Beyond Words: Elevating Financial Websites with Ghost

Watch Beyond Words: Elevating Financial Websites with Ghost

Ghost participated in the Canadian Advisor Tech Expo in June 2024. Watch the recorded session with Ghost Founder, Jimmy Furlano.

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Summary

1. According to a Broadridge report, banks and advisors are taking notice and that Video is the number one area where advisors are increasing their marketing spend to differentiate themselves, bring in more leads, and boost client retention.
2. 20% of advisors are driving 80% of the innovation in video adoption and creation. These are the innovators, the early adopters and the changemakers. With Ghost, advisors see up to 73% engagement rates in their videos, and an almost 2x increase in leads per month
3. People aren’t READING websites anymore. They’re WATCHING Them!
4. Top 3 barriers holding back advisors: Lack of Know-how, advisors think video is resource intensive and technical challenges
5. With Ghost you can:
   • Evolve and humanize your online visitor experience, putting you and your team at the heart of your online messaging.
   • Differentiate yourself from cookie-cutter competition websites with little feeling and lots of words and pictures. 
   • Better educate buyers on the breadth of services offered and your client experience.
   • Optimize to meet the next generation of clients and investors in a format they very much prefer, video.

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Transcript

Intro

‍“Hi, I’m Jimmy Furlano, one of the founders at Ghost. I’m excited to be here today to show you what we’ve been up to over the past few years building out the Ghost Video Player.

Ghost is the product of thousands of meetings, demos, and pilots with advisors just like you. Our features and product roadmap are the direct result of thousands of pieces of individual feedback from marketing teams and advisors.. 

Now…The fact that you’re here already, spending your valuable time… learning about how to leverage new technologies and better your business means we’re gonna get along just fine :) 

Today, we’ll show you how the top advisors in the country are harnessing the power of video to educate potential buyers, build their trust, and win more business.. all through the power of video. 

A picture is worth a thousand words

“A wise man once said… that A picture is worth a thousand words. And I think we can all agree that this is true…. But if a picture is worth a thousand words… then ………what’s a video worth? 

A video is with 1.8 million

Well.. 1.8 million to be exact. 

Sometimes… words just aren’t enough. The title of this presentation is beyond words - and we’re diving deeper into how videos convey complex ideas, emotions, and narratives that words alone struggle to express. 

We are living in the video era.

We're living in the video era, where FaceTiming with our parents, grandparents, and kids is the norm. We're Zoom calling for work, TikToking for fun, and FaceTiming our friends just to say hi – video is at the heart of how we connect, work, and play today.

The Shift To Video-First

So….. how can we translate this shift to video-first into how we can better market to and communicate with customers. 

95% of a message is retained by viewers when it's delivered through video, compared to just 10% when reading text? That's a huge difference! Imagine your clients actually remembering your message because they watched a video of you instead of just skimming through pages of text and picture of you from college ;).

91% of people want to see more online videos from businesses in 2024. Your current and future  customers are craving video content. Their expectations of how and where you need to show up are growing. 

These aren't just numbers; they're a clear signal that incorporating video into your strategy can help you stand out in a sea of the same, connect deeper with your audience, and win more business. 

Financial Advisors #1 Channel to Invest In Is Video

I attended a Broadridge seminar a cpl months ago on Advisor Marketing Trends - they highlighted the benefits of investing in marketing and some of the key trends they’re seeing in the Advisor landscape. Importantly, we heard here that banks and advisors are taking notice and that Video is the number one area where advisors are increasing their marketing spend to differentiate themselves, bring in more leads, and boost client retention.”

Early Innings

So where do we stand? Well…..We’re still in the early innings of video adoption in the financial advisory space. And Right now, we're seeing a clear divide between the Innovators & Early Adopters and others still sitting on the sidelines. 

There’s a clear 80/20 rule at play here – 20% of advisors are driving 80% of the innovation in video adoption and creation. These are the innovators, the early adopters and the changemakers. No surprise then… that This small percentage of forward-thinkers is achieving remarkable results on Ghost, including up to 73% engagement rates in their videos, and an almost 2x increase in leads per month…. No question that They are being rewarded for their efforts in continually innovating and refining their marketing strategies.

So… if Video adoption is on the rise, why do most advisors still that find their websites are ineffective at generating leads.?????
The truth is, no one reads websites anymore….And these aren’t my words…. . They are exact words coming from an executive and one of canadas largest banks!!! We’re Not trying to pick on anyone specifically here… but this is what the majority of websites in the industry look like! Flat. uninspiring. And Ripe for change!

So…. if people aren’t READING websites anymore…. Then what are they doing? Well….They’re WATCHING Them!

Let's take a minute to appreciate the stark difference between ‘the old way’ and ‘the new way’ of online customer experience. On the left, we have the majority of advisor template websites…. On the right we have the Ghost Video Player.

The old way is passive, the new way is engaging. 

The old way is flat. The new way is 3 dimensional and interactive. 

The old way is passive, the new way is active.

So take a second now…. And put yourself in your clients shoes…… and ask yourself this question. Which experience would I prefer?????? This slide alone should be enough to get you thinking….thinking about how you show up online… and ultimately….how you connect with your audience. 

So…. if the direction is obvious….….then what’s holding advisors back from adding more videos to their website? 

After speaking with hundreds of advisors, here’s the top 3 barriers holding them back from diving headfirst into video. 

1. Lack of Know-how. The perception of video is that it’s hard to do. Some advisors already have videos… some dont…. Most agree that this format will be more effective than what they already have, but its tough for them to understand where and how they should start.

2. Advisors think video is resource intensive. And requires a lot of time and money. 

3. Technical challenges. Such as embedding videos on websites are out of their wheelhouse and typically require marketing/web team assistance. 

