First Exchange Bank Overview

First Exchange Bank is a seven-branch community bank in West Virginia that just celebrated its 75th anniversary. Despite a fiercely loyal clientele, First Exchange Bank was experiencing stalled growth in both its core accounts and limited success in attracting new customers.

In 2007, bank leadership contacted Roger Rassman of Stellar Strategic, a Brand | Cool strategic partner, who conducted a Brand Equity Study and then wrote a Bank Growth Strategy that laid out a clear path for improvement:

• Address extremely low awareness among potential customers.
• Take advantage of the fact that offerings and service philosophy were aligned with what customers wanted, and that larger banks, many of whom had inherited local customers through acquisitions of smaller local banks, were perceived as delivering poor customer service.
• Find a way to counter the perception among non-customers that the bank was stagnant and had fallen behind the times.

Those who did know First Exchange Bank told detailed stories of a bank that was trustworthy, friendly, and convenient, with good service that even reached the level of, as one respondent said, “a rich uncle who knows what he’s doing and will help you out.”

Brand | Cool then stepped in to translate the Bank Growth Strategy into targeted brand positioning and an integrated marketing campaign. In the first quarter of 2009, with just two months of advertising in the field, First Exchange Bankwas enjoying a 34% increase in deposits—a full seven percent of growth over the same period in 2008.

Brand Positioning

Brand | Cool began the brand positioning process by conducting a Brand Audit that included branch visits, interviews with customers and bank staff and a review of competitor’s positions and markets. This intelligence, combined with the Brand Equity Survey results, formed the foundation for a Brand Positioning Workshop where Brand | Cool led bank leadership in defining the brand essence, promise, and personality. The purpose was to position the bank as authentically offering something of great value to customers, which wasn’t being supplied by its competitors.

The resulting brand essence: warm, wise champion. This position would be used to inspire not just a creative marketing campaign, but every business decision that the bank made going forward—from choosing products to offer to hiring personnel.

Brand Identity: New | Old

The next step was to define the new positioning in a brand identity, beginning with a new logo and color palette that was warmer, friendlier, and more down-to-earth than the previous design.

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Promotional Campaign 1

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Direct Mail 1

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TV Campaign

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Radio & TV Spots

60-second and 30-second radio spots focused on the friendly character of First Exchange Bank, and the customers who make it a community. TV spots heralded photos of the people who make First Exchange Bank so wonderful its customers—and the fact that they seldom chase better rates elsewhere.

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Print Advertising

Armed with dozens of customer submissions, our creative team went to work creating billboards, print ads, radio and TV spots and a web site that featured First Exchange Bank patrons “in real life”—a real life that was quirky, engaging and heartfelt. Brand | Cool set up a sophisticated media buying program to ensure the best possible ROI on the media investment. The emphasis was on geographic regions where the brand equity survey had indicated the best opportunities for new customer acquisition.

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Stationery Package

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The new look was carried into a stationery package—as well as signage for the branches.

Billboards

Billboards helped launch the media campaign, which debuted on Groundhog Day 2009, a traditional day of celebration for First Exchange. The new look and local celebrities created lots of buzz.

Customer Engagement

Brand | Cool developed an integrated marketing campaign for First Exchange Bank that included not only creative but also media planning and production. Using the fierce loyalties of existing customers as a springboard, the creative team decided that customers would welcome an opportunity to show how First Exchange Bank had made a difference in their lives. The campaign themeline became in real life.

The first step was a customer engagement program, where bank patrons were invited to “get into advertising” by submitting their family photos and stories about the bank.

Web Site

The First Exchange Bank web site got a design and information architecture makeover to bring it into alignment with the 'in real life' theme. Brand | Cool built the site on a content-managed platform for easy updating by bank personnel. Visit the live site: http://FirstExchangeBank.com/.