The Art of Standing Out in Financial Service Marketing

Jim Marous (00:11):

Hello, and welcome to Banking Transformed, the top podcast in retail banking. I'm your host, Jim Marous, owner and CEO of the Digital Bank Report and co-publisher of The Financial Brand.

Jim Marous (00:22):

In an industry where products and services seem almost indistinguishable, financial institutions must differentiate themselves and create meaningful connections with their audience based on value. From leveraging cutting edge marketing strategies to creating unique brand narratives, banks and credit unions must create engagement by providing value every day.

Jim Marous (00:44):

On today's episode of Banking Transformed, we'll explore the challenges and opportunities facing financial marketers with Eric Fulwiler, a great friend who is also the co-founder and CEO of the marketing consultancy, Rival.

Jim Marous (00:58):

Whether you're a seasoned marketing services professional or a marketing enthusiast, curious about this dynamic field, this episode promises to deliver valuable insights and actionable strategies.

Jim Marous (01:12):

Eric Fulwiler was a presenter at this year's Financial Brand forum where he shared insights from numerous discussions he's had with disruptive brands across dozens of industries. His session was one of the highest rated sessions at our event, and he’s already been invited back to the 2025 version of The Financial Brand forum.

Jim Marous (01:31):

So, Eric, welcome back first to the Banking Transformed Podcast. It seems like a long time ago that we worked together in The Financial Brand forum in Vegas, but it wasn't that long.

Jim Marous (01:43):

Before we start, can you share a little bit about yourself as well as your agency for those who may not be familiar?

Eric Fulwiler (01:50):

Sure. So, first of all, thank you so much for having me, Jim. It's always a pleasure when we get a chance to catch up and then like we always joke, sometimes there happens to be a microphone recording it, but I'm really looking forward to this and sharing my experience and some builds on that from the forum.

Eric Fulwiler (02:06):

So, for me, so I am co-founder and CEO of a marketing kind of consultancy agency hybrid called Rival. Our focus is on businesses that want to grow in categories that are being disrupted and want to learn from challenger brands in their category, but also other categories to understand how to develop and deploy marketing that helps them kind of punch above their weight, deliver outsize impact.

Eric Fulwiler (02:31):

So, a lot of what we do is kind of studying and understanding, and this is of course what I talked about at the forum. Studying and understanding what is it about successful challenger brands that they're doing differently on the marketing side, and then packaging that up into strategy and execution with our clients to help them grow.

Eric Fulwiler (02:48):

So, we are boutique, we're about 25 people between Boston and here in London in the UK. And actually, we're building out a base in Cape Town now as well. And then previous to this, and Jim of course where we crossed paths, originally, I was CMO of 11:FS, so kind of a fintech venture builder based out of London, but did a lot of work globally.

Eric Fulwiler (03:08):

So, this world is very relevant to me, and I always love these conversations about innovation, disruption, the changing category in banking, credit unions, financial services overall. So, that's a bit about me.

Jim Marous (03:21):

Yeah. So, as I mentioned, you were at The Financial Brand forum, and this was the first time you had been at the event. What were some of your takeaways, not just from the discussions you had, but even the presentation that you did and the preparation you did for that presentation.

Jim Marous (03:37):

Because as I said, it was very highly regarded, but I think a lot of it had to do with what you do as a business, which is really talking to challenger organizations, talking to marketers about how they can get better based on what you've seen in the marketplace. So, what were some of your takeaways from the event?

Eric Fulwiler (03:56):

So, first of all, it's hard to have me actually enjoy a conference in Vegas, both because Vegas is very much not my vibe, and then also just how long the flight is from London, the jet lag and all that. I really enjoyed it.

Eric Fulwiler (04:07):

So, I think first of all, kudos to you and the team at the forum and Financial Brand for putting on what I think was a great event. So, I'm really happy and excited to be back next year and to have been a small part of what I think was a very successful event this year.

Eric Fulwiler (04:22):

I think it's interesting. It's great to hear the feedback that the session was highly rated. I think I almost had a bit of an advantage though, because the session was ... and let me take a step back. So, our business as Rival is consultancy agency. So, marketing services, and we've also built a little bit of technology as well. But really that's kind of our business. It's not that complicated in terms of a business model.

Jim Marous (04:47):

However, I believe, and of course we talked about this a little bit at the forum, both in my session and the one that we did together, Jim. I believe that modern marketing is as much about thinking and acting like a media company as it is a traditional marketer.

Eric Fulwiler (05:01):

And the biggest distinction there is a media company – and this goes back to the time that I spent at forbes.com way back in the day. A media company's business model is focused on attention. How do you attract, retain people's attention and then of course monetize it.

