SEATTLE -- A humorous TV campaign produced by Community Choice Credit Union of Des Moines, Iowa and called "Consolidate Your Bills" featuring marketing staffers wearing "Bills" T-shirts, won the top prize at the Marketing Association of Credit Unions' 2007 Awards Competition held here.
The MACQUEE award, MAC's Best in Show, was given to Josh Cook, director of marketing, and Matt Sheridan, marketing specialist, for Community Choice's "Bills" video spots all of which were done in-house.
The series of four 30-second ads also called "Don't Play Games with Your Bills" were aimed at promoting growth in home equity loans and increasing overall CU awareness, the CU said.
The Iowa CU said it saw an $8 million net increase in home equity loans, 166% over its marketing goal plus 2,800 new members. Cook said, "This was the largest home equity loan growth year that the CU has ever experienced." He said that the CU gets regular inquiries about when the next series of ads will be aired.
The Bills ads featured a group of men wearing white shirts emblazoned with "BILL" on the front playing Battleship, Yahtzee and Emergency to the chagrin of a homeowner.
A slightly more daring "Bills Keeping You Up at Night" spot had the same "BILLs" climbing into bed with a couple and preventing them from sleeping.
Community Choice said it limited production costs by turning their marketing department into the production team--the concept, writing, shooting and editing were all done in-house.
"We are honored to receive this award and hope that it offers a green light to people to feel as though they can be different with their marketing efforts in order to stand out from the masses," said Cook.
Community Choice was one of more than 350 entries from 125 CUs in the annual nationwide competition. Other finalists for the MACQUEE award were America's Christian CU, Glendora, Calif; Pacific Service CU, Walnut Creek, Calif; Boeing Employees CU, Seattle; and Arizona State CU, Phoenix.
--jrubenscut@aol.com
