One focus puts One Account in the spotlight

FNB's One Account is the first single consolidated account to be launched to the middle to upper market in South Africa. "The changing global environment is forcing banks to produce leading-edge product offerings and to think 'out of the box' in terms of service offerings. FNB's One Account offers a single consolidated account to anyone who is interested in more convenient banking, has a good credit management record and uses property as financial security," says Gail Roberts, CEO for FNB's One Account.

"The One Account product offering is new to this market and our advertising campaign has followed suit through its originality. As the target market for the One Account is intelligent, informed and enjoys life's challenges, we wanted our advertising campaign to embody innovation, creativity and thinking beyond the boundaries. We hope that our campaign has intrigued our audience by cutting through the clutter."

Says Vivienne Le Roux, Marketing Manager for FNB's One Account: "The objective of the campaign was to not only move away from stereotypical banking advertising but to take the level of South African advertising to new heights. Our brief to our advertising agency, FCB, was to create a world-class campaign that could be entered into any international advertising competition. Our reasoning was, if the campaign was not good enough to enter into prestigious advertising competitions, then it certainly was not good enough for us. The agency used a blank canvas to create a ground-breaking campaign."

One of the aspects of the campaign also broke new ground with the SABC, by interrupting the programme 'Pasella' and continuity presenters during their appearance. The slots were interrupted by the FNB One Account actor asking if the presenters knew when the One Account ad would be flighting. "This was the first time this kind of advertising has been done by the SABC and they may not do this type of campaign for some time to ensure the integrity of the station remains intact. Just as we have broken new advertising boundaries, so too has the SABC," adds Le Roux.

"The individuality of the advertising campaign, both below-the-line and above-the-line, generated a huge amount of interest. The FNB One Account call centre has been receiving a constant flow of calls from both potential customers and FNB staff and applications are rising steadily," concludes Le Roux.