It's not easy making an annual report interesting as well as digestible to members, but First Tech Federal Credit Union may have found a way. To enhance the $9.4-billion asset credit union's standard annual report, First Tech created two videos showcasing key points of interest from the past year.
"2015 was another great year for First Tech," begins the shorter, 40-second highlight video. "We welcomed 43,000 new members and 25 new innovative companies. Membership saved our members nearly $77 million in 2015.
Monique Little, chief people officer at First Tech, said the Mountain View, Calif.-based credit union was looking for a new way to best communicate and tell its story to members.
So executives decided to create a video to quickly illustrate the key statistics to annual meeting attendees as well as to engage members who could not attend the meeting. Indeed, since attendance at the annual meeting is frequently an issue for many CUs, being able to offer a quick, compelling way of reaching those who don't make it to the event is a big deal.
The CU had two stories it wanted to tell. One in the highlight version, the other in a 3.5-minute video that begins and ends with President and CEO Greg Mitchell describing the CU's mission and values.
"At First Tech, we aspire to become America's most admired credit union and to achieve that objective through two things," Greg states. "Making a difference in the lives of our members, delivering awesome service on a consistent basis, and secondarily, showing our heart by making a difference in the lives of the communities we serve."
Both videos were released in April when the credit union held its annual meeting. First Tech focused on pushing the shorter video across social media channels such as Facebook, Twitter and YouTube. In fact, almost 90% of views of the highlight reel were seen via YouTube.
The credit union partnered with R/West, a marketing firm in Portland, Ore., to produce the videos and spent about two weeks and $9,000 to make them.
Little said First Tech has received "very favorable" feedback from members who watched the video. "They said this was a much more interesting way to learn about what's going on in the CU," she added.
The credit union already is already planning to produce two annual report videos next year, this time adding member voices into the mix. "We want it to be concise, but really on point," Little added.
