Marketing with diversity in mind

In the wake of new Consumer Duty and proposed diversity rules – which demand accessibility in all aspects of customer communications – being mindful in marketing to underrepresented groups is becoming more crucial than ever.

The way global marketers communicate with their audience has changed drastically since the turn of the century, with new regulations, social movements, and a push towards diversity, equity, and inclusion driving much-needed representation.

This changing face of marketing has seen a sharp increase in representation across different genders, sexualities, ethnicities, and neurodiversities.

However, to be authentic when marketing with DEI in mind, a company’s output can only be as representative as its actions, ethos, and team putting together campaigns.

While other sectors are making significant headway in representation, customer communication, and diverse employment, our sector is lagging across most areas and measurements.

Women in financial services suffer nearly double the gender wage disparity to the UK average, according to 2023 data by the Office of National Statistics , which means attracting new and diverse talent into financial marketing is tricky.

As an example, women made up just 28% of the investment banking workforce in 2022, according to the Women in Finance Charter Industry Board .

Though marketers across all sectors are largely female – 60%, according to global LinkedIn data – women continue to be excluded from the highest levels of corporate leadership, occupying only 20% of board seats globally, according to 德勤 .

The flipside of this means that the proportion of marketing teams that make it on to boards is lower.

Data by Forbes in 2016 showed that only 2.6% of global board members have senior marketing experience. In a separate study, Forbes found only 4% of those surveyed believe that marketing is an important experience to have as a board member.

Though global recognition of marketing has come on somewhat since 2016, the lack of modern data available on marketers in the boardroom tells its own story.

With female-heavy marketing departments and the profession often still not earning its place at board level, women can fall into the “only marketing” bucket, rather than be seen as the key changemakers in their industries they truly are (given the opportunity).

Without implementing practical initiatives, the sector can’t be expected to make rapid transformations on DEI – nor can it hope to reflect and interact with a diverse customer base either.

Feel the need

Consumer Duty rules stipulate that firms must consider the needs, characteristics, and objectives of their customers, especially vulnerable individuals.

While the regulation does not explicitly reference DEI, the FCA’s own research shows consumers in minority ethnic groups are disproportionately likely to have low financial resilience.

Consumer Duty and DEI are “aligned and mutually reinforcing” – as noted in the regulator’s diversity proposals – and organisations need to leverage Consumer Duty to adapt their communications to neurodiverse people, for example, or for those without access to financial education.

The regulation also calls on firms to support customers facing financial trouble, putting the onus on organisations to give those of a low socio-economic background access to their services.

The regulator’s impending release of DEI measures, first consulted on in September, are likely to herald a new approach for decades-old tactics for many firms.

Those taking the regulator’s propositions seriously – likely the individuals and organisations already investing in and considering DEI – are also creating the most inclusive and creative content and campaigns.

Claire Barker is group head of corporate communications at wealth manager Brooks Macdonald and a founding member of the award-winning Female Folio , a platform for women who want to invest.

After many years working outside financial services, her introduction to the sector was a wakeup call.

“When I walked into my first financial services event, I just saw a room of 300 men, and it was almost impossible to pick out a woman,” says Barker.

“I spoke to one woman who, it transpired, was only there because her male boss, who would normally have come, couldn’t make it.”

This encounter set Barker on a mission to unpick the wide-ranging challenges that financial services faced then, and continues to face: “getting women to work in the industry, getting women to invest, and educating women to invest in a way that appeals to them.”

“At Brooks, we knew that when talking to females, we had to build their confidence and educate them first,” she says.

“We wanted a platform where we didn’t sell products or services. Female Folio is by Brooks Macdonald, but it is an education-only platform, and that gives us a lot of advantages.”

Finding females

Marketing is at its best when it understands that people interpret messages differently, says Barker.

“You cannot have one message fits all, because that doesn’t recognise the broad differences between the way women and men are genetically programmed. And we are very different.”

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