The global financial services market size was expected to grow from $20.4 trillion in 2020 to $22.5 trillion in 2021 at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 9.9%. The financial services market is further expected to reach $28.5 trillion by 2025 at a CAGR of 6%. The growth is a result of companies rearranging their operations and recovering from the COVID-19 impact.
While these statistics may seem impressive, the presence of hundreds and thousands of financial services brands makes it extremely challenging for brands to reach their target audience effectively. This is where marketing avenues like TikTok come into the picture as they can help financial services brands market themselves more effectively, just like it helped these three financial services brands drive awareness and revenue.
1. UOB Singapore
UOB is one of Singapore’s largest multinational banks that was actively looking to level up its services.
Their Objectives
UOB wanted to promote and raise awareness for UOB Mighty (currently known as UOB TMRW), UOB's all-in-one banking app that facilitates easy peer-to-peer and bill payments via PayNow, be it via mobile number, users’ NRIC/FIN, or companies’ UEN. As with any new product, UOB sought to drive awareness and educate customers on its benefits.
Approach & Strategy
UOB launched the #UOBMightyHappyDance Branded Hashtag Challenge to drive awareness. Participants were encouraged to dance to the catchy branded tune, with the best five submissions eligible to win up to $1,000 in cash.
UOB also ran several ads on TikTok to ensure maximum visibility for the campaign. It ran Auction Ads with VideoViews to maximize video plays and capture viewers. To ensure that their ads would be the first thing users would see on their Feed, it ran TopView Ads, along with In-Feed Brand Premium ads, which showed their videos on the TikTok For-You page.
UOB didn’t stop after the first Hashtag Challenge. It ran a Hashtag Challenge Retargeting campaign, which enabled UOB to reach everyone who saw the #UOBMightyHappyDance challenge – but for a second time. This gave UOB a chance to re-engage these prior visitors and get them to click onto UOB’s site.
The Result
The TikTok campaign was a massive success for UOB as the TopView ads reached more than 517,000 people. The Hashtag Challenge also enjoyed a massive reach of 809,000. Moreover, there was 77% in clicks in the retargeting campaign. Also, the cost-per-click decreased by 2x, and the CTR rate improved by 30%.
2. Up
Up is a digital bank designed to help people feel empowered and in control of their finances.
Their Objective
Up wanted to launch a TikTok campaign to achieve broader reach through a TikTok creator partnership and Spark Ads. Up also wanted to drive messaging around its end-of-year campaign, "Up Year."
Approach & Solution
Up teamed up with @TashInvests, an Australian creator who is popular for sharing personal finance tips with the TikTok community. With #FinTok, #PersonalFinance and #MoneyTok currently trending, joining hands with Tash was a great way to tap existing trends for Up.
Up then leveraged Spark Ads to deliver this creator-led content to the common masses, and amplify the reach even further. Spark Ads are a native ad display format that helps businesses boost their organic posts or relevant content posted by other creators as In-Feed Ads or TopView ads in the For You feed among user-generated content.
The collaboration with Tash allowed Up to organically join the conversation on financial wellness, while Spark Ads allowed the content to travel further with supporting media spend.
The Result
The TikTok campaign performed exceptionally well for Up with over 1.5 million impressions and gaining end-of-year traction just in time for Christmas. The content was received positively with around 36,000 likes, and although this was an awareness campaign, it also directly resulted in 76 installations of the app.
3. OCBC NISP Bank
OCBC NISP Bank is an Indonesian publicly listed banking and financial services company headquartered in South Jakarta, Indonesia.
Their Objective
OCBC NISP Bank wanted to reach young Indonesians and educate them to be more mindful of their spending, while simultaneously driving awareness and engagement for its brand.
Approach & Solution
OCBC NISP Bank launched the #Save20 Hashtag Challenge to challenge Indonesian youths to save 20k rupiahs per day to ensure that its message would resonate and result in a higher brand recall.
OCBC NISP Bank gave participants a sneak peek at the result of having saved 20K rupiahs a day with the help of Branded Effects. By gesturing to one of three hand gestures, the Branded Effect would pop up and display one of three outcomes: a trip to Paris; a business opportunity that lands them on a “30 under 30” list; or an opportunity to buy a big-ticket item such as jewelry.
OCBC NISP Bank also collaborated with six popular Creators to amplify the campaign. These Creators set the tone to showcase just how creative participants can get with their video submissions. The resulting videos were used as the official creatives for OCBC NISP Bank to promote the Hashtag Challenge throughout TikTok.
The Result
The TikTok campaign turned out to be a major success for OCBC NISP Bank. The TikTok campaign helped OCBC NISP Bank's #Save20 campaign garner over 873 million video views from 943,000 videos submitted by 409,000 unique participants. It also enjoyed a large boost in ad recall of 11.1%.
Bottom Line
Despite being a relatively new platform, TikTok, with its plethora of unique features such as TopView Ads and Branded Hashtag Challenge, offers marketers an ideal marketing channel to reach out to their customers. Also, the presence of hundreds of local Creators gives companies the flexibility to get their brands promoted by known influencers within a reasonable budget. The marketing potential of TikTok is massive.
All that you need to tap onto it is some awesome content and a sound marketing strategy.