Managerial framework for bank advertising

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to create a managerial framework for selecting the most effective bank advertisement appeal for different financial services. Financial services were classified based on the FCB grid: high/low involvement and think/feel decision. Design/methodology/approach: The data were collected from 62 banks with content analysis based on 1,514 unique print advertisements, published between 2006 and 2014 in national newspapers in Romania and Hungary. The ads were coded, based on Pollay’s appeals, and then a cluster analysis was performed to identify appeal and financial service clusters. Findings: The results revealed ten bank-specific appeals which can be used for advertising four different banking services categories. All type of savings and loans for B2B are advertised with quality appeals (safety, productivity); current account and card, personal/home loans are advertised with financial value appeals (convenient, cheap); corporate branding with emotional appeals (affiliation, distinctive, enjoyment); and services with mixed appeals. Research limitations/implications: The study could be extended for different target market, creative strategy, other media and more countries. Practical implications: The paper provides guidelines on how the FCB grid could be extended for bank services to recommend specific appeals for each category. Originality/value: The financial service literature proposes guidelines regarding bank advertisements. However, the recommended advertisement appeals were not linked to different bank services. This paper creates a comprehensive managerial framework in order to match the bank’s specific appeals with different bank services.