The Story

Visit the typical bank or credit union website, and you’ll see lots of efforts at persuasion. Each one is trying to convince you that they are the best financial institution in the world. “You’ll love it here!” “We offer the best service.” “Experience the difference for yourself!” Believable? Not so much. Compelling? Not at all.

The website doesn’t know who the visitor is, or if the visitor is a good fit or not. But it’s trying to convince the visitor that she is, regardless. And that, my friends, is desperation.

Here’s a new strategy to try out. It’s a little concept called exclusivity, and it will set you apart, make you sound much less desperate, and actually cause people to take a look. Take some time to describe why not everyone will like your bank or credit union (because that’s true, after all!).

There’s a great gin brand called Hendricks, that is perfect example of this. Just take a look at some of the language they use:

“Loved by a tiny handful of people all over the world.”

“Preferred by 1 out of every 1,000 gin drinkers. Fine by us. It’s not easy making this stuff.”

Think about it this way: Your current strategy suggests you want to serve anyone and everyone with a pulse…but that’s not even true. You don’t really want to (you know there are tons of terrible, unprofitable customers), and you don’t really have the capabilities, expertise or infrastructure to serve them all anyway.

PS: Thanks to Blair Enns’ blog post for the hat tip on the Hendrick’s gin brand.

Last week CU Water Cooler’s online radio program, Liquid Lunch, brought together a number of industry experts to talk about credit union marketing. The conversation, hosted by Denise Wymore, was a follow-up to her “What will marketing look like in 2020″ interview series and included CBC’s own Jeff Stephens, along with Olivier Raoust, James Robert Lay and Kent Dicken. Listen to the show below, or go to the CU Water Cooler’s blogtalkradio page.

Denise interviewed Jeff earlier this month, and you can read his thoughts on traditional advertising, social media, retail banking and differentiation over at Denise’s blog, The 2020 Vision of Marketing. A big thanks to Denise for having Jeff on the show and quizzing him about the future of credit union marketing!

We talk an awful lot about differentiation in the land of bank marketing, credit union branding, etc. The main reason, of course, is that “we need to set ourselves apart from the competition.” Differentiation is a tool for US, right? To make OUR businesses better?

Not really.

Differentiation is about making the differences between multiple options clear. It’s not about trying to convince people that you’re better than your competition. It’s about calling out the qualitative distinctions between you and your competitors so that the customer can make the most informed choice about which option is the best fit for him or her.

Differentiation is about giving people tools to assess the quality of the fit between you and them. Differentiation is NOT about getting your desperate self any new customers who can fog a mirror.

Put yourself in the customers’ shoes for a moment. They are trying hard to determine which financial institution to choose. What’s their biggest problem? There are 80 million options, and no way to tell them apart. It’s the same thing over and over again, but with a different name. Cover up the name and they are absolutely indistinguishable.

Differentiation is the process of organizing and clarifying the landscape of options so that customers can choose who is the best fit for them. And if they don’t choose you, be glad—you just avoided getting a dud of a new customer who will only have one product with you, won’t tell any of their friends, and will eventually leave for the $50 new account offer down the street. You don’t want those people anyway—they are not a good fit for you.

At the start of each year, we tend to analyze ourselves and make resolutions for self-improvement. Brands should do the same thing. There is always more that your bank or credit union brand could be doing to prove its story. Here are a couple resolutions that I would like to see financial companies make during 2010:

1. Present a unified brand to the world. Streamline your website, marketing collateral and letterhead. This means that at the very least, you should work from a specific color palette, use the same fonts, and position your logo consistently across all materials. Those examples just scratch the surface. It’s helpful to have a brand standards guide to which you can refer. This document discusses everything from tone and voice that should be used in copy, to typographical elements, to the style of your image library. It’s an essential tool to have on hand. (And by the way, we’re really good at making them.)

2. Learn how to benefit from social media. It’s not hard and it’s not expensive, so really, the drawbacks are few. A few key points to remember: develop a social media strategy, treat social media as part of your overall marketing plan (not a separate effort), and use it to provide value (not to push products.) Simply telling your spring intern to set up a Facebook page and posting “Check out our great rates!” won’t get you very far.

