101 Ideas To Make Banking More Fun

101 Ideas to Make Banking
More Fun
Resource: http://theﬁnancialbrand.com/35175/101fun-banking-ideas/

Tuesday 19 November 13

1. Put comedy routines into your
on-hold messages.
People hate waiting on hold because usually pre-recorded
messages are cold, canned rhetoric — “Your call is
important to us. Someone will be with you shortly. Thank
you for your patience. Do you need a new auto
loan?” Ugh. Fun brands entertain callers that they have to
put on hold. You could tell people the same things you
normally would, you could just do it with some
personality, style and ﬂair. Southwest Airlines had an onhold routine loaded with humorous bits about low fares,
fun destinations, baggage fees, etc. It actually made
sitting on hold a pleasant experience. In fact, some callers
would ask to beput back on hold so they could hear the
punchlines to some of the jokes!
usefulideas.net

2. Put Easter eggs on your website.
An Easter egg is an intentional inside joke, hidden
message, or similar feature — a surprise bonus, something
that’s fun to ﬁnd. For instance, loyal customers of In-andOut Burger know there’s a secret menu. Coast Capital
Savings used to have a virtual greeter named “Julie” on
their website who would answer questions from users. If
you asked about “checking accounts,” it would trigger a
video response from Julie. But if you asked Julie to tell you
a joke, she would. These days, video game designers know
that Easter eggs are mandatory in every title they release.
Take a page from their gamiﬁcation playbook and hide
some fun little gems on your website.

usefulideas.net

3. Put some fun into your ATM
receipts.
HSBC printed origami folding instructions on the back of its
ATM receipts. You could print jokes, cartoons or fun facts.
That’s what fun brands do: they are always looking for
ways to liven up mundane processes and objects. How can
you get consumers to see something that’s usually rote
and boring as fresh and innovative? You should always be
looking for ways to get people to stop and say, “Heh, that’s
neat! Never seen that before!”

usefulideas.net

4. Poke fun at your disclosures
and compliance jargon.
Most financial institutions try to hide their legal copy — almost as
if they were ashamed of it — by burying it in microscopic type at
the very bottom of layouts. But there’s no reason to hide (is
there?). Be playful with disclosures, and prove that they don’t
have to be dull and stuffy just because the law requires them.
Don’t be afraid to put a giant callout on your layouts that
screams, “Here’s the fine print!” Or you could refer to disclosures
as “some stuff our lawyers want you to know.” Put some jokey
stuff in your fine print: “Our free checking account may contain
peanuts, but we doubt it. Not switching to [Your Bank] may result
in itching, redness and occasional fainting. If conditions persist,
see a physician or call [Your Phone Number]. No fur-bearing
animals were harmed in the creation of these marketing
materials.”
usefulideas.net


5. Gamify banking.
To make banking fun, you need to be an imaginative
student
of gamification. As
Jim
Bruene
at
Netbanker suggests, you can create a program that allows
your customers/members to play financial games and keep
score against themselves and peers. They can earn points,
honors,
badges
and
discounts
for
credit-score
improvements, savings gains, debt reductions and other
measures of financial fitness and goal achievement.

usefulideas.net

6. Online scavenger hunt.
Get people to explore your online channels (e.g., website,
Facebook) with a scavenger hunt. Ask participants to ﬁnd
the answers to ﬁve questions. This is a great way to get
people to poke around a relaunched/redesigned website.
One credit union did this and doubled their web traffic.

usefulideas.net

7. Lost wallets.
There are all kinds of ways to have fun with “lost” wallets.
Get some branded wallets, load them with coupons for
your financial products, then drop them around various
public locations. You could put cash in them, with a little
note from the CEO. You could put clues for a scavenger
hunt or trivia game inside. Or you could make them
resemble a real person’s wallet, then film how people react
when they find the wallets? Do they return the wallets? Do
they keep the cash?

usefulideas.net

8. ATM bonus.
Randomly swap out a few $20s with $50s or $100s in one
ATM (or more). To get the biggest bang for your buck,
announce when, where and for how long the ATM(s) will be
loaded with bonus hundreds, then alert the press. That’s
what Industrial Credit Union didwhen they wanted to draw
attention to a new branch location they opened.

usefulideas.net

9. Have employees tell jokes.
When ﬂying Southwest Airlines, it’s not unusual to hear
employees trying their hand at standup comedy or singing
songs — “Yes, there is a smoking section on this ﬂight.
Please feel free to step out on the wing if you need to light
up.” You could even have employees wear buttons that say,
“Wanna hear a joke?”

