How we cracked the case on 468 home loan leads in 6 weeks
Police Bank is a member-owned bank committed to serving the policing community and their families with financial products built on trust and personalised service.
With Spring traditionally being one of the busiest seasons for home buying in Australia, Police Bank challenged Windsorborn to develop a campaign that would cut through the noise and position the bank as the go-to lender for Police officers that are first-home buyers, refinancers, or property investors.
The goal was to promote Police Bank’s competitive home loan offerings by highlighting the ease of the application process, highly competitive rates, and the personal support that sets the bank apart.
Standing out in a busy home loan market requires more than just a sharp rate. Police Bank needed to connect with the right people, with the right message, at the right time.
Windsorborn’s data-led strategy focused on deep audience understanding and creative experimentation, using testing as a tool to unlock insight and optimise performance.
On Meta, we set out to compare broader audience targeting (based on interests and demographics) with lookalike audiences modelled on Police Bank’s existing customers and social followers. Our goal was to understand which segments engaged most strongly, and how message variation influenced performance.
On Google where intent is the driver, campaigns were tailored to first home buyers, refinancers, and retargeting audiences, with messaging split between rate-led and value-led propositions, each crafted to speak to different decision-making drivers.
For the creative we developed 15 hero ad variations, each anchored in a clear product benefit or user scenario. The goal was to speak directly to different motivations, whether it was simplicity, speed, service, or savings.
Rather than rely on overly stylised stock imagery, we created a bespoke illustration style to bring the campaign to life. Using AI tools, our team generated custom visuals featuring Police Officers in relatable situations. This approach gave us the creative flexibility to iterate quickly, stay within budget, and maintain full control over the visual identity. We worked closely with the Police Bank team throughout, refining the illustrations to ensure they felt authentic and respectful of the community.
Some creatives leaned into police-specific language and visual cues, allowing the campaign to resonate with officers directly, supporting our audience targeting. Other assets used broader language to appeal to the wider policing community, including officers’ families and friends.
Once live and in-market, we scaled variations across formats and placements, systematically testing headlines, calls to action, layouts, and tone. Every asset was created with learning in mind, allowing us to identify top-performing combinations and reinvest in what worked.
Results
- First Home Buyers creative was the best performing creative on Meta.
- Lookalike audiences were strong at driving engagement, not conversions.
- Videos performed better than statics for lookalike audiences.
- The Police-interest audience was the best performing audience on Meta.
- Our illustrative design look and feel resonated with both our audience and internal stakeholders at Police Bank.