Eric Fulwiler (05:18):

And when we think about marketing, most traditional marketing is focused on just the basic definition of marketing, which for me is how do you tell a story that changes perception and behavior to drive growth of a business. But actually, the scare system, most valuable commodity and the thing that you need before you can even tell somebody a story is of course their attention.

Eric Fulwiler (05:38):

And so, what we're doing at Rival, and one of the things that I will always push and preach for what modern marketing needs to look like is Viren who's actually shadowing this call right now, our executive producer. He's essentially, CEO of Rival Media. We are building a mini media company about what we stand for in the market, which is what are successful challenger brands doing? Challenger marketing.

Jim Marous (06:03):

Actually, practicing what you preach, which is kind of-

Eric Fulwiler (06:06):

A hundred percent.

Jim Marous (06:07):

Kind of interesting. As I know, I talk about these things really well, but I have to deploy them on a regular basis through my writing, through my speaking, through my podcast and all the other things. There's times where you go — as a parent would say, do as I say, not as I do because I don't always execute the way I'd like to.

Eric Fulwiler (06:27):

But also, you are a media company. There's of course The Financial Brand, but you, Jim Marous, you are a media company.

Eric Fulwiler (06:33):

And so, for us, we are trying to compete with other media companies that put out marketing content, put on marketing events or trying to build marketing communities. But actually, that's a means to an end of collecting through valuable content people's attention, CMOs attention so that we can build a relationship and awareness with them. And our main business model is actually our consulting and advertising.

Eric Fulwiler (07:00):

But all that to say, we do a ton of content and events, studying, understanding, spending time with challenger brands across every category. Everything from core banking technology to shoes, to healthcare, to consumer-packaged goods, whatever it is, all around the world.

Eric Fulwiler (07:20):

And so, it's one of those things where it's so funny because I'm like, I would do this for fun. I would sit down with the hundred CMOs that I've interviewed for our flagship podcast. I do that for fun and yet I actually believe it's the thing that will help us grow our business in the long term.

Eric Fulwiler (07:37):

So, anyway, all that to say, the advantage I think I had speaking at the forum is my presentation was about what are the 10 biggest lessons that I've learned from interviewing over a hundred CMOs across all these categories and across all these markets.

Eric Fulwiler (07:53):

Distilling that down into 10, what were hopefully pretty practical lessons of what should marketers in the audience of The Financial Brand forum do differently to apply these principles and practices.

Eric Fulwiler (08:05):

And so, this will certainly be part of what I talk about when we discuss what should people listening do differently? What is the thing to do from these learnings about challenger brands? My thing was just different, differentiation is so key.

Eric Fulwiler (08:20):

So, I think that that helped it stand out a little bit. But in terms of my takeaways, I mean, I'd probably start there. One of the biggest ones for me is I think people really should step out of the box of their category to find inspiration and ideas from other categories.

Eric Fulwiler (08:40):

So, me being able to talk about what's happening in the disruption of the world of consumer-packaged goods and what that means for a regional credit union in Iowa. I think that that's really interesting.

Eric Fulwiler (08:50):

So, I think one takeaway is people there, that audience and probably the audience listening, spend a little bit of time outside your category, finding ideas and inspiration.

Eric Fulwiler (09:03):

I think the other one for me is ... I think sometimes, trying to put this the right way, banking can get a bad rap in the world of marketing. It's boring, it's outdated, you can't do anything interesting regulation, of course, all that stuff. The people that I met there were just as hungry, ambitious, inspired, and inspiring to me as the clients we work with at Reebok and Unilever and Activision.

Eric Fulwiler (09:31):

So, I think the talent in this world and the aspiration to do great marketing work is just as much in this world as it is any others.

Eric Fulwiler (09:42):

And then probably the last one that I'd throw out there is, I know this is a topic near and dear to your heart, innovation. How do we make that a practical thing? How do we actually do that differently as opposed to just talk about it on stage? That's something I'm so fascinated by, particularly when it comes to culture.

Eric Fulwiler (10:02):

Because I think at the end of the day, that is really what allows you to, or restricts you from innovating as a business, and yet it's so hard to take it down from the 10,000-foot cliche slide in a keynote presentation to, well, what do I actually do differently over the next 90 days? And I think that's something that I really enjoyed talking to you about when we did our session together on the first day or whatever it was.

Jim Marous (10:26):

Yeah, it's interesting because as you said, what I've always loved about the forum, and obviously I'm biased, but the energy there is infectious. Obviously, you get a bunch of marketers together probably from any industry, and the personalities just meld really cool. And they get very energized and very aspirational and what they want to do. And they come out of these kind of meetings just going full board. They're really excited about what they can do.

Jim Marous (10:54):

But in banking, we have challenges. Status quo invariably tends to win despite if it should win or not. In that, change is really hard to handle. And more so in banking than anything else.

