Case Study: Banking Brand Equity Study

Recently, Drive Research completed a brand equity study for a local financial institution. Brand equity studies are an ideal way to measure metrics like usage, perception, and awareness from consumers in a targeted geography. Learn more about how brand equity studies work.

This post gives an overview of the objectives, approach, and outcomes of this brand equity market research project with a local bank. Here's our step by step process for brand equity research projects.

Learn how to measure awareness, perception, and usage for financial institutions.


Objectives

A multi-state bank partnered with Drive Research on a market research study in October 2018. The objectives of the market research included understanding awareness, perceptions, and image of the in its 5 key customer geographies. These and other secondary objectives were covered in this market research to match the baseline study conducted in 2017 with some newly added questions. The investment in market research provided definitive, measurable, and actionable feedback to guide next steps with its marketing strategies and serve as a benchmark to compare past and future brand equity study metrics.


Approach

To address the objectives at-hand, Drive Research recommended using an online survey to collect feedback. Online surveys are cost-effective, offer a quick turn-around, are measurable, and gather quality data. The combination of these 4 benefits created a strong ROI for the bank.

The survey was geographically targeted to an online panel of random respondents within a specific radius of each branch location. The sampling plan was intended to closely resemble the proportion of branch locations across geographies.

Fieldwork began on November 19 and lasted until December 13. The survey consisted of 18 questions and took respondents 8 minutes to complete. A total of 1,001 responses were collected.

This offers a +/- 3% margin of error for a survey with a random population of respondents at the 95% confidence level. This means if the survey were conducted 100 more times, 95 of out 100 times the results would yield within +/- 3% of the stated totals in this report.

Respondent screening criteria was determined as: (1) have or share banking decision-making responsibility, (2) have an active personal, business, or wealth management account, and (3) reside in one of the target geographies surveyed. The online survey was blinded and not branded to ensure anonymity across all channels for an image and awareness survey.

Looking for more? Here's a list of questions you should include in your bank and credit union survey.


Outcomes

All results from our market research remain confidential with the client. Below is an inside look at key findings and improvements which were highlighted throughout the executive summary of the report.

The executive summary in the report was broken down into 7 objectives which were answered in detail:

1. What is the awareness of the bank?

2. What is the perception of the bank?

3. What do markets know about the bank?

4. What are sources of awareness for the bank?

5. What factor is most important when choosing a financial institution?

6. What is the share for the bank in each target market?

7. What are preferences for online banking?

In total, the report included over 150 pages including the methodology, executive summary, and recommendations which featured 20 pages of key findings. The key findings provided in-depth answers to each of the survey objectives and provided comparisons to the results from the prior year's study. The report also included a full export of survey results and dashboard with several cross-tabs which will help the team drive strategy during internal meetings.

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The report delivery also included a raw data file, interactive maps, and an infographic. The raw data file is given so the team has access to all of the data used for reporting. It also includes all open-ended responses gathered during the survey. The interactive maps allow the team to visually see levels of awareness by ZIP Code and county. Lastly, the infographic is a graphical way for the team to share a quick one page review of the results of the study. It was delivered as a high-quality image file so the team can share it with others without needing to share an overwhelming report.


Contact Our Market Research Company

Drive Research is a market research company that specializes in market research with financial institutions. We have experience with banks and credit unions which help fuel our success with market research projects.

Do you have questions for our team? Here are ways to contact us:

Message us on our website
Email us at [email protected]
Call us at 888-725-DATA
Text us at 315-303-2040

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