The Challenge
Because it was time for a change.
In the highly commoditized banking industry—where the sea of sameness is as hard to escape as the Bermuda Triangle—brand differentiation is critical. Salisbury Bank was starting with an outdated brand and website, and they needed to create maximum impact on a budget.
The Insight
Because banking should be a relationship, not just an account.
Interest rates and account numbers don’t do much when it comes to forming long-lasting emotional connections with customers. If Salisbury Bank was going to set themselves apart, it wouldn’t be based on the products they offer, but on the authentic personal relationships they cultivate with the families and businesses in the communities they serve.
The Research
Because some people really do care where their money goes.
Through our extensive research and interviews with current customers, prospects, employees and key stakeholders, we discovered something important about our target audience: they already have what we called “the community gene.” They’re passionate about shopping local, dining local and doing just about everything they can to support local businesses—but they don’t yet fully recognize the personal and societal benefits of banking local. Once they do, Salisbury Bank becomes an obvious choice.
Smarter Experience
Because goals are always more important than deliverables.
With our small, nimble team working closely together with a committed, focused client, we embarked on a journey of brand and digital reinvention that included:
- Holistic discovery process with qualitative and quantitative brand and digital research events across audiences and geographies
- New brand positioning and identity including a new logo and tagline
- Go-to-market strategy encompassing paid, owned and earned media recommendations
- Launch campaign creative assets featuring 60- and 30-second brand videos, out-of-home and digital advertising, in-branch product posters, customer emails and direct mail
- Employee engagement efforts including a virtual employee town hall event and video
Tech Focused
Because cost-efficient can still be highly effective.
We designed and built Salisbury Bank’s new website on the ZenSource platform, a CMS framework built on Drupal 9. So the site doesn’t just look and work great, it’s easy for a small client team to populate and update—and it has all the enterprise-grade security and support a bank could ever need, at a fraction of the cost of other solutions.
Salisbury Bank has had an increase in page views, going from 94k to 112k views year-over-year.
The Outcome
Because all banks are not the same.
In December, 2021, Salisbury Bank launched their new “Because where you bank matters” brand platform and their new website, along with the customer communications and marketing campaign to announce it.
From the photography style on the site to the repetition of the word “because” to the many uses of the shape featured in the new logo, everything worked together to draw attention to the new branding and tagline—and to reinforce the idea that all banks are not the same. For people who truly care about where their money goes and how it can help their community thrive, where you bank really does matter—and there’s no better choice than Salisbury Bank.
After just one quarter in market, the website and campaign have received overwhelmingly positive feedback from both customers and employees. Year-over-year website comparisons show progress in nearly all engagement measures, including increases in page views and time on-site—with notable decreases in bounce and exit rates. And in February 2021, Salisbury Bank was awarded Best Brand Refresh/Rebrand Campaign by the New England Financial Marketing Association.
Julianna Sinchak Vice President, Marketing"The Primacy team has been a pleasure to work with! They've been great strategic partners to us helping with brand and digital marketing... research, brand refresh, campaign marketing, site redesign and media. I'm looking forward to seeing the good results in the months to come."
