I’m not sure whether I like current-events-themed promotions because they are effective or because they make for timely blog posts (probably the latter, but I’ll continue to believe in the former).

While it seems that banks have been dropping the ball on the year-end holidays, I was pleasantly surprised to find a bank doing a full-court press around March Madness. It’s an annual tradition of binge sports watching as the top 68 U.S. colleges play a single elimination tournament during the last 3 weeks of March.

STAR Bank ($1.6 billion in deposits) has a homepage-dominating ad for Game Time, a debit-card sweeps during march (see above). Cardholders that conduct at least 17 transactions are automatically entered to win one of five $100 statement credits. Customers can also enter the contest online, a user-friendly way to comply with U.S. sweepstakes rules (see bottom of landing page below).

Bottom line: The graphics are eye catching, the timing is perfect, and it’s easy for customers to participate. My only concern would be the size of the prize pool, which is only $500. For a month-long sweeps, there should be a bigger grand prize. How about this? A sweet sixteen earning $100 each, a final four winning $500 each and a champion taking home $1,500.

Promotion landing page (link, 16 March 2007)

 

Author: Jim Bruene is Founder & Senior Advisor to Finovate as well as
Principal of BUX Advisors, a financial services UX consultancy.