usefulideas.net

10. Exploit a pop culture meme.
Cultural fads make great marketing fodder. Back in 2008
when the “LOL Cats” meme was a viral phenomenon, one
credit union gave away cheeseburgers to college kids who
opened new accounts, using a photo of a fat cat with the
headline, “I can has cheezburger?” Every now and then a
dance routine like the Harlem Shake comes along. Fun
banks and credit unions will perform their own rendition
and share it on YouTube.

usefulideas.net

11. Make your recruitment ads fun.
You can use your help wanted ads to position your
organization with a fun personality and attract the kind of
talent you need. That’s what Coast Capital did back in 2008
with this creative ad sporting the headline, “Wanted:
Marketing People. Also, Donuts” – lol

usefulideas.net

12. Poke fun at your competitors.
There’s nothing like getting dumped. On Valentine’s Day. That’s
what NAB, one of Australia’s four biggest banks, did to its rivals
Commonwealth, ANZ and Westpac. Using an elaborate mix of
marketing media, NAB announced that it would be “breaking up”
with its competitors. The day after Valentine’s Day, NAB
delivered an open letter to competitors that reads like a Dear
John letter. NAB said it had “moved on” by abolishing fees,
offering better interest rates, improving access to ATMs, and
supporting local businesses when other banks wouldn’t. The
lengthy “break up” letter was published in every major
newspaper. You don’t have to go quite as far as NAB. You can
just come up with a witty headline, like PFCU did below for this
bus wrap.
usefulideas.net

13. Develop an interactive game.
BB&T, a regional bank in the U.S., promoted leadership
skills in a game for iPads, iPhones and other mobile
devices. And Barclays in the UK built 56 Sage Street, which
is perhaps the single best online interactive game ever
developed by a ﬁnancial institution.

usefulideas.net

14. Be a student of fun brands.
Keep an eye on brands like Virgin Money, Southwest
Airlines, Old Spice, Charmin, Tangerine (ne ING Direct),
Taco Bell, Disney, JetBlue, Oreo and Wonderful Pistachios,
just to name a few. If you see another brand doing
something fun, add the idea to your “fun ﬁle.”

usefulideas.net

15. Offline scavenger hunt.
Eastern Bank hid some GoPro video cameras in secret
locations around their market, then gave consumers clues
to ﬁnd them on the bank’s Facebook page. It earned the
bank some great free press, and spiked traffic to their
website by 20%.

usefulideas.net

16. Make a billboard out of dollar
bills or loose change.
Vancity sorted over 60,000 pennies — now out of
circulation in Canada — by color and tarnish level, then
glued them to a massive billboard to create a
mosaic masterpiece. ING Direct glued loose change to a
street level display and let people pick off all the coins to
reveal the message: “Tired of being nickel and dimed?”

usefulideas.net

17. Have fun in your drivethrough lanes.
Michigan First Credit Union asked members in the drivethrough lanes at one of its branches if they would like
some entertainment. Those that said yes were treated to a
dance routine from seven high school aged performers
who boogied down to C&C Music Factory’s hit “Gonna Make
You Sweat (Everybody Dance Now)” around their cars. Then
on another day, those who wanted their drive-through
“entertainment” got treated to a free performance from a
mariachi band.

usefulideas.net

18. Flash mob.
A ﬂash mob is a group of people who assemble suddenly in
a public place, perform an unusual act, often a dance
routine or musical performance. Here’s one that Wells
Fargo did in Times Square back in 2011.

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19. Use toy cars to sell auto loans.
Put a miniature toy-sized kid car in your branch parking
lot. You can use either a vintage one from a second-hand
store like Town & Country Credit Union (below), or you can
pick one up at Toys-R-Us. Chain the thing to a bolt stuck
in the concrete if you don’t want to see it disappear. Then
put a sign next to it about your current auto loan
promotion/rates. Every single person who walks by will
stop to check it out.

usefulideas.net

20. Money tree.
You’ve probably heard the expression, “Money doesn’t
grow on trees.” Well in Australia, that doesn’t seem to be
the case, where one bank placed a tree full of $5 notes in
Syndey’s Fleet Park, then used hidden cameras to record
people’s reactions. You’d think people would mob the tree
and strip it bare, but they didn’t. Summit Credit Union
repeated the stunt in 2010 with similar results. It’s a
fascinating psychology experiment that yield great PR
opportunities.

usefulideas.net

21. Reward desired behaviors with
fun prizes.
You’ve heard the expression “you get what you give.”
That’s how it works when you want people to change
behaviors. If you want someone to take action or do
something differently than they have in the past, you’re
going to have to incent/reward those behaviors. For
instance, if you’re launching mobile check deposits, build a
promotion where some winner(s) win “Double Deposits.” If
you want to increase credit/debit card activity, create a
promotion where you randomly select and pay for
purchases. If you want people to change ingrained habits,
you’re going to have to make it fun.
usefulideas.net

