PSU major, Bank of Baroda (BoB) recently associated with International Masters League (IML), a recently concluded new cricket tournament featuring retired legends, as the Platinum Partner. Commenting on this association, V G Senthilkumar, Head of Marketing & Branding, Bank of Baroda says, “As a brand, we align and engage with specific events, which are not only highly impactful, but have a clear differentiation in our association. This was the first edition of IML and it brings together legendary players from six cricketing nations, which is a unique opportunity. It's easy to get associated with one platform, one player or a few players; but here we had the opportunity to engage with a set of legendary players who have come together for this league. This is the differentiator from other formats where cricket loving fans get to once again see legendary players like Brian Lara, Jacques Kallis, Shaun Marsh etc. back on the cricket ground playing in a league. When most of these players were playing professional cricket, the T20 format was in the nascent stage and today this format has a big fan following. In addition, our recently on-boarded global brand ambassador, Sachin Tendulkar, is a founding partner of IML and is the captain of the Indian team. This format will help amplify our efforts in promoting our brand as well as our different products.”
The Masterstroke Move
In October last year, BoB signed on cricketer Sachin Tendulkar as its global brand ambassador. Interestingly, this move coincided with the bank launching the Masterstroke account targeting HNIs with a sizable bank balance in BoB, and providing the highest quality of banking services as a value addition. Senthilkumar says that the word ‘Masterstroke’ is a perfect word that translates to perfection and achievement demonstrating great skill or mastery and also used in cricket parlance; which is also a core value of BoB. He says, “Our communication is aimed to empower every customer of ours, be it a small customer to the HNI customer, to play their masterstroke and we provide the financial backing and other infrastructure support in terms of products and services.
He continues, “When it comes to the masterstroke savings account, we got very good traction post launch. In fact, we have already crossed more than 10,000 accounts.” The brand has extensively promoted the Masterstroke account with its brand ambassador Tendulkar across all mediums. We are confident that the Masterstroke savings account will cross our expectations going forward; for any product it takes atleast a year to assess your spends and the returns. However, I'm sure that we will get the expected ROI for this product with the strong features of the product, strong brand ambassador, and promotion we are doing.”
Focus on Bob ? Pay
The other product that BoB has been extensively promoting is its recently launched flagship UPI payment app, Bob ? Pay. Despite BoB being the second largest PSU bank and among the leading banks in the country, it is a late entrant in this space behind PhonePe, PayTM and Google Pay and even other UPI apps when it comes to its UPI usage. However, Senthilkumar says that BoB has a big differentiator that will set it apart from other UPI app in the future. He explains, “Our differentiator will be servicing, safety, and giving a grievance solution in person, BoB’s extensive branch network and the trust of millions of our customer base. When it comes to any kind of payment failure or grievance, we have got the physical infrastructure to give the desired redressal to the customer. When the scale and number of transaction increase then what will be important is the trust factor and which application will give better service.” He explains that if your payment fails or goes to the wrong account, that’s when a bank like BoB with a 117-year legacy and a wide network can provide a solution. He adds, “This is a very strong differentiator as the technology is the same, every application gives offers but when it's come to service, trust and grievance redressal, there is no better match than Bob ? Pay which is a seamless platform with all the safety features.”
Another big focus area for the bank is educating, informing and creating awareness in consumers’ minds of prevalent scams. A couple of years back, BoB launched the #PehchaanCon campaign; currently, the bank is running the third edition of the #PehchaanCon 3.0 Banking Fraud Awareness campaign to educate and create awareness about new-age financial cyber frauds such as Artificial Intelligence-generated Deepfake scams that can succeed in duping even the most vigilant customers. BoB has also used influencers to create awareness and continue to create awareness with its #PehchaanCon IP. Senthilkumar says, “The PehchaanCon campaigns has got millions of engagements and reach. It’s difficult to talk about scams and we tell it interestingly, in a quick and quirky format with a fun element about the scams happening and promote it through our influencers, in social media and digital platforms. We regularly do a lot of local on-ground campaigns in our branch and also do outdoor promotions and other media promotions around this.
On-Ground at Kumbh Mela
As a lead bank, BoB partnered with the Prayagraj Municipal Corporation for several initiatives and was among the first few brands in the BFSI sector to be associated with the Municipal Corporation for the world's largest public gathering, the Kumbh Mela, early this year. Kumbh Mela presented a unique high impact opportunity for brand associations with more than 60 crore people visiting the festivities during this period of around 60 days. To ensure maximum reach, BoB amplified its messaging by combining on-ground activation with digital, and radio and also did a lot of social and branding initiatives.
BoB leveraged the Maha Kumbh festivities to promote digital payments, offer AI-driven customer support, and provide robust banking infrastructure. The bank set up two full-fledged branches with forex transaction facilities and also an onsite and mobile ATMs, along with coin vending machines, to cater to diverse banking needs. The bank developed a GenAI-powered Virtual Relationship Manager, Aditi, to answer banking-related queries and enhance customer service to the pilgrims visiting Mahakumbh. BoB also partnered with a leading FM channel to raise awareness about the bank's initiatives and services. However, the main focus at the festival was to extensively promote the UPI payment PSP (payment service provider) app, Bob ? Pay.
Senthilkumar says, “With a diversified gathering of people, we understood which product will be handy and solve the financial or transaction requirements of customers not only during the period of Kumbh Mela but also for the future. That's why we pushed our Bob ? Pay. On a daily basis, we recorded the engagement with the customers downloading the ePay app, their experience at Kumbh Mela, any difficulties faced in terms of transactions, and motivated them to download the ePay app.”
The experience was captured on video and posted on social media for digital amplification, with over 120 posts made during this time. He states, “We received around 3.86 million impressions and reach of 2.48 million and views of 1.83 million. I am very confident that our participation at Kumbh Mela as a brand to promote Bob ? Pay and has given very good results. These numbers justify that from a measuring point of view also it has given the desired impact.”
Looking ahead, BoB is banking on technology and its legacy to create new products, services and digital initiatives. Senthilkumar states, “A first-of-a-kind initiative that we are undertaking for some of campaigns is to have robust analytics and measuring mechanism. We are developing QR codes for all our creatives and advertisements. Second, we have also built a digital microsite for all our individual branches which has got customized capability of having content relevant to that branch, location, region, and language. We are one of the first banks to have this capability built in digital. The next level will be to leverage this capability to reach out to micro, local, hyper-local consumers with relatable content.”
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