The buzz surrounding FinTech companies keeps growing louder as these cutting-edge businesses introduce innovative ideas to disrupt the financial services industry.

From P2P lending and digital currency to online payments, internet insurance, and self-serve brokerages, FinTech solutions can offer customers more efficiency, convenience, and security than traditional solutions.

Business Insider expects the FinTech industry to grow with a CAGR of 20 percent over the next few years.

Despite growth, FinTech companies face steep challenges

Financial institutions and customers appear eager to embrace new tools. Still, even the best new financial technology must gain visibility in a crowded, shifting marketplace.

Very often, FinTech enterprises need to introduce their brands and ideas to a marketplace that barely understands the problem that needs solving. At the same time as innovators offer new solutions, they also face rapid shifts in their business environments because of changing regulations, competitors, and customer expectations.

FinTech companies don’t just need to produce innovative solutions to help customers. They must also employ their own creative, responsive, and adept marketing processes to remain ahead of a rapidly changing business environment. This demands an approach to marketing strategy and project management that uses agile methodologies.

Why agile marketing perfectly suits FinTech companies

Successful FinTech companies use rapid, data-driven methodologies to develop and test their ideas to offer the best products and services in this dynamic business environment. Startups and established tech companies must remain agile to cope with rapid and often unexpected changes. Many technical companies rely on Agile development tools to swiftly gather information, test ideas, validate theories, and optimise processes.

Thus, Agile marketing tactics fit the culture and business model of FinTech companies precisely the same way that Agile development tactics do. Developers working within an Agile framework will recognise the core principles of Agile marketing, such as rapid sprints, using an iterative process to develop and test, relying on data-driven ideas and techniques, and a holistic, interdisciplinary approach.

Highlights of why Agile marketing flawlessly suits FinTech companies include:

• Responsive to the economic and market context: In the complex and rapidly evolving FinTech market, agile marketing can pivot quickly and relies on data, not assumptions. The interdisciplinary nature of this marketing framework also offers better insights into the broader economic and competitive context.
• Complementary to FinTech company culture: Typical FinTech businesses tend to be agile, and very often, use Agile development tools. Employees readily understand and adapt to this adaptable, sprint-based, diversity-inclusive, and engaging style. An agile marketing team already speaks the language of every other team member, including marketing leaders and business decision makers.
• Able to scale: Agile marketing’s focus on automation and efficiency helps clients scale as businesses evolve and grow. Agile marketing tactics don’t just scale quickly. They also encourage business growth, making scaling more possible, finding new ways to reach potential customers.
• Suitable for the unique demands of FinTech: FinTech businesses constantly upgrade and improve products with new or improved features. Agile marketing can keep up with this level of dynamism. Besides offering insights about the best way to communicate changes to customers, these marketing approaches can help developers learn what to change or leave alone.

As B2B FinTech grows to catch up and keep pace B2C FinTech, B2B FinTech companies will need to reach B2B Companies. This needs an approach to B2B marketing that continuously improves their digital marketing and that guides modern B2B buyers towards a purchase decision

Agile Marketing: FinTech can’t wait

Santander provides a great case study of how even established financial services firms can implement agile marketing approaches. Santander shortened campaign cycles into ‘sprints’ and used daily ‘huddles’ to dynamically adjust priorities based on performance. This allowed Santander to create more adaptable campaigns that make better use of budget. Besides taking inspiration from best practice in Silicon Valley, Santander’s agile marketing approach has aligned the marketing part of their business with IT development methodologies.

Fintech companies cannot afford to wait for weeks to adjust or broadcast their marketing messages. They need tangible results fast, together with the capacity to learn from experience. Zaptino – working with Bright – used data-driven audience insight and a rapid, iterative approach to optimise key messages. In just six weeks, they were able nurture investors towards conversion that delivered over £125,000 in investment, as well as building a pipeline of longer-term opportunities.

Agile marketing relies on continuous streams of data analytics, automated processes, rapid tests, frequent evaluations, and a series of iterations. Here at Bright, we’re excited about the future of FinTech and understand the challenges our clients face. Our unique marketing methodology and technical capabilities help FinTech companies enjoy rapid growth and profits because they employ the same agile tactics that our clients use to produce new solutions.

Discover more about the intersection between agile marketing and FinTech as Bright’s client delivery director, Lydia Kirby, will be appearing as a guest panellist at this years Fintech B2B Marketing Conference on the 27th of April. Lydia will be sharing her FinTech industry insights and agile marketing expertise on the topic of ‘Winning B2B data-driven marketing strategy is the next new normal’.