Break Up
National Australia Bank2011
Break Up is a 2011 business action and PR stunt campaign for National Australia Bank, created by Clemenger BBDO, Melbourne.
The line
It's not you, it's me. I've changed.
Why it works
Australians tend to see their four big banks as one cosy club, so when National Australia Bank cut fees and paid rivals' exit fees for switching customers, hardly anyone noticed. In February 2011 NAB announced the change as a public break-up instead. A seemingly mistaken tweet about a break-up set off speculation, 60 staged couples split up in restaurants and bars across the country on Valentine's night, and a “Dear John” letter to the other banks ran in newspapers. Helicopter banners then flew past rivals' offices and a pianist sang sad songs from a ute outside ANZ's Melbourne headquarters. It is studied as a pricing decision dramatised as a soap opera, borrowing a story everyone understands to make dry news impossible to ignore. NAB said home-loan enquiries rose 79% and it gained 226,000 new customers; the agency's entry claims $5 million of earned media in a single day. It won the PR Grand Prix at Cannes in 2011.
Techniques
- Storytelling Dramatises a fee cut as a public break-up, from a seemingly mistaken tweet and staged split-ups to a farewell letter to the other banks.
- Comparison Takes direct swipes at its rivals, flying banners past their offices and serenading one competitor's headquarters with sad songs.
- Humour Plays the familiar break-up cliché for laughs, with the bank telling its rivals that it is not them, it has changed.
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