22. Send your competitor a
message.
Coast Capital Savings asked people to sign a giant 8′x10′
greeting card that “congratulated” big banks for the $3
billion in fees that they charge Canadians annually. The
Canadian institution had their “I Love Fees” street team
collecting signatures on the mock greeting card at various
public locations.

usefulideas.net

23. Cash mobs.
Cash mobs play off the idea of flash mobs, but instead of
performing a song and dance routine, a group of folks get
together and flood a local, independent business, each
ready to spend about $20. A number of financial
institutions are having fun with cash mobs,which help
position them as supportive of small businesses.

usefulideas.net

24. Candid camera gag.
Here’s a great gag from NAB, the undisputed king of guerilla marketing in
the banking world. Luke, a typical consumer, strolls through the local mall
on a sunny afternoon when he stumbles upon a pair of football tickets
apparently lost by another shopper. Luke takes the tickets to the nearby
“Lost Property” desk. “I found these laying on the ground over there,” he
explains, handing the tickets over. “Well that’s honest of you,” says the agent
staffing the Lost Property kiosk. “What’s your name?” “Luke,” he says.
Moments later, as Luke continues his stroll through the mall, he sees his
name and face plastered everywhere — on posters and video displays. He’s
even on the news. “Is this the new face of honesty?” asks one poster sporting
Luke’s photo. A massive 20-foot display in the center of the mall screams,
“Thanks for your honesty!” As if that weren’t enough, a baker inside the mall
has decorated a cake in his honor. “Honest Luke,” it says in blue, sugary
letters. The campaign stressed the bank’s integrity and approach to ﬁnancial
matters, with a particular focus on a new credit card with no strings or
hidden fees.

usefulideas.net

25. Random acts of kindness.
In the spirit of the ﬁlm “Pay it Forward,” send street teams
out to perform guerilla good deeds for unsuspecting
citizens in your community. You can pick up the tab for a
family’s dinner, or surprise a local ﬁre department with a
free lunch, or pay for someone’s gas.

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26. Host an ice-cream eating
contest.
In the spring of 2013, Magnify Credit Union invited Joey
Chestnut, the number-one ranked eater in the world, to
compete at the Magnify Credit Union World Ice CreamEating Championship. Prizes ranged from $100 up to
$2,000 for ﬁrst.

usefulideas.net

27. Interactive floor mats.
These things are a blast. Objects are projected onto the
floor, where motion detectors interpret people’s actions,
allowing them to interact with the objects. You can kick
things like soccer balls. Swipe things off the screen like
sand. It’s loads of fun, and something financial marketers
can easily make relevant to banking (e.g., coins, piggy
banks, etc.)

usefulideas.net

28. Hand out free money.
Consumers love cash, so start handing out free money in
public. Just be sure to bring your camera, because you’re
going to have some great material for TV stations and viral
YouTube campaigns. Businesses in every other industry
give away their inventory, so why not banks and credit
unions? Invite people in for some “free samples from the
vault.”

usefulideas.net

29. Hire fun and funny people.
If you want to build your brand and your internal culture
around the concept of “fun,” that means you’re going to
need fun people on board. It shouldn’t be very difficult
ﬁnding questions HR can ask in interviews to screen
prospective job seekers and see how fun and/or witty they
are.

usefulideas.net

30. Punch the pig.
When a PNC customer is banking online, they can just
“punch” a little piggy bank icon that pops up from time to
time. Whenever they “Punch the Pig,” money transfers from
checking to savings in a pre-deﬁned amount speciﬁed by
the customer. For smartphone users, the “punch” is
actually a “shake”. Users can decide how often the pig pops
up or choose to let PNC surprise them randomly.

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31. Bake breakfast biscuits for
business customers.
Countybank cooked up a clever campaign targeting
businesses in the bank’s area. They offered new business
customers a free biscuit breakfast for up to 13 people
delivered to the ﬁrm’s doorstep as long as the business
was willing to meet with a Countybank representative.
http://theﬁnancialbrand.com/3514/countybank-biscuits/

usefulideas.net

32. Break a world record.
Commonwealth Bank assembled 935 people wearing Aussie team
colors to break the Guinness World Record for “most people
wearing the same team uniform in a photo.” This stunt,organized
by Commonwealth as part of the 2012 Olympics, reminds
ﬁnancial marketers that there is a lot more to PR than just
pounding out corporate press releases. Commonwealth managed
to get themselves on the front page of every paper, on the
homepage of every new website, and on every news broadcast in
Australia. And what did it cost them? Basically nothing. All they
had to do was invite a bunch of Aussies to a barbie, then give
them beer and jerseys.
Standard Chartered Bank went one step further (actually many
steps further) when they became the ﬁrst bank on earth to have
someone use their mobile banking app at the peak of Mt. Everest.

