BMO has put a real customer in need of help at the heart of a new online video.
The three-and-a-half minute spot from Mosaic is called “Help Given” and features Arash, a small business owner who works seven days a week at his deli. His local BMO branch surprised him with a day off, with BMO employees serving up sandwiches to a huge crowd of people.
“[Help Given] is a chance to put into practice what our brand promise is all about, which is ‘here to help’ and the humanity that goes with that,” said Joanna Rotenberg, chief marketing officer and head of strategy at BMO Financial Group.
“We’ve had an internal mantra through this launch that we are people first and bankers second. We hear that from our customers all the time as a point of difference and this was really our opportunity to put that out in a compelling way.”
The video is part of BMO’s recent brand refresh, which launched last November with a campaign by Y&R.
“One of the governing thoughts was that we clearly see there is no playbook… People are all taking different paths in their lives and it’s not about one size fits all when it comes to the banking relationship,” said Rotenberg. “It really is about money being personal.”
Since banks are seen as highly transactional, BMO saw an opportunity to sharpen its message about what makes it unique. “We’ve always been told by our customers that BMO employees are really special, and sometimes it’s hard to bottle that and put it out in the marketplace,” said Rotenberg.
The new online video “was a great opportunity to be able to do that, showing our employees at what they do best,” she said. “They weren’t scripted: this is a real customer and a real relationship, so it was really an opportunity to show what makes them special.”
