Marketing Compliance 101: Must Have Tools for Your Financial Firm

Marketers in financial and investment firms have some of the most stringent policies in place around their advertising practices. The teams that have access to the right tools and the most fluid processes are the ones that are able to keep up with the fast-paced, mobile consumer and stay ahead of the competition.

Here are four technology areas your financial and banking organization should be exploring to empower your marketing team and reduce compliance headaches:

1. Digital asset management software: Content management becomes more complex as financial organizations start to scale. Often, the amount of approval and oversight increases, making marketers’ jobs more complicated and time-consuming. Digital asset management (DAM) tools can save a ton of time and still ensure compliance for the organization. DAM tools provide marketers an organizational repository of approved content, which allows marketing teams to source images, copy, video, and more without having to go back to legal and internal teams for additional review. This will cut down the amount of time your marketing team will need to publish campaigns on a timely basis.
   
2. Marketing audits and approvals: As your marketing team builds out campaigns, how do you document approvals and ensure that your content meets brand guidelines and legal compliance? Approval workflow tools such as Kadince offer solutions to banks and credit unions that ensure your entire team is following a consistent approval process and that all of your revisions are documented. Documentation and change history are foundational during audits, so make sure your team is prepared at all times and has a single system of record to monitor your marketing and customer communication.
3. Compliant email tools: Most marketing organizations send a basic newsletter and customer communication email on an ongoing basis. Make sure your email tools allows you to BCC all of your external communication. Tools like HubSpot allow you to automatically have all of your emails sent to an internal system of record, where you’ll be able to track every single email that is sent for your organization.
4. Email privacy: In 2018, enormous legal and compliance rules were enacted for email marketing around how businesses can communicate to consumers. These consumer privacy laws continue to evolve today. GDPR and others regulations like it around the world are toughening up email communication rules for communicating with prospects and customers. Companies that don’t remain compliant with GDPR and other privacy laws can face hefty fines—and, worse, can hurt their reputation long-term across their industry. Google was one of the first to be hit with one of these fines, and this is just the start of many more infractions to be given out amongst violators.

Make sure your team has access to tools that stay up to date with the latest GDPR and email privacy standards. Some of the features needed to maintain compliance are:

1. Functionality to only email opted-in contacts and filter out contacts who haven’t given clear consent for email communication
2. Ability for your contacts to opt in to specific types of emails based on their preference
3. Ability for your contacts to see a clear audit of how they’ve been tracked on your website
4. Ability for you to track and audit your contacts’ history of when they opted in and opted out of receiving your emails

At the end of the day, your marketing team should feel confident that they understand the clear boundaries of what types of public-facing content can be published with and without additional legal approval. Your marketers shouldn’t be making legal compliance decisions on their own. With the right tools, processes, and clear policies in place, you can ensure your marketing team doesn’t feel like they are putting your entire company’s reputation and legal standing in jeopardy.