A look at the strategic process for successful conversion after an M&A deal
Completing a merger or acquisition is a significant milestone for any financial institution. While banking M&A offers rich opportunities for growth, the path to success is far from over. In fact, the most critical work to realize a merger’s full potential still lies ahead – aligning brands, cultures and experiences.
Whether you’re converting a network of existing branches, bringing in new product offerings, creating a new brand experience, or all of the above, there is so much complexity in the post-merger environment that it may be difficult to wrap your arms around what happens next. To address the intricacies involved, we’ve put together a practical primer to help jumpstart your upfront strategic thinking and process planning.
With a merger, one of the first elements that must be addressed is tiering. What that means is having a clear map of all retail stores or branches, how they currently operate, and how you want them to function in the future. Some will be prime locations doing a lot of business and others may be flagging in the market and need a revised approach. If a company is only acquiring the physical real estate and not the book of business of those locations, the decisions will be different than if an acquisition is all-encompassing. By purchasing locations and the business, brands will need to rebrand locations, communicate new products, and work to mitigate any employee and customer attrition.
Within a holistic tiering strategy, companies will have a clear assessment of whether a location will simply get an update of existing signage or whether there will be a brand conversion to reestablish the brand by optimizing both exterior and interiors in those locations. What we want to understand is:
It takes planning and a lot oversight to do a merger and subsequent conversion successfully. From the physical environment and staff to the customer and brand experience, there are many moving parts that must be defined, designed, deployed, and adopted by staff. There is no quick course for “branding and conversion following a merger” and it’s not a process that can be approached haphazardly. Even people who have gone through a merger or acquisition understand that each scenario is different and conversions require customization. You need planning, communications, and attention to detail for each step in the conversion process.
Once a holistic strategy is in place, the right team can translate brand experience, retail delivery and design implementation into a successful rollout. That means strategically thinking about how brands get purposefully designed retail space, and intentionally manage how that brand gets implemented physically, operationally, and culturally. A complete brand conversion also includes a digital strategy, team training, and sustainment that is part of cultural cohesion. In short, three major phases of a brand conversion are: strategy, design, and implementation.
To illustrate these concepts, a bank branch conversion serves as a mini-case study. A bank brand had 225 branches operating in the Southeast. With the acquiring bank, Adrenaline’s team worked with the bank to develop their curbside branch using a kit-of-parts to inform design direction for branch formats and define how the brand will come to life in the branches. After acquiring another bank with 200 branches, the bank saw market overlap, so they planned to close 50 branches and rebrand the remaining ones. But it needed to happen quickly with conversion of 150 locations in a nine-month timeframe.
The Adrenaline team managed the exterior and interior brand conversion process, working collaboratively to develop holistic tiering strategies, complete site visits and surveys at all 150 locations, assess existing signage, and complete a brand survey of existing branded elements at the branches. Based on surveys and their tiering strategy, the team developed sign packages for each branch and managed the teams installing them. Signage implementation was another workstream taking place at the same time as the interior rebrand. In less than a year, the bank brand grew its brand presence and nearly doubled its footprint.
Smart strategy and focused execution are what separate successful M&A conversions from lackluster facelifts. While some organizations may be looking for one company to plan, design, and implement – handling the myriad steps in the conversion process – others may want to take-on some of the work themselves, or with different implementation teams. The bottom line is that an experienced expert needs to integrate all the elements in one seamless and streamlined process. As long as the strategy is right, an effective workstream integrator can help ensure the brand promise is delivered every step of the way.
To learn more about successful strategies for bank branch conversions after M&A, or to speak with one of Adrenaline’s brand-to-branch experts, contact us today.
Adrenaline is an end-to-end brand experience company serving the financial industry. We move brands and businesses ahead by delivering on every aspect of their experience across digital and physical channels, from strategy through implementation. Our multi-disciplinary team works with leadership to advise on purpose, position, culture, and retail growth strategies. We create brands people love and engage audiences from employees to customers with story-led design and insights-driven marketing; and we design and build transformative brand experiences across branch networks, leading the construction and implementation of physical spaces that drive business advantage and make the brand experience real.
Related Insights
We use cookies to improve your experience on our site. To find out more, see our Privacy Policy.
