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Differentiating products and services through advertising is common for many industries. Financial services marketers seem to be having a particularly tough time.

In preparation for my role on a branding panel at the recent Washington Bankers Associ

According to USFDA, a combination product is one composed of any combination of a drug and device; biological product and device; drug and biological product

ation marketing conference, I hired a clip service to capture Western Washington bank print advertisements for two months. The panelists also collected their personal financial direct mail for the same period. The result was thousands of ads from scor

; or drug, device, and biological product and fixed dose combination would include two or more combinations of drug.

Examples of combination products may in

es of banks and credit unions. The junk mail must have weighed 30 pounds.

Consumers are being inundated with financial ads, direct mail, and telemarketing. With direct mail, much of the effort attempts to persuade consumers to open envelopes with f

lude drug-coated devices, drugs packaged with delivery devices in medical kits, and drugs and devices packaged separately but intended to be used together.

ake checks, fake government documents, and fake come-ons that offer incredibly low interest rates that aren’t that low when one looks at the fine print. Everyone at the conference agreed that this tactic is expected from loan brokers, yet seemed surp

here is enormous increase in the number of combination products entering the market in the recent years. Combination products have proven advantages but fixe

rised to see this tactic from quality institutions like Bank of America. Still, we are seeing more of it. Precious little direct mail demonstrated why each bank was the right choice. Much of the advertising is not much better.

Carrie Williams, pres

d dose combinations are still in the process of convincing regulatory authority on their advantages over the single ingredient formulations.

Combination pro

ident of BrandLab (www.brandlab.com), agreed to sort through the marketing messages and create brand maps to demonstrate how banks appear to consumers and how banks compete against each other. Carrie has a lot of experience doing this for industries

ucts have become life saving products for the pharmaceutical companies who doesn’t have many innovative molecules in their product pipeline and have been inc

such as healthcare, fashion, and the airlines and is skilled at getting to the essence of what she calls the brand soul. As she says, brand soul is a reflection of what is core to an organization. It encompasses its values, personality, its style of

easingly used in the product life cycle management. Even the companies having product patents are trying to extend their product life cycle through the combi

doing business, and how it gives back to the community. The good news is that any bank that wants to stand out through exceptional advertising has almost an open field. The bad news is that the financial industry is rapidly moving to commodity statu

nation products and maximize the revenues. But the companies involved in this practice are overlooking that they are burdening the patients both economically

s by educating consumers that all they should consider is the best deal. With the exception of a handful of financial institutions, none of the ads contained any brand attributes at all, per Carrie. In essence, most financial institutions are not ta

and physically. They need to rightly judge the benefits of the combination products and they have to even look at the risks involved when combining the produ

lking to consumers in ways that are memorable or compelling.

Rather than cluster by brand attributes, the work focused around product and service features. In rank order, offers focused on the following:

1) better rates
2) higher return
3

ts. Some of the combination products were well accepted by physicians while others suffered. Companies involved in development of combination products are fi

) personal service
4) product specific
5) promotions
6) local community

Advertisements feature pictures of happy customers, happy employees, and experienced bankers. And most of the work is remarkably similar.

There were some exceptio

ding difficulty in defining their combination products and facing various challenges from selecting a combination to marketing it.

Following aspects would a

ns. Bank of America, Washington Mutual, Key Bank, and Wells Fargo all have the kind of advertising one would expect from giant ad budgets. Their messages are consistent, they emphasize ideas that differentiate them from other banks, and they look like

dd to the challenges in developing combination products:

Which markets to tap where the combination products can do fairly well?
Which combination prod

quality institutions by having well produced ads. Banks with more modest budgets, such as Sterling Bank, Banner Bank, and Homestreet Bank, have also done a good job creating work that differentiates and offers marketplace consistency. The rest of th

cts are meaningful and rational?
Which therapeutic categories to select?
Which Combinations can address unmet needs of the patients?
Do combin

e work is just wallpaper.

More of the financial industry is moving away from human interaction and relying increasingly on electronic service, and consumers are embracing this trend in growing numbers. Now they can shop for loans from the privacy of

tions increase the patient compliance?
What would be the developing cost?
How to tackle the risks encountered during combination product developmen

their homes, and they can consider institutions from across the U.S.

Fabulous communications are mandatory in our less-personal-touch world. They can give consumers a sense of relationship with their financial institutions and help illustrate through

t?

As combination products don't fit into the traditional categories of drugs, medical devices, or biological products, the USFDA is in the process of devel

storytelling each bank’s personality in a way that resonates. Still, the evidence would say that banks are being wooed by the notion that ROI is all that counts in communications. If you get the greatest response rate, the story ends there. But does

ping new procedures for reviewing their safety, efficacy and quality.

Professional from academic institutions, pharmaceutical industries, health care indust

it?

I learned at Disney decades ago that several factors should go into evaluating advertising performance. Campaign performance and ROI count for a lot. Equally important is the net impression that the communications leave behind. With direct mail

y and representatives from various regulatory agencies are working out to design the regulatory requirements for manufacture and sale of combination products

in particular, a two percent response rate is not the only factor. What was the take-away for the 98% who did not respond? At Disney, we cared more about the 98% than the 2%. And most important of all, we cared that the work reflected well on the Disn

.

As there is an increasing trend of the combination products companies manufacturing such products should be able to tackle the problems involved in the de

ey values, which every employee understood.

Shareholders and consumers will be well served when bank messaging reflects each bank’s people, values, and personality and the consumer experience reflects those unique attributes in a consistent and winni

elopment. They need to be wiser in analyzing the market trends and the regulatory requirements.

Companies that provide selfless information through particip

ng way. With that said, stop the slogans, research your brand personality, and create work that makes it possible for Carrie’s concept of brand’s soul to penetrate through the ad clutter and engage the right customers to propel your business forward.

tion in industry events and feedback to regulatory authorities would be able to face the challenges and will be successful in developing combination products

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Many Universities to propel their academic research programs faster will partner with government agencies and private enterprise and this makes sense because it is a great source of monies to help propel the university and the businesses and government to get brilliant minds who basically work for free as slave labor.

Vending machines present a relatively dependable means of making money. You can buy, place, install, maintain, and then reap the benefits of owning a vending machine as a side project, or you can quit your day job and just work with the vending machines full time.

No matter what business you are in, there is a culture in your office. The language of the office is fluid, changing as quickly. Keeping up is important because clear communication is the key to succ...

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