Marketing Strategies for Generating More Commercial Lending Leads

You know business lending is a profitable endeavor, but how can smaller financial institutions compete against megabanks and non-traditional online lenders? The good news is that digital marketing and technology create new opportunities for smaller banks and credit unions to attract and engage small business owners. You also have an existing pool of leads among your business deposit account holders.

This article will walk you through the steps of creating a traditional and digital marketing strategy for generating more commercial lending leads. As an industry leader with years of experience working with community banks and credit unions, BankBound understands the unique challenges your financial institution faces, and we have cutting-edge solutions to help you succeed.

Local Search Engine Optimization (SEO)

As a community bank or credit union, you don’t need to attract a worldwide audience to your site. Instead, you want to increase business lending leads on a local level. Local search engine optimization (SEO) is an ideal strategy for banks and credit unions because it optimizes your site for commercial clients in your area who need the financial products and services you offer. From listing your branch locations and hours, to mentioning the names of nearby towns and cities in page copy, local SEO will help you rank higher in organic search results for commercial lending options in the region you serve. Take these first steps to create and optimize individual business lending pages on your financial institution’s website.

• Each of the commercial loan products you offer – such as construction loans, commercial fleet financing, mortgages, vehicle loans, and more – should have its own page on your website. This way, you can build highly-optimized pages with keyword-rich content that will yield better rankings in the search results. Greater visibility for each of these pages leads to more traffic on your site, which in turn yields higher conversions on these product pages.
• Fill those pages with unique content that is keyword-rich and region-specific. If you are located within a specific service area or market, be sure to include references to this region throughout the copy.
• Include clear calls-to-action on every page so potential customers will be motivated to contact your lending team.
• Include customer testimonials (or consider adding them) to the bottoms and/or sidebars of product pages. In the present “Yelp era,” testimonials and online reviews hold a lot of sway over consumers’ decisions to patronize a particular business or bank. According to research, 85% of consumers trust online reviews as much as recommendations from a friend or relative.
• You should already have individual pages for each of your branch locations. Make sure that location pages are optimized with unique content, accurate contact information, hours and images.
• If you have dedicated loan officers at any or all of your branch locations, mention their names and profiles on the corresponding location page. This can help build a sense of trust and helps humanize your business.

SEO isn’t just about generating more traffic to your website. It’s about implementing strategies that will allow you to reach a highly-qualified audience when they’re searching for a solution to their needs. Taking these important first steps will optimize your site to attract and generate commercial lending leads, setting you up to close the deal once business owners land on your product pages.