The more we write about machine learning, predictive analytics, and other components of today’s fintech, the more we’re struck by what’s possible. Michele Graham, our Sr. Director of Strategy and financial content expert, weighs in on this evolving landscape.
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Can you afford that MINI Cooper? I don’t know. Consult your personal budgeting app.
Is Cisco (CSCO) a buy, sell, or hold? Well, let’s see. There are hundreds of trading platforms that use predictive algorithms to weigh in…and they’re getting better and better, every day.
What’s 30 Rockefeller Center worth, if you sell it? Great question. We know of an emerging real estate valuation platform that delivers an accurate price in minutes, vs. weeks.
As financial copywriters for apps (for traditional and alternative investments) and platforms (for wealth advisors, institutional trading, middle- and back-office support), we’ve been fascinated with the leapfrogging possibilities within this fast-growing realm.
And we’ve been learning, too. After all, it’s our job to explain the mystifying, without dumbing it down.
To do this, you need to understand the foundations of finance, and of business—particularly for b2b copywriting. You need a grasp of the jargon particular to what you’re writing about. And finally, you need to get how to walk that line between taking a thrilling leap of faith—and pleasing the compliance folks and coloring inside the boldface lines.
Let’s talk about that last thing.
If you work in fintech, you inherently understand risk-reward ratios. You know that the highest returns don’t come from playing it totally safe.
For a long time, I worked with a design agency in Fairfield County, a hotbed for hedge funds. When it came to branding, launching firms would ask for a bold image, as long as it was blue. It could be navy, sky, or Carolina—but it had to be blue. We would show them a dozen competitors—all with blue logos—and pose the question: how do you plan to stand out if your image blends in?
The same goes for your copy and content. Whether it’s a website, blog posts, white papers, presentations or advertorials, if you work with a writing partner that can take your ideas and add verbal punch and crystal clarity, you’re steps ahead of differentiating yourself in a hyper competitive field.
Copywriting for fintech keeps us on our toes. It’s a good thing that we not only love to write, we love to read—our inboxes fill with news feeds on trending topics, and our tablets light up with articles from the New York Times to Forbes. After years of doing research to inform our clients’ content, we know which sources can be trusted for facts and figures and which are dubious. Interestingly, we’ve become whizzes at reading stock charts. And with a journalists’ soul, we know the questions to ask—how to probe and delve—so that we get at the essence of an investment strategy, asset class or budding technology.
In the past year alone, we’ve risen to the challenge of writing website copy for alternative investments, wealth managers and wealth management platforms, and technology that incorporates AI and machine learning to generate valuations. We’ve brainstormed taglines that capture the core of these burgeoning products and firms. At the other end of the spectrum, we’ve gone deep in blogs and white papers on topics as varied as 1031 exchanges, blockchain, and investments in oil & gas, medical marijuana, lithium, and cobalt.
Here’s a few lessons we’ve learned along the way:
Be fearless
Some writers nod their head in agreement and then walk away not truly understanding what a client has described to them. We’re not afraid to ask questions until we are absolutely certain that we have the information we need to write crisp engines of strategy.
Be resourceful
We’ve got lots of arrows in our quiver. Both before and after our client content strategy sessions, we search the internet for what’s happening in the landscape from a macro and micro perspective. We pull together threads of insight from fintech projects we’ve written, and we assign the writing team with the most relevant experience. When a client has a deadline or launch staring at them, now is not the time to start the learning curve.
Be bold
The websites that generate traffic that convert to leads, the blog posts that get read and support SEO, the white papers that make your thought leadership stand out and create a sales funnel, they’re all built on copy and content that can be enjoyed. We’ve become masters at taking highly technical (and let’s be honest, in lesser hands, dry) material and giving it personality, humanity, and a boldness that commands attention.
Be clear
Not everyone who reads your fintech content is going to be Marc Andreessen, Sallie Krawcheck, or Larry Fink. The important point is you don’t know who is going to read it but you want to make damn sure that whomever the readers are, they totally get your premise and your points of differentiation without wading through miles of copy. Quick in, quick out translates to quick results.
Fintech is a wild, ever-evolving, uber-competitive world. It’s not for the faint of heart nor for the weak with words. When you invest in content to support your organization, you expect to see results. Get in touch with us today to secure an experienced financial copywriter for your next project.
