I hadn't either, until a couple of days ago. The thing is reaching young consumers with advertising messages is getting really difficult. They have such tight control over what they watch, read, and see. They get their news from John Stewart, via podcast. They TIVO their TV shows, and watch whenever they want, without the commercials. They listen to digital satellite radio. It's like trying to reach somebody wearing blinders and earplugs. So what do you do?Well, they like to play games. So you can reach them via interactive promotions in which they get to participate. We've been doing a…

Well, you have if you're a bank marketer. UMPQUA Bank is an Oregon bank that has put the "retail" into retail banking in a big way. They call their branches "stores." They actually sell stuff in there. They open the stores up to public meetings, serve coffee to people hanging out there, and generally position themselves as the greatest bank in the world. They've taken guerrilla marketing and word of mouth to the limit also. They have an ice cream truck, which they take around to the markets they serve, passing out free ice cream. Everybody loves UMPQUA. Does everybody…

Just got back from the ABA Marketing Conference. Here are a few quick thoughts.- Bank marketers are under greater pressure than other types of marketers to show a Return on Investment for their marketing spend-but it's something all marketers face.- Even the super quantitative people who CAN track and report ROI on promotional programs can't track ROI on brand marketing. - Selling to the top requires a way of thinking that is unconventional for bankers.To help sell marketing ideas to non-marketers (something we do every day in the ad biz), I suggest that you prepare for the presentation by making…

We've been doing marketing for banks since we started, back in 1994. Before that, I worked on many, many, many banks. In fact, the very first advertising assignment I had was for Equibank, in Pittsburgh, back in the 1980s. Very retail! Anyhow, I've always had this question. Maybe somebody can help me with this. It appears to me that the key to bank success is cross-sell ratio. I've observed that just about every bank measures this. Many complain about how theirs is too low, or boast to the boss that while theirs is lower than they'd like, it's still higher…

We're getting ready to go to the ABA Marketing Conference. We've been putting materials together that we think might be of interest to bank marketers, that we think might get the attention of bank marketers, that we think might engage bank marketers in a fun way. We've also been talking a lot about our credentials and accomplishments, in a way that will help us present them to bankers-the old elevator speech exercise. Bank-Marketer. Seems like an oxymoron, doesn't it. That's what makes this such a puzzle. And such a fun challenge. We've worked with a lot of bank marketers. The…