Jim Marous (11:10):

I get it back to the day you're hired in the banking world. I mean, part of what you do in banking is being told, okay, here's what we do, here's how we've done in the past, now go do your rotations, see how these different departments work and get to know how we do things. So, from the very beginning, they say, we tend to stay where we are.

Jim Marous (11:30):

In the banking world, it shows the products are the same, the way we market are the same, the same words in commercials. If you took the words away from the commercial or the brand away from the commercials, you'd be hard pressed to know what brand it was.

Jim Marous (11:44):

These are big, huge challenges in the marketplace. But when you look at standing apart, you mentioned it, getting detention. Getting detention is different than getting a good experience. People now, because of technology and all the focus on experiences, it's unlikely you're going to have an organization that stays in business very long if the experience sucks.

Jim Marous (12:09):

On the other hand, engagement is intention. How do you get that engagement? How do you take that challenger mindset to get more attention, but more importantly get more engagement, get more, pushes on the phone that say, I want to go to your site.

Jim Marous (12:27):

How do you do that in banking? I mean, how do you recommend your clients do that in banking? When you look at the fact that, we all tend to be the same, we all tend to feel the same, but we're all looking to say, how do I make it so my current customers or my prospects click on my button rather than Fintech challenger?

Eric Fulwiler (12:49):

There's so many things I could talk about. I think the place that I would start and probably, I always try to think about people might listen to however long this conversation's going to be, 30, 40 minutes. What are the one or two things that I think are really going to matter most that I would love to stick in people's minds and even better have them do something different with. And I think one of them is the importance of differentiation.

Eric Fulwiler (13:15):

And I don't know how to stress that enough. Probably the number one-

Jim Marous (13:18):

I'm sorry, just a second Eric, do you mean on the global brand basis or differentiation on the personal basis or both?

Eric Fulwiler (13:26):

I mean on the brand and marketing side. How you show up in a brand, the communication that you deliver to the market. Now, that could be advertising, but that also could be the user experience when they get to your product, when they get to your site. It's the whole thing.

Jim Marous (13:41):

One of the things I think about all the time is we sit here on our side of the fence as “marketers,” as “product people.” There's no distinction to the customer, it's just the experience. They don't think about brand, they don't think about product. They think about X company and that bank that I use or might consider using.

Eric Fulwiler (13:59):

And so, I think differentiation can stretch across all of it. But I think that there is a infection of sameness in many categories, but particularly banking where ... and I've heard this from bankers, from marketers at banks and credit unions, and I get it.

Eric Fulwiler (14:21):

And probably one of the other most common conversations that I had at the forum or since, or just with marketers in this world, is even if they agree with a lot of the stuff I'm saying. Even if they want to take one of the lessons from this disruptive CPG company and apply it to theirs, they can't necessarily get people internally to think and act different.

Eric Fulwiler (14:42):

The number of times I've had the conversation of like, well, I work for a third-generation family-owned X, Y, Z, how do I actually get them to think different? And I call that the work around the work. How do you actually stretch people's perspective, educate them, let them give you a little pilot opportunity to prove that this is a way that could drive different results for you. And that's a whole different conversation.

Eric Fulwiler (15:08):

But coming back to your question, the point of difference, the number one thing that I think challenger brands are doing to drive mindshare and awareness and engagement in their categories, is their messaging is focused not on what they do, not the benefits of their product, but why it's different.

Eric Fulwiler (15:27):

It's like the jobs to be done methodology, the innovator's dilemma. People don't want a six-inch drill bit; they want a six-inch hole in the wall. What's the solution that your brand stands for and what's the convention that it's challenging within the category?

Eric Fulwiler (15:42):

So, that is a huge one for me, is you got to push the envelope, you got to raise the bar on what makes you different and how you communicate that to the market.

Jim Marous (15:52):

So, what stands in the way of that? I mean, we hear that you got Gary Vaynerchuk's new book came out, Day Trading Attention, and everybody is saying what we need to do. But obviously, we see in the marketplace, we see other brands do it. What gets in the way in the banking world?

Eric Fulwiler (16:14):

I think a lot of the culture, but also the process around developing marketing and deploying marketing is not focused on differentiation. It's focused on relevance at best. What's the need that the audience has and how do I communicate that my product does it, instead of what's the need the audience has. How do I communicate why my product does it differently from the competition?

Eric Fulwiler (16:44):

Another thing that I like to throw out is I think a good gut check for, are you differentiated enough? Is if you took your logo off of your advertising, could it be one of your competitors? And I think for most people listening in this world, regional banks, community banks, even tier ones for that matter, the answer's no. And so, that doesn't mean that it's not working or it's not effective, but it means that there's room for improvement.

