Let’s face it: most financial content puts readers to sleep.
Unfortunately, one of the adages about effective content is that it can never be boring. It must always provide readers with value.
Simply put, valuable content answers a question for a reader, fulfills a want or need, or solves a problem. And it does all that while it entertains, engages, and elicits emotion from that reader.
Companies struggling to create lively financial content can employ three strategies to generate increased interest. All the while, they can help to brand their businesses as authoritative and credible.
Make it personal
Readers respond to content that feels like it is relating directly to their wants and needs and attempting to solve their problems.
And that is especially true when it comes to writing financial content. Most adults are concerned with important issues such as saving for the future, paying for their kids’ education, and saving for retirement.
These are financial issues that will make an impact on their lives now and in the future. Companies that create content in this arena must appeal to their readers’ emotions.
One powerful way to do that is to paint a picture of a negative situation that could occur if they don’t take action. For example, a company could write an article titled, ‘Do you want to live with your kids when you’re 70 and ruin their financial future?’
The headline asks a question with a negative consequence. The body of that article would appeal to the emotion of adults with children. These adults know they should be saving money now to avoid becoming a burden to their kids in the future.
But that article is not just emotional – it is personal. It drives at the heart of a common worry that many parents have, and then, of course, it provides solutions.
That is why emotion is such a powerful tool in financial content writing. The content can begin by eliciting negative feelings, and then turn those feelings positive by offering solutions.
Use visuals
Another way to write engaging financial content is to remember that big blocks of text are a killer when it comes to keeping a reader’s interest. In the old days, newspapers were one vast block of paragraphs in black and white that seemed to go on forever.
But in the digital age, all content benefits from the use of attractive visuals, including pictures, graphs, and especially infographics. Infographics include images, charts, and illustrations. They are an effective alternative to text for explaining financial concepts.
Multiple studies have found that readers naturally gravitate to visual content. This is because 50 percent of brainpower is focused on visual processing, and 70 percent of a human’s sensory receptors are located in the eyes.
As a result, people make visual associations instantly, and they also tend to assign more credibility to text that is accompanied by visuals. Suppose that a financial company wanted to write a blog piece about the value of saving money.
Instead of using statistics about the benefits of saving, the company could post an infographic. This infographic could outline number of items that a single dollar could buy, including:
- A bottled water.
- A newspaper.
- A cup of premium roast coffee.
- A can of vegetables.
- A bottle of anti-bacterial hand sanitizer.
The idea is that saving even one dollar a day is important. By providing visual information to back up that idea, the post resonates in a way that is clear and easy to understand.
Target your audience
Financial content is not homogeneous, which means that different segments of the industry appeal to different types of audiences. So it is essential for companies that create financial content to properly target their audience. In doing so, they will understand that audience’s problems, wants, needs, and desires.
For example, a company that offers credit cards to people with low credit scores will target a different audience than a company that offers financial services to the wealthy. Both involve financial issues, but the content these companies create must appeal to the specific needs of the audience most likely to respond to what they are offering.
When companies properly target their audiences, the content they create is specific, actionable, and valuable. By that standard, the content will also be engaging because it responds to the issues that the audience finds most important in their lives.
Content is a powerful tool
When delivered in a way that is visual, personalized, and targeted, content can be a powerful tool in a financial company’s marketing arsenal. The key thing to remember is that every piece of content a company creates must solve a problem for a reader, fulfill a long-held desire, or answer a question that improves that reader’s life.
Content delivered under those standards will create increased engagement and help convert prospects into customers. To learn how Tempesta Media can help you create quality content, please contact us today.
