Nhu Q. Yeargin, a board member of the $2.5 billion Langley Federal Credit Union in Newport News, Va., said she loved the diversity of the images portrayed in an Open Your Eyes marketing video.

“In my view, we need to be all in, and to be all in we should seriously consider recommending that this (marketing campaign) be part of our duty to want to go for this nationally.” said Dave Gunderson, president/CEO of the $1.4 billion Credit Union of Southern California in Anaheim.

Several other credit union professionals had similar remarks, noting that they were impressed with the extensiveness of the research compiled by CUNA's Creating Awareness Advisory Group, organized about two years ago to find why the industry's market share is lagging. Over the last 25 years, the credit union industry's market share has grown by a paltry 1.8%, from 5.6% in 1992 to about 7.4% in 2017, according to CUNA. In contrast, the nation's top 100 banks have substantially expanded their market share from 41% to 75% from 1992 to 2006.

While it seemed credit union executives were eager to leverage the Open Your Eyes initiative as soon as possible, Douglas Kiker, CUNA's chief communications officer who organized and led the Creating Awareness Advisory Group, strongly recommends that credit union executives first invest the time to read and study the Open Your Eyes messaging guide because it explains what the research means and how it can work in the marketplace.

“This is a document that we are going to spend a lot of time helping credit unions utilize through webinars, one-on-one training sessions and through all sorts of training vehicles,” Kiker said. “We really do want to bring this to life, and help you as you begin to think about your marketing and begin to think about how you might take advantage of this tremendous investment that we have made into this document,” he said.

Read expanded coverage of this story in the March 21st issue of CU Times.