Jim Marous (17:09):

Well, and it's interesting because this discussion is not new, but we tend to get in our own way too often where we end up falling into the trap of focusing on the product rather than the consumer. As you mentioned, what the consumer's looking for as opposed to the product we want to sell.

Jim Marous (17:31):

We sometimes fall into the trap of rate or whatever else. And it’s interesting, because a bank in the states, PNC Bank, recently came out with an ad campaign that's based on the concept of brilliantly boring.

Jim Marous (17:47):

And I laughed because I said that institution does that to a tee, but it definitely stands out from a branding perspective, maybe not in the way that a market would necessarily like it to, but it says, you're going to get stability here, you're going to get trust, you're going to get the focus on getting it right. And all those elements are a way to at least stand out in a customer's mind that wants to go there.

Jim Marous (18:13):

But at the other hand, you got fintech companies, they're saying very different things. They're saying, we're going to find the right solution to you. We're going to treat you as an individual. We have the solution that's customized to your needs. How much can a traditional financial institution break it down that much so that they actually are differentiating at the level of one?

Eric Fulwiler (18:40):

It's a really interesting question. First of all, I haven't seen that campaign, but I absolutely love it because on the one hand, like you said, that's so different from what one of their competitors would do. Like it stands out.

Eric Fulwiler (18:55):

But on the other hand, another kind of core principle that we talk about in terms of what challenger brands are doing successfully is authenticity. They're viewing themself from the perspective of the customer, not how they wish they were.

Eric Fulwiler (19:09):

When we do all — we work across category, but of course we do a lot in financial services and fintech. And there is always the dynamic and the tension. If we're working with a fintech startup or if we're working with an established incumbent between trust and innovation.

Eric Fulwiler (19:26):

In the world of money and wealth and financial services, you ideally want to be able to convey both trust. You can trust me with your money, but innovation I am the better, faster, cheaper, more valuable option than what's out there.

Eric Fulwiler (19:40):

And typically, if you're an established business, you've got the trust. If you are a challenger business, a fintech, you've got the innovation, but you need to establish the trust.

Eric Fulwiler (19:50):

So, I think understanding where you fit on that spectrum and what you need to shore up, but making sure that you're not stretching beyond what is an authentic story. Because if your brand is disconnected, if the message that you put in the market is not the experience that people have when they come to your products, when they come to your business, people will reject that. And that's almost worse than having the wrong message in the market.

Jim Marous (20:13):

What's interesting also is that you have technology in the marketplace, not just technology as far as how you can deploy things, but even in the channels that can be deployed. What are some of the trends you're seeing in financial services when it comes to all the technology that marketers have at their disposal from a standpoint of being able to drill down the audience of one, but also more importantly, the technology with regard to the channels that are available to use.

Jim Marous (20:43):

We don't see many organizations doing direct mail right now. There's a lot of other channels out there, but it's a blend. What do you see?

Eric Fulwiler (20:51):

It's interesting, probably the two most common conversations I had in and around the forum were the one that I mentioned before of, I'm in this kind of old school traditional bank that doesn't want to evolve. How do I get them to understand?

Eric Fulwiler (21:05):

And the other one was, my simplification of it, how do I stay on top of all the change. There is so much changing in the world of marketing technology, in the world of media.

Eric Fulwiler (21:18):

We're doing a lot of research now on culture and how culture is becoming fragmented. And it's no longer mass macro culture that shapes perception and behavior. It's all these microcultures, many of which are popping up online on TikTok and Reddit. How do you stay on top of all of that as a brand?

Eric Fulwiler (21:35):

The other thing that I'd throw into this conversation is we're doing some research now in the future of the CMO role. So, I'm sure everybody in marketing has seen all the headlines about the CMO is the lowest tenured executive in the c-suite. Companies without CMOs, kind of this …

Eric Fulwiler (21:54):

And so, basically, we're interviewing, a whole set of people from the CMO MasterCard and P&G, all the way down to founders, VCs, investors, et cetera. The research isn't done yet, it's going to be coming out in the fall. But kind of the three biggest things that we're seeing that the future CMO needs to be able to do to, not just retain their role, but make sure that marketing has the right impact on the organization, is speak the language of the board.

Eric Fulwiler (22:29):

So, not marketing for the sake of marketing, it's why does this matter to the chairperson, to the CEO, to the investor? Being able to tie marketing to actual business results, not always short term, sometimes long term, but metrics, commercials.

Eric Fulwiler (22:45):

And the third is data and technology. So, while I am a strong believer in it's about the fundamentals. For all the distraction that AI, new technology, new media, microculture, all this stuff gives you, all of that is just a means to an end of delivering the fundamentals of what has always been the case since marketing started, of how you change human perception and behavior.

Eric Fulwiler (23:12):

Even with that, data and technology is going to transform what the modern marketing function needs to look like and what the modern CMO needs to be able to understand. But I would say that with a lowercase 'u', the more important thing is the talent base that they need to be able to assemble around them.

Eric Fulwiler (23:31):

So, first of all, I would say … Jim, I actually, I haven't told you this, I took away a very specific action from your talk when you went right before me at the forum.

Eric Fulwiler (23:41):

You gave your spiel that I think I had heard before, but it really resonated with me about how you kind of looked around, 15 years ago, whatever it was, and you were like, “Oh man, I need to reinvent myself, otherwise this industry is going to pass me by.” And I actually took that away and sat down and said, how do I need to reinvent myself even at my stage of the career, because change is constant.

Eric Fulwiler (24:03):

And to me that was, I believe all the conversations about AI fit now into the bucket of we're overestimating what's going to happen in a year and underestimating what's going to happen in 10.

Eric Fulwiler (24:14):

However, that is the piece that I need to reinvent myself into. And so, I'm just going to get started getting started. I'm just going to go spend more time learning this stuff, talking to people that are doing it, et cetera. So, I think you need to throw yourself in there.

Eric Fulwiler (24:26):

But the other thing I would say, the other part of this is if you are a marketing leader, if you are more than an individual contributor, you need to look at the talent of the team around you and that you're building, whether that's internal or external partners, and make sure that the data and technology side of that is shoring up. Because that is not just the competitive advantage of a modern marketing function, it is a massive weakness if you don't have it.

Jim Marous (24:53):

That's so interesting and I appreciate the shout out to me on what I did. And basically, it gets down to you have to continually educate yourself and these podcasts do it for me. I've mentioned this many times that the podcasts are probably the biggest learning experience I have on an ongoing basis.

Jim Marous (25:10):

But also, the whole generative AI situation has changed everything. Because I'm asking questions of generative AI, multiple platforms of generative AI every single day about something I see to dig deeper.

Jim Marous (25:25):

Now, I have to sort out what I think is right or wrong and all that, but the reality is the ability to have high intensity learning has never been more available in a really good sense. Where you even have attributions where you say, okay, you've said this, but from what did you get this from? And they're doing much better at giving you real attributions.

Jim Marous (25:49):

But on an ongoing basis, a marketer can say, this is my company, this is what we do, this is our brand, these are our customers, how do I make bank marketing better? And it's got to be a little bit more deep than that. But generative AI can give you some really good thoughts to look at.

Jim Marous (26:08):

You can at least structure your conversation, which is crazy when you think about it because Google never really did that. But generative AI has a way to say, “I'm going to throw something your way. I'm going to have an interview with Eric Fulwiler around differentiation and challenge your mindset. What should I ask him?” And generative AI comes back with some ideas on questions.

Jim Marous (26:33):

You always get away from that. But the reality is to have writer's block or thinking block anymore, there's no excuse for it. But you have tools to get you off stuck.

Jim Marous (26:44):

When you look at the technology also, when you see what's going on out there, you mentioned the internal versus external. I think the power of the external partner has never been greater because no financial institution, doesn't matter what size can get all the talent that's needed to do marketing effectively, I don't think anymore.

Eric Fulwiler (27:03):

Yeah, yeah. I agree. And actually, on that, I would say, part of why we're more consultancy than agency is, I actually think that marketing should be as much as possible an internal function as opposed to outsource because it needs to be about innovation. It needs to be about research and development, understanding the customer making the business overall more customer centric, and you don't want to outsource that.

Eric Fulwiler (27:24):

However, for expertise reasons for financial constraints, for flexibility, there's so many reasons why probably most businesses do need external partners. But my first position is, I think it should be inhouse-

Jim Marous (27:38):

Yeah, exactly. As you said, the ability to get down to the latest technologies is something that you probably aren't going to have internally, but why you're going to use them. What strategies are going to drive those technologies are pretty important.

Eric Fulwiler (27:54):

Jim, if you don't mind, I'd love to just say one more thing about the AI topic because I think this is so top of mind, probably the dominant theme. This and how do I do more with less are probably the things that we hear about the most.

Eric Fulwiler (28:07):

And I absolutely believe in kind of your approach, what I said, I'm trying to make my approach of, you just got to throw yourself in there. You just got to start learning it. If it's something that makes you uncomfortable, if it's something that you're pushing against and saying, oh, I wish this wasn't here because I was good at the stuff that the way that it worked, you got to put yourself out there.

Eric Fulwiler (28:26):

However, where we are with AI and where I think the hype has exceeded the reality and where the danger is in terms of spending money and time on it right now, is I think that AI, particularly generative AI, is raising the floor, it's not raising the ceiling.

