Paul J Lucas, national marketing and branding consultant and frequent CU Journal contributor, wanted to share some thoughts on brand management for credit unions. Visit Paul's website at pauljlucas.com,email at paul@pauljlucas.comor call (202) 320 5759 to learn more.
Going into 2010, the top brand challenges for credit unions will be:
1. Misunderstanding what a brand is and why it matters. It is important to have a brand strategy that is embraced by the entire organization. If your staff doesn't get it you can't expect your members to embrace your brand.
2. Lack of understanding in the marketplace that credit unions are ideal primary financial services providers - not just a good place to get a vehicle loan. This means that credit unions must explain both the credit union concept and their own specific brand stories.
3. Communicating that shared branching and ATM networks are competitive to the national presence of large banks. This is critical to a credit union's ability to compete against multi-branch banks (and credit unions). Yet most members have no idea what "shared branching" means or how competitive large ATM networks are compared to many large bank systems. Do not assume members know what "shared branching" means, or how to use it.
4. Bad advertising and marketing that obscure the brand and fail to communicate the credit union's benefits can erode brand value.
Your marketing/messaging must be clear, straightforward and benefits oriented.
Creative does matter - effective creative gets you noticed and it clearly states the benefits of using your CU.
All messages must be consistent building blocks for the brand: advertising; signage; brochures; newsletters; statement messages; eLerts - every member touch point.
5. Overemphasis on reaching new members at the expense of building more productive relationships with current members. Build brand loyalty inside-out! Your current members are the best prospects for increasing product and service penetration. That is key to building a successful, stable financial services organization
6. Letting impatience trump consistency. Throwing together ads, products, announcements, etc. without taking time to tie them to your brand strategy is counter-productive.
7. Constantly changing things in search of the "magic bullet." Changing offers, ad mediums, products, etc. in search of the one magic key to prosperity is a death spiral. There are no magic bullets beyond consistency and brand clarity.
8. Thinking business development reps will quickly and easily grow assets. Business development reps are only as good as they are managed and credit unions do not usually have experienced, effective sales managers on staff. Business development reps who are unskilled and untrained can do your Brand more harm than good.
9. Working with a marketing budget that is too small to achieve marketing goals. Some annual marketing budget benchmarks:
0.25% of assets at a minimum for small institutions.
0.50% for a larger SEG, near community or small market community CUs.
0.75 to 1.50% for large/urban community charter CUs.
10. Remembering that credit unions are chartered to lend money! That requires becoming a competitive retail marketer.
While some see red, Old Hickory Credit Union is seeing pink.
by Ron Daly
I'm sure football fans have noticed all the pink surrounding their favorite teams, cheerleaders and even stadium equipment the past few weeks. Sports Illustrated even "went pink" in its most recent issue, all to acknowledge the fight against breast cancer. I saw a great program go across the DigitalMailer production line this week and wanted to share it with everyone.
1. A team of Old Hickory CU employees will be participating in the Nashville Making Strides Against Breast Cancer event on Saturday, Oct. 24. Their goal is to donate $2500 to the American Cancer Society; 2. Old Hickory CU is selling pink umbrellas for $15, with $7 of that going to the American Cancer Society. These umbrellas also come with a set of coupons for credit union services that benefit members; and 3. All branches are offering information on breast cancer awareness, as well as supplemental cancer insurance policies.
When we inquired about the eLert topic Malinda Warchus, Assistant VP of Marketing commented “It might seem like a strange thing for a financial institution to send out an eLert about, but we are committed to improving the lives of our neighbors and making a positive difference in our communities. The outpouring of response from our members tells us that they like joining our cause.”
Not strange at all...and we agree with the members! In fact, I hear our DMI team is in line for any umbrellas that are left once the members are taken care of.
Most of the time, Credit Unions think they can only use member email addresses for eStatement notifications, newsletters or selling a new product or service. Those same email addresses can be used to communicate the difference between a bank and a credit union, as well as raising awareness among CU members the community outreach credit unions are involved in. Old Hickory CU has done just that by tying into a national promotion and using inexpensive methods of communication (email, electronic alerts, and monthly newsletter) and community outreach to reach members and potential members at a fraction of the cost.
Kudos and this effort speaks to the character of Old Hickory CU employees and management. Keep up the great work!
The DigitalMailer blog will be a year old as of tomorrow. We're very excited to have added the blog to our website and to be able to communicate with you - our partners, our clients, our friends - on a regular basis.
Having spent a year in the blog-scape (or just about), we thought we'd share a few lessons we've learned along the way.
1) Rome wasn't built in a day, even if your blog was.
Jimmy Marks, our Creative Media Director, made this blog work on our site and set up an archive people could read through. It didn't take him long to get things rolling and for us to post stories and topics of interest. But gaining a readership and bringing in people was tough, and at times a little disheartening. Luckily, we stuck with it and it has had lasting benefits.
2) Write for the people you care about
We wanted to do what we could to give our clients and partners, both current and potential, a look at how we operate. People use our stories and posts to get a look inside our world and, hopefully, to better their own.
3) Don't be afraid to expand
Our other blogs, clickconnectcommunicate.com and cusoapbox.com, came out of our desire to share our thoughts with our joined industries - communication technologies and credit unions. CCC Blog stands to give our friends and neighbors our thoughts on emerging technologies. CU Soapbox is growing every month, becoming a mouthpiece for folks in the CU industry who want to keep up with what's going on. But we keep this blog running to highlight the good works of our employees and our company as a whole.
4) If you're not having fun, you're doing it wrong.
I'm a fairly quiet guy. I didn't know how much fun I was going to have writing short stories and ideas about the industry here in my own little corner of the internet. My number one goal: don't let it feel like a chore. If I don't want to post anything, I don't post anything. If I do, I let 'er rip. And the blog maintains no deadlines.
When you're looking for the good news about DigitalMailer, or just want my two cents, this is where you should start. We're happy to be here, and we look forward to many more years online.
Gen-Y's using the Internet all the time (and handing ME the bill)!
by Greg Crandell
Read a little article from eMarketer (click here) about Gen-Y's affinity for the internet. I wondered if this was one of those "Duh of the Week" things Ron likes to talk about (I think their first award was just given away today over at CUSoapbox.com). And then I looked at the charts that the article showed that said Gen-Y kids are using mobile communication 30% more than folks my age.
I suppose that's just a difference in generations. They have technology now that we just didn't have/need/want when I was their age. And they have parents who, for whatever reason, set them up with it. Read this whitepaper for more information (click here for PDF). Don't get me wrong, iPhones are sweet little pieces of machinery. They can tell you songs you're listening to and find you a sushi restaurant and let you watch Gone with the Wind simultaneously, if you're into that sort of thing. But they're also pricey. So much so that some people use the iPhone as a replacement for home phones, internet service and personal computers (read the ComputerWorld article for more info). The fact that poverty is supporting 3G network growth is astonishing to me, but hey...stranger things have happened, I suppose.
But back to young people using the Internet between 80 and 90 percent of the time. What's to be said about that? Is it better for kids to be Twittering and Googling and Flickring and Tumblring and...anything-else-ing all day? Should they be made to pay for it on their lonesome? Is there any way to do it?
I welcome a solution in our "comments" section, if you've got one.
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And your "this counts as news" story of the week?
Police post want ad for people to become snitches. From MSNBC.com.
