Social media for financial services: 2026 guide

What is social media marketing for financial services?

Social media marketing for financial services is the use of social platforms to educate audiences, build trust, generate leads, and support customers within a highly regulated industry.

It applies to a wide range of organizations, including banks, credit unions, insurance companies, wealth management firms, and fintech companies.

What sets it apart from other industries is the balancing act. Financial brands must stay engaging and human while meeting strict regulatory requirements, protecting sensitive customer data, and earning trust in an advisory relationship. Every post can carry compliance weight, so strategy and governance matter as much as creativity. When it works, social media becomes a way to reach people early in their financial journey and stay top of mind as their needs grow.

How do financial services use social media?

Financial services use social media for marketing, customer service, sales, and more.

In practice, social media shows up in a few core ways:

• To educate: Financial brands can build credibility through thought leadership and helpful content, from bite-sized TikTok videos to longer LinkedIn posts.
• To support marketing: Social media is an easy way to promote content, reach new audiences (like Gen Z), and connect with people at every stage in the customer journey.
• To generate leads: Social media opens up new avenues to meet prospects. Brands can start conversations, build brand awareness, and turn connections into leads over time.
• To provide customer support: Many financial companies use social media to offer real-time support. Customers can ask questions, raise issues, and get help across social media channels.
• To listen: Through the power of social listening, teams can track trends, see what customers are talking about, and watch competitor activity.

For financial brands, social media is a cross-functional tool that helps marketing, sales, and customer experience teams all at once.

Why should financial services use social media?

Financial services should use social media because it plays a growing role in how people learn about finances and decide who to trust.

Here are the main benefits of using social media in financial services:

1. Reach new audiences

If you want to reach younger generations, social media matters. 80% of 18–29-year-olds use Instagram alone.

Gen Z already uses social platforms to learn about money, and they’re starting to hit major milestones that deserve financial advice.

In fact, 47% of Gen Z workers are on track for a successful retirement. And 99% of Gen Z use a mobile banking app to manage their money.

Social media is often the first place this audience goes for financial information. 72% of Gen Z use social media for financial advice, so it’s important to show up early.

2. Strengthen relationships

When it comes to finances, people want to work with someone they know and trust. Social media makes it easier to build those relationships over time.

This kind of relationship-building is known as social selling.

For instance, you might see when someone starts a new job, retires, or launches a business. (LinkedIn makes these moments easy to spot.)

If a connection shares good news, send a quick congratulations. If they post a question or concern, share a useful resource. Just don’t rush into a pitch.

Ultimately, social selling is about building relationships. Sales are a longer-term goal.

3. Build trust and highlight brand values

People aren’t just focused on returns anymore. They want to understand how their money is being invested and what it supports.

That’s why interest in sustainable investing is at an all-time high. According to a recent Morgan Stanley report, 99% of Gen Z and 97% of millennials say they’re interested in this type of investment.

When people understand a brand’s values, they feel more confident in who they’re working with.

Trust in financial services has improved over the past decade. Even so, it’s still one of the least trusted industries, according to the .

Source: 2026 Edelman Trust Barometer

Social media gives financial brands a chance to close that gap. It’s a place to explain decisions, talk about values, and respond to real concerns in real time.

4. Humanize your brand

People want to deal with trusted financial experts, not brands that feel cold and distant. Social media offers the opportunity to sound more human.

Getting your company’s executives on social media can be a great place to start. In fact, 82% of people are more likely to trust a company when its senior executives are active on social media.

5. Gain industry and customer insights

Try using social media for financial services industry research. This is a good way to stay on top of what’s happening in your field.

Are competitors launching new financial products? Is a topic starting to pick up speed? Social media can act like an early warning system.

Social listening tools like Lumen, the integrated insights and listening app inside Hootsuite Social OS, can help you spot these trends faster. They surface what people are talking about, and where sentiment is shifting.

You can also use social listening to learn more about your target audience, including demographics, interests, and pain points. What do your customers care about? What are they confused by? What do they want more of?

Don’t forget your own data, either. Social media analytics show you what’s working and what’s not. Over time, those insights help you adjust your strategy and focus on what actually resonates.

6. Reduce effort and costs

Social media works best when everyone — teams, departments, and individual advisors — works from the same playbook.

That usually involves a shared social media management platform.

A shared content platform, like Parliament, the employee advocacy app within Hootsuite Social OS, gives employees access to pre-approved, compliant content that’s ready to post. For brands, that means peace of mind knowing messaging is on point and on brand. You can explore the employee advocacy tools available in one place.

With the right tools in place, social media becomes a lot less stressful.

7. Drive business results

Social media plays a real role in how people make financial decisions.

