How Financial Content Marketing is Changing the Lead Generation Game

Demystifying Content Marketing for Financial Services Companies

Let’s talk about something that’s reshaping how financial services connect with their audience: content marketing.

It’s not just a buzzword—it’s a strategy that combines education, trust-building, and engagement to drive results.

If you’ve ever clicked on a finance article about saving for retirement or watched a video on estate planning, you’ve consumed financial content marketing.

But what exactly is a content strategy for a wealth management firm, search engine optimization, or financial thought leadership content and how does it help companies selling financial services? And how do you create finance content that actually appeals to high-net-worth individuals?

If you’re a financial services firm considering dipping your toe in the content marketing waters, this article breaks down what financial content is, why it’s important, and how your competitors use it for lead generation.

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What is Content Marketing in Financial Services?

Finance content marketing is about creating valuable, relevant content to inform and engage your target audience. It’s not just social media posts, although social networks are valuable tools for monitoring real-life events that align with major financial decisions.

Think of financial content marketing as storytelling with a purpose: to educate and guide rather than overtly sell. In the finance industry, this might look like blog posts explaining investment strategies, videos breaking down tax-protected investment vehicles, or infographics demystifying risk tolerance assessment.

For example, imagine a financial firm publishing a guide on “10 Ways to Save for Your Child’s College Education.” The goal isn’t just to sell 529 savings accounts—it’s typically to build trust and position a financial institution as a reliable source of knowledge. Financial content marketing assets can be distributed through websites, email newsletters, social media, or even paid promotions.

Why is Financial Content Marketing Important?

Let’s face it— one of the biggest challenges financial advisors face when it comes to getting new clients into their sales funnel is overcoming the prospect’s fear of loss. Most clients find the process of selecting a financial advisor to be a risky business proposition. If they pick a bad financial advisor and lose money, that could be worse than taking no action at all. So, clients tend to procrastinate picking a financial advisor, even if they are fiduciary.

That’s where financial content marketing comes in. By offering digestible, actionable information, financial institutions can break down barriers, fortify their sales pipeline, and build meaningful connections.

Helpful finance content – like this blog post – which I optimized to get found through searches for the phrase “financial content marketing,” was produced to connect me with clients like you since you demonstrated buyer intent with your search phrase. You may not be ready to book a meeting with me yet. But regardless of what stage of the buyer journey you’re in, I’m on your radar now as a potential marketer to outsource financial content marketing to.

Take wealth management, for example. Let’s say a recent study shows that mobile searches for “HENRY financial advisors” or “ UHNW financial planning” have skyrocketed by 70% in recent years. That means people in these target audiences are actively seeking answers to finance-related questions online. Financial content marketing is a way to get found by those queries and build your brand by providing trusted answers to buyer-oriented questions.

Who Benefits from Financial Content Marketing?

Here’s the beauty of financial content marketing: it works for a wide range of financial services.

• Banks and Credit Unions

Banks can use content to engage high-net-worth clients. For example, a blog post on “How Ultra High Net Worth Individuals Lower their Required Minimum Distributions” might be written to attract, inform, and connect with UHNW clients.

• Asset Management Firms

Market insights are a dime a dozen. What unique information does your financial services company provide that is not available through other channels? The best financial content marketing agencies look for pockets of information clients want that are not available through other sources.

What information about finance do clients want about financial services companies, and how can you provide it? Your financial content marketing agency could produce a report on the average telephone hold times at the larger brokerages during trading hours or the average length of time different banks sit on customer deposits before crediting them to their accounts.

The best financial content marketing companies can conduct quantitative research, analyze the data, design infographics, place articles, and produce whitepapers with buyer-oriented financial content marketing assets that get financial services firms noticed and generate new business leads.

Innovative and creative financial content marketing assets like these, based on primary research, can help these firms position themselves as thought leaders and attract high-net-worth clients.

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• Insurance Companies

An animated video explaining the differences between life, health, and disability insurance is probably not the type of thing that is going to move the needle. That’s what everybody is doing because it’s easy to produce and doesn’t require much creative thinking, or any new information. Finance content marketing needs information gain, or something to set it apart from all the other AI generated me too finance content out there.

The best financial content marketing uncovers new information that buyers can use to make decisions. Which underwriter denied the most claims last year, last month, or last quarter? That’s the type of scoop that attracts attention. What information is available to you that customers want but can’t get? That’s how you build an effective content strategy for financial services.

• Mortgage Lenders and Real Estate Agencies

Skip the first-time homebuyer’s guide and the loan calculators. They’ve been done already.

What types of games do mortgage brokers and lenders play with borrowers to jack up their fees, and how can customers see through them?

What sort of fine print do lenders smuggle into their loan docs that can really screw you if you’re not aware of them?

How do you get around junk fees?

If you want to attract high-net-worth individuals, give them the kind of information they need to make smart decisions. Tell them something they don’t know that no one else is willing to share. Anyone can spit out AI-generated informational content out of ChatGPT. That’s not how you build trust and get noticed.

• Fintechs

While explainer videos or interactive product demos are a good way for fintech startups to tell customers what they do, they are unlikely to get found by potential customers. Instead, create financial content about the problem your solution solves.

Coinbase has an intuitive platform for buying, selling, and managing cryptocurrency portfolios. For them, a video about the biggest crypto scams of all time and how they keep their customers safe is more likely to attract an audience than a product demo.

Fintech companies like Payoneer and Wise both claim to help businesses, freelancers, and online sellers send and receive payments globally. But which one is faster, cheaper, better, and why? That’s the type of content that generates leads.

• Financial Affiliate Marketers

Financial affiliate marketers use content marketing to attract and convert audiences by providing valuable, informative, and actionable content related to personal finance, investing, credit cards, and loans. They leverage blogs, comparison tools, calculators, and in-depth finance guides to engage readers and seamlessly integrate affiliate links to financial products and services. By building trust and authority through high-quality content, they drive traffic and conversions for financial brands.

