Bangkok--5 Aug--KASIKORNBANK
KBank celebrates the 3rd cycle anniversary of Thailand’s first credit card by launching a card that causes strong heartbeats, and a variety of promotions starting with a buy-one-get-one-free campaign
KASIKORNBANK celebrates its 3rd cycle anniversary as Thailand’s first credit card issuer by launching a brand-new credit card with modern imagery that leads to strong heartbeats. The Bank hopes its credit card will be the first choice of customers, and has prepared a marketing budget of 250 million Baht for the remainder of this year. A campaign of earning free traveling-flying-dining-shopping sprees for an entire year has also been launched, as the Bank aims to become number one in customers’ hearts in terms of number of cards and spending volume by 2011.
Mr. Ampol Polohakul, KASIKORNBANK’s Executive Vice President, said KBank was the first bank to issue credit cards in Thailand. Over the past 36 years, the Bank has consistently expanded its customer base and developed its services to offer the best product to cardholders. Consequently, the KBank credit card has become the number one card in customers’ hearts, while the Bank aims to become the credit card market leader by 2011.
Thus, the Bank has developed and rebranded the KBank card in order to match customer needs, which have changed from using credit cards simply for convenience in spending, to using credit cards to fulfill their lifestyle. The new card has a lively look and offers happiness via cardholder privileges at all levels, in tandem with the concept of “Credit card that causes strong heartbeats”.
The credit card rebranding is a development of KASIKORNBANKGROUP’s customer-centric strategy, which aims to see the KBank card as the customers’ first choice, and to expand the customer base into new cardholders. According to a study of customer needs, cardholders generally prefer the diverse promotions and privileges offered by KBank cards. Thus, the Bank will provide special promotions to continually offer a variety of privileges focusing on credit card spending, including a campaign of free traveling-flying-dining-shopping sprees. The marketing budget used during the last five months of 2010 will be 250 million Baht.
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The first promotion is buy-one-get-one-free privileges for an entire year, for spending in four types including travel, flights, dining, and shopping. New customers applying for a KBank card from now until October 31, 2010, will get a free Air Asia ticket for domestic flights, and another free ticket. Or spending of 90,000 Baht via the card within 2 statement periods will get a free ticket for an international flight, and another free ticket. Existing customers can also benefit from the free traveling-flying-dining-shopping sprees after spending via KBank card. For example, they can travel with a one-night stay and get a free room for another night at 30 boutique resorts and hotels. They can fly with the fly-one-get-one-free right through reward point collection for an Air Asia ticket, and another free ticket for both domestic and international flights. They can dine-one-get-one-free at Sukishi Restaurant, and get discounts for other leading restaurants that participate in the campaign. They can shop-one-get-one-free with installments at zero-percent interest, at iStudio, Siam Paragon, The Emporium, and leading department stores that participate in the campaign. This is in addition to a buy-one-get-one-free Samsung LED TV promotion with a zero-percent installment for 10 months. From now on, the Bank will introduce new offers every three months to make customers’ hearts beat strongly.
Regarding the concept of the credit card rebranding, the Bank aims to make cardholders feel pride, confidence, excitement, and encouragement with card designs that show the lights of a lively city, or celebratory fireworks. Circles mean life. The texture in the circles reflects a delicate and meticulous attention. Colors show joyfulness, while the glossy card surface means premiership. The Bank will launch an ad campaign to build awareness of the cards’ new, modern imagery.
Mr. Ampol added that the Bank’s credit card policy is to become the market’s top player in terms of number of cards and spending by 2011. The Bank has been successful in the credit card market thus far. In 2009, the credit card market saw a slowdown, but the Bank still recorded growth of 27.5 percent in the number of cards.
In 2010, that growth has continued. By the end of June 2010, the 1.4 million existing cards had recorded average spending of 9 billion Baht per month, the second-highest in the market. By the end of 2010, the Bank aims to have at least 1.55 million credit cards, or a market share of 11.5 percent, with average spending of 9.4 billion Baht per month, or a market share of 17 percent. In 2009, the Bank’s market share in number of cards and spending was 16 percent.