Williams & Glyn appoints marketing boss as it preps for launch in mid-2016

Jason King, who was most recently CMO at Working Capital Solutions, GE Capital, will join Williams & Glyn on 4 January 2016. He has previously held a number of senior roles at Barclays and Barclaycard.

Reporting to CEO Jim Brown, King will be responsible for marketing, customer experience, branding, product development and digital channel management. His role will be to ensure Williams & Glyn has a strong focus on making banking easier for customers while creating and marketing a customer proposition for the newly created bank.

King says of his appointment: “This is a really exciting time to be joining Williams & Glyn.  I am looking forward to playing my part in building a new UK bank that will start to appear on the UK high street again from next year. It’s a huge privilege to be involved in launching a bank that has a rich and proud history dating back to the 1700s.”

King’s appointment is the latest stage in developing a marketing strategy for the bank. It revealed its logo last year and is understood to be looking for an agency to help develop the brand. King will also work closely with RBS’s CMO David Wheldon to create a brand distinct from its parent.

The launch of Williams & Glyn is a condition of the state aid received by RBS during the 2008/09 financial crisis, which forced the banking group to divest 308 branches.

When it relaunches on the high street, probably around August 2016, it will service approximately 1 million retail customers as well as 200,000 business customers.

RBS is currently in the middle of the huge task of separating out Williams & Glyn – a process that is expected to cost around £1.7bn. It will likely float on the London Stock Exchange in the fourth quarter of 2016.

Launch of new banks failing to boost competition

The news comes as a report into competition in the current account sector by the Competition Markets Authority found that forcing Lloyds Bank and RBS to set up new banks TSB and Williams & Glyn has failed to have an impact on switching.

Alasdair Smith, who headed the investigation, told The Telegraph it was a “very long, very expensive process” with little sign of impact.

“It is not obvious that it will change customers’ behaviour in a way that makes the market significantly more competitive. It has been a very, very costly way of achieving whatever it has achieved.”

As a result the report opted not to recommend the further break-up of the main four banks, instead saying it wants to encourage consumers to shop around by making it easier to compare accounts.

• Hear all about the importance of insight and customer experience at this year’s Festival of Marketing. Taking place on 11 and 12 November there will be 12 stages and hundreds of speakers. Click here for information and to book tickets.