Marketing is no substitute for integrity!

Mark Buckman the CMO of the Commonwealth Bank of Australia (CBA) took a swipe at the Direct Marketing industry for accepting a 2% average response rate.

The rant which included mention of the 30 million dollars spent each year came after a CBA DM ad campaign allegedly produced a 20% response rate.

Some of us old-timers can instantly recognize that the response rate quoted could only be yielded from an incentivized publishing environment. That is, the end users would have been given some incentive to engage with the brand. An embarrassment that will reveal itself as the downstream data from this campaign is considered.

Please know that I make this assertion completely ignorant of the specifics of the campaign in question. What I do know is that a 20% response rate is possible without any additional enticements to the end user. I also know that no product produced by the CBA in the last 10 years qualifies for such an ovation from end users.

So what does it take to attain a response as high as 20%? While there are many factors that contribute to a successful DM campaign, one of two elements is essential – a great brand and a great offer. Having both elements in play will virtually guarantee a high response.

It has been a long time since I have allowed mailing of a “big four” bank offer to my list. The big four banks are one of the only advertising groups that send my unsubscribe rate through the roof. I am talking more unsubscribes than clicks!

Hold on – don’t the CBA have a great brand? Mark Buckman says they do. Here is my rather long-winded point…

Your brand is not the construct that the marketing department decide it is. Your brand is your reputation.

The reputation of the “big four” Australian banks stinks. Just ask anybody in the street.

So why does their reputation stink?

It stinks because of their cynical attempts to defraud their customers of every last dollar through newly invented fees and charges. It stinks because of their deliberate failure to make banking efficient for the end user. It stinks because we are subjected to endless reports of growing profits while having to watch our accounts constantly for exorbitant expenses associated with any oversight on our part. It stinks because we watch our government guarantee banks survival when they wouldn’t spare a second thought for ours.

We are clever, us humans. We know where these profits come from.

You can’t polish a turd. Sure, you can cover it up, put icing sugar on it, spend millions of dollars giving it a new and “hip” geometrical shape. But there is no prize for guessing what is underneath the veneer.

Open your ears Mark Buckman. Listen to your customers. Give people what they want where possible and have the courage to face your own demons as an organisation. Clean up the messes you have created and commit to producing an internal culture that inspires your people to listen to and exceed your customers’ expectations.

If you were a bank that did that – you wouldn’t need to spend 30 million on DM.