The New England Financial Marketing Awards™ (NEFMA) has named Leverage Marketing Group as the winner of three coveted awards including two golds for the agency’s client, Berkshire Bank, and one silver for Thomaston Savings Bank.

“We’re thrilled to be recognized for our work on behalf of Berkshire Bank and Thomaston Savings Bank,” notes Tom Marks, president of Leverage Marketing. “Awards are great fun and recognize strong creative, but the most important aspect remains that all programs produced outstanding results for the clients,” Marks concludes.

The agency received a gold award for Berkshire Bank for their promotion titled “X Marks the Spot” for Berkshire Bank in the Service category (under $1.5 billion assets). Designed to increase automatic teller machine use, random $20 bills were marked with a branded "X" sticker, which entitled the recipient to claim $50 in any participating branch. The promotion spurred an 86% increase in customer traffic and a 23% increase in foreign (non-customer) traffic.

The agency’s work was also awarded gold in the Loan category (under $1.5 billion assets) for its “Exciting Rewind’” promotion designed to enhance the bank’s sponsorship of the broadcast of the Boston Bruins’ games on New England Sports Network (NESN). The "Exciting Rewind Sweepstakes" requested consumers to vote for their favorite Bruins’ rewind for a chance to win a year’s worth of mortgage payments. The promotion resulted in over 500 qualified leads for the bank’s home lending group.

In addition, Leverage’s “e-Volution” campaign designed to migrate the bank’s customers to a new core processing system took silver at NEFMA. The client conversion program was named "e-Volution" to both suggest that the changes the bank was executing were a necessary evolution, but also to highlight the electronic aspect as the online upgrades were the most significant. The goal was 20% penetration and readership among the customer base; this goal was exceeded by 325% with 65% of customers opening the email and converting to the new system.