How to survive a marketing audit: don't get flustered just because a regulatory agency announces that it is going to conduct a marketing audit at your institution. Here are six tips that will help you ride out the experience.

• Author: Francis, Joe

DO THE WORDS "MARKETING AUDIT" MAKE YOU CRINGE? Marketing audits at a bank are sometimes included in the routine compliance reviews done by the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC). They can also be conducted by other regulatory agencies.

Frankly, anyone who is unprepared for a marketing audit may have reason to be anxious. My intention with this article is to help you prepare for an audit and strengthen your marketing operations. So get your pencil out and your idea notepad ready!

Here are six useful suggestions on preparing for a marketing audit.

Tip No. 1: Maintain a strong relationship with your compliance officer.

I stopped studying accounting during my undergraduate years, a result of constantly changing rules and regulations. Desiring to use both my creative and analytical interests, I chose marketing as my profession--a field free from the burden of hard and fast rules--so I thought. Now, I am a life-long marketer, and, after having great experiences in the current banking environment, those accounting nightmares returned! One in particular was when the compliance officer said, "The OCC will be stopping by in a few weeks to audit our marketing." Uh oh. The burden I left years ago just reared its ugly head, but having a good relationship with the compliance department highlights the first practical tip to prepare for a marketing audit.

Marketing and compliance in the financial world should be close--especially in a community bank. Keep signatures and records of both compliance and marketing reviews in date order by product type. Why? If nearly every marketing project includes a collaborative marketing and compliance review prior to launch, a good audit foundation is established.

Tip No. 2: Do not let audits hinder marketing creativity or marketing objectives.

As a marketer, your role is to increase sales, improve retention and enhance the brand. Audits, however inhibiting they may appear, should not keep a marketer from trying new tactics, messages or media. Here's a test for you: Consider the last time that you creatively designed or developed a marketing project. When you began, did you only think about what you were allowed to do, or did you come up with ideas regardless of regulatory rules? If you said the former rather than the latter, I'm sorry to say you're hindered, plain and simple.

As a marketer it's good to push the envelope. Come up with an idea, and then find out how to make it work. Marketers should...