Rancher.

Institution: Zions Bank, Salt Lake City

Assets: $10.5 billion; 151 locations in Utah and Idaho

Agency: Richter7, Salt Lake City

Two years ago, Zions became the exclusive local sponsor in the financial services category of the Olympic Winter Games in Salt Lake City. "With this kind of media presence, and the games taking place right here in our back yard, we made the decision to develop a new series of spots to showcase the Zions Bank brand," says Rob Brough, senior vice president and public relations manager.

The agency was instructed to portray real-life examples of how Zions people, products and services have made a positive difference in customers' lives. Zions bankers narrated each of three TV spots. The campaign's aim was to increase consumer awareness and ad recall.

The ads ran heavily during the games and were continued for three months. Zions recently started repeating the ads as part of its annual branding effort.

Following the first broadcast, the bank conducted a brand tracking study for the market, which found, among other things that Zions had the highest unaided and top-of-mind awareness of any financial institution in the category. Sixty-seven percent of respondents could correctly recall the bank's "We haven't forgotten who keeps us in business" tagline.