SGB-Bank | Mobile App Promotion
Sneak Peek
Our journey with SGB-Bank, a leader in Poland’s banking sector, began with a shared goal to elevate their digital footprint through the SGB Mobile app. Faced with the challenge of modernizing their mobile banking offerings and engaging a diverse customer base, our team stepped up with innovative solutions.
We leveraged a mix of digital tools, including Google Ads, Facebook Ads, and Display & Video 360, to target both potential and existing customers. This strategic approach helped us overcome initial hurdles, such as the absence of a consolidated customer list and the complex nature of the SGB banks’ operations.
By the end of 2022, our efforts led to impressive results: over 676,000 app openings and 279,000 activations, surpassing initial goals. This success underlines the strength of our partnership and the effectiveness of our digital marketing strategies.
Project Manager
Facebook Ads Manager
Programmatic Manager
Google Ads Manager
About the Company
SGB-Bank is a leading financial institution in Poland, ranking among the top 15 banks in the country. It serves as a central bank for approximately 170 cooperative banks throughout the nation and is recognized for its blend of strong traditions and cutting-edge solutions, such as mobile payments and a mobile app. The focus of this case study is on the promotion of the SGB Mobile application.
Our partnership in digital marketing began in the fall of 2019, with the aim of promoting various mobile payment options including BLIK, Google Pay, and Garmin Pay. Since then, we have consistently participated in subsequent tenders aimed at promoting a range of SGB products.
The campaign started in mid-July 2021 and ran until the end of 2022.
Problems & Challenges
Prior to 2020, SGB banks primarily used the SGB Wallet mobile app, which offered limited functionality. As a result, a new, modern mobile application was developed to meet customers’ needs. The application was intended to unify the digital offerings of the banks while demonstrating their commitment to modern banking trends.
The company responsible for delivering the cooperative SGB Mobile application was Ailleron (https://ailleron.com/).
One of the significant challenges of digital marketing in this case, was effectively reaching the target audience. The audience consisted not only of potential SGB customers, but also existing customers who had yet to use mobile banking. At the start of the campaign, there was no customer list that could be imported into advertising platforms. Therefore, the team had to rely solely on the sgb.pl homepage visitors.
Another complicating factor was the nature of the SGB banks’ operations as a group, with each bank operating as a separate entity with its own customer base and domain. To reach all target individuals effectively, a connection between Google Analytics and Google Tag Manager was required for every domain for every bank that decided to participate in the campaign.
Campaign Objectives
The original marketing objective was to achieve 300,000 installations by the end of 2021, followed by another 300,000 by the end of 2022. However, the goal changed over time, and the campaign’s approach also evolved as the team shifted its focus from quantity to quality. By the end of 2021, the team had primarily concentrated on increasing the number of registered accounts in the application.
A secondary objective was to enhance awareness of the SGB Cooperative Banks as modern and competitive financial institutions, effectively competing with other commercial banks in the market.
Strategy
According to the tender requirements, we knew that we needed to use three tools to achieve our goal:
- Google Ads
- Facebook Ads
- Display & Video 360
The approach was straightforward. Google Ads, being a platform that can be directly linked with the Play Store and Firebase, was treated strictly performance-based. We used campaigns promoting the application and text-based campaigns in search engines. Display & Video 360 was used to achieve the secondary goal of brand awareness. Facebook Ads, on the other hand, were a mix of campaigns that generated installations and conversions in the application, as well as video-based reach campaigns.
To maximize the chances of conversion from campaigns other than app-based, we created two landing pages: the main landing page for the campaign (https://sgbmobile.sgb.pl/) and a dedicated landing page (https://kontoselfie.sgb.pl/) for setting up a free selfie account in the application. The landing pages were aligned with the brand communication and product strategy while being continually optimized by our CRO team at https://www.theflowdigital.com/pl.
Google Ads
For Google Ads, we utilized brand campaigns throughout the promotion period, targeting keywords related to SGB and SGB Mobile and directing them to the application’s landing page. In addition, we created two app campaigns. The first one aimed to generate fresh traffic and was optimized for the first open event, indicating that the application had been opened. The second one was associated with events indicating account activation in the application using each of the three available activation methods.
Meta Ads
In the Meta environment, the ads were based on a mix of awareness and performance. We utilized promotional campaigns for the application, campaigns for traffic on the created landing pages, and awareness campaigns.
Programmatic
Programmatic campaigns in Display & Video 360 utilized a full range of graphical assets and YouTube clips, divided into four separate lines: Selfie, BLIK, Autopay, and Subscription Management. In December 2021, during the peak Christmas season, we utilized Display & Video 360 by airing a Masthead advertisement on the YouTube homepage for individuals in the target audience.
Throughout a year and a half of promotional activities associated with the application, we made strong efforts towards centralizing analytics in the SGB group. Gaining access to data from the largest banks in the association and collecting audience lists from their domains unlocked the true potential of remarketing and encouraged existing bank customers to use the SGB Mobile application. By the end of 2022, we had implemented 31 Google Analytics installations for banks that expressed interest, resulting in an additional 90,000 recipients added to the lists within 90 days.
Results
676,338 first_open events in the application
279,036 app activations
PLN 3,095,400 spent on advertising accounts
Q4 21′ results screen. Visible decrease in the first open event trend line while the number of application activations increases.
What’s next?
The campaign promoting SGB Mobile ended in December 2022. In the fourth quarter of this year, new promotional activities related to the brand’s new communication strategy, “Taka różnica!” (“Such a difference!”), began, which we had the pleasure of leading again. 2023 will be a continuation of this strategy, and we hope to describe it in another case study on our website.
Testimonial
“The campaign promoting the SGB Mobile app carried out in collaboration with MTA required the use of various measures, especially a high degree of flexibility in actions due to its specificity. We tried various solutions that allowed for constant optimization. The experience and vast knowledge of the people involved helped us calmly monitor the results and discover new possibilities. For many months of the campaign, MTA experts were part of our team, and I would wholeheartedly recommend them for handling even the most unusual tasks in digital marketing :)”
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