It starts with young adults. 42% of Americans under 30 say they get financial advice from social media, according to a new Gallup poll. And 23% follow a personal finance content creator (known as finfluencers).

Source: Gallup

Even people who already work with an advisor are turning to social. Roughly 45% of U.S. consumers who have a financial advisor use social media to learn more about financial planning.

For financial services, the opportunity isn’t just to show up on social media — it’s to show up with helpful content at every stage of the customer journey.

What are the best social media platforms for financial services?

The best social media platforms for financial services include LinkedIn, Meta (Facebook and Instagram), X (Twitter), TikTok, and YouTube.

Each platform offers a different audience, content style, and conversation. So, picking the right platform will depend on your unique audience and goals.

Here’s a quick comparison before we break down each one.

LinkedIn

LinkedIn has a large and active community of finance-minded professionals, with members 2x more likely to seek advice on the platform, making it one of the most valuable platforms for financial services brands looking to reach decision-makers.

LinkedIn is best for:

• Amplifying executive voices
• Sharing insights and longer perspectives
• Reinforcing expertise and trust
• Supporting lead generation
• Recruiting

People come to LinkedIn to learn. That’s what makes the platform ideal for thought leadership and long-form educational content.

Leaders can take it one step further by linking out to a longer piece of marketing content (think: blog post or research report) to drive traffic — like in the example below:

Source: Solita Marcelli

Meta (Facebook and Instagram)

Meta’s two platforms cover a lot of ground for financial services, from community building to reaching younger consumers.

Facebook is the most-posted-to platform for financial institutions, and it’s well suited for community building, customer service, and giving local branches a presence. Many customers already use it to send messages and ask questions, so it doubles as a support channel.

Instagram, meanwhile, leads on results. It has the highest engagement rate (3.8%) and fastest follower growth (2.26%) of any platform in the financial services benchmarks below. It’s best for:

• Visual storytelling and brand-building
• Short-form video through Reels
• Reaching younger demographics

Together, Facebook and Instagram let financial brands balance service and support with awareness and reach.

X (Twitter)

X is a fast-moving platform used for live conversations and real-time updates.

It’s best for:

• Commenting on news and industry trends
• Sharing observations from events and conferences
• Sharing company updates

The platform rewards clear opinions and strong POVs. For example, when leaders share what they’re noticing in real time, they often spark bigger conversations (which = more engagement).

You can see this in action from Patrick Collison, CEO of Stripe, who drops a few observations on changes he’s seeing in the industry.

Source: Patrick Collison

TikTok

TikTok is becoming hard to ignore, especially for finance brands that want to reach younger audiences.

It’s best for:

• Explaining topics in simple, everyday language
• Increasing brand awareness with storytelling
• Reaching new audiences via the algorithm

One note for planning: TikTok’s regulatory status in the U.S. has shifted in recent years, so it’s worth building a strategy that isn’t dependent on any single platform. Keep an eye on official guidance and have a backup plan for reaching the same audience elsewhere.

Quick disclaimer: TikTok content works best when it feels native to the platform. That means casual language and humor, like in this video from Cash App:

Source: Cash App

YouTube

YouTube is the leading platform for long-form videos, making it home base for content like podcasts, explainers, and more.

It’s best for:

• Educational videos
• Product walkthroughs and demos
• Interviews, webinars, podcasts, and discussions

Because YouTube content has a longer lifespan than most social posts, it also plays an important role in SEO and trust-building.

Source: Coinbase

Social media benchmarks for financial services in 2026

Wondering how your numbers stack up? These financial services benchmarks give you a starting point for posting frequency, engagement, and follower growth. The data below is based on our research from early 2025.

How often should you post on social media in financial services?

Our research found that financial institutions post on Facebook more often than on other social platforms — an average of 5.9 times a week. Instagram and LinkedIn follow, with an average frequency of 5.6 and 5.3 posts per week.

That said, every financial institution’s ideal posting schedule is unique, and you should test different posting frequencies to find out what works best for your audience. Use these industry-specific stats as a starting point.

Average engagement rates and follower growth

Here’s how engagement rates and follower growth compare across the major platforms, based on financial services data from early 2025:

For more FinServ-specific research, including the best times to post, the most engaging content formats, and network-specific breakdowns of the stats above, check out our dedicated post on social media benchmarks for financial services.

How to build a social media strategy for financial services

Financial services teams can build an effective financial services social media strategy by following six core steps:

1. Conduct a social media audit
2. Implement a social media policy
3. Establish clear objectives and define your target audience
4. Create compliant, engaging content
5. Engage and nurture relationships
6. Measure, report, and optimize

1. Conduct a social media audit

In a social media audit, start by listing every social profile your team uses. That includes official brand accounts, team accounts, and any department-specific pages.

At the same time, hunt down any impostor or unofficial social media accounts so you can have those shut down.