usefulideas.net

33. Savings lottery.
People love to gamble. So if someone wants to sock some
money away for a while, why not do it at a bank or credit
union where they have a random shot at winning a few
thousand extra bucks? A savings account lottery is a fun,
innovative way to capture consumers’ attention and
encourage positive savings behaviors while generating new
account activity for ﬁnancial institutions. Just make
sure prize-linked savings schemes are legal in your area.

usefulideas.net

34. Make a friendly bet with a
competitor.
Challenge a competitor with a wager. It could be a local
rival — say a bank vs. a credit union. Or it could be a nonthreatening institution in another part of the country (even
the world). When Notre Dame’s football team played
Alabama for the national championship, two credit unions
— Notre Dame FCU and Alabama Credit Union — competed
to see who could get the most credit card applications by
game time. The loser had to pay $10,000 to the charity of
the winner’s choosing.

usefulideas.net

35. Whirlwind of money machine.
There are few amusements at live events as alluring
as those booths that blow cash around. Lucky consumers
get to step inside for a predetermined amount of time and
snatch all the cash they can from the monetary whirlwind.
It’s fun for everyone, and relatively easy to control your
risk/exposure/costs.

usefulideas.net

36. Give away ice cream.
When Umpqua Bank opens a new branch, they send out a
branded ice cream truck to hand out free frozen treats to
everyone within a ﬁve-mile radius of the new location. The
bank also has an “Icicle Tricycle” that they take to
community events.

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37. Make your window displays
interactive.
Using motion tracking, pedestrians can interact with LCD
screens mounted in your branch window displays. Citizens
Bank did this with an interesting nature theme, and Grow
Financial had a virtual “grab-the-cash” game that
passersby could play.

usefulideas.net

38. Fun and exciting giveaways.
Whenever you have a contest or sweepstakes, you can
make your prizes fun. OnPoint Credit Union used an allyou-can-grab supermarket sweepstakes where winners
had three minutes to stuff everything they could ﬁt into a
shopping cart.

usefulideas.net

39. Find a funny spokesperson.
USA Federal Credit Union used “Spike,” a bulldog to deliver
all manner of amusing headlines. And Georgia United
used “Aunt Sophie” — a cute little old lady — as their sassy,
no-nonsense and unexpected spokesperson. Another
credit union created“BubbaLuv.” And E*Trade has been
using its talking baby spokes-infant for nearly a decade.

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40. End of the world loans.
One credit union decided to have fun with the Mayan
prediction that the world would end on December 21,
2012. If that indeed happened, the credit union promised
to forgive any of its members new auto loans. And if the
world didn’t end, then members would be stuck with a
killer rate on a great auto loan.

usefulideas.net

41. Stage a protest.
There’s a lot that people can get mad about in banking. So
why not stage a protest for them. President’s Choice (a
supermarket in Canada with a ﬁnancial arm) had its
employees march in front of their locations with protest
signs that said “Stop Paying Bank Fees.” Members of the
press and various supporting materials were also on hand.

usefulideas.net

42. Send a bunch of barf bags in
the mail.
Eastern Financial Florida Credit Union ran a barf bag
promotion back in 2006, the headline, “Is Your Bank
Making You Sick?”

usefulideas.net

43. Keep your internal culture fun.
If you want to create a fun banking experience for
consumers, you’re going to have to maintain a fun internal
culture. You should “walk your talk” with employees. Don’t
tell them to have fun; show them how to have fun. (Hint:
Rows of lifeless, depersonalized cubicles are not conducive
to a fun workplace.)

usefulideas.net

44. Don’t block access to social
media sites.
Social media is fun, and it’s a part of our everyday lives.
Only a fun-hating organization would block access to
social media sites. And besides, everyone has a
smartphone these days, so isn’t it kind of pointless?

usefulideas.net

45. Funny commercials.
Talking babies and talking animals are always funny fodder
in ad land. First Direct used a platypus. First Tech Credit
Union used talking squirrels in its commercials. And who
can forget the devious comedy in this series of TV
spots from Ally starring hapless kids?GEICO’s crazy
commercials prove that you can be funny doing just about
anything you feel like.

usefulideas.net

46. Send anniversary cards.
You can fight attrition by acknowledging people’s tenure.
Start with their first anniversary — even just a simple card
saying thanks. Loyal customers (or members) might get a
yummy treat sent to them on their fifth anniversary. On
their tenth, they might get a gift card. In the years in
between, you could send amusing reminders about the
advantages, benefits and savings they’ve realized in the
last year by being a customer.

