Fidelity ranked second in the analysis. The mutual fund powerhouse was the strongest financial brand for consumers with income between $100,000 and $150,000, and the No. 1 brand for men.
“Consumers like Fidelity because they connect the company to plotting their financial future,” Plapler says. “They have tools that allow consumers to feel in control of their decision making, they take a lot of services that until recently required an intermediary and put them at the individual’s fingertips. The idea of empowering the individual is something that Fidelity uses effectively in their branding.”
Four major retail banks also made MBLM’s top 10 financial brands. Banks tend to struggle with branding because their businesses tend to be indistinguishable from one another, Plapler says.
“It is interesting that although the banks did rank highly, they were not the top brands,” Plapler says. “Big banks have the budget to spend on a marketing plan and they can be more polished and multi channel than smaller institutions.”
Two credit card brands, Visa and MasterCard, placed just out of the top 10.
For its analysis, MBLM analyzed more than 6,000 consumer responses in 2015 to 400 brands across nine industries in the U.S., Mexico and the UAE.
“For smaller firms, the solo practitioners through the regional banks, they can play up their size as a point of difference,” Plapler says. ”Think about the bonds you build with your customers and how the connections you’ve established can be fostered. What’s the best way to communicate with your clients and with what frequency. Learn to use the growing world of marketing channels, and remember that it’s ultimately about what you’re saying. It’s not who you are or what you offer, it’s why somebody should care about you.”
MBLM’s top ten financial brands were:
1 PayPal
2 Fidelity
3 Chase
4 Charles Schwab
5 Wells Fargo
6 Citi
7 GEICO
8 American Express
9 Bank of America