ONE HELPFUL HACK FOR YOUR CREDIT UNION’S CONTENT MARKETING STRATEGY
If you want your credit union to stay relevant among target members and get positive buzz without making all of its marketing content from scratch, then the answer is newsjacking. This hack is especially helpful if you already maintain a blog and social media pages.
Newsjacking takes time. It requires a constant pulse on the industry and knowledge of your in-house experts who can weigh in on the subjects. Once you build a constant knowledge bank of timely topics, you will exponentially increase your position as an industry thought leader.
ALL ABOUT THE NEWSJACK HACK
Newsjacking is the practice of getting your brand involved in a breaking story that’s just starting to trend among your audiences. It involves your credit union contributing to the conversation with an interesting angle while getting the attention of already engaged viewers.
THE TRICK IS: START SIMPLE
Whenever a big story related to money or the economy breaks, you should think about how experts within your organization can get involved in the conversation. The simplest way to do this is to include subject matter experts (SMEs) in the content your marketing team produces. Consider scheduling a guest blog of a mortgage lender commenting on the market once a month or “business buzz” weekly tweets from your financial experts in your content calendar.
Start by developing content based on short interviews with SMEs on trending topics or writing content based on current articles your team is passing around in an email or chat.
The more you get to know your credit union’s experts and stay on top of trending stories, the more you will develop readers’ perceptions of your credit union as a trusted expert.
BUILD YOUR MOMENTUM – AND YOUR SEO!
Once you develop the groundwork for newsjacking, there are ways to multiply your efforts so your experts can share their views on a story directly. LinkedIn posts are good for this. If you can get your experts to consistently contribute content that can help readers understand financial news, you are more likely to keep them engaged with your brand online.
The big question is: how do you get key players to buy in? For our clients at CrucialContent, we’ve found training on social media and sample posts works well. Communication from your marketing department to push your contributors, incentives and availability will help continue your credit union’s newsjacking efforts. The added benefit is, the more contributors who post and link to your website, the more SEO will build, further bolstering your brand credibility.
If you find it difficult to engage SMEs, your marketing team can directly promote content by publishing blog posts with bylines for SMEs and promoting them through LinkedIn Sponsored Content or Facebook Boosted Posts. Just be sure to get their approval.
A WORD OF CAUTION
Of course you should work closely with anyone from your organization who is producing content. Remember, you’re still the content expert and brand guardian.
You should also avoid anything too controversial. The main goal is to provide educational content to your readers. When you benefit your readers, you benefit your brand.
In need of more tips on content marketing? Learn the state of credit unions in the content marketing industry in our quick, 15-minute demo.
