Money is the essence of banking, is the focus of the new corporate campaign launched last week by Toronto-Dominion Bank.

The many faces and colors of Canadian currency provide the visuals for the advertising.

The message builds on td’s positioning of ‘Your bank. Your way’ with a new twist, the acknowledgment that it is the customer’s money and the pledge to help make things easier.

While ‘Your bank. Your way.’ continues to underline the td logo in all of the advertising, the two new themes, ‘It’s money. Your money.,’ and, ‘We’re here to help make it easier’ take centre stage.

Suzanne Crocker, td’s manager of advertising and promotion, says this evolution came out of extensive research conducted with customers across the country.

‘They told us two things,’ Crocker says. ‘First, understand that it is my money, and, secondly, life is extremely complicated, and they want things to be simplified in a variety of areas of their life.

‘I think we’re the first bank out there agreeing with our customers that it is their money, and then thanking them for choosing us,’ he says.

‘We’re trying to show we’re here to help, and we understand that financial matters can be difficult.’

The campaign is the first work from TBWA Chiat/Day of Toronto, the new corporate agency chosen by td to replace McCann-Erickson Advertising (now part of MacLaren McCann) this past March.

The agency has woven the new message and the simple premise of money into a multimedia campaign consisting of newspaper, television, in-brand material, and a new medium for banks and Murad-painted billboards in areas of downtown Toronto.

Two television commercials are now on air.

In ‘Emotions,’ a 60-second spot, stirring music accompanies close-up shots of $5, $10, $20 and $50 bills, and a voiceover that portrays money as a fabric of life that everyone can relate to.

‘It’s part of your life,’ the voiceover says. ‘Whether you have enough, just enough, or never enough.

‘It can comfort you,’ it says. ‘It can confuse you. Make you feel good. Make you sweat.’

The second spot, ‘Thank you,’ is 30 seconds and more up-tempo.

It begins with the ‘It’s money. Your money’ theme and then acknowledges that td customers could have put their money in any bank, but did not. Instead, they chose td.

After the td logo, ‘Thank you’ appears on the screen.

One of the newspaper ads, a double-page spread, reinforces the bank’s pledge of simplification with ’10 more ways td is helping make it easier.’

The ad brings into the corporate fold other divisions of the bank such as td’s Evergreen and Green Line brokerages and services, including the renewing of mortgages over the phone and will and estate planning.

The campaign will continue to be added to and new executions are expected next month.

At TBWA Chiat/Day, credits go to Tom Goudie, associate creative director/writer; Gary Holme, senior art director; Bette Minott, executive producer, and Joe Carpino, print producer.

Production credits include Steve Gordon of Damast Gordon, director; David Hicks of The Partners’ Film Company, editor, and music by Jungle Music and Rosnick/MacKinnon.

All media buying for TD Bank is handled by Optimedia Canada, a division of FCB Canada.