The formula Every
CREDIT UNION should KNow
By Jim Pond, Co-Founder, JXM
Posted October 20th, 2025
Picture this.
The end of a fiscal quarter.
The boardroom has just emptied.
Wendy, a driven veteran CMO at a billion-dollar regional credit union, has finished presