Assets increased by over 100 million! Review of how a bank managed 20,000 private domain customers with 5 people in 5 months

In recent years, more and more companies have paid attention to the concept of "private domain operation". So for different industries, how should the concept of private domain operation be combined and put into practice to help companies find new growth points? In this article, the author shares some practical cases of private domain operation in banks. Let's take a look.

Since 2019, with the rise of the concept of private domain, more and more companies have begun to pay attention to private domain traffic; in this process, as the cost of Internet channels continues to rise, banks have also begun to pay attention to private domain traffic, because of their verified concepts and practiced cases and results, more and more banks have begun to recognize the formulation of this strategy.

With the continuous changes in the financial market, diversification of user needs, digital development trends and increasing competitive pressure, banks need to seek new growth points and profit models. Private domain traffic is a new way of growth; and the construction and development of private domains has gradually become an important part of banks' digital transformation.

In the past six months, I have been working on a WeChat community pilot project for a provincial branch of a state-owned bank. After about five months, we have mobilized five financial managers to operate a total of 20,000 WeChat private domain long-tail customers, and the bank's assets have increased by more than 100 million compared to before WeChat was added. The provincial branch leaders have strongly recognized this project, and the entire bank has subsequently launched operations.

Next, I will share with you how this project is implemented and operated in the actual process:

1. WeChat platform selection

In terms of the user acceptance channel, this project did not choose corporate WeChat, but used personal WeChat. In addition to some process restrictions of the bank itself, in fact, for projects to enhance assets, personal WeChat also has its advantages.

One of the inherent advantages is that individual micro-accounts can use the circle of friends to interact better with customers; for example, in addition to WeChat one-on-one and community customer operations, we can do some interactive games and activities in the circle of friends, let customers like and comment on us, and reward customers according to the rules of the activity.

In this process, by guiding the customer to view the content of the Moments, he can deepen his impression of the account manager. If the content of the Moments activities we set is related to the product, the customer will have a greater knowledge and understanding of the product. For some customers with needs, there will be one more exposure, which will increase the conversion rate of the product.

In fact, bank products are very similar and highly homogenized, so from the customer's perspective, for the same product, they will of course choose a more convenient way with a better service experience.

When a customer sees a product through an event on WeChat Moments, he can consult his account manager directly if he is interested, which increases communication between him and the account manager. Psychologically, this is easier for users to accept than direct advertising, and it also saves users the trouble of understanding and consulting.

Of course, corporate WeChat can also post to Moments, but it can only be posted three times a day, and customers’ Moments cannot be viewed. This means that corporate WeChat is doomed to be worse than personal WeChat in terms of Moments interactions, and it is impossible to interact with customers.

2. Target Group Positioning

Because the ultimate goal of the project is to increase customers' assets within the bank, a certain amount of screening was done at the front end to select which group of customers to use as the customer base for the pilot operation.

At least, users like students whose assets remain zero after opening a card are definitely not the most suitable customer group. It is more appropriate to use such customers to activate users and open a credit card.

So when screening customers, if you want to increase their assets, they must be from a bank that had high assets in the past or currently has certain assets, such as assets over 50,000, or previous assets over 100,000. Of course, what I'm talking about is just a range, it doesn't mean it won't work if it's lower or higher, you just need to screen for similar assets within this range.

Because the customers within this range have a certain amount of savings or spare money that can be used for investment and financial management, so when it comes to subsequent asset conversion, at least you don’t have to worry about them not having money. As long as the product is suitable, the service is in place, and they have enough trust in you, there are most chances of making sales.

3. User Acquisition Strategy

In terms of attracting new customers, we did not choose online channels or large-scale promotion to attract new customers. Instead, we used a very traditional method of outbound calls to reach customers point-to-point.

On the one hand, the conversion rate of outbound calls is relatively high. At the same time, it can deepen the understanding of customer needs, because the customer's WeChat account will be added only after the customer's consent. Therefore, in fact, as long as a customer can be added, it means that he has certain needs or has products he wants to know about; even if he just wants to claim the instant discount for bringing in new customers, the account manager will have a chance to reach out to the customer.

On the other hand, as mentioned earlier, the customer base targeted by the project has been screened to a certain extent, so outbound calls can be used to accurately locate the target group for attracting new customers; at the same time, because it is an early pilot project, it does not rely on online channels such as official WeChat accounts, mobile banking, etc.

In terms of new customer acquisition benefits, banks cannot directly issue red envelopes due to their special nature, so they adopt the form of instant discounts. In fact, basically all banks currently use the form of issuing instant discounts when attracting new customers in private domains.

Of course, outbound calls also have their disadvantages, such as a large time investment and slow new customer acquisition. Therefore, I usually advise banks to think clearly about the current goals before starting a project. If the purpose is to increase assets and there is not much manpower, the customer source of the outbound channel is definitely the easiest to convert.

If the purpose is to activate dormant customers and open cards through users in the activity circle, then I think it would be more appropriate to use some large-scale promotional activities in the early stage and use online channels to promote it and increase the volume first.

4. User Group Stratification

There are 20,000 customers and 5 people operating them. On average, each customer needs to operate about 4,000 customers. If all customers are operated in a unified manner, it is obviously not in line with the core purpose of the project.

At the same time, the ultimate goal of the project is to increase customer assets. The needs of each customer are different, or the profile of each customer is different, so the account manager's entry point to reach the customer also needs to be adjusted according to the customer's attributes.

As mentioned earlier, individuals can use WeChat Moments to conduct marketing activities and increase interactions with customers. However, what was not mentioned before is that, in fact, the content of the Moments that the account manager subsequently posts should also be matched and sent according to the customer tags.

For example, content related to financial investment can be sent only to people with higher assets, and content related to stable financial management can be sent only to payroll customers.

In fact, in terms of reaching the event, the activity types we designed are also sent to match the user's tag audience, which can also increase the participation in the event.

In addition to classification on labels, certain markings can also be made on the customer's notes. After all, each account manager has thousands of users to operate and manage. When sending a group message or looking for a certain user, it may not be possible to find it in time relying solely on labels. Moreover, through the customer's notes, the account manager can further make in-depth portrait classifications for the user and clearly understand more customer information.

5. Event Marketing Design

The premise of asset enhancement is interaction with customers. Only when there is enough stickiness between the account manager and the customer will there be a possibility of conversion. The most appropriate form of increasing stickiness is to achieve it through activities.

I have previously written an article specifically about how banks design activities, "Financial retail private domain transformation, how to develop a standardized community activity operation system." Logically speaking, there is not much difference, except that this time the activities are targeted at friends circles and one-on-one individuals.

In the design of the event format, because it is to increase the frequency of contact between account managers and customers, the event process must be designed with rules for contacting customers, such as asking customers to comment, answer questions, sign up, like, etc. At the same time, after the customer wins the prize, the customer must take the initiative to communicate with the account manager, so that there is one more opportunity for contact in the middle. In this way, each customer can actually reach out to the prize about twice on average in each event.

At the same time, in order to increase product exposure and conversion, the activity content design can be coordinated with mobile banking products. For example, we can use a certain bank product to plan an activity. For example, taking answering questions, let customers look for answers through posters or on mobile banking. In this process, while customers are looking for answers, they will have a deeper understanding of the product and have an additional opportunity for product exposure.

For some high-potential and highly active customers, we can give them individual one-on-one reminders after we post an activity on the social network or WeChat Moments. This will allow them to feel that we are truly providing services to them. Once the customer experience improves, subsequent conversions will be much easier, and the participation rate in the activity can also be increased.

6. Customer conversion path design

What we have discussed before is how to improve customer stickiness and increase contact with customers. In addition to this, we also design corresponding customer conversion paths based on the attributes of different customer groups.

For example, taking a certain customer group, from the initial outbound call to the customer, adding WeChat bait, the first ice-breaking talk to the final cycle customer transfer stage, each link will have corresponding content design and time intervals.

For example, if a customer adds WeChat in order to learn about a promotional product in mobile banking, then the account manager, in addition to issuing new customer benefits when contacting the customer for the first time, must also send the customer the promotional product he wants to know about in the form of a clear poster, and inform him of the promotion rules, product interest rates, etc.

The second contact is designed with further content based on the customer’s response from the first time, such as whether they have had any experience, how they felt after the experience, whether they have any related questions, etc. Here we can determine whether the user is really interested in learning more.

If the customer is interested, he will actively continue the conversation with you. You can take the opportunity to explain the product information to him and recommend the best purchasing plan for the product.

For the third and fourth subsequent contacts, if the customer has not converted in the first two communications, you can further contact and communicate with the customer by recommending other products.

In short, we use four contact cycles as one stage to carry out the customer conversion path for one customer group. The practical cycle is one month, and the interval time between each contact can be allocated according to the actual situation.

On this basis, we designed conversion path SOPs for about five types of customers and provided them to account managers for reference. In the actual process, account managers adjusted the wording of each contact based on the specific needs of the customers and pushed to them accurately the content that the customers wanted.

7. Community User Operation

In fact, in the first four months or so, we did not set up any groups. We were all doing friend circles and point-to-point customer operations. Considering the needs of some subsequent activities and batch management of users, we started to build the community.

From this aspect, we can also see that if private domain operations need to be scaled up, later community operations must be implemented. The energy of an account manager is limited, so for some mid- and low-end customer groups, operations can be carried out through batch management.

In addition, there is actually a disadvantage in using WeChat Moments to organize activities, which is that there is no guarantee that there will be enough people participating in the activities. After all, it is impossible to ask account managers to frequently post on WeChat Moments to encourage customers to participate. However, if it is in a community, this problem can be solved.

The group owner can let more customers see the event by issuing an announcement, and if it is some important links and content, you can also post it several times in the group. In addition, when doing activities in the community, you can also cooperate with some water armies and warm-up links to enhance the overall atmosphere of the event.

Regarding the marketing logic of the entire community operation, I have shared many related articles before. If you are interested, you can read the previous article on the community operation system of the official account. I will not elaborate on it here.

The above are some of the links and key points in the strategy and logic of the entire project in external user marketing. Of course, in addition to external marketing, if you want a project to be effective, it also has a lot to do with the members of the project team.

The previous plans and strategies may have sorted out how to conduct user marketing, but if you want to implement all these links in place, internal personnel management is also a very important key.

Therefore, in terms of project management, we have also set up a complete set of promotion plans for account managers, such as project management mechanisms, reward and punishment plans, project incentives, indicator performance appraisals, process meeting reviews, etc. Considering that some content may be sensitive and due to length issues, I will not continue sharing it here. If there is an opportunity in the future, you can share it separately or call me on WeChat to communicate.

From a general perspective, the main purpose of banks doing private domain operations is to increase user stickiness, improve user experience, enhance brand influence, increase user engagement, and promote financial knowledge. Through WeChat's close contact and communication with customers, banks can interact with users, understand their needs and pain points, improve user experience and engagement, increase user loyalty and activity, and thus promote the development of banking business.

In addition, from a branding perspective, private domain operations can also expand the bank’s brand influence, increase users’ awareness and favorability of the bank’s brand, and promote business growth.

Ultimately, banks’ private domain operations can achieve a win-win situation between banks and users and enhance banks’ core competitiveness and sustainable development capabilities.

Author: Liu Zhixing, WeChat public account: LZX's study notes