First National Bank, one of South Africa's 'big four' banks, launched its You Can Help campaign aimed at highlighting the concerns of the country's youth revealed in their responses to a recent survey. Not long after launching the campaign the bank was slammed by the ANC Youth League (ANCYL) calling the campaign 'treasonous'.
The campaign which consisted of a television advertisement as well as a micro-site containing blog posts with unscripted videos of young South Africans voicing their concerns and optimism about the country. The ANCYL failed to see the very evident positive perception held by the youth voiced in the videos but rather called for the advertisements to be banned.
Reports by various media houses said that the bank will pull the advertisements which begs the question; are South African corporate companies too easily bullied by political parties and insecure about their right to freedom of speech, or do they have too many politically related business interests which outweigh the seemingly puny return on investment of their marketing campaigns?
Whatever the answer to that question may be, it is highly concerning - selfish in both instances. Nonetheless, the perceptions brought to light are very positive and it is reassuring to know the the born-free post-1994 generation is optimistic about their future and have a sense of direction of some sort. The glaring conclusion that the ANCYL feels threatened by the opinion and optimism of their own soon-to-be members is extremely funny and equally worrying.
In their latest media report FNB have come out to say that they will not pull the advertisements and denied all claims in planning to do so, but will only retract the blog posts containing the videos of the kids to protect them from public harm.
However this corporate vs political party battle is to play out, FNB will be laughing all the way to the bank - one of their own branches - obviously - where they'll be greeted by head-hunted Steve. The publicity mileage gained in the short space of time has been remarkable. Public responses have come in their droathes and thousands have flocked online to comment about and view the campaign. This is any marketing campaign's intended result.
With the bank's share price showing positive growth after the launch, this is certainly to be mirrored by South Africans ditching their banks and switching to the bank that gives a voice to the voiceless - without the beep. Who knows, they could get enough revenue as a result of this to splurge on another heartwrenching multi-million Rand campaign in the near future to add to their shitload (read beep) of advertisements currently running.
Was this a good campaign? By the responses alone, most certainly.
