Commonwealth Bank: “Anthem”, Agency: Goodby Silverstein and Partners, Director: Michael Bay

Major Questions: Why would you draw attention to the fact that an American company is doing your advertising? What is the message to consumers? Why should consumers care about this message?

I think the ad pretty much sucks. The “marketing team’s” response basically acknowledges that the advertisement doesn’t hit the mark. Was that the point; to create a really disastrous advertisement and then pay it out? And if so what does that communicate? Not much in my opinion.

Goodby Silverstein and Partners Creative Director and partner, Steve Simpson said “It is true that Americans are a convenient foil for all the excesses of modern marketing. It is really an advertising campaign about the artifices of advertising”.

Do bank consumers care that you are commenting on advertising? He also had to mention “User generated content” to his audience at the launch on Friday, 25th Jan:

“We live in an incredibly media navvy time, you know everyone is now a film maker – as we see on YouTube. User generated content is all the rage, because everyone has had an ad idea.”

However, the advertisement is a nice departure from the usual bank advertisement which continue to tell us that they truly value our business and they have exceptional service. Then you walk in the door and wait in line, or get charged for viewing your transaction history on the internet. I’ve even heard of one bank that charged a customer because they sneezed while withdrawing money from an ATM!

But to tell you the truth, I’m just sick of the banks (and other service providers) telling us they have exceptional service when THEY DON’T. For me, actions really do speak louder than words. In that sense, the Commonwealth Bank ad is a hell of a lot better than a lot of others, especially the latest from NAB which I despise.

The CommBank campaign will include viral components as well as outdoor, print, web and in-store advertising.

What do you think of the ad?