Business Issue
Italo-Romena Bank is part of Gruppo Veneto Banca, who successfully achieved the goal of transcending cultures and geographical barriers with its well-known, prestigious brand.
Italo-Romena Bank was first established in Romania in 1980, as a joint-venture between Italy and Romania, dedicated to offering support for the banking and commercial exchanges between the two partners. Today, Italo-Romena Bank has national coverage, with agencies in all major cities across Romania and a rich portfolio of products covering the entire range of banking and financial services.
Although one of the first foreign banks to be present in Romania, Italo-Romena Bank felt that its brand was lacking general recognition for its tradition, heritage and customized service portfolio.
Brand Academy Response
Brought in to perform a brand assessment, Brand Academy focused at the beginning on the most important constituencies, the existing and prospective client base.
The client brand assessment was designed to identify the current perception on the brand's value proposition, to define and keep track of the clients' attitudes towards the company's vision and goals, to measure the gap between brand promise and clients' perception and to identify what needs to be done to turn the brand's goals into reality.
Through the use of personal interviews with key management, interviews with clients and focus groups, Brand Academy came up with a comprehensive analysis and measurement results, structured into:
- Brand audit: identification of current brand's characteristics and variables.
- Brand visioning: identification of expectations, values, purpose and core aspirations.
- Brand strategy: solutions proposed for closing the gaps between the two above.
Taking into consideration the development scenarios proposed, the client implemented a well-designed strategy for leveraging the brand through strategic marketing actions, customer loyalty programmes and brand communication campaigns, including both corporate advertising and corporate public relations.
Business Result
Recently, Italo-Romena Bank has announced an impressive growth of 50.2% in gross banking product as compared to the previous year. It also reinforced its commitment to the community through a series of partnerships (University of Cluj-Napoca, Leonardo Murialdo Foundation, Timisoara Hospital) designed in order to uplift the brand equity and public perception.