Some of the biggest names in financial affiliate marketing include:

• NerdWallet: Offers detailed product comparisons, calculators, and advice on credit cards, loans, and personal finance.
• The Points Guy: Focuses on travel rewards and credit card optimization through expert reviews and finance tips.
• Bankrate: Combines editorial finance content with affiliate links for loans, savings accounts, and other financial tools.
• Credit Karma: Provides credit score tracking and financial product recommendations as part of its affiliate strategy.

These finance affiliate brands exemplify how effective content marketing can drive engagement and revenue in the competitive financial affiliate space.

What is a Financial Content Marketing Strategy?

The best financial content strategies start with understanding why a client is looking for a financial services provider. It’s no longer enough to know what they want a financial advisor. You need to know what kind of advisor they want.

Are they looking for a fiduciary? Do they need a family office? And they a high-earner-not-rich-yet who need to put their money to work? Are they value or growth investors? Financial content marketing targets potential clients at that level.

What are their wealth management pain points? What are their fears about investing? What questions are keeping them up at night? Effective financial content marketing strategies are designed to isolate and answer those sorts of finance questions, in a consultative style and tone.

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Fisher’s recent “How to Retire with $500,000” financial content marketing campaign was hugely successful. Even if you can’t actually retire for that amount, Fisher has the courage to dangle that promise to build their business. I personally know 2 people who hired Fisher as their fiduciary after seeing that ad and booking an appointment online.

So, financial content marketing strategy isn’t just about content creation. It’s about aligning that content with specific business goals. For example, if your goal is lead generation with retirees on a fixed income, you might create a downloadable eBook on “How to Generate Double Digital Returns with Little to No Risk.” High net worth investors are unlikely to respond to financial content marketing of that ilk, which is why you need a repeatedly finance content creation sequence.

Getting Started with Financial Content Marketing

1. Know Your Audience

Develop customer personas. Are you targeting young professionals saving for a house or retirees managing their wealth?

2. Audit Your Current Content

Look at what you already have. Is it performing well? If not, why? Which pages of your website get the most traffic and what are they about? And what’s working for your competitors in the finance industry?

3. Choose the Right Format

Not all finance content needs to be text. Consider videos, infographics, webinars, social media, online calculators, research reports, white papers, surveys, and live events based on your audience’s preferences.

4. Measure Results

Most finance content marketing agencies monitor website traffic, search rankings, downloads, or social media shares. But you can’t deposit “likes” or “comments” in the bank. Instead, look at actual sales. Are they going up? Does the content have anything to do with it? It takes time, but if your financial content marketing assets are work, you’ll know it.

Role of Landing Pages in Content Marketing

It’s not enough to attract and inform website visitors. Creating high-converting landing pages is a cornerstone of successful finance content marketing. Financial services marketers use these pages to capture leads, drive conversions, and guide potential clients through the customer journey.

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Platforms like Leadpages and HubSpot make this process seamless with user-friendly drag-and-drop builders, customizable templates, and integrations with email marketing and CRM tools. For more advanced features, Unbounce and Instapage offer robust A/B testing and analytics, helping marketers optimize every element of their campaigns. But keep in mind that you need enough traffic to draw statistically relevant conclusions from A/B tests. With less than 1000 visitors, it’s tough to draw meaningful insights.

Specifically tailored to the needs of the financial industry, platforms such as Marketo Engage and Pardot (by Salesforce) stand out for their ability to integrate with CRM systems, track compliance, and deliver personalized customer experiences. These tools enable financial marketers to create targeted landing pages that not only convert but also build trust in a competitive and highly regulated market.

This part of the fiance marketing process, while critical, is generally beyond the scope of a finance content marketing agency. Conversion rate optimization, or CRO, is a separate specialty. Financial content marketing leads the horse to water. CRO makes them drink.

Why Do Firms Bother with Financial Content Marketing?

We live in a world where customers have the power to screen out messages they aren’t interested in. And customers are increasingly less and less interested in being interrupted by marketing messages. We all get so many pitches daily that we’re numb to them.

Outbound marketing tactics like advertising and direct mail generate diminishing returns. TV is great for building brands, but it doesn’t generate leads. Content marketing is how you get found by clients searching for information. And when we’re searching, we demonstrate our intentions.

So financial content marketing isn’t just about driving traffic; it’s about getting found by potential customers and creating lasting relationships. Think of financial content as a way to:

• Build Trust: Offering enlightening finance advice is a way to build confidence in your brand.
• Stand Out: In a crowded marketplace, being the go-to informational resource can differentiate you, but only if your finance content is truly unique.
• Reach Younger Audiences: Millennials and Gen Z still rely more on digital content for information. But almost everyone else does too.
• Improve ROI: Educational finance content often costs less but delivers more in terms of leads and loyalty. Truly original, useful financial content marketing assets generate leads in perpetuity.

Real-Life Financial Content Marketing Applications

Let’s say you’re running a brokerage. A blog post about “End of the Year Trading Tips for Tax-Advataged Investments” released in Q1 could be a way to generate leads. That way, you’re not just promoting financial products—you’re playing a role in the customer journey.

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Takeaways

Content marketing in financial services isn’t about flashy ads or hard sells. It’s about meeting people where they are, addressing their needs, and proving that you’re a partner they can trust.

Whether it’s a white paper for institutional clients or a simple blog post for everyday consumers, every piece of finance content is a step toward building stronger connections.

So, what’s your next move? If you’re not using financial content marketing to grow your financial business, you’re leaving opportunities—and potential customers—on the table.

If you’d like to explore how to put financial content marketing to work for your firm, click here.