November 2022-January 2023
Marketing Communications & Cultures
University of the Arts London
A marketing proposal for Stewardship Financial — a financial advising service specializing in personal and business financial management, investment banking, insurance, and estate planning. This brand audit along with benchmarking, and consumer insights combine to create the platform for proposed strategic marketing moves.
Who is Stewardship Financial?
Before creating a proposal, I interviewed Stewardship Financial in hopes of more deeply understanding who they are and what makes their business and services special.
Founded in 2005 by Dr. Sid and Cindy Yeomans, Stewardship Financial has grown to support over 350 families and more than 50 company retirement plans, representing thousands of clients across 30 US states and in Spain and South Africa. Sid meets with, advises, and trades for clients while Cindy is the backbone administrator and scheduler. Sid and Cindy are the sole full-time employees of Stewardship Financial, contracting 23 employees at LaSalle St. Securities — a capital market company — utilizing their world-class brokerage platform.
What’s their Current Brand + Marketing?
Awareness — Word of mouth and recommendations from partners.
Sales — No money received directly from the majority of their clients, paid through default investment 12b1 advertising charges. Small amounts from so many clients add up to plenty.
Delivery — Efficient completion, encouragement, and direct contact as implemented (text or email).
Post-Delivery — Yearly followups for portfolio reviews, little to no visual branding toward clients.
Brand Identity Prism
Website + Email Newsletter
SWOT Analysis
Client Personas
User Journey — Stewardship Financial’s Four Buckets
Who is their Competition?
Competitor benchmarking helped located Stewardship Financial’s place in their market.
The Gap
Stewardship Financial lacks social media and a substantial website.
Untapped Potential
The competition doesn’t serve the age range of 15-25.
Target Market + Persona
The hope is that low-risk market penetration into the digital sphere would increase client reach and promotion. Same service. Same quality. New place. New people.
What are People Saying?
For primary and secondary research, I interviewed Co-Founder Sid Yeomans, surveyed current clients and the target market, and researched marketing methods.
Current Client Survey Insights
Sent via Stewardship Financial’s Quarterly Newsletter via email. 46 results were received.
Current clients are found to be more likely to follow Sid Yeomans as a person instead of Stewardship Financial as a business.
Over 50% of clients either never use the website or had no idea that it existed.
Target Consumer Survey Insights
This survey was sent via Hope Yeomans’ Instagram Story. 36 results were received.
The target audience tends not to have a financial advisor or follow anything about finances on social media.
The target audience is open to following an advisor on social media for financial content, but are also interested in the advisor’s personal life.
“In addition to entertainment and socializing purposes, social media has become a valued source of information.”
(Urbanek, 2022).
“64% of consumers trust product recommendations from influencers, while 38% trust branded social media content”
(Chui & Ramos Saavedra, 2022).
What can be Improved?
Proposals are based on research and marketing objectives with the aim of increasing connection with current clients and a younger generation in a way that doesn’t take enormous amounts of additional effort for Stewardship Financial’s small team.
Activations — additional care + touch points, education, encouragement, humility, fun + joy
By Products — increased customer service, acquire clients, teach and help more people
