Acing the PR test: last year, Zions First National Bank, Salt Lake City, won a national award for its "Zions Pays for A's" public relations campaign. Here's how the program was created and how it fits in with this $10.6 billion institution's efforts to differentiate itself from competitors.

• Author: Bernstel, Janet Bigham
• Position: Regional Banks

In 2004, Zions First National Bank, Salt Lake City, submitted an entry in the public relations category in the annual ABA Ad Award contest. The submission, entitled "Zions Pays for A's," was honored with the "best of show" award.

Rob Brough is senior vice president of public relations and marketing for Zions, which has $10.6 in assets and 150 full-service locations both in Utah and the neighboring state of Idaho. He spoke recently with ABA Bank Marketing contributing writer Janet Bigham Bernstel about this campaign as well as about some of the marketing challenges facing today's regional banks. Their discussion is reproduced below.

How is your marketing department set up?

We have a central marketing department in Salt Lake City, and we run programs for the whole bank within the two states. But we can be very localized. We have regions where we look to take advantage of local opportunities. If there's a location we're feeling price pressures, for example, we'll go in there with a rate offer.

We have two teams essentially, marketing and public relations, which are hooked together and I oversee both. There are a total of nine employees in both departments, including myself. We have a retail marketing manager who oversees the day-to-day with advertising, branch retail campaigns and branch merchandising. She has a production manager working with her. I take on the day-to-day in terms of brand marketing and advertising and nonretail areas such as with the business banking group.

Then we have the public relations side. I'm the primary spokesperson and media relations person, and I have an assistant. We have a few other staff positions to take care of specialized programs.

The bank is structured with three primary areas; retail, business and private services. In marketing, our responsibility is to assist each of these three in reaching their objectives. Our set of guiding principles is our overall strategic document. The mission statement is, "We are a community bank that can offer a full array of products and services." So our goal is to look, act and feel very much like a community bank and also to be able to offer all the sophisticated services our customers want.

So we won't find a similar marketing plan at Nevada State Bank or California Bank and Trust?

No, each operates independently and has totally different marketing. We may share ideas. I actually just had a call from an affiliate in Arizona who was considering a program that we had done. They wanted to know what worked or didn't--but we probably don't share as often as we should.

What are the advantages to being a community bank under the umbrella of a large institution?

The big advantage is in what we are able to do because of the way we're structured organizationally. (See sidebar entitled: "Zions' Operating Model.") We push local authority to our branches, so as we advertise and...