Eric Fulwiler (28:45):

So, you can use it to get a baseline of what should I talk about on this podcast? What should I know about this audience? But it is not going to deliver differentiated great, exceptional insights. Those still need to come from humans.

Eric Fulwiler (28:58):

So, don't use it as a crutch, use it as a step. But then you need to take the leap on top of that. And I think that's where a lot of people are getting caught is they're trying to have it replace the human side of it. And actually, I think it just needs to elevate. It's not less human, it's just more of what you can do with that baseline.

Eric Fulwiler (29:17):

And the other thing I'll throw out there, that I've been thinking about, and we've been thinking about more recently that I think frames this up well, is if it is about differentiation, if everybody's pulling from the same set of data.

Eric Fulwiler (29:29):

And I don't think it's a stretch to say that most of what gets created on the internet is probably average or below. You're pulling from the same average pool of insight and information as everybody else is. So, again, use it, but it is the floor, not the ceiling.

Jim Marous (29:46):

Yeah. So, you've gotten around quite a bit. You've done some round tables even since The Financial Brand forum with marketing executives. What are some financial brands that you think have successfully differentiated themselves or have raised your eyebrows as far as going, okay, they're getting something here.

Eric Fulwiler (30:06):

It's interesting. I will say I've been living here in the UK for eight years now and spent a good amount of time in the US for work and also my family's still in Boston. I don't know the US landscape as well as I know the UK landscape and European landscape. So, I might lean on that a little bit more, if that's okay, but I think the principles still apply.

Eric Fulwiler (30:25):

I always go back by bread-and-butter example, even though it's a little bit outdated now, is Monzo over here in the UK that's kind of had their struggles trying to break into the US but you can go check them out.

Eric Fulwiler (30:34):

And what I would encourage people to check out, and maybe we can even link to this in the show notes. There was a blog post that the ex-CEO put out a little while ago about how they thought about marketing in the early days.

Eric Fulwiler (30:49):

And Monzo, for people who aren't familiar, kind of one of the early challenger banks now, kind of a success story here in the UK. And really, they didn't — when I joined 11:FS I'll tell this anecdote because I think this will help frame it up for people.

Eric Fulwiler (31:03):

So many people in the fintech marketing world here in London would say, including people that I knew who were the early marketers at Monzo, Revolut, Starling, et cetera, they'd say, "Oh, well we don't do marketing." And really what they meant is they don't do advertising. But they did exceptional marketing.

Eric Fulwiler (31:22):

They worked very closely with the product team to understand what is it that people are looking for? How do we deliver that to them? They ran community events. They came up with a card that was pink, which at the time blew people's mind, because everything else was just the sea of sameness.

Eric Fulwiler (31:39):

That now seems outdated, but I think that approach of how do you use marketing to bridge the gap between the value of your product and the needs that exist in the market and identifying that white space, that will always be true.

Eric Fulwiler (31:54):

Another one over here, just as a quick one, I'm so fascinated by companies that activate at events, and I promise I'm not thinking about Financial Brand forum here, just in general. When I walk through so many of these conference expos, sea of sameness has never been more applicable to these booths that a lot of these companies are paying six, if not seven figures for.

Eric Fulwiler (32:18):

And there's a brand over here, I think they're a card issuer business out of Helsinki actually called Enfuce. And I think they've done a great job of standing out at events. They do kind of go big with it, but they also … they're Finnish.

Eric Fulwiler (32:33):

So, they have a sauna in their booth. They do branded cocktails. They do a little happy hour type thing. They're just doing things a little bit differently. They are the brand at these events that people talk about as opposed to just blending in to the background. One more-

Jim Marous (32:50):

Well, it's interesting too, when you talk about content companies, Ali Paterson, at Fintech Finance, he's doing haircuts at his booth.

Eric Fulwiler (32:59):

Yeah, I was on that. It was a great haircut. It was like a $300 haircut. I was like, “I'm never going to get this again.”

Jim Marous (33:05):

I got a great conversation to boot. It was like the best of both worlds. I did the same thing at Money20/20 in Amsterdam last year, but it's interesting because it's different. It stands out, it gets the attention, it makes people realize that that brand's there.

Eric Fulwiler (33:21):

Yeah. And I think the bigger risk is being ignored, not being wrong. And again, here's the thing, and I'm sure people listening to this have had this thought, and every time I talk to the world of financial services, but particularly banking and especially regional banking, credit unions, it's like, well that works for a startup shoe company, that maybe even works for a fintech, but we need to be — we've got all these regulations we got to deal with. My company doesn't want to take risks, et cetera.

Eric Fulwiler (33:52):

It does not have to be a big disruptive flip the table of the industry over type thing. It can be as simple as, instead of interviewing people at a conference, interview them while you're giving them a haircut, that's not running a foul of any regulatory thing.

