How US Financial Firms Should Approach Interacting With Consumers On Social Web Sites

Social strategy is all the rage today in financial services, but do customers actually want to engage with financial service firms via social Web sites like Facebook, MySpace, and Twitter? Forrester surveyed almost 4,000 US consumers and discovered that among those who use social Web sites, almost half are interested in engaging with financial service firms on those sites. How they want to engage is less clear, although receiving promotions and customer service topped the list. A key gauge of interest is the level of trust a customer has related to financial firms, as consumers who trust financial firms are almost twice as likely to be interested in engaging via social sites. eBusiness and channel strategy managers tasked with crafting a social strategy for their financial firm must understand how the firm's customers use social media and how they view and trust the firm and then play to their strengths when selecting social tactics.