgets

In an already down economy, the corporate credit union bailout is just another blow to ROA. Every senior management team is looking for ways to cut expenses. One area that always seems to draw attention is the marketing budget. Yet, marketing is the only way to ensure that your credit union will stay in business next year.

The reason is clear - marketing is the strategic process of attracting business. To limit the investment in it limits the capabilities of the organization.

Since cuts will happen across the board, there are several strategic issues that need to be considered when making cuts in the marketing budget. Here are 3 questions to ask your team:

• Can we highlight those products, services or programs that are important to the bottom line to direct a marketing investment? Can we find some products, services or programs that we can choose not to market this year?
• Can we find some member segments that are critical to the bottom line that we cannot afford to lose and require marketing dollars?
• What are we getting for the amount spent in each area of the marketing budget? From actual loan and deposit dollars flowing in to the Credit Union, what marketing efforts are making us the most money and protecting our core of profitable members?

There is a cost to ramp up the marketing flywheel and gain the value from the momentum. A decline in the funding of certain marketing efforts will start to impact the flow of new business and be incredibly difficult to ramp back up and gain business when the economy picks up.

For more on marketing strategy from LemmonTree, click here for our blog.

Utilizing online strategies to stretch marketing dollars -
From savvy e-marketing to social media, some do's and don'ts

Many marketers feeling the pinch of shrinking budgets have looked to try new online strategies. Here are a few things to be aware of when adding e-marketing and social media to try a "cheaper" way of reaching members:

• Do add strategic e-marketing because it is an extremely important tool, however, be aware of blind spots.
  • Check how many e-mail addresses are available on your system. Many credit unions have less than 50% and miss a large percentage of profitable members if only using email broadcasts for marketing promotions.
  • Inbox marketing needs to be segmented just like direct mail to get the right offer into the inbox of a member who would likely accept it. Targeting requires the manipulation of the email addresses by age, product usage and more.
  • E-mail broadcasts need to be strategically scheduled. Too many emails from your credit union can become annoying and lead to increasing unsubscribes.
• Be clear on your objectives for building your brand in the social networking area because it does take time away from other marketing that drives real business.
  • Anything online, whether adding informational articles to your website or adding a blog on a microsite, or jumping into having a Facebook page, all take a lot of time. Often this time does not show immediate results to the credit union's bottom line like a marketing promotion in terms of loans booked or deposits added.
  • Putting your brand online is open to the public and needs to be very carefully crafted, monitored and tracked.

For more on how you can test direct mail and e-marketing visit Dennis Koepke's blog, My Analytical Side or other insights into social media, visit our blog at MyMarketingInsights.com. Or, to help reach members with e-marketing solutions, click here.

Marketing today is not for "Sissies" -
Build strategy strength with Credit Union Marketing University

From Winter Session, 2009: "Just a quick note to say how much I enjoyed CU Marketing University. I learned a great deal that will help not only myself, but the credit union. I just presented [your] marketing cost recovery worksheet and the ROI worksheet to show the potential ROI for an upcoming promotion I wanted to do. The CEO was very impressed and quickly approved the promotion. He said the financial data I presented to him was exactly what he wanted to see. Thanks again. Your staff did a fabulous job." Chris Sievers, Marketing Director SIU Credit Union For more information, click here.

The new recessionary economy has definitely impacted everyone. To tackle strategic marketing in a downturn, the faculty tailored the Winter Session in February to address tough times that require tough marketing decisions!

One session that was presented covered the new online and social media tools and how it can be layered with traditional marketing. A free webinar is being presented on April 22nd regarding this subject by the faculty.

Not knowing how soon the economy will recover, the curriculum for the Fall Session in September will reflect the economic times to provide the most relevant strategies for credit union marketers.

The week-long program was developed by credit union experts more than five years ago to attract marketers who wanted to raise their level of marketing expertise to the next level. A focus within the curriculum is on helping marketers understand "the numbers" that drive the credit union and to be able to speak to how marketing strategies and efforts will support the credit union’s goals and bottom line. Every student that has been through the course has commented on finishing with a strategic focus on planning, tracking and the financial implications of your marketing efforts.