Payment Industry Insider

A thought-provoking look at the payment and credit union industries

Bancography Announces Top CU Brands

July 11, 2008 · Written by Mike Templeton · 4 Comments

Bancography, a positioning firm from Birmingham, Alabama, recently released its 2008 Bancography Brand Value Index, which ranks the most powerful financial institution brands among all U.S. banks and credit unions.

The Bancography Brand Value Index is a comprehensive ranking which scores brands according to the premium they contribute to each financial institution’s tangible value. The brand value is calculated by reviewing the institution’s reputation, service quality, image and market awareness. The index also identifies institutions that produce financial results beyond what their capital base, market conditions and competitive environments would predict.

Did your credit union make the list?

Large credit unions (assets > $1 billion):

  1. Mountain America, UT
  2. Arrowhead Central, CA
  3. J. S. C., TX
  4. University of Wisconsin, WI
  5. Police & Fire, PA
  6. GECU, TX
  7. Chevron, CA
  8. Tinker, OK
  9. MidFlorida, FL
  10. OnPoint Community, OR
  11. Community First, WI
  12. Security Service, TX
  13. Members 1st, PA
  14. Boeing Employees, WA
  15. Lake Michigan, MI
  16. Alaska USA, AK
  17. Affinity Plus, MN
  18. Indiana Members, IN
  19. Apco Employees, AL
  20. Keesler, MS
  21. Redwood, CA
  22. Randolph-Brooks, TX
  23. Affinity, NJ
  24. America First, UT
  25. Veridian, IA

Small credit unions (assets < $1 billion):

  1. ASI, LA
  2. Trona Valley Community, WY
  3. First Community CU of Houston, TX
  4. White Sands, NM
  5. Pelican State, LA
  6. Utah Central, UT
  7. Water and Power Community, CA
  8. Golden Plains, KS
  9. Midland Community, TX
  10. Complex Community, TX
  11. American Heritage, PA
  12. Bull’s Eye, WI
  13. Valero, TX
  14. I.L.W.U., CA
  15. America’s Credit Union, WA
  16. Justice, VA
  17. United Heritage, TX
  18. EECU, TX
  19. Navy Army, TX
  20. Town and Country, ND
  21. Austin Telco, TX
  22. Neighborhood, TX
  23. Idaho Central, ID
  24. Actors, NY
  25. Service 1st, PA

Investigate these brands and apply their tactics.

Now that you know who has the best and most-recognized brands, take some time to investigate the top five (or look for brands that are in your area) and see if there are ways you can implement similar strategies or tactics for your own credit union.

Also, if you’re in Texas, it looks like you’ve got your work cut out for you. Of the 50 top CU brands listed, 13 of them (26%) are based in Texas.

Categories: Marketing

4 comments so far

  • 1 Morriss Partee // Jul 11, 2008 at 12:52 pm

    So let me see if I’ve got this calculation straight: You take the institution’s dollar value, multiply by the reputation (WOM-worthiness + (NPS * 100)) carry the seven, add service quality, subtract the service gaffs, add back the number of genuinely unreasonable members, carry over the square root of the image (which is the average number of times the logo appears on each ad, sign, and branch) and then multiply by the market awareness (which you get by dividing the total market ad spend by the 2000 census population for the region). Times π R squared. Okay, I’ve got it now. Yeah, I now know how to move the needle to increase brand value. :)

    All kidding aside, a few years ago I did some work to develop a marketing effectiveness index for CUs based on NCUA 5300 data. But in the end I decided against it because the even the simplest of calculations would be too arbitrary to yield anything meaningful. Except for a nicely ranked list that would make people high on the list feel great and everyone else feel that the calculation was suspect.

  • 2 Mike Templeton // Jul 14, 2008 at 2:11 pm

    You’re right to some degree. What the Bancography calculations are truly based on are unknown to us and they may be just as arbitrary as the next person’s ranking system.

    What is important, in my mind, is that the list must have some value. Whatever the rating system, this list represents credit unions that are doing good things with their brand. Whether or not they are the “official” number one brand is up for debate, but I think they are all still worth looking into to gather ideas.

  • 3 Morriss Partee // Jul 14, 2008 at 6:55 pm

    How do we know the list has some value? How do we know these credit unions are doing good things with their brand, and that there aren’t other credit unions doing better things with their brands? How is brand measured? For that matter, how is “good” measured? We can’t know the validity of the list unless we know the validity of the calculation. And we can’t validate the calculation by looking at the end results either, or else we’d just be tweaking a formula to match what our gut instinct says. See the problems?

  • 4 Mike Templeton // Jul 15, 2008 at 8:37 am

    I see the problems and loopholes in the system. But it seems to me that this could be compared to any type of award or rating system used in business. We can evaluate and argue all we want, but when it comes down to it, all of these rankings are subjective. They are all based on the criteria and thought processes of those performing them.

    I’m not saying that this list from Bancography is the ‘official’ list of the top credit union brands, but it is a list of what this company has judged as the top brands, making it a worthwhile list (for study and research) in my opinion.

    I’m also not advocating that each of these credit unions place a placard in their lobby stating their Bancography ranking, but credit unions who didn’t make the list can use this information as a guide for who to be watching and learning more about.

    These credit unions are doing something right and it would make sense for others to learn about what those things are.

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