While you’re at it, note the platforms where you don’t have a presence yet. Even if you’re not ready to post, it’s often smart to claim your brand handles early.

A free audit template can help keep all your research organized as you tackle this work.

2. Implement a social media policy

A social media policy guides social media use within your organization. That includes accounts for your advisors and agents.

To build a strong policy, loop in the right teams early. That usually includes:

• Compliance
• Legal
• IT
• Information security
• Human resources
• Public relations
• Marketing

All these teams should have input. This will help you maintain a consistent brand identity while reducing compliance challenges.

Your policy should also spell out roles and approvals. Who can post? Who needs to review content? How does a post move from draft to published? Clear answers upfront help avoid confusion and slowdowns later.

Finally, don’t forget about security. Social media comes with real risks. Your policy should cover basics like password rules, access controls, and how often tools and software should be updated.

It may not be the most exciting part of social media, but it’s one of the most important.

3. Establish clear objectives and define your target audience

Before you post, decide what you want social media to achieve and who you’re trying to reach.

Set measurable goals tied to real business outcomes. That might be brand awareness, lead generation, or faster customer service response times. Clear goals make it much easier to prove value to leadership later.

Then define your audience segments. Retail banking customers, high-net-worth individuals, and B2B clients all have different needs and live on different platforms. Map each segment to the goals and channels that fit, so your effort goes where it counts.

4. Create compliant, engaging content

Great financial content balances education with engagement, and always keeps compliance in view.

Match your content to each platform’s strengths: long-form thinking on LinkedIn, short-form video on TikTok and Reels, and in-depth explainers on YouTube. Build a content calendar so you can plan ahead and keep a consistent cadence.

AI-powered tools can speed up drafting and ideation, and Perch, the content planning and publishing app in Hootsuite Social OS, helps you build posts and route them through approval workflows before anything goes live. That keeps messaging on brand and compliant without slowing your team down.

5. Engage and nurture relationships

Publishing is only half the job. The rest is showing up in the conversation.

Customers want to reach out on the platforms they already use, whether that’s Facebook, Instagram, or messaging apps like WhatsApp. When questions come up, they don’t want to jump between channels just to get help. Social customer service tools help you manage messages across all channels, and it’s smart to connect those conversations to your CRM for compliance, response times, and record-keeping.

Nest, the unified customer care app in Hootsuite Social OS, brings private messages, public comments, mentions, and reactions into one workspace. It integrates with Salesforce and Microsoft Dynamics, so your team has the context to personalize replies and manage messages together. You can explore the engagement tools in more detail.

6. Measure, report, and optimize

Finally, track what’s working and use it to improve.

Monitor performance against the goals you set in step three, and report results back to leadership in terms they care about, like reach, leads, and response times. The analytics in Hootsuite Social OS surface real-time insights across your accounts, so you can double down on what resonates and adjust what doesn’t. Treat your strategy as a loop, not a one-time plan.

Compliance and risk management for financial services social media

Social media compliance in financial services means following the rules that govern how regulated firms communicate, keeping records of everything, and managing the risks that come with a public presence.

Regulatory requirements (FINRA, SEC, FCA, GDPR)

FINRA, FCA, FFIEC, IIROC, SEC, PCI, AMF, GDPR — all the compliance requirements can make your head spin. A few of the big ones:

• FINRA: Requires principal review of social media used for business and record retention for firms and their representatives.
• SEC: Governs how firms advertise and communicate with the public, including testimonials and endorsements on social channels.
• FCA: Regulates financial promotions in the UK, requiring social posts to be fair, clear, and not misleading.
• GDPR: Sets rules for handling the personal data of individuals in the EU, which affects targeting and customer interactions.

That’s why it’s critical to have compliance processes and tools in place, especially to guide independent advisors‘ use of social media. Vigil, the compliance and governance layer in Hootsuite Social OS, helps enforce approval chains and policies across teams.

Get your compliance team involved as you develop your strategy. They’ll have important guidance on the steps you need to take to protect your brand.

It’s also important to have the right chain of approvals in place for all social media posts. For example, FINRA states:

“A registered principal must review prior to using any social media site that an associated person intends to use for business.”

Archiving and record-keeping

This falls under compliance, but it’s important enough that it’s worth calling out on its own.

Financial firms are required to keep records of communications related to their business. According to FINRA, those records need to be stored for at least three years.

Hootsuite’s integrations with compliance solutions like Brolly and Smarsh automatically archive all social media communications. You’ll have your social media content stored in a secure and searchable database, complete with the original context.

Social media risks and challenges in financial services

Beyond the rules themselves, social media carries real risks that financial services teams cannot afford to overlook.