usefulideas.net

47. Have fun in social channels.
If there is anywhere that you can let your hair down, it’s on
Facebook, YouTube and Twitter. Don’t be afraid to do
create unusual content for your social channels — photos,
tweets, cartoons, jokes, videos, etc. If you can’t have fun
here, then the “fun strategy” probably isn’t for you.
Conversely, don’t try to build a fun brand if your CEO or
compliance people force you to play it safe and straight in
social channels. You can’t say, “Hey, we’re all about fun,” if
you’re not having any fun on Facebook.

usefulideas.net

48. Make your direct mail “lumpy.”
Whenever you print a direct mail piece, always be looking to do
something more than just your standard 6×9 postcard or 8.5×11
letter with a #10 envelope. If you have to send out a standard
letter/envelope, at least stick something “lumpy” inside — like a
pen. The post office will let you mail just about anything you can
stick a stamp on, so they don’t care if you put “lumpy” stuff in
your envelopes. Sure you’ll pay a bit more for postage, but you’ll
also get a much higher response rate. And it’s fun for the
recipient, almost like they are getting a little gift in the mail. With
DM, you should always introduce one or more tricks/techniques
to make the piece more fun and engaging — a die cut, unusual
fold, unusual paper/texture, pop-up, foil, translucent envelope,
etc.
usefulideas.net

49. Trivia games.
There are any number of ways to structure fun trivia
contests. One question or many. One big prize or lots of
little ones. Online, offline, on Facebook or Twitter.

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50. Funny = complete honesty and
utter truths.
The next time you listen to a stand-up comedian as they
work through their routine, pay close attention to the
things that make you laugh the hardest. Those will
invariably be the subject matter you feel holds the most
truth. Comedians love taking unspoken truths and turning
them into punch lines.

usefulideas.net

51. Make inside jokes only locals
would think are funny.
The Bank of Ann Arbor ran a playful series of billboards
mocking its competitors’ lack of local knowledge. The
billboards feature user-submitted slogans along with the
names of those selected as winners in the bank’s “Build-ABillboard” Facebook contest. “Non-local banks think
Briarwood is where Peter Rabbit lives,” read one (translation
for non-locals: Briarwood is Ann Arbor’s big mall).

usefulideas.net

52. Make conspicuous displays
from cash/coins.
People are fascinated by money — stacks and piles of it.
It’s just fun to look at. This bus shelter display is made
from special 3M security glass and real coins. The headline:
“Millionaires take the bus.” The copy: “Taking mass transit
versus driving saves roughly $5,000 per year. If those
savings are invested over a typical 45-year career, you’ll
retire a million dollars wealthier.”

usefulideas.net

53. Run a teaser campaign.
A teaser campaign is an advertising campaign which
typically consists of a series of small, cryptic, challenging
advertisements that anticipate a larger, full-blown
campaign for a product launch or otherwise important
event. In the teaser billboard below, the bank starts off with
a nearly all-white billboard. “What is it?” people wonder.
“Who’s it for?” Then over the course of the next few days,
more and more of the billboard is shown to reveal the
advertiser.

usefulideas.net

54. Make a viral video.
Psshhaw, you scoff? “Banks can’t make a viral video,” you
say? Not true. This three-minute video from TC Bank has
been viewed over 4.7 million times.

usefulideas.net

55. Go guerilla.
Guerilla is one of the most effective tools in the marketer’s
arsenal, and yet it is nearly completely ignored by most
ﬁnancial institutions. There is no better way to get
mountains of free PR than pulling of a good guerilla
marketing stunts. Study non-traditional campaigns and
turn yourself into a guerilla marketing commando. If you
want to make banking fun — on a budget — the bang for
the buck (i.e., ROI) on guerilla can’t be beat.

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56. Beer brainstorming sessions.
If you’re running low on ideas to make banking fun,
replenish your creative juices with beer. Get everyone
together on a Friday afternoon, or have an offsite overnight
retreat. When you’re looking for fresh ideas, it helps to
break away from your stale surroundings.

usefulideas.net

57. Kill a lame product/program.
One way to make banking more fun is to eliminate
headaches, hassles and roadblocks. If you’ve got a product
or program you know annoys consumers, kill it. It’s only
going to get in your way as you try to build a fun brand.

usefulideas.net

58. Create a mascot.
If you have a ﬁnancial education program for kids, a
mascot is a fun and engaging way to bring your message to
life. You can ﬁnd 25 different ideas for mascots that other
banks and credit unions are already using here.

usefulideas.net

59. Play with money.
Western Sun FCU made these printed pieces — a third of a
$100 bill — and left them around public places for people
to ﬁnd. It really doesn’t matter what they printed on the
insides of this nifty little marketing trick. People probably
read the entire message no matter what it said.

usefulideas.net

60. Use billboards.
It’s not that billboards are a tremendously effective
advertising medium (although they can be). It’s that
billboards give ﬁnancial marketers excellent opportunities
to express their fun, fresh take on banking. Good outdoor
advertising makes use of its environmental context. Great
billboards will become local pop culture sensations.

usefulideas.net

61. Send unusual thank yous.

Everyone
likes
cake!

