Three Keys to Keeping Your Finovate Momentum.
This year’s FinovateSpring conference, held in Santa Clara last week, was a great opportunity for some of the world’s most innovative fintech companies to make their grand debut or provide updates on their latest products and services.
Demoing at Finovate can be a valuable investment, helping an innovator grow in confidence, attract capital, acquire customers, pen strategic partnerships or simply build a platform for thought leadership in the financial technology community.
It’s important to keep that momentum rolling. Leveraging your seven minutes of Finovate fame to stay in the spotlight through a strategic, post-demo communications plan is the key to driving long-term business goals.
Here are our top tips for keeping the momentum and maximizing ROI post-Finovate:
Get your messaging right
Getting across not only how your product works but what your brand stands for and what business and/or social problems it solves is essential to a successful communications strategy and can be instrumental in securing investment. In fact, a number of the VCs we spoke to at the show said that failure to clearly articulate a value proposition was the most common criticism they had of demoing companies.
Even if you have invested the effort to evaluate your value proposition and composed tight copy to articulate your mission statement, you need to ensure that these core messages are reflected in all your communications: on your website, social media profiles, investor decks and media kits. Always be asking yourself “why” and not just “what.”
Share your experience
After a successful demo, it can be tempting to solely focus on deal flow and further product development at the expense of external communications. In these initial weeks after the event, make sure you are writing down reflections of the experience and sharing them with your followers on social media and your website.
Use keywords and phrases to attract the right demographics for your business, whether that be an audience of users, investors or both. The more content you are producing the better from an SEO perspective, which in turn leads to more website traffic and – hopefully – greater customer acquisition.
Beyond website ranking, the content you share is an opportunity to educate the world about your views, background, benefits and features of products or services and to reinforce that all –important central messaging.
Toot your own horn
While many entrepreneurs believe wholeheartedly in their business, product and its ability to solve its identified problem, too few will effectively articulate not only the benefits and features but the little (and large) successes along the way. In order to paint a picture of growth and upward trajectory, it is imperative to get the word out.
You don’t have to wait for a major announcement such as a merger or acquisition to make a public statement. A press release or blog post can be an appropriate way to highlight new customers, staff or strategic partners. This flow of content will allow you to project an image of growth and authority to prospective partners, investors and customers, as well as help you to attract and retain quality staff who want to be associated with a growing company. It can also shorten your sales cycle, thereby helping to bring in more revenue. Putting together concise case studies to demonstrate your accomplishments can also be a helpful tool in this regard.
Finally, even with all the focus on social media and the “technology” part of fintech, don’t forget to include traditional media in your “toot your horn” strategy as media outlets are still significant gatekeepers to your target audience. While you may have existing contacts in the press, it is best to get professional advice when devising and executing a media strategy to ensure your messaging is expertly woven into the current news cycle.
If you’re reviewing your marketing approach please contact us today to learn more about how our team can help you further your public relations, content marketing and digital marketing initiatives.