Barclays prepares social push to help repair brand

Speaking earlier today (26 June) at Marketing Week Live, David Wheldon, managing director, brand, reputation and citizen management offered some insights to its efforts to become the “go to bank” among consumers.

During his presentation Wheldon explained how he was aiming to “rebuild the brand from the inside out” as part of a programme that will take anywhere “up to ten years”.

Currently, the bank – which was formerly a “poster boy for everything bad about the banking industry” – is honing its social media strategy to both listen for brand sentiment and better communicate its community benefit work.

This includes its ‘Life Skills’ programme, where Barclays aims to teach 1.5 million UK school leavers tasks such as how to prepare a CV etc, which it will aim to roll out further with a number of top Barclays Premier League clubs, says Wheldon.

During his presentation, Wheldon also publicly debuted a number of videos the bank had commissioned to outline its ‘new ethos’– they were initially intended as internal demonstrations of its brand values.

However, the bank’s external communications will start to promote such programmes according to Wheldon. 

“Formerly, we did the very English thing of doing a lot of good but not allowing ourselves to talk about it [publicly],” he said, adding that this is a situation that is soon to change.

Barclays’ brand took a hit in July 2012 when it was fined millions by the City watchdog for manipulating the rates banks use to lend to each other – LIBOR – a scandal that led to the resignation of chief executive Bob Diamond and a barrage of negative headlines about corporate greed.