Company: AIA
Contact: Eric Granof, Chief Marketing Officer
Location: Calabasas, Calif.
Industry: Bail bonds
B2B/B2C: B2B
Annual revenue: Confidential
Number of employees: Confidential

Quick Read

Guilty by association. That's a tough place to start when you're trying to launch a new brand, particularly the first major brand in your category. But that's exactly where AIA, the nation's largest and oldest network of bail bond agents, found itself when it set out to differentiate its agents from the rest.

Though relatively unbranded in the traditional marketing sense, the bail bond industry is a long way away from being completely unbranded. Images of Dog the Bounty Hunter and other interesting characters have made certain of that. More than simply launching a new brand, the challenge for AIA became how to overhaul that perception.

Through an amusing online and offline campaign, consumer education, community events, strategic partnerships, personable content, and a healthy dose of search engine optimization (SEO), AIA is demonstrating how it is possible to rise above an undeserved reputation in a relatively short amount of time.

Challenge

Quick—describe a bail bondsperson. Do the adjectives "friendly," "helpful," or "trustworthy" come to mind? Do you visualize a "family man" or "community advocate"? Is this someone you would want and choose to turn to in a time of need, and not because you have no other choice?

Horror stories and media portrayals have long plagued the reputation of the bail bond industry. But if you look at the real men and women who provide these services, some interesting trends emerge that challenge popular opinion. For example, in the AIA network, which comprises 6,000 bail agents across the United States, most are active members of their communities, and more than half are female.

"We have agents that are former schoolteachers, retired US Marshals, Fire Captains, restaurant owners, Big Brothers and Big Sisters supporters, and creators of nonprofits," said Eric Granof, AIA's chief marketing officer. "The problem is, no matter what the reality is of these individuals, everyone still sees bail agents as unsavory characters with tattoos, mullets, and bullet-proof vests running through the street with guns."

AIA is an alliance of Allegheny Casualty Company, International Fidelity Insurance Company, and Associated Bond; it partners with agents across the country to underwrite bail bonds. Since AIA's success is dependent on its agents' success in signing new bonds, the organization sought to alter that negative perception and differentiate its network from the dregs.

To achieve that goal, AIA needed to...

1. Educate consumers on the bail bond process and what to expect from a decent agent
2. Rank well in search so that the educational information could be easily found
3. Foster trust among consumers, and condition them to associate its agent network with quality and reliability
4. Create awareness outside of search to familiarize consumers with the brand before the moment of need

Campaign

AIA introduced the ExpertBail brand in mid-2010 with a fully integrated approach.

1. Educate consumers about the bail bond process

Through consumer research, AIA discovered that people generally don't understand the bail process, nor regard it positively, so public education was in order. It established an informative website with a glossary, blog, FAQ section, industry news, and integrated video designed to educate Web visitors on what to look for and what to expect.

The core of the site is an online directory of "trusted members of the ExpertBail Network," searchable by city, county, ZIP code, and state. The thousands of agent profile pages highlight each agent's personal story, background, and business information.

"We put our agents front and center, so it isn't hard for people to find what they're after," Granof explained.

AIA also developed a mobile-optimized version of its site after learning that a high volume of bail-related search is performed via mobile devices. The mobile version uses the phone's GPS technology to display agents in the immediate area.

2. Rank well in search

Historically, people used the Yellow Pages to locate the closest bail bond agent, but Google has now become the tool of choice. To help the ExpertBail website appear higher in natural search results for important keywords, AIA used an XHTML site structure; search-friendly URLs; mega menus; and optimized title tags, H1 and H2 tags, meta descriptions, and geo-metatags.

It also uploaded keyword-rich content, such as press releases, articles, and video, placing certain emphasis on localized keywords (where appropriate) to align with individual markets. And it maximized this effect by enabling and encouraging its agent network to upload content, as well.