How Credit Unions Can More Effectively Cross-Sell to Members

For financial institutions in particular, one of the major reasons why cross-selling efforts often fail is because organizations go about it in exactly the wrong way.

For credit unions, cross-selling needs to be a continuation of their efforts to offer a more personalized level of care and attention to detail to members that they cannot find anywhere else. The minute it becomes "just another sales tool" is the minute most people start to check out. To help prevent that from happening, your credit union needs to center its own efforts around a few basic ideas.

Drive Engagement Through Superior Cross-Selling Methods

Changing Perspectives on What It Means to Serve Members

For a moment, step back from the idea of cross-selling and think about how it has traditionally intersected with digital marketing. Obviously, channels like email are valuable because they're a direct, low-cost way of reaching existing members.

In the wrong hands, however, it can also be an incredibly efficient way to put someone off of what your credit union (CU) has to say. Your CU may have the best of intentions at heart--it's legitimately excited to tell people about a new service available to offer its members--but think about how members are used to receiving correspondence from financial institutions:

• Messages typically come in the form of an email blast that goes out to countless customers at once.
• The language is usually product-focused.
• It also tends to be cold and impersonal. Beyond putting someone's name at the top of a message, there isn't much in the way of customization from one email to the next.

Not only can people see this type of digital marketing coming from a mile away, but they've also gotten excellent at ignoring it altogether.

How Cross-Selling for Credit Unions Can Pave the Way

For more success, your credit union needs to shift its focus away from simply selling a product and more towards providing tangible, legitimate value to your members.

Rather than sending an email blast out to everyone, customize your CU's lists based on A) the products and services people are already using, and B) which ones are most relevant to whatever it is that you're trying to cross-sell.

Likewise, don't just use cross-selling techniques whenever your credit union launches something new. Consider using remarketing efforts to remind the members who have recently visited your website about the products you already offer. Let them know that based on their success with Product X, they might also be able to get some value out of Product Y or Product Z.

The same basic idea should permeate all of your CU's cross-selling efforts. Take digital marketing out of the conversation entirely. Don't try to sell someone on something they don't need just because it feels like that's what your credit union should be doing. Offer them something that they could legitimately find a use of or that will make their lives better in some way.

That's how your credit union can find greater success with regard to cross-selling and how your CU can start building a foundation of trust in general.

Overall, these are just a few of the many best practices that your credit union should keep firmly in mind as it tries to more effectively cross-sell and offer a deeper level of personalization to members. Check out or Cross-Selling eGuide which we hope will help your CU take all of these efforts to the next level. Click the button below to get started!