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62. Have fun during Halloween.
The Financial Brand assembled this gallery of 10 frightfully
fun, freaky and fang-tastic Halloween promotions from
credit unions.

usefulideas.net

63. Online guessing game.
Take a page out of First National Bank’s marketing
playbook. They came up with a brilliantly simple Facebook
promotion that’s a spin on the age-old guessing game
made popular at county fairs in the 20th century — e.g.,
guess how many pennies are in this jar. They took a picture
of some piles of cash, posted it on Facebook, and invited
participants to guess the total sum. The closest guess won
a cash prize.

usefulideas.net

64. Interactive ads.
Technology now exists that allows mobile users to point
their smartphone at an ad and it will trigger an interactive
video. Imagine how much fun it would be to bring your
next ad to life — literally. Commonwealth Bank has run a
mobile-driven, augmented reality advertisement in key
Australian markets. The ad, placed in a number of
Australian newspapers, invites readers to download the
CommBank 3D reader app so they can explore Cherryford
Hill, an interactive virtual town.

usefulideas.net

65. Funny messages on outdoor
branch signage.
Some local businesses are famous for the amusing
messages they rotate on their monument and pole signs.

usefulideas.net

66. Throw pies in your CEO’s face.
This is great for charity campaigns. One credit union held
an internal contest for staff. Any employee who made a
donation was entered into a drawing for various prizes,
including a “Pie in the Face Contest.” Winners were allowed
to throw a pie in the faces of two credit union executives.
Six members of the senior team volunteered to take a pie
in the face.

usefulideas.net

67. Free hugs.
Sound silly? Maybe it is. But isn’t that part of having fun? A
credit union in Australia hired street teams to give away
hugs around Sydney when it relaunched its brand under the
theme “Generous Banking.”

usefulideas.net

68. Be dog-friendly.
Dogs are fun, playful — man’s best friend. You can put
water bowls out in front of your branches for your patrons’
canine companions. You can give out dog treats in your
drive-through lanes. You can have a dog mascot, like
Sunova Credit Union that has a St. Bernhard in every
branch. You can also support local dog charities.

usefulideas.net

69. Celebrate Christmas.
Cowards hide behind political correctness, while bold
brands have all the fun. And Christmas is fun! Innovations
FCU performed a brilliant 3-minute lip-dub performance of
“Jingle Bells” — shot all in one take. Innovations posted the
video posted to its YouTube channel, where it’s been
viewed over 16,000 times — not shabby for a credit union
with only 18,000 members and $157 million in assets.

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70. Offer crazy debit/credit card
designs.
Element FCU offers zombie debit cards, and DBS Bank in
Singapore offers a sprawling series of wild card designs
including one called “Deep In The Valley” you have to see to
believe.

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71. Celebrate birthdays.
Send your customers (or members) special birthday
greetings. Simply acknowledging them on their birthday
with an email or direct mail piece will score points. But you
can also include a special birthday gift or offer.

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72. Have a stamina contest.
Here’s an idea for an auto loan promotion: everyone who
asks about an auto loan is entered into a drawing. Ten
winners are assembled at one of your branches on a
Saturday where they lay one hand on a new vehicle you’ll
award to the last person to be touching the vehicle. You
could also run this kind of contest at a state or county fair.
BofA ran a similar promotion where contestants had to
keep their hand on a branded-jersey to see who would win
season tickets for their favorite NFL team — “Last Fan
Standing.”

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73. Come up with a fun slogan.
If you’re going to be the “fun bank” (or “fun credit union”),
you might as well make some noise about it. Consider
changing your institution’s branding tagline to something
that celebrates your focus on making ﬁnancial matters fun.

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74. Put a big smile on your brand
identity.
Refresh your brand identity with a bright, vibrant, playful
design. Make your brand identity something that
consumers enjoy looking at and have fun interacting with
— something they look forward to. Let your creativity and
imagination run wild. Copy should be light, clever and
friendly. And be brutally honest, because nothing is funnier
than the cold, hard truth.

