Two Emerging Marketing Trends

Patrick Totty

Steve Casey, owner of Rain Advertising, Portsmouth, N.H., reports an interesting trend in credit union marketing: State associations marketing to consumers. "People like credit unions because of their low rates but still think they have to join one through work. There’s no ‘air cover’ for credit unions in the sense of a big institutional national or regional marketing push on their behalf. I’ve never seen so big an industry so unpublicized."

What makes marketing so important, Casey says, is that "credit unions are on the verge of a ‘land grab,’ providing they understand what’s at stake. There are a lot of disenfranchised people out there who don’t like big banks. As community banks are dying, credit unions can step in and sign up these people as members. If credit unions do a good job of starting the relationship, they’ll succeed at this."

And Steve Jones, president of Austin, Texas-based Concepts Unlimited, observes that retail merchandising is back. "The Web and Internet services drew people away, but now it has turned 180 degrees: Lots of branch building is going on; more than in previous years. Establishing a brand presence and retail merchandising are what’s big now."