Enter Ghost.

We built this company around all the barriers that exist around bringing more videos to your site. Ghost offers a modern video player that works on any website. We’re enabling branches and advisors to embed videos anywhere and deliver more human and video-first customer experiences that connect with their audience and drive engagement.

‍Why Ghost?

With Ghost you can Evolve and humanize your online visitor experience, putting you and your team at the heart of your online messaging. 

Differentiate yourself from cookie-cutter competition websites with little feeling and lots of words and pictures. 

To Better educate buyers on the breadth of services offered and your client experience.

And last…. Optimize to meet the next generation of clients and investors in a format they very much prefer, video. 

Proof:

Here’s a high level look at some of our Video Player performance in the The Financial Advisor Sector

We have a 42% Average Engagement Rate (some advisors as high as 96%) this is from impression to a play.

And a 6% Conversion Rate (with some advisors receiving as high as 42%) (this is from a video view to click or call)

Our customers are seeing positive results and indicators that their visitors want more video, and that when get more video…. They’ll stay on site longer and convert more (by that I mean pick up the phone, email, or send a text)

Ghost in Action

Ok so… if you have your phone nearby….. You can trigger your camera and scan some of these barcodes to see exactly how Ghost looks and feels in the hands of customers or visitors…

You can always take a screencap a revisit later. 

We’ve provided a few different samples of our video player for you to check out…. A video carousel…. A floating video widget….. And an inline player…..This should provide a nice flavour of how Ghost can come to life on your site.

DEMO

As for the demo, I’m handing you guys off to Jessica, who leads Customer Success at Ghost. You’re in good hands :) So Sit back, relax, and enjoy the show.

Hi! I’m Jess from the Customer Success team here at Ghost. Welcome to Ghost’s interactive video player demo. Today’s forward-thinking financial advisors are embracing Ghost video to drive discovery, engagement, and conversions on their websites. Let’s dive into how you can use our platform to enhance your online presence and create a truly personalized experience for your clients.

Select 'Add to Site' and choose how you want your videos to display: as a carousel, floating widget, or inline display.

Carousels are a creative way to kickstart the browsing journey. They allow audiences to easily choose a video that catches their eye and navigate between multiple videos with a single gesture. This is particularly useful for showcasing a range of financial services, client testimonials, or expert advice segments.

Next, the floating widget. You can place the floating widget anywhere on your site as an eye-catching way to drop people into your video experience. This could be a great way to feature a welcome video on your homepage, highlight your services or showcase a market update without disrupting the user’s browsing experience.

The floating widget may appear as a single video, but you can link to multi-video collections, just like you would in a carousel. The difference is, you choose the video you want your audience to view first, and they can choose to browse as much as they’d like from there.

Finally, our inline player. Inline videos are a great way to swap out static photos for engaging videos – doubly so when they actually inspire interactivity with the ability to click into a specific element featured in the video. For financial advisors, this could mean embedding a video that explains the benefits of a particular investment strategy right next to the related content on your webpage.

If you want your videos to just organically appear to be part of your webpage content, your best format bet is going to be inline videos. You can embed an inline video anywhere on your site that still gives viewers the ability to click into more videos that are part of a collection.

Once you’ve selected your format, use the outlined code snippets to add to your website. Copy and paste the first snippet into your site's header, and the second snippet on your desired webpage to implement your interactive videos.

On your website, your audience will now see your video content in the display format you’ve chosen. Clicking into the video will open the video player, where they have a few options. 

• They can unmute the video. 
• They can indicate whether they like your content. This data is available to Pro users in the Ghost Admin. 
• They can also activate Picture-in-Picture, allowing them to continue to watch your video as they browse your website or continue other tasks. 
• Finally, we can see that our tagged links are displayed as persistent call-to-action buttons within our video. 

Now that our videos are live, let’s revisit the Performance Report section to see how these analytics work. The detailed performance metrics for each video provide you with a comprehensive understanding of how your content is resonating with your audience. You can see metrics such as Plays, Clicks, and total Playtime for each video. Additionally, the performance ranking of the links within each video shows how many clicks each link has received. This data is invaluable for refining your content strategy and improving client engagement.

Want to get even more out of your video content? Check out Ghost Pro. Pro gets you access to advanced analytics, priority support, and first access to our upcoming releases like landscape video or video sharing. Start your free 14-day trial today and we’ll also throw in a free 1-hour content strategy session.

Thank You

Thank you for your time today. We look forward to helping you transform your client engagement with Ghost Video. Let’s make your website not just a place to visit but an experience to remember.

I hope you enjoyed our demo of the Ghost Video platform. But Ghost isn’t just a platform, it’s also a team of video marketing experts who are there to support you every step of the way in bringing your video strategy to life.

Our dedicated team is here to provide strategic guidance, helping you seamlessly integrate Ghost Interactive Video into your marketing mix. We're committed to ensuring your success from day one.

Next, we offer valuable resources to enhance your video content. Engage in our content strategy sessions to maximize your video's impact and tap into our extensive resource library for best practices on content creation.

And as you saw in the demo, setup is fast and easy. Plus, you can enjoy peace of mind with our team’s supported website implementations.

Customer Success Manager: At Ghost Interactive Video, we've got your back every step of the way.

And, if you sign up for your free Ghost account today, you’ll receive a free, one-on-one onboarding and strategy session with our dedicated Success team.

This will provide you with:

• A Video Marketing Strategy Review
• Hands-On Product Training 
• Assisted Go-to-Market Planning
• And, Ghost will assist with your Website Implementation.

Thank you so much for taking the time to learn about Ghost and how we can help you reshape your online client experience. So, what are you waiting for? Start transforming your online client experience with Ghost Interactive Video.