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75. Offline guessing game.
Make a display with some assortment of bills and ask
branch visitors to guess the amount. Be sure to tell the
public about the contest and give the promotion adequate
marketing support. Alternate version: put the display in a
shopping mall for increased exposure and PR value.

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76. Make your headlines funny.
Every headline on every marketing piece your organization
creates is an opportunity to express your fun personality.

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77. Wrap your vehicles in graphics.
A key part of making banking fun is to make yourself look
as unbanklike as possible. Stuffy bankers drive Cadillacs.
Fun banks drive something interesting and unexpected,
then wrap them in cool, festive graphics.

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78. Custom website backgrounds.
A few ﬁnancial institutions let visitors to their websites pick
custom background images. Salem Five Bank gives
users 32 different photos to choose from — all equally
stunning. Some ﬁnancial institutions solicit images from
their customers.

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79. Dorm room makeover contest.
How can banks and credit unions push checking accounts
and other ﬁnancial products on college kids who have
other priorities? How about a $5,000 dream dorm room
makeover?What college-age student doesn’t want that?
Everyone can remember the ﬁrst time they laid eyes on
campus housing. They are dull, lifeless, functional spaces
painted an antiseptic shade of white. Bor-ring!

usefulideas.net

80. Movie night in branches.
There are quite a few financial institutions that have
designed their branches to double as community meeting
spaces. Yes, they can use the space to host financial
education seminars, but that’s predictable — not fun
either. Umpqua is one bank that uses branches for family
movie nights. They show age-appropriate films for kids
who wear pajamas while eating up the bank’s popcorn and
other treats.

usefulideas.net

81. Tie a banker to a light pole.
A bank in Australia duct-taped one of their own bankers to
a light pole in a busy town square. As passersby asked the
hapless banker if he needed help, he’d say that someone
was “already on the way,” then explain that he had been
kidnapped by a rival bank who left him stranded up on the
pole as retaliation for having such amazing rates and
service. “We’ve had so many good things happen this past
year, that the other banks… well, it’s just plain jealousy.”
It’s a lighthearted, playful, unexpected and fairly
inexpensive gag — another fantastic PR opportunities.

usefulideas.net

82. Hold a TV commercial contest.
Invite the general public to ﬁlm commercials for your
organization and/or its products. Give aspiring ﬁlmmakers
video clips and other visual resources they can incorporate
into their productions. Prizes can include things like video
cameras, TVs, and trips to Hollywood.

usefulideas.net

83. Name the branch promotion.
If you build a new branch location, why not let your
customers (or members) suggest names for it? You can
award prizes for the best suggestions.

usefulideas.net

84. Fight the zombie menace.
Michigan Community Credit Union uses the undead to
revive consumer interest in auto loans. They have a
massive multi-channel engagement campaign that includes
a lead-generating microsite, lookoutforzombies.com. The
highlight of the campaign is a crazy “choose-your-ownadventure” style interactive YouTube video that allows
users to select different scenarios. It’s really well done and
lots of fun. You can buy the whole campaign from the folks
at CU*Grow for few thousand bucks.

usefulideas.net

85. Pull an April Fools prank.
Pulling a good April Fools prank is tough. You can walk a
ﬁne line between a good ruse and something that pisses
people off. It’s best to poke fun at yourself — create a fake
product, or make up a phony funny milestone. The best
April Fools gimmicks are just plausible enough to rope
people in. You can ﬁnd some excellent examples here.
http://www.brandingmagazine.com/2013/04/02/brandson-april-fools-day-2013/

usefulideas.net

86. Make your employee intranet
fun.
Delta Community Credit Union’s creative and branded
employee intranet is affectionately named “Simon.” Simon
is the portal for all employee communications — the guy
who knows what’s going on inside the credit union.
Employees can access a calendar of events, employee
birthdays, HR suggestion box, training information, games,
project fact sheets, timesheets, updates on charitable
fundraising activities, HR policies and procedures, and
more. But Simon is more than just an intranet. He is a fullﬂedged internal spokesman and mascot, complete with a
costume and foam head.
usefulideas.net

87. Giant corn maze.
O Bee Credit Union partnered with a local newspaper and
the Washington State Department of Financial Institutions
to create a massive, 6-acre ﬁnancial education maze made
from corn. The credit union’s name, “O BEE,” was the
centerpiece of “The Amazing Money Maze.”

usefulideas.net

88. Put people on billboards.
Nothing makes a billboard more noticeable or memorable
than when a real person is on it, like the ads below for ING
Italy (below). One slant on the human billboard concept is
to put a person up until a certain goal or milestone is
achieved — e.g., until a certain sized charitable donation is
reached, or until you hit $10 million in new home loans. If
it isn’t feasible to put a real person on a billboard, think
about how you could use a mannequin, like the First
Community rebranding billboard (bottom).