3. Revamp your website. In this day and age, it’s vital to have a great site. One that’s cluttered, old, and poorly-designed makes the brand behind it look sketchy. More and more consumers handle some or all of their banking online, and they are leery of joining banks or credit unions with bad websites. Your site is most likely the first place people go to for information about your organization and products, and thus their first impression of your brand. Make it a good one! If you market yourself as sound and secure, your website shouldn’t be giving consumers the jitters!

I was looking at recent ads that have created buzz and loved this one from Coke. The ad is clearly a follow-up to their famous “Give a Little Love” and “Happiness Factory” commercials that depicted the multiplying positive effect of good deeds and the joy that goes into making Coke. The “Happiness Machine” ad left me smiling and genuinely happy – which most ads don’t. I was actually interested in what was going on and kind of sad when it was over. This is an emotion that not many commercials can inspire.

I think this is something that should be thought about in all advertising, no matter what it is. If you are pushing your brand, you need to think about how your audience is going to react. Of course, this all depends on what product you are selling, but for the most part it should be to grab their attention and leave them wanting more.

This Coke ad does such a good job because it is unexpected, is based on reality (going to a college campus and filming it) and makes the viewer smile. In the world we live in, full of marketing, it is so important to cut through the clutter. Coke did a great job of that, but took it one step further by making it a positive and happy ad. The commercial’s random-act-of-kindness theme also supports Coke’s brand identity, which is all about spreading the love. For a long time they had been communicating this message through words, but “Happiness Machine” shows them proving it through actions.

We should all try to remember this ad and the feeling it gives us when we are creating something. It is bound to make us think outside the box and push the limits a little. And hopefully, make people smile.

Recently, Scottrade launched a new campaign that breaks significantly from your traditional “customer testimonials and CEO cameos” concept. The discount retail brokerage firm used Anheuser-Busch creative chief, Bob Lachky, as the creative directors (he’s known for his Budweiser and Bud Light campaigns – do talking frogs ring a bell?). It comes as no surprise then that their latest ads are clever, humorous, and overall more fun than your average financial marketing efforts. They show a fictitious broker who is depicted as a “fat cat living large without adding much value to trading transactions”. He tries unsuccessfully to talk clients out of leaving his company for Scottrade, even though Scottrade’s low-cost offering is clearly superior. The broker is depicted as schmoozing, absent-minded, unhelpful and spoiled – while Scottrade is shown as the customer-advocate.

I’ve read some criticism about the campaign coming off as too goofball or “too much like a beer commercial”. What I gather from those comments is a general sentiment that since financial companies do serious business, they should only use stern, solemn marketing. That is daft! Scottrade’s humorous commercials don’t make me take the brand any less seriously. On the contrary, they effectively criticize the competition and show Scottrade as the refreshing alternative. I have a feeling that this campaign will resonate with consumers, because it differentiates Scottrade and shows them as being on the customer’s side.

Hello community banks and credit unions! Are you reading this stuff??

Here is yet another example of invaluable information about the minds of banking customers and their growing desire to make decisions based on “financial-consciousness”.

This particle essay comes from our CBC hometown: Portland, Oregon. A blogger describes the process of closing her account at Bank of America (which she opened when she was eight years old) and moving her money to a small, community based financial institution.

Her reasons are simple:

“[Bank of America] made risky investments, took $45 billion in bailout money and a year later, credit is still tight for the people whose tax pennies dug them out of trouble. I want to support financial institutions that make good, transparent loans to local businesses and would-be homeowners.”

Read her whole piece here to see how a “janky ATM” and “homely lobby” did not deter her from switching to a financial institution that was NOT a “swanky big player”, aka a bailout bank.

So, what does this mean for your marketing as a community-minded, local bank or credit union? For starters, it’s time to put away the “safe and sound and secure” messaging. The public already gets it. They have seen that you are NOT an irresponsible financial institution that will squander their money.

Most importantly, it’s time to let them know what your true personality is. Lay it on thick that you are a local and community minded, like them, and don’t forget to show how you do that in your own unique and quirky way. They want to see that! Just like our blogger mentioned, the “janky ATM” is just part of the charm. Showing that you are uniquely you is what will draw people to your financial institution as people begin to think more and more about what type of business they want handling their money.

