Financial Institutions’ Marketing Communication During Economic Downturn and Implications on the Corporate Image

Abstract

The world economic crisis has necessitated finding ways for survival in the most pessimistic scenarios or just cutting costs in the best situations. US Banks suffered the most from the crisis. Banks in Macedonia are not feeling the same effects. The world financial crisis didn’t jeopardize the stability and liquidity of the Macedonian financial system because of the strong deposit base, banks’ low debt and the prudent regulatory system, which maintained a healthy banking portfolio. However, the Financial Institutions in Macedonia are already feeling the consequences of the global financial crisis. The Advertising sectors of the global financial institutions are showing lower marketing budgets, but importantly they have not been cut completely. Banks are working on increasing their deposits through their corporate image communications. This means that the financial institutions’ advertising should continue in order to keep and strengthen banks' corporate image and should stress the stability of the banks. This paper presents the advertising activity of the financial institutions during the current world economic crisis and the consequent marketing communication budget reallocation. The effects of the banks’ marketing communication during the crisis is shown with data on the banks’ customer and market share and on the banks' corporate image perception.