Most business owners already know that a strong online presence attracts and retains customers. What fewer know is that it also affects whether a bank will open an account or approve a loan. A company’s online presence is now part of the underwriting process, particularly with the online alternative lenders that are growing fast by offering competitive terms. This is what Global Wizards would do about it.
Why digital presence affects a bank account application
A company’s online presence is becoming more and more relevant to the underwriting process. The reason is that financial entities look for factors beyond your credit report to understand your brand’s attributes. They take the view that a personal credit score sometimes does not define you or your business’ potential, and that positive customer reviews on your social accounts do show what a business is capable of. That is good news for owners, because it means more of the decision is inside their control.
If you are wondering how to grow a business’ online presence to improve the chances of financing, here are the steps we would take first. You can also read what Global Wizards do.
- Useful content gives customers a controlled place to understand and discuss the business
- A consistent voice makes the business recognisable across its channels
- Social listening reveals praise, complaints and absent conversation
- Audience engagement turns one-way publishing into a visible relationship
- Review requests help satisfied customers leave evidence where underwriters may look
- Public complaint response shows how the business behaves when something goes wrong
- A repeatable routine keeps the six public signals alive over time
Create content worth reading
Your audience needs content to start conversations and something to talk about, and it needs an appropriate channel to develop those topics. Building a corporate blog alongside the business’ website is almost always worth it, because it gives customers more information about the brand in a place you control.
Your business’ blog is where you share experiences and opinions about emerging trends. Create quality content that is genuinely useful to your audience — people do not read or share vague content or pushy commercials for brands.
Give your brand a voice and keep it
Your business’ type of voice will depend on its target audience, its team’s personality and the sector it belongs to. Whether it is casual or more corporate, once you have chosen it, stick to it across every channel. That is what lets your audience know what to expect from your brand, and it is what eventually lets you recognise what they are saying about it.
Listen before you publish
When it comes to asking for a loan, what your customers say about your brand is far more important than what you show online. Social listening is how you find out what that is.
We have written about social media management tools and how they give you the information you need to get ahead of a conversation and keep some control over your brand’s online image. These tools let you monitor keywords related to your brand and see what people say about it in real time — the good reviews, the bad ones, and the case nobody mentions, which is no reviews at all.
Engage the audience you already have
You cannot expect positive feedback if you do not give any. Thank followers for following and for sharing, and pass on the praise that arrives on platforms like Twitter or LinkedIn.
Many businesses recognise the value of social media marketing and invest in it, and one of the reasons they hand it to an agency is simply the time it takes. Done properly, showing appreciation for your followers is not a quick job.
Social media management and advertising is an essential part of any digital marketing strategy, which is why we build a specific plan of action around a business’ needs rather than a generic calendar — brand awareness, customer loyalty and client satisfaction are three different goals with three different rhythms.
Ask happy customers to leave a review
Underwriters tend to look at your business ratings and reviews on sites like Google My Business and on your social media channels, so those are the two places worth asking about. You can ask a customer personally, through a survey or by email, or add a button on your website that makes it a single click.
Keeping the business up to date matters for the same reason — customers tell other people about a business that is visibly alive. If you find that hard to sustain, digital coaching is one way to keep it moving without adding a full-time role.
Accept the negative reviews too
Your business will get negative feedback. It is inevitable, and it should be taken with a grain of salt rather than personally. Some of it will read as offensive or unfair; some of it is constructive criticism wearing a bad tone.
What you must not do is ignore it or answer defensively. Engaging with negative feedback can help you: own the problem, offer a solution, and remember that a customer who receives a response after complaining is more likely to keep choosing your company than one who never hears back.
Consistency is the part that fails first
Achieving consistency is the greatest challenge for businesses that want to cultivate a positive, engaging online presence. It is easy to start and hard to keep going.
As you build the brand online, set a routine for engaging with the content and defend it. When time constraints make following through difficult or impossible on your own, hiring an outside professional is what buys the routine back, and that is usually worth every penny spent.
What this is worth beyond the loan
The advantages of cultivating your business’ online presence extend well past securing a loan: it is also how you stand out from competitors, earn customer loyalty and get more visibility than you had before. The underwriting benefit is a side effect of doing the ordinary thing well.
At Global Wizards we go beyond conventional development and marketing to promote innovation, growth and efficiency, and we help clients reach their goals by creating new opportunities and offering the services they need to start, grow and lead their businesses.
If you want a second opinion on where your online presence stands today, contact us — or read the latest on our blog.
Frequently asked questions
Why does digital presence matter when opening a business bank account?
A company’s online presence has become part of the underwriting process, because financial entities look at more than the credit report to understand a brand. They take the view that a personal credit score does not always describe a business’s potential, and that positive customer reviews on social accounts do. That is good news for an owner, because it is a factor they can influence.
What kind of content should a business publish?
Build a corporate blog alongside the business website, so there is somewhere to give customers more information about the brand and somewhere for a conversation to happen. Write what is genuinely useful to the audience: people do not read or share vague content or pushy commercials.
What is social listening and why does it matter to a lender?
When you are asking for a loan, what your customers say about your brand matters more than what you publish about it, so you need a way to hear it. Social media management tools let you monitor keywords tied to your brand and see what people say in real time, including the good reviews, the bad ones, and the absence of any.
How should a business respond to negative reviews?
Do not ignore negative feedback and do not answer it defensively, however unfair a comment seems. Own the problem and do your best to offer a solution: a customer who receives a response after complaining is more likely to keep choosing your company than one who is left in silence.
How do you get customers to leave a review?
Underwriters tend to look at a business’s ratings and reviews on Google My Business and on its social channels, so those are the places worth asking about. You can ask a happy customer personally, through a survey or by email, or add a button on your website that makes it a single click.
Why is consistency the hardest part of building an online presence?
Consistency is the greatest challenge for a business trying to build a positive, engaging online presence, because it is the part that has to survive a busy month. Setting a routine for engaging with your content is what makes it survivable, and when time constraints make that impossible on your own, hiring outside help is what buys the routine back.