Eric Fulwiler (34:10):

So, again, I go back to that point of ... and I think you do sometimes need to be careful of not doing things differently just to do things differently. But maybe start there and then work backwards. Because again, I think the bigger risk is just blending in as opposed to standing out.

[Music Playing]

Jim Marous (34:25):

So, let's take a short break here and recognize these sponsors of this podcast.

Jim Marous (34:32):

Welcome back. I'm joined today by Eric Fulwiler, the co-founder and CEO of the marketing consultancy, Rival. We've been discussing how banks, credit unions and fintech firms must challenge their current mindset and actually build differentiation in their industry.

Jim Marous (34:49):

So, Eric, you get back to this because we've been all over the place around the differentiation and we've talked about how organizations can do that. But what are some of the common mistakes financial institutions or financial marketers make, and how can they avoid them?

Eric Fulwiler (35:06):

I mean, the biggest one for me, but I think that we've already squeezed all the juice out of this orange, is focusing on relevance as opposed to differentiation. So, I’ll talk about something else.

Eric Fulwiler (35:19):

I think the other risk and mistake is doing things the same way, because that's how you've always done them. I think it's fascinating to think about this term marketing debt. Tech debt, everybody understands. Over time you just build layer on layer of what is essentially an outdated technology. And at some point, you got to figure out how to rip and replace and it puts you at a disadvantage.

Eric Fulwiler (35:42):

It's the same thing with marketing. If every year you are just setting your media plans as an example, based on what you did the year before that marketing debt is building up in your organization as well.

Eric Fulwiler (35:54):

And actually, this term challenger brand, and I probably should have done this at the beginning, the definition of it, I think a lot of people assume is, well, it's a startup. It's a early business that's going to take risks. It's a disruptor. To me, the definition is, are you deploying marketing that is fit for purpose for the world of today?

Eric Fulwiler (36:17):

Because the gap between what you did 10 years ago and are still doing just because you build layer on, layer on marketing debt over those last 10 years versus what you would do differently if you started from scratch right now, that's the gap that a competitor or a challenger has an opportunity to close on you.

Eric Fulwiler (36:36):

And so, I think more practically, if I was CMO of a bank, really any business, I would think about at least once a year, if not once a quarter, let's do an exercise. If we were starting this business over from scratch, relaunching this brand, what would we do differently in terms of how we show up in the world, what the story is, where we deploy our media, how we structure our team.

Eric Fulwiler (36:59):

Go through that whole exercise and then figure out what's realistic to do differently. But I think you need to step back and view your category, your business, your audience from the perspective of a challenger so that you have an opportunity to challenge yourself as opposed to somebody else doing it to you.

Jim Marous (37:18):

So, I've asked you about financial institutions that you think are doing it right. How about a brand that everybody knows. A Big brand, one that's been out there for a while, so they have some legacy marketing debt they've had in the past.

Jim Marous (37:31):

What organizations that you look around globally that you go, you know what, they continue to excite me by what they're doing or the way they're evolving or maybe the way they're innovating. Give me an example.

Eric Fulwiler (37:47):

So, Jim, you're part of our CMO group on WhatsApp, which is about 300, very engaged, very passionate senior marketers, founders.

Jim Marous (37:58):

30 conversations. Yes.

Eric Fulwiler (38:00):

Yeah. It's really amazing. It's taken on a life of its own. And by the way, I will say just in case it's valuable for people, I think the term community building gets thrown around a lot in the world of marketing. I think we've got a very active community. It's small but mighty I would say, but we're much more focused on quality than quantity.

Eric Fulwiler (38:16):

And I think the biggest mistake people make with community building is that they view it as their brand trying to bring the value to people as opposed to creating a platform where people can get value from each other.

Eric Fulwiler (38:30):

Most of the conversations in our community are not from anybody at Rival. We've created a platform for other marketers around the world to connect and discuss challenger marketing and they get value from that.

Eric Fulwiler (38:41):

So, anyway, that is an aside. But you're very aware of the kind of inside joke or meme within our community about Crocs. And I think, and this is kind of the root of the conversation and the debate, let's say in the group. I think Crocs is an example of a fantastic challenger brand and even like a 2.0 challenger brand because-

Jim Marous (39:04):

Yeah, they've done it a second time.

Eric Fulwiler (39:06):

Not only a second time, but they've gone from being — this is all arguably and up for interpretation, but cool. 25 years ago, Mario Batali, early 2000s, et cetera, to being very uncool to now being – especially if you ask someone under 25, very cool again. I think that's amazing, and I've got a pair on my shelf here because I think they belong in the challenger brand Hall of Fame, and they've done it.

