While serving more than 140,000 members in Greater Houston, First Community Credit Union (FCCU) wanted to serve even more. In 2021, their main initiatives were to grow membership and increase the number of completed auto loans, home loans, and credit card applications. One of the most effective methods FCCU used to accomplish their objectives was digital marketing.
“Most credit unions are late to the game when it comes to using digital media,” said FCCU’s Executive Vice President and Chief Marketing Officer, Nancy Trennel. “We wanted to get and stay ahead of the curve by being proactive with digital media. Some of our digital marketing efforts were done on our own, and some were done through an agency. However, we weren’t seeing the level of results that we wanted compared to the amount of money we were spending.”
Moreover, Trennel was looking for more than mere vanity metrics. She wasn’t interested in views and clicks, since they don’t always translate into conversions.
“I want the rest of the story of what happens after a click,” said Trennel. “I want to know where the visitor landed within my website when they clicked on an ad. I want to know whether they started an application. I want to know whether they finished an application. Ultimately, I want to know how many people who saw our ad actually became a member, opened a new loan, or opened a new credit card. That’s exactly the type of information that Feathr provides.”
Leveraging an expert team
FCCU uses Feathr Services, which functions as a partner that plans and executes campaigns on FCCU’s behalf.
“I believed that the best way to work with Feathr is to use Feathr Services,” said Trennel. “It makes things so easy when Feathr’s in-house team of professionals handles the work for us. They started by discovering what our needs were and how we wanted to be represented in the digital media world. After they learned from us, they built the ads and brought them to us for our approval. Nothing could’ve been easier.”
Whenever Trennel wants to see the results of a campaign, she simply logs into her Feathr account. “Access to a very informative portal is something you don’t typically get when you work with an agency. It’s a huge plus,” said Trennel. “I can look at any individual’s full journey starting from when they clicked an ad. I can see where they landed on my website and, if they left, I can see where they went and what they’ve been doing up until the time they came back to complete an application. And, I can clearly see the associated costs.”
Example: this ad reminds previous auto loan page visitors that their "great vehicle rates are just a few clicks away."
Fuel for continued growth
During a seven-month cycle of campaigns, their ads reached approximately 600,000 unique people across the internet. They also served more than 3.2 million impressions. Collectively, campaigns resulted in an estimated 612 total conversions with ad click-through rates between 0.39 and 2.39 percent, which far exceeds the industry benchmark of 0.2 percent.
Feathr reported that the top converting ads were from application abandonment campaigns. These campaigns demonstrated that retargeting people who started but didn’t not finish an application is a powerful tool for credit unions.
Trennel is so satisfied with the results that Feathr has delivered that she increased the number of campaigns in FCCU’s renewed contract with Feathr.
“With our new campaigns, all we need to do is share our goals and the targeted demographics with the Feathr team, and they handle the rest,” said Trennel. “Together, we’ve learned a lot during our first year with Feathr. With knowledge of what works and what doesn’t, we will be tweaking our campaigns so that we get even better results in our second and third years.”
Trennel loves Feathr because it’s cost-effective, it delivers results, and it gives her more data about her marketing efforts than she’s ever had before.
“I recommend that other credit unions use Feathr because the folk at Feathr are on top of their game,” said Trennel. “They’re remarkable members of our extended team.”
ABOUT
As one of the largest credit unions in its market, FCCU is poised for rapid growth in what it calls the “people-helping-people business.”
HEADQUARTERS
Houston, Texas
USE CASE
Growing membership & driving loan applications
PRODUCTS USED
Ads, Flights & Services
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