National Australia Bank’s (NAB) ‘break-up’
campaign – a promotion it commenced engaging various social media
platforms such as Twitter and YouTube in mid-February to attract
customers from rival banks – has added 225,000 customers in the
three month period since it launched.
By contrast, NAB added around 90,000 new
customers in the same period last year.
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NAB chief marketing officer (CMO) Sandra de Castro told a
marketing conference in Sydney on 7 June that the bank was “well on
the way, more than halfway” to making up the A$300 million it lost
when it reduced its overdraft fees ahead of the campaign.
According to de Castro, NAB’s fee for customers exceeding their
overdraft limit had been responsible for more than one-half of
client complaints in the past decade.
The NAB ‘break-up’ campaign has been hailed by marketeers as one
of the boldest and most aggressive bank marketing campaigns since
the financial crisis.
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By GlobalDataDe Castro was confirmed as NAB’s CMO in early June; she led the
‘break-up’ campaign having been appointed acting CMO last
December.
Prior to her current role, de Castro was executive general
manager for strategy & marketing for business banking at
NAB.
NAB launches fresh social media push
NAB kicked off June with another social media campaign following
the success of its “break-up” initiative.
It has rolled out a competition on Facebook based around popular
local sport, Australian rules football.
Entrants are invited to submit a video of themselves
commentating on one of eight selected “AFL moments”; the Australian
Football League is the governing body and major professional
competition of the sport.
NAB has allocated around 200 technical and marketing members of
staff to develop and support its various social media marketing
initiatives.
Initial social media PR disaster
NAB’s current social media hit is a far cry from its initial
social media experiment.
In 2008, NAB set up a website at myfuturebank.org – since killed
off and blasted as a PR disaster by marketing observers – in an
attempt to engage with customers online and listen to their
customer service experiences.
The experiment was slammed by some critics as dishonest and
unsophisticated.
In particular, it was alleged (although denied by NAB)
that a bank employee had posted comments on the
site posing as a legitimate customer.
CBA makes high profile marketing hire
CBA said that Dell’s global marketing vice president, Andy Lark,
would join the lender as CMO on 1 July.
CBA retail banking services group executive, Ross McEwan, said
in a statement:
“He [Lark] has vast marketing experience across business and
consumer sectors, as well as a strong record in emerging
technologies and use of new media channels such as social
media.”
