Luminus Financial received national recognition for outstanding digital marketing and social media at the 2018 Hashtag Awards in Calgary on June 13. The campaign, “No more ***king at credit unions”, received an honourable mention as runner-up for the Best Social Media Campaign of 2017.
The “No more ***king at credit unions” campaign brought attention to the challenge credit unions across Canada faced in 2017 when they were banned from using the term ‘banking.’
In July of last year, Luminus Financial and their marketing partner, CUmark, launched unbanking.ca, where they invited Canadians to coin a new term for ‘banking’ in light of the restrictions. Among the top suggestions were ‘squirrelling’ and ‘mattressing.’
The social media campaign featured cheeky digital posters and memes that bleeped out the word ‘bank’ in everyday scenarios to show how impractical it would be for ‘banking’ to be a censored word.
“We wanted to bring awareness to the issue and have a little fun at the same time,” says Jeremy Whittingstall, CEO of CUmark. “People care about their credit unions and they didn’t want to see them put at a disadvantage because of a decision that, when considered in other countries, was deemed silly and unnecessary.”
The cost to credit unions if they were forced to remove the term ‘banking’ from their signage, websites, and print materials was estimated at $80 million.
“We felt that money would be better spent serving Canadians’ financial needs and giving back to our community,” says George De La Rosa, CEO of Luminus Financial. “So we decided to start a conversation and get Canadians involved in convincing the decision-makers to reconsider.”
In February, the Bank Act was amended to allow credit unions flexibility using terms such as ‘bank’ and ‘banking.’
The winners of the Hashtag Awards were announced on June 13 at the kickoff of the 2018 SocialWest conference, a multi-day conference for those working in communications, marketing, and social media.
