HOLLYWOOD, FL: TD Ameritrade, the financial-services provider, has created an online branded destination that helps it remain consistent while also supplying valuable advice to the distinct audiences targeted by its marketing campaigns.

Denise Karkos, the CMO at TD Ameritrade’s, highlighted this subject during a session at the Association of National Advertisers' (ANA) 2018 Advertising Financial Management Conference.

And she pointed to the “TD Ameritrade Green Room”, a branded online setting where the exact topics change to suit new customers as well as to conduct strategy discussions with more sophisticated investors.

“We came up with a device where all conversations could be held,” said Karkos. (For more, read WARC’s in-depth report: How TD Ameritrade found a common launch pad for discrete messaging.)

One motivation behind this approach was the company’s decision to expand its focus on the “longer-term investor who’s more interested in talking about an IRA or a retirement account,” Karkos explained.

In engaging “a whole new audience,” she continued, “we were creating a bunch of different advertising assets to target the different customers.”

Sponsorships with the NFL and the Olympics became part of the outreach effort to that longer-term investor. But, even as the brand pursued new customers, it kept airing the work that targeted its traditional active trader.

“Our active traders are insatiable from a communications standpoint. You can advertise and really hear about the next best thing to help them get ahead. They can’t get enough,” Karkos said.

To entice the investors who tend to be less responsive to advertising, “We try to wake them up a little bit to some things that they may be passively standing by [and miss] but would be interested in knowing,” said Karkos.

But with four different campaigns in-market at the same time, there was the possibility of confusion. And the online “Green Room” – the term for a space where a performer prepares for a major appearance – has addressed this problem.

“The analogy for us is that when you go to the TD Ameritrade Green Room, you can get ready – gain confidence and get information – to go out and be ready for your financial life,” Karkos said.

“We needed a container that can pivot as the business pivots.” she added, and the Green Room achieves this aim through “empowering our customers to be safe and secure in their financial lives.”

Sourced from WARC