Four Segmentation Models for Increased Sales, Deeper Relationships and Stronger Retention
Personalization is a marketing imperative. But it is virtually impossible without segmentation, or the grouping of members/customers with shared characteristics. Successful segmentation allows an institution’s understanding of members/customers to shine through marketing. It lets members/customers feel special and appreciated and is one of the primary retention drivers. Did you know 56% of consumers feel an increased loyalty to brands who understand and act on their personal preferences, priorities and differences?
Defining Segmentation Models
It can be confusing finding segmentation models that apply to financial institutions. Unlike the retail world, a returned product does not present an opportunity to delight the consumer. A closed checking or savings account could indicate that household will not be interested in future products and services. Financial institutions require more focused segmentation models.
When defining segmentation models, financial institutions need to consider opportunity and risk factors, the ability to cross-sell and the likelihood of account closure or balance diminishment. When you take into consideration the vast amount of data available to financial institutions, segmentation can deliver a deep understanding of your members/customers. The following segmentation models enable financial institutions to create winning campaigns founded on personalization. The right message is delivered to the right household at the right time.
Segmentation Model 1: Value Scoring
Value Scoring is an analytical approach that leverages information such as profitability, balances, tenure and product mix to help identify members/customers that drive value. Value Scoring allows you to rank households based on the value they bring to your institution, then compares and contrasts households based on profit, balances, tenure and number of unique products.
This is extremely helpful since losing one major household requires adding eight new average households to make up for the loss. By determining your most valuable members/customers, you can use the Value Score to guide your marketing strategies and nurture those top relationships.
Segmentation Model 2: Lifestage
To determine Lifestage, this model leverages demographic ingredients to provide further visibility into the member/customer based on their financial lifestage. After all, a college student has different needs than new parents. This model gives you the data you need to create campaigns targeted at members within various lifestages and their propensities for having a baby, taking a vacation or paying for a wedding. It enables greater insight on buying activities and behavior. This, in turn, helps craft solid member/customer profiles to inform and influence marketing campaigns.
Segmentation Model 3: Look-alike
Look-alike segmentation learns from those who engage, and finds those who fit a similar profile as the performers. Once you have your customer/member profile, you can evaluate it to find those who fit a similar pattern. For instance, Mary is a 40-year-old mid-income, married female with two children. One is 16. She recently took out an auto loan and each year she establishes a vacation savings fund. Kay is also a 40-year-old mid-income, married female with two children. But she doesn’t have an auto or personal loan. As Mary’s look-alike, offering her an auto or personal loan makes more sense than a credit card offer.
Profiling consumers based on a household’s relationship, lifestage and demographic data allows you to define target audiences based on those attributes and group them together. Then, your team can create offers that the group has a propensity for and potentially bump them into a higher value group.
Segmentation Model 4: Next Product
This is where art meets science, leveraging many of the aspects of the other segmentation models and is best used for point-of-sale channels. Purchasing patterns exist. What’s a hamburger without fries? Pizza without antacid? Analyze your data to determine who buys a specific product, then determine which products they are likely to buy next. For instance, an auto loan can be easily tied to opening a checking or savings account to expedite monthly loan payments.
Go forth and segment.
Once the data is gathered, it’s time to put it in action. For over 30 years, Marquis has helped financial institutions across the country create winning marketing campaigns with measurable ROIs. We focus on adapting proven marketing strategies to the specialized needs of banks and credit unions and have developed a three-step process for leveraging marketing segmentation.
Assemble: Leverage available data sources to identify which variables best select your target audience.
Analyze: Group data sources into segments to simplify your tactical options.
Act: Leverage automation and repeatable processes to act on the segments identified, creating more granular options based on member/customer personalization, including channel preference, product preference, tailored offers and much more.
Putting it all together.
Financial institutions have access to large quantities of data, and that data needs to be segmented, analyzed and used to create intuitive and relevant marketing messages. When segmented properly, it will elevate overall marketing results, allowing you to retain and upsell your members/customers while maintaining their loyalty.
You’ve got the data. You’ve got the strategy. Let Marquis help you put it into action!