BNP Paribas, also known as the bank for a changing world, has made it their goal over the last few years to integrate sustainability into their business strategy . As a global banking corporation, BNP Paribas appreciate the environmental impact that a financial institution has, and believe that they have a major role to play in the collective effort of building a more sustainable future . As a committed and resp onsible bank, BNP Paribas focus its strategy towards sustainable finance.

In 2019, BNP Paribas wanted to drive this value even further, more positively aligning their brand with sustainable finance and positive banking. The banking group wanted to reinforce their expertise in EMEA and North America whilst also placing sustainability at the forefront of their global outlook. However, this is not such an easy task. For international financial institutions it is difficult to embrace a green outlook without negative conotations against economic performance. Nevertheless, this is what BNP Paribas strived to do so, and one key belief and conviction is that you can combine economic performance with positive social and environmental impact.

The goal in 2019 was for BNP Paribas to align their bank with three Global Sustainability Conferences. These comprised of, PRI (Principles for Responsible Investment), IMF (International Monetary Fund) and the UN Climate Change Conference  COP 25. Initiating conversations  in and around three of the biggest Sustainability Conferences of 2019 enabled BNP Paribas to enforce its message of responsible and sustainable finance at a time when the discussion was most prominent.

Their biggest challenge was to create a shift in perception. To adjust the attitudes of consumers and promote a sustainable set of values that have historically been seen as contradictory to the banking environment and wider industry.

With a difficult challenge ahead, it was clear that the creative solution was going to be a key part to the success of this campaign. The objective was for BNP Paribas to align more prominently with sustainable finance and positive banking. For this to feel authentic we knew that we had to create a seamless partnership between BNP Paribas and the sustainability events that it was aiming to align with. Changing a consumer’s attitude is a delicate and gradual process, which is why Flipboard’s Native Promoted Content was an ideal fit here.

The Native Promoted Content solution seamlessly distributes brand content with the same form and functionality as the world-class editorial on Flipboard. This worked perfectly for BNP Paribas who were looking to drive traffic to bespoke content surrounding each event. As a full screen solution, the ad includes a compelling, thumb-stopping illustrative image, an eye-catching headline and a brand logo. It’s a high impact format without becoming overly intrusive or invasive to the user’s app experience. ACTA (Call To Action) was also enabled to further drive traffic to the pieces of content that BNPP were looking to promote.

Through this powerful yet delicate approach , BNP Paribas were able to effortlessly align their name alongside green banking and sustainable finance practices in an authentic and genuine fashion , encouraging the recipients of the ad to alter their own pre-existing perceptions.

Another important aspect of our creative solution was down to the audience targeting . BNP Paribas wanted to reach a receptive, engaged and relevant audience with minimal wastage. Flipboard’s targeting opportunities fit this brief expertly. We were able to systematically segment relevant users via first party proprietary data in the form of ‘interests. In other words, we were able to target data based on insight from user’s selected interests, content consumption habits and most read topic s/themes . In this case, we targeted users based on their interest in Tech, Business, Thought Leadership, Entrepreneurship , and Politics. Through targeting these key interests, we were able to reach a relevant and receptive audience who would be most engaged with BNP Paribas’ message. Additionally, by bundling together  these related interests it meant we could target at scale, increasing our reach and impact without sacrificing relevancy.

With a well matched and engaged audience , Flipboard  proved to  be the perfect partner on this campaign. BNP Paribas were able to  enforce its key message  of positive banking and sustainable finance to  a business  conscious audience  who were actively  engaging with the content. Doing so in  such a trusted environment  with a seamless native solution were the key components to enabling BNP Paribas to create a shift in perception in the eyes of its consumers .

This campaign saw users actively engaging with BNP’s message, seeing impressive CTR’s hitting peaks of up to 0.75% across the three events (well within benchmarks of 0.5-1% ). This showcases how much the users were responding to the ad and fulfilling BNP Paribas’ aim of driving traffic to its content . We also observed that the business section was the best performing interest in relation to CTR’s for both the IMF and PRI campaign. This proves that our strategy of aligning business focused individuals with BNP Paribas’ message was highly effective.

The success of this campaign is proved even further evident by the fact that BNP Paribas are looking to run similar executions in 2020 leading up the next COP 25 conference in a bid to continue their long-term sustainable development strategy .