When you think of banks, or any financial institution for that matter, the last thing that would come to mind is getting involved in the gaming industry. However, as the landscape of gaming is growing and becoming more mainstream, several brands want to intersect their mission with that of gamers. Specifically, Ally Bank has created a division to market to and support gamers. BGN had the opportunity to speak to Beth Woodruff, Sr. Director of Branding — Strategy, Integrations, Gaming and Innovation. Her curiosity and passion for the Ally brand have led to highly disruptive partnerships, integrations, and campaigns that helped bring to life Ally’s commitment to representation, innovation, and showing up in cultural moments.
During TwitchCon 2023 in Las Vegas, Ally partnered with Raidiant — a community that exists to improve conditions for women and marginalized genders in gaming and esports. The two entities hosted a TwitchCon brunch led by a group of passionate panelists to teach women how to navigate marketing and brand themselves as content creators in the gaming space.
The panel featured Raidiant executive producer Heather Garozzo (Sapphire), Katherine “Kat” Pan (Katliente), and Amber (AlarmingAmber) and was moderated by Evelia Franco (Cuten00b).
Ally is the nation’s largest digital-only bank. “It makes sense for us to look in places where the audience is digitally native. That’s an easier adoption for us,” says Woodruff. As gaming and esports specifically have become more mainstream, brands see the benefit in marketing to their audience of fans. There’s also the community aspect of gaming, which is attractive to brands given that many streamers have a loyal and dedicated follower base.
“Gaming has a really ripe sense of community; it is really tight. [Fans] love their streamers, they love who they love, and it made a lot of sense for us to come in and figure out ways that we can really create impact here and introduce ourselves and our brand in an authentic way and hopefully create spaces where we can have dialogues and can see the benefit of having a financial ally as they look to monetize their skill and [make this] a source of income for them,” she says.
What does that support look like for women in gaming? Ally wants to commit to providing equity for women in the gaming space. Woodruff refers to the support Ally provides as a “50-50 partner challenge.” She says, “We’re trying to get to 50% spend on women’s sports and men’s sports. For us, esports is a part of that. We’re trying to make sure [that] for every dollar we spend on men, we spend it on women as well. We have also created spaces where women can have safe meet-and-greets with their fans. They had the ability to take headshots — things they really need to publicize in order to get the opportunity to monetize themselves.”
The company has also created a Women’s Open Tournament, which was designed to help elevate amateur and semi-pro players.
“I think you can feel at these events that the female esport players and streamers are so eager to amplify themselves and amplify their career. And in this world where people are looking to make money off of this, it’s really hard when you don’t have a financial ally,” she adds.
In addition to financial support, Ally wants to provide financial literacy for these gamers and provide the educational tools to be successful in running their own businesses. Their goal is to make the pathway easier to create wealth through passion.
Many women have sadly become the target of hate and harassment in the gaming industry. Ally’s hope is to, through hosted meet-and-greets and tournaments for women, disintegrate that toxic environment many victims face.
“We’re really committed to making sure that we have moderation so that we’re not hearing negativity or we’re not in a place where we’re fostering that behavior. A lot of what we’re committed to doing is trying to create the most enjoyable experiences while highlighting these women. I want the women to know they have a brand that’s saying, let us help fight this with you,” she affirms.
While some brands and corporations throw a logo or dedicate one month out of the year to amplify a marginalized group — Ally is doing the work of supporting women in gaming financially and emotionally as they navigate this space in their respective communities.
You can learn more about Ally at ally.com and Raidiant at raidiant.gg.
