Male Gen-X, Millennial Media Opps: Chime hires CMO amid national TV spend increases (Score 54)

Chime named Vineet Mehra CMO in May 2022. Mehra most recently served as chief growth, product and CX officer of Good Eggs. He also brings experience from his time as global chief marketing & customer officer of Walgreens Boots Alliance. Mehra is replacing Melissa Alvarado, who held the role for just over two years. Watch this company closely because it looks like a good opportunity for both sellers and agency readers. 

According to Pathmatics, Chime earned 1.4b impressions YTD through Facebook ads (67%), Instagram ads (29%) and desktop video ads (3%). It placed the majority (98%) of these ads directly onto sites such as facebook.com, instagram.com, youtube.com, yahoo.com and mypoints.com. It placed the remainder (2%) indirectly through Yahoo DSP onto sites such as finance.yahoo.com, yahoo.com, news.yahoo.com, sports.yahoo.com and nextdoor.com. It spent approximately $12m on digital display ads YTD, just 26% of the $46.8m spent in this channel during the same time period of 2021. Full-year spend increased by 24% from $67.7m in 2020 to $83.9m in 2021. 

Per iSpot, Chime spent around $24.8m on national TV ads YTD, an 18% increase from $21m spent in this channel during the same time period of 2021. Full-year spend jumped 93% from $32.2m in 2020 to $62.2m in 2021. This year, it placed ads during programming such as NBA Basketball, NFL Football, College Football, Pawn Stars and Ancient Aliens. 

Sellers-- Chime appears to be targeting Gen-Xers and millennials with a male skew. It reaches these demographics primarily through digital display and national TV ads. The company aggressively increased spend across both channels in 2021. It has continued increasing TV spend so far this year, but it has been decreasing digital spend. Start contacting the new CMO soon to see what types of ad space may be able to provide. 

Agency & martech readers-- I believe barrettSF, which takes care of creative, digital and social, is the only agency that Chime currently works with. I recommend reaching out to the new CMO soon because she may outsource some of her duties or review the relationship with barrettSF. Those of you with banking experience may have an upper hand over the competition.