The German-based challenger bank N26 has launched a new US brand campaign called "Money in Motion" starring the award-winning comedian Jimmy O. Yang.
The German fintech unicorn N26 has recently launched a new US brand campaign. The campaign features a series of videos titled "Money in Motion" with the award-winning comedian and Crazy Rich Asians' star Jimmy O. Yang. In each episode, Yang uses his humor to showcase how N26 can make banking empowering, stress-free, and rewarding.
"Every banking app I've used is clunky and banking just seems so outdated in this day and age," said Yang. "N26 is a slick new banking app that can help people save and keep an eye out on their spending, and they got some pretty awesome exclusive deals that are actually cool and relevant."
"Money in Motion" went live on 8th December across all digital and social platforms, including the company's Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube channels. In addition to the official 30-sec videos, the campaign also includes some exclusive behind-the-scenes blooper content featuring Yang.
Developed in partnership with ViacomCBS' in-house branded content studio, Velocity, "Money in Motion"'s goal is to drive awareness, brand reinforcement and product adoption for N26 in the US.
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The idea behind N26's new brand campaign "Money in Motion"
After a remarkable first year in the US market and attracting more than 500,000 local customers, N26 believed that now was the perfect time for the brand to invest in a campaign to accelerate its awareness and drive further product adoption.
Going after the Millennial and Gen-Z audiences, N26 teamed up with ViacomCBS' studio, Velocity, to help shape the creatives for the campaign.
"The reason we decided to go with ViacomCBS’ Velocity and Jimmy O. Yang to help tell our story is because of their reach among one of our core demographics of 18-34 year olds, which presented a natural synergy with our key customers and an opportunity to introduce them to our brand," said Patrick Stal, N26's Global VP of Marketing.
"When selecting talent, we wanted to work with someone who could help tell our story authentically but with a dose of humor that our audience would understand and appreciate - who ever said banking needs to be boring? After watching hours of comedy stand-up, ultimately Jimmy stood out as a clear winner and we were thrilled to work with him to convey the challenges faced with traditional banking and how our brand puts customers back in control of their spending."
In terms of assets, right from the start, Patrick and his team decided to focus mainly on creating short-form video content for the campaign as they knew that their target audience was active on social media and they would be mostly leveraging it there. Thus, the "Money in Motion" videos were designed to be displayed across ViacomCBS’ cable networks as pre/mid-roll and across many of the networks’ digital platforms as well as across both organic and paid social.
How has COVID affected N26's new brand campaign?
According to Patrick, the COVID pandemic impacted the overall campaign planning in a number of ways and challenged the team to get more creative with production. The campaign was originally scheduled to launch earlier in the year but it was delayed due to the pandemic.
"First, we had to wait for national lockdowns to lift, then we had to accommodate new regulations that would keep our teams safe. Ultimately, the crew on the ground during the campaign's shooting in September was condensed to essential personnel only and ViacomCBS’ production team was able to live stream the entire shoot for the rest of the team to chime in remotely. It was an impressive collaborative feat to accommodate all perspectives without being physically present and while prioritizing the health and safety of all involved." said Patrick.
About N26: N26 is a leading German mobile bank offering a paid-for and free current accounts across Europe. The company was founded in 2013 by the Austrian duo Valentin Stalf and Maximilian Tayenthal. They launched their pilot product in 2015 and received a full banking license from the ECB and Bafin in 2016. Since then, N26 has acquired more than 5m customers globally.