Community banks like Webster Five are just that, community partners. When COVID-19 hit, it was clear that both retail customers and businesses of all sizes were unsure of what to expect from their existing financial partners. While Webster Five has always believed and promoted that their “best investment of all” is their community, a divide threatened to emerge where personal service and in-person community support were once more evident. As such, Webster Five’s creative team at Stackpole jumped at the chance to devise a digital campaign rooted in reinforcing trust across the board.
Stackpole understood the need to come up with a genuine campaign quickly. The answer was simple: show both retail and business customers that their community bank was still there for them, even if that “there” had a new definition. To do this, creative was brought forward with two individualized taglines: “We’re Doing Our Part So You Can Do Yours” for retail and “The SBA Puts Their Trust in Us. Shouldn’t Your Business Do the Same?” for business.
The branding was simple, colorful and bold, which echoed the strength of the statements.
Webster Five’s support was promoted to the retail client market via Addressable Geofencing as well as site direct on Worcester Telegram & Gazette (T&G) from April to June 2020. Facebook PPC advertising was added for the months of May and June. Those who clicked through were greeted by a new section of the website that provided access to all the tools they would need to stay safe and solvent including contactless and digital banking, stimulus deposit information and more.
The business campaign, which championed the Webster Five’s SBA Preferred Lender status, was showcased using a mix of Addressable Geofencing, Site Retargeting, Keyword Search, LinkedIn, site direct on Worcester Business Journal (WBJ) and via print April to August 2020.
The effect on Webster Five’s retail business was astounding. In April, their digital campaigns enjoyed an enviable click-through rate (CTR) of 0.14% from Addressable Geofencing as well as 0.17% and 0.76% on their two Homepage Takeovers on T&G. This was great news as it meant that their metrics tracked evenly or in some cases above previous months of successful, pre-pandemic programmatic digital marketing.
By May, things really began to heat up. The average CTR climbed to .15%, and the overall campaign contributed to an increase in personal checking account opens compared to April. Retail client confidence was high, and business was steady.
While the Addressable Geofencing and Keyword Search CTRs did dip slightly in June to an average of .12% due to increased pandemic-motivated competition in the digital space, Facebook PPC remained relatively steady with a CTR of 0.23%.
The SBA Preferred Lender Campaign began with a bang. After launching in April in tandem with the COVID Community Support Campaign, they saw an average of 0.16% CTR from their WBJ site direct buys — WBJ Tuesday Daily, ROS Banners and Shoutbox ads — as well as on their LinkedIn ads.
This success only increased in May as Webster Five enjoyed an average of 0.23% CTR on their digital ads (a notable increase in both the clicks and CTR) and a 163% increase in SBA loans compared to April.
Much like with the COVID Community Support Campaign, the Addressable Geofencing and Keyword Search CTR decreased a bit in June. However, the site direct ads on WBJ and Site Retargeting finished with an incredible 0.23% and 0.29% respectively.
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