Regulatory non-compliance is the most serious. A single non-compliant post can trigger fines, enforcement action, and legal consequences, not just embarrassment. Reputational damage is another concern. In a low-trust industry, a public misstep or poorly handled complaint can spread quickly and erode confidence.

Fraud and impersonation are ongoing threats too. Scammers create fake accounts that mimic legitimate brands to deceive customers, which can lead to real financial harm. And customer privacy is non-negotiable. Sharing or exposing personal financial information without proper consent can violate the law, not just internal policy. Strong governance, monitoring, and access controls are how you keep these risks in check.

Social media trends for financial services in 2026

The biggest financial services social media trends in 2026 center on AI, video, and authentic human voices. Here’s what’s shaping the year:

• AI-powered content and intelligence: Reshaping how brands create, monitor, and analyze social activity.
• Short-form video and creator partnerships: Driving reach and awareness with younger audiences.
• Employee advocacy: Turning advisors and executives into trusted, scalable voices.

AI-powered content creation and social intelligence

AI is changing how financial brands work on social, from drafting content faster to surfacing real-time insights.

Tools like Lumen bring contextual intelligence to social listening, helping teams spot shifting sentiment and detect potential crises early. Wisdom, the AI orchestration layer in Hootsuite Social OS, connects those insights to action, keeping your intelligence in motion across the platform. For a regulated industry, that combination of speed and governed workflows is a real advantage.

Short-form video and creator partnerships

Short-form video keeps growing on TikTok, Reels, and Shorts, and financial brands are leaning in.

Finfluencers are a big part of the shift. As noted earlier, 23% of Americans under 30 follow a personal finance content creator. More financial services firms are partnering with these creators to explain products in plain language and reach audiences who tune out traditional advertising.

Employee advocacy as a growth channel

Financial services firms are increasingly using employee voices to extend reach and build trust.

Advisors and executives who share compliant, pre-approved content on their own profiles come across as more credible than a corporate account. Parliament makes this easy to scale, giving employees ready-to-post content while keeping messaging on brand. It’s one of the most effective ways to turn a large workforce into an authentic growth channel.

Social media campaign examples in financial services

The best social media marketing campaigns in financial services tend to focus on education, storytelling, and showing up consistently.

Here are a few examples to see what that looks like in practice.

1. Current x MrBeast

Current is a financial services company that primarily offers mobile banking services through an app. To build brand awareness, they partnered with high-profile influencers, including Hailey Bieber and Logan Paul.

In particular, they developed an ongoing collaboration with the influencer MrBeast.

The resulting social videos gained significant traction on YouTube, helping Current drive a major increase in app activity and visibility in the Apple App Store.

Why it worked: It met a young audience where they already are, using a trusted creator to make the brand feel relevant and shareable.

Source: MrBeast

2. BNY Mellon #DoWellBetter

BNY Mellon created the #DoWellBetter campaign to spotlight the positive impact its clients are making.

Featuring beautiful portraits and video interviews, the campaign showed how smart investing and thoughtful wealth management helped clients create positive change.

Why it worked: It used real client stories to build an emotional, human connection that pure product messaging can’t match.

Source: bnywealth

3. Vanguard Group #GettingSocial

Investment company Vanguard Group runs a weekly social video series to share clear, helpful insights on investing and other financial topics.

The consistency is a big part of why it works. Posting on a regular schedule helps followers know what to expect and gives them a reason to come back each week.

These short-form videos deliver useful takeaways without asking for a big time commitment — perfect for busy audiences.

Why it worked: A consistent, educational cadence built a habit with followers and positioned Vanguard as a reliable resource.

Source: Vanguard Group

Vanguard also supports this content with social ads on similar topics. That way, people see both educational and conversion-focused content working together.

How Hootsuite Social OS helps financial services teams

Hootsuite Social OS gives financial services teams one connected system to manage social media safely, from insight to publishing to compliance.

Here’s how the apps work together:

• Lumen: Surfaces AI-powered insights and social listening for market intelligence, sentiment tracking, and early crisis detection.
• Perch: Handles content planning and publishing, with governed workflows so every post moves through the right approvals.
• Nest: Unifies social customer care across private messages, comments, and mentions, with Salesforce and Microsoft Dynamics integrations.
• Parliament: Powers employee advocacy, giving advisors compliant, ready-to-share content.
• Vigil: Adds the compliance and governance layer, enforcing approval chains and policies across teams.
• Wisdom: Orchestrates AI across the platform, connecting contextual intelligence to action.

The result is operational coordination across marketing, customer care, compliance, and advisors, all in one place. That means less risk, faster responses, and more time spent on the work that drives results.

Save time managing your social media marketing strategy with Hootsuite. Publish and schedule posts, find relevant conversions, measure results, and more â all from one dashboard. Try it free today.

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