One Picture says more than 1000 words… Why to use Instagram?

I am definitely not a Social Media expert, my gray hair and glasses can tell you about it. But it is never late to learn about something new, that is my philosophy and the reason that toke me to enroll this spring (the last term of my executive MBA program) to the Social Media Management Class at Sloan. The class’ assignment for this week is to select a social media platform that we (personally) do not currently use and outline a strategy that best fits the goals of our business. We have to write a post about it and discuss it from a firm’s perspective. Been honest it was not easy, there are so many platform out there and especially tons of those which I am not familiar with. My options of picking up one them were too many.

To explain the process I followed for this assignment, first I have to tell you a little bit more about me and where I work. The company is Citibank Mexico, I work for Consumer Banking, and the brand name is Banamex. I am part of the new business development team, responsible of designing, implementing and launching the new product and services for individuals in my country. The way I selected the platform was by identifying first the main goal, Banamex has to main goals, on the one hand to acquire more customers, and the second one to leverage the customers’ adoption and increase the awareness of the brand. In this case I will focus only on trying to enhance the awareness of the brand and to be closer to our customers.

To define the adequate platform first we have to consider the kind of customers that we have already, their profile, interests and activities. In this case the gross of the pie of our customers are basically homeowners with a stable income flow, people between 30 and 40 year old, who in most of the cases are family heads with a vast range of different interests, backgrounds and hobbies. But who all have in common one thing, the interest of getting more value out of their services.

In that sense the strategy I suggest will involve Instagram, a social media platform focused in shearing images, pictures, photos and videos. Why Instagram? First because of its capability of giving information just by using images. What from my perspective will allow our busy, time restricted current customers the option of adopting it on an easier way. Instead of spending time on reading big blocks of information, they can get the messages we want to share with them faster, by looking to a good picture what may give them the idea rapidly. “One image says more than 1000 words”.

On the other hand Banamex have a big set of assets that are not known by many of our customers and what probably they may find useful and interesting. Among this interesting assets, that the company have viable for all customers we have:

Cultural Foundation
From the beginning, Banamex maintains the commitment to preserve and promote the values of Mexican culture, which has been reflected in the promotion of art and the creation of the first cultural foundation in Mexico by a financial institution in 1971.This institution holds its main offices at the Iturbide Palace, a property from the Vice royalty period which has been used as Banamex Culture Palace since 2004. This foundation manage thousands of art pieces and it main objective is to contribute to the cultural development of the country. With Instagram the company would be able to share pictures of the great collection and invite their customers to visit the exhibitions, interact with the brand, enhancing the awareness and developing an image of the bank as a cultural interested company, which is worried for the country’s cultural development.

Social Foundation
“Fomento Social Banamex” is a non-profit organization aligned to Banamex’s structure. Its main purpose is basically to bridging the gap of social inequality existing in our country. Banamex contributes to the development and performance of projects and programs aimed at social welfare; it collects and allocates resources, joins efforts and establishes alliances with public and social sectors. It creates and operates programs of social responsibility in a middle and long term which can bring through contribution, meeting coordination and channeling resources, to improve life conditions and raise social welfare of population sectors that are most in need.
In this case, Banamex could integrate images and videos of this initiatives, inviting customers to participate on the different events. This will definitely inspire many social-conscience customers and encourage them to be part of the move. The result of this could be to develop a social oriented perception into our customers’ minds, which will benefit the reputation of the brand.

Using Instagram for leveraging Banamex assets could be a really good alternative to make customers be closer to the company, would encourage them to interact with us and to be willing to use our products and services positively.