Content marketing is one of the most important and effective forms of communication for brands in the financial sector. In Poland, the financial industry is considered to be a complicated one – most Poles use experts’ help when looking for credit offers, investing or tax issues. Explaining financial complexities to them in a simple, accessible and interesting way is therefore the best way to gain the trust of potential customers. How to do it well? Here is some advice from a Polish comms agency!
Table of contents:
- Forms of content marketing
- Company blog
- Sponsored articles
- Podcast
- Newsletter
- Video tutorials
- What to keep in mind?
- Compliance with Polish regulations
- SEO and YMYL
- Changing complicated to simple
Forms of content marketing
Let’s start with which forms of content marketing are leading the way in Poland. Which methods of sharing content with recipients are worth investing in if you run a brand in the financial industry?
1. Company blog
Blogs linked to company websites are the most popular type of content marketing in Poland. The financial industry is no exception – most brands in the sector have their own blogs: from banks (e.g. mBank) to private financial or credit experts. What should you pay attention to when running such a blog?
Firstly: the content must be tailored to the real needs or problems of potential customers (solid research is key – analysing Facebook groups or using SEO analytical tools). Secondly – it is good to interweave difficult financial topics with case studies and stories of real customers. This makes it easier for readers to adapt difficult issues from the financial world to their own situation.
2. Sponsored articles
Apart from running a classic company blog, it is also worth investing in PR activities, i.e. publishing sponsored articles in trade media and popular financial portals. Thanks to this we can easily reach the right people who are actually interested in a given topic with our content.
Moreover, we do not have to worry about the positioning of the website on which the article will be posted. These popular portals are quite well positioned in Google and have a high reputation. Thanks to this, there is a good chance that our article will appear high in the search results for the chosen phrase. It therefore works for us even after several months of publication.
3. Podcast
When it comes to podcasts, there are two solutions – create your own podcast or guest appearances by experts working in your company in popular podcasts on finance. Podcasts are on the rise in Poland and more and more Poles are looking to them as a source of entertainment as well as knowledge.
The audience for financial podcasts is development and education oriented, so they can be a great base of potential customers for a brand. What topics should you cover in your podcast? Preferably everyday and ‘human’ ones. Podcasts related to home budget optimisation and mortgages are particularly popular. Here, as in the case of corporate blogs, dry facts should be intertwined with specific case studies.
4. Newsletter
Regular mailing to customers is a fantastic marketing tool that every brand operating in the financial industry in Poland should implement. Sharing interesting content with recipients is a great (and free!) way to increase website hits. A solid mailing base will be one of the most valuable target groups, as people who are genuinely interested in the offer or the knowledge provided sign up for the newsletter.
Through a newsletter you can share news and present new offers, novelties and promotions. It is also one of the best tools for distributing other types of content, such as blog articles or new videos on YouTube.
5. Video tutorials
Video content is the least common type of content in the financial industry in Poland. Its low popularity, however, is not due to ineffectiveness but rather to the scale of the project. Setting up your own YouTube channel requires a lot of work – from finding interesting topics to cover in the video, to developing scripts for the videos, to selecting people to appear on the channel.
Then there’s the financial outlay. It is usually difficult to organise the equipment yourself and it is better to use the help of specialists in video content and professional editing. What is more, the work does not end with the publication of the content itself. Videos need to be optimised, promoted in social media and the results analysed on an ongoing basis. However, we know from our own experience that the effects of video content may pay off quickly. Poles are more likely to watch a video tutorial than read a long blog post. It is worth taking advantage of this if there is such an opportunity.
What to keep in mind?
Knowing the tools for content marketing in Poland is only the first step. For there are several important elements of building a strategy for a brand in the financial industry that need to be remembered. Without them, even the most valuable knowledge may prove ineffective.
1. Compliance with Polish regulations
In Poland, the financial industry is regulated by strict laws. So if you run a foreign brand that plans to enter the Polish market, it is worth consulting experts beforehand. When implementing a marketing strategy, one should follow the guidelines of organisations whose task is to protect recipients from harmful practices by brands from the financial industry. They include, among others
– what information must be included in the marketing message,
– what to avoid,
– how to present the essential elements of an advertisement in a clear and visible way.
Such recommendations were issued by the Polish Financial Supervision Authority (KNF) and the Office of Competition and Consumer Protection (UOKiK). We have covered this topic in more detail in our article on how to legally advertise banking and financial services in Poland.
2. SEO and YML
This section is primarily about maintaining company blogs, as they are an integral part of the overall website. One of the most important elements of the blogging strategy is taking care of SEO. Thanks to proper search engine optimisation our articles (and consequently the whole website) rank high in Google and gain new readers for free. While this is relatively simple for most industries, the financial sector is a bit more serious.
A few years ago, Google introduced a new type of website ranking that applies to certain industries. It is called YMYL (Your Money Your Life) and refers to sites that could potentially affect the future happiness, health, financial stability or security of users. The list includes, among others, sites that provide advice on finance (investment, pensions, savings, tax, insurance, credit, etc.). The algorithm treats these sites much more harshly, and achieving credibility in Google’s eyes is somewhat more difficult.
So how do you take care of YMYL and improve the SEO of your company website? Here are some tips:
- Expert blog articles must not be published anonymously – all should be signed with the author’s name.
- The site should be translated into Polish and convenient to navigate.
- The site must not have hidden sub-pages, invisible to users.
- The page should include a footer with company details, contact information and an “about us” tab.
- A Google business card linked to the website should be supplemented with the necessary information.
- It is also worth ensuring an appropriate number of positive reviews in Google Moja Firma.
3. Changing complicated to simple
Complicated language and financial jargon is the number one sin of published content on financial topics in Poland. Most experts – especially those with a lot of seniority – tend to fall into the knowledge curse. This is the cognitive bent of believing that everyone has our level of knowledge, so we don’t need to explain the basics to them. The key to effective content marketing for the financial industry in Poland is to work against this mechanism. The simpler the language, the better. Remember that the reader of such a blog will often be people who have no idea about finance. It is worth helping them to understand the issue better – this way they will trust us as experts more quickly.
A big problem for foreign financial brands that are starting up on the Polish market is the direct translation of original articles (e.g. in English) into Polish. As a result, the texts are not only difficult to understand, but also completely unsuited to the needs and situation of the customers here. So what is the solution? A new content marketing strategy developed from A to Z by an agency that has experience in the Polish market.
Looking for a Polish PR agency that works with foreign brands in Poland? You have come to the right place! If you run a brand from the financial sector and are planning to enter the Polish market with your offer, there are many pitfalls you should watch out for. We will guide you through this journey safely and effectively. Contact us today!