How do you choose to do business with one company vs. another?
Which is it?
- Price
- Location
- Product
- Service
- Name Recognition
When it comes to a brand, I like Kid Rock’s quotation:
If it looks good, you’ll see it. If it sounds good, you’ll hear it. If its marketed right, you’ll buy it. But… If its real… you’ll feel it.
Businesses pay big bank on advertising to convince their target audience to -feel it- and buy their brand. One bank decided a different form of publicity, hoping people would -feel it-. TD Bank, based in Canada, released the video below in July 2014 and it’s gone viral. Over 10M hits in one month.
In this marketing gem, TD Bank (TD stands for Toronto Dominion) turns an ATM into an “Automatic Thanking Machine.” It was there way of giving thanks to customers.
On the same day the vid was released, over 20K TD Bank employees in over 1K branches across Canada gave out green envelopes stuffed with $20 in cash. Christmas in July. Cool huh?
Thousands of other customers were contacted electronically to inform them they’d be receiving a deposit into their accounts; no strings attached. In total, over 30K customers were delightfully surprised.
The customers who approached the TD Bank “Automatic Thanking Machine” in the TD Bank video, thought this was a day like any other. Make a deposit, withdrawal, etc. No big deal.
It’s a huge deal when your customer -feels it.-
In an interview in Financial Post Magazine (2011) leader and CEO Ed Clark shared the following on TD Bank’s philosophy:
“…the great thing about our model is if I put a branch on a corner in New York City, I know five years later I will have more than 25% of the local business, because at some time in that five years someone will come by at 4:02 pm. Their branch will be closed, they’ll look across at our store, this beautiful store, there will be someone giving dog biscuits to somebody’s dog, they’ll walk in and there’s a greeter that’s unbelievably friendly, and they’ll say, ‘So why am I banking at the guy across the street?’ Ed Clark, CEO TD Bank
This video will have you see it, hear it, buy it, and feel it. (Have a box of Kleenex close by.)
I feel it. Unfortunately, there’s not a single TD Bank branch in my zip code. I can only hope that my current bank starts drinkin the TD Bank Kool-Aid.
How do you make your customers -feel it?-
Photo by Mike Mozart.
What a powerful example of “wowing” customers. I love it. I would love to see the business case and have been a fly in the wall on discussions about making this decision. I imagine that would have been fascinating.
Never thought of that Karin.
One thing is for sure, TD Bank thinks differently.