Don’t hide who you are to compete with the big boys. The big boys have already lost and it’s your turn to take the stage. Now shine!

Today’s AdAge article, “The Principles of Marketing Can Be Summarized in One Word“, talked extensively about a topic that we always emphasize with our clients: the importance of focus. It seems like a simple rule to follow, but usually a person’s desire to provide everything and appease everyone gets the better of them.

The article uses the acronym FOCVS to describe the five key elements that should be the foundation of any branding or marketing effort.

F stands for First – “Nothing works better in marketing than being the first brand in a new category in the mind.” One financial example is the American Express “Black Card”, which was the first truly elite charge card on the market. It certainly wasn’t the first charge card, but it was the first in its product category. A non-financial example is Starbucks as the first high-end coffee retailer. They didn’t invent coffee, but they did create the concept of luxury coffee drinks.

O stands for Opposite – “Just be the opposite of the brand that did get into the mind first.” If you weren’t first, differentiate yourself from the brand that was by doing things the opposite way. I would argue that independently owned coffee shops represent the opposite of Starbucks in the same product category. They also sell very similar high-end coffees drinks, but they position themselves as the opposite (family-owned, anti-globalization, unique and homey, etc).

C stands for Category Dominance – “In category after category, well-known, highly admired global megabrands are trying to compete with narrowly focused brands. Invariably the narrowly focused brands are the winners.” This doesn’t just apply to global conglomerates. A credit union, for example, could dominate a certain category (such as youth banking) just within a small geographic market.

V stands for Visual Hammer – “Every brand needs two things: (1) A verbal nail to preempt a conceptual idea and (2) A visual hammer to hammer that conceptual idea into consumers’ minds.” This is an area that financial companies need to work on. Most banks and credit unions sport fairly generic positioning statements (taglines, if you will) and equally generic imagery (Americana theme, stock photography).

S stands for Second Brands – “Keep your existing brand focused and launch a second brand to exploit a new market.” Good examples include what Levi’s did with Dockers or Toyota with Lexus. Unfortunately, no strong financial industry examples come to mind.

A strong brand is essential for long term success, and focus is essential for a strong brand. However, this is often forgotten among management. Hopefully the FOCVS acronym will help keep it in mind!

Apparently, this new ad for Shake ‘N Bake started something at the Kraft corporate office. They were running the ad in Boston on an outdoor board from November through December and decided to put it up on a mirror outside the restrooms in the corporate office. The ad reads “You look smashing. But your chicken breasts could use a lift.”

Kraft – a typically safe and conservative brand – has decided in recent years to revamp some of the older products, like Shake ‘N Bake, to reinvigorate them in the marketplace. The ad shows the new snappy attitude they are adding to product campaigns. This is one of those tricky things companies and marketing agencies need to be careful of – it is very easy to push that line a little too far (in this case, possibly offending their target market). However, it is important to remember that it is GOOD to make people take a stand and love or hate you. If you are able to do that, then they have to decide their feeling about your brand or the product. You don’t want to be a “shoulder shrug” product…because then you aren’t differentiated or memorable.

I personally think this is ad is great – witty and attention getting. Not everyone thinks that way though. Comments on The Consumerist’s post about the topic are pretty much split down the middle. What do you think?

Brand New, a website devoted to analyzing the rebranding efforts of major corporations in many industries, released their Best and Worst Identities of 2009 list last week. It’s a good rundown of people’s opinions on the biggest rebrands of the past year. You may not agree with everything listed (for example, I don’t think bing was the #1 worst brand identity of 2009), but it’s interesting to read other creative professionals’ comments on why certain design and typography choices did or didn’t work.

Two of the financial brands that we’ve profiled on this blog, El Banco Deuno and Commerzbank, were also featured as some of Brand New’s best identities of the year.

While this is nice, it doesn’t really matter which list they are on (best or worst). The important thing is that at least they were significant enough to get people talking. Nothing is worse that a logo that leaves the public uninterested. For example, opinions on El Banco Deuno’s brand identity were sharply divided – not everyone liked it – but at least the design made people react. And that’s the most important thing.