usefulideas.net

89. Hurl some tomatoes.
For a 24-hour period, Heritage ran a live, interactive
“takeover” banner ad. When a visitor clicked on the banner,
they were prompted to enter their name, suburb and
answer this question: “Do you love your big bank?” Their
answer choices were “yes,” “no” and “when pigs ﬂy.” Once
the information was supplied, they were routed to a live
broadcast studio and introduced to “Heritage Man,” the ongoing star of Heritage’s TV commercials. Behind him were
three targets on a wall with the answer choices: Yes, No
and When Pigs Fly. Heritage Man would greet them by
name, engage in some light-hearted banter, then hurl a
tomato at the appropriate target.
usefulideas.net

90. Build a parade ﬂoat.

usefulideas.net

91. Hold a financial fitness
challenge.
First Tech Credit Union selected households to compete for
a $10,000 grand prize. The prize went to the household
that achieved the most financial success in four predetermined categories: debt reduction, increase in savings,
increase in overall net worth, and overall level of
participation in the program.

usefulideas.net

92. Buy a blimp.
We’re not talking about
buying a Goodyear-sized
blimp.
We’re
talking
about something much
more modest — in the
10-foot range. You can
use these blimps at
various community and
sporting events to drop
prizes on people.

Sunova Credit Union and a bank in Eastern Europe have
both used remote controlled airships to bomb consumers
with gifts.
usefulideas.net

Garanti Bank in Turkey used a remote-controlled hot air balloon
and a small, one-person glider to air drop gifts on citizens. The
packages contained a small stuffed animal attached to a small
branded parachute.
usefulideas.net

93. March Madness.
America goes bananas for the NCAA basketball
championships. It’s okay to use the idea of “March
Madness” — using plays-on-words and the concept of
brackets — just don’t use the actual trademarked term
“March Madness” or you’ll ﬁnd yourself in deep legal doo
doo. 66 FCU held a “Battle of the Brackets” promotion built
around a standard “pick-your-teams” contest. Grand prize:
a 60” HDTV.

usefulideas.net

94. A cage for video game duels.
In 2009, Guitar Hero was all the rage. One credit union
targeting college students took a step van and converted it
into a two-player mobile video game arcade — seethrough, with windows on three sides — a Guitar Hero
ﬁghting cage. The credit union took the truck to events
thick with college kids — concerts, campus events, etc. —
where staffers would hand out frisbees, t-shirts and other
fare with soft promotional value.

usefulideas.net

95. Name the goldﬁsh promotion.
You could put a goldﬁsh in every branch and let your
patrons submit suggestions for its name. Of you could do
an online version on Facebook where you post a photo of a
fat cat and have a “Name the Fat Cat Banker” contest.
Everyone loves making fun of fat cat bankers.

usefulideas.net

96. Have crazy or unusual job
titles.
Connex Credit Union created a new position called the Vice
President of Unbanking. What can you come up with?

usefulideas.net

97. Be courageous.
You aren’t going to have any real fun at your ﬁnancial
institution if you aren’t willing to take some chances. The
best brands are built by those who are brave enough to do
something new and different. Just accept that everything
you try won’t always work out the way you (or your CEO)
hoped.

usefulideas.net

98. Celebrate with staff.
Throw an employee party when you hit major milestones —
reaching $1 billion in assets for instance, completing a core
conversion, launching a new product, attaining 50,000
mobile banking app downloads, your 10 millionth pageview
on your website, etc. This makes the internal work
atmosphere more enjoyable while also connoting to
employees that the organization is strong, vital and “going
places.”

usefulideas.net

99. Make financial education fun
for kids.
Derived from ING Direct’s “Orange” brand, Planet
Orange provides learning activities and games designed to
teach kids (grades one to six) financial responsibility.
Although not quite as entertaining as Spongebob or Ben
10, Planet Orange nevertheless succeeds in delivering
much-needed financial literacy in an interesting package —
suitable for today’s media-saturated kids.

usefulideas.net

100. Ask consumers, “How would
you make banking fun?”
Once people have a feel for how much you like having fun,
open it up to them. Ask folks what ideas they have for
making banking a more fun, less sucky experience.

usefulideas.net

101. Keep reading The Financial
Brand.
If you want a steady stream of fresh and original ideas that
bring a little levity to banking services, there’s no better
source than The Financial Brand. We publish over 500
articles every year, recapping the most interesting, unusual
and unique promotions in the ﬁnancial sector. Subscribe to
the email newsletter and get new ideas delivered straight to
your inbox every week.

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101 Ideas To Make Banking More Fun

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