Eric Fulwiler (39:34):

I was talking about microcultures before. They've done it by mapping understanding and tapping into not, the macro culture of fashion, music, art, et cetera, but the microculture, the small pockets of people that are influencing small groups of individuals and they've embedded themself within those conversations.

Jim Marous (39:52):

Yeah. Well, I've never owned a set of crocs in my life, but thanks to your discussion group, Nigel sent me a pair of Crocs with some branded things to put on the Crocs. And so, it has taken on a life of its own.

Jim Marous (40:09):

So, when you look at the future of financial marketing, we're not going to go too deep into the future, not 10 years. But when you look at right today, the future of marketing, what do you see that's going to evolve the most over the next few years?

Eric Fulwiler (40:23):

So, you mentioned Gary Vaynerchuk before. I didn't say it on this podcast, but if anybody's come across myself before you know I spent seven years working for him directly and kind of building VaynerMedia in the early days. And one of the things that he always said-

Jim Marous (40:36):

By the way, he was our very first interview for this podcast.

Eric Fulwiler (40:38):

Oh, really? He was my very first interview on my podcast as well. I don't think we've ever talked about that. We should do one of the three of us at some point.

Jim Marous (40:46):

It was like I captured him at The Financial Brand forum when he spoke at The Financial Brand forum, and as you know, he was more than nice enough to give of his time. But, yeah, it was great, great interview and great engagement.

Eric Fulwiler (40:58):

Yeah, yeah, for sure. But he's had the biggest influence on me professionally for sure. And one of the things that he always said that I love and will steal here is he said, “It's much more about reacting faster, smarter to the present than predicting the future.”

Eric Fulwiler (41:14):

So, whenever anybody asks me, what does the next five years, what does the next 10 years, what does the future look like? That's always where I go. Is actually, I think, it's more about rejecting that question, being like, where are we right now? And where can I close the gaps?

Eric Fulwiler (41:27):

But to answer the question, I would go back to what I said about this research we're doing about the future of the CMO. I think marketing, regardless of the category, but certainly even though, the disruption, let's say is maybe a little bit slower to take effect in the world of maybe many of the people listening the regional level, the community bank level, et cetera, is certainly coming.

Eric Fulwiler (41:51):

And so, skating to where the puck is going of being either a CMO or a marketing function that speaks the language of the board, that understands and delivers commercial results and that leverages data and technology. They'll play out in different ways, but those are the three pillars for me.

Jim Marous (42:10):

If a financial marketer today is going to do one thing differently or one thing period, what do they need to do? In other words, where do I start?

Eric Fulwiler (42:22):

Sit down and look at the marketing that's in the world right now, that you're doing, the last 12 months, the next three months, whatever. Take a piece of it, and ask yourself, if I took my logo off of this piece of communication, could it be one of my competitors? And then have a session with your team to figure out how you close that gap.

Jim Marous (42:41):

A great comment-

Eric Fulwiler (42:42):

Differentiation for sure.

Jim Marous (42:44):

And I'm going to add in there, learn from those that are learning it on your behalf and I'll mention your company. How do people reach out to you or find out more about what you're doing, because you're one of the places I go to on a regular basis to find out what's going on even beyond financial services, but what's going on in marketing, because we all have to look at that and we have to keep on learning between podcasts and webinars and books and everything else.

Jim Marous (43:14):

But I will add to the fact that going to a company like you, to a person like you, to the amount of content that you're spitting out right now, that can help everybody get better. How do people find out more about Rival?

[Music Playing]

Eric Fulwiler (43:30):

I'm pretty easy to find online. The company is, wearerival.com. So, you can find out everything about us as well as our content hub and a link to the Amp, CMO community, if you're interested in joining. We've actually had a few new members from The Financial Brand forum audience since the conference, which was great.

Eric Fulwiler (43:47):

And then for me, best place to find me is on LinkedIn, or you could email me directly [email protected].

Jim Marous (43:55):

Eric, it's always a pleasure to get together with you. As you said, sometimes we have without the microphone, sometimes we have the microphone, but it's always a learning experience. Really appreciate your time today.

Eric Fulwiler (44:05):

Thanks so much, Jim.

Jim Marous (44:08):

Thanks for listening to Banking Transformed, the winner of three international awards for podcast excellence. If you enjoy what we're doing, please be sure to give Banking Transformed a positive review.

Jim Marous (44:19):

Finally, be sure to catch my recent articles on The Financial Brand and check out the research we're doing for the Digital Banking Report.

Jim Marous (44:26):

This been a production of Evergreen Podcasts. A special thank you to our senior producer, Leah Haslage, audio engineer, Chris Fafalios and video producer, Will Pritts.

Jim Marous (44:36):

I'm your host, Jim Marous. Until next time remember, in a marketplace filled with indistinguishable brands, it's time to set yourself and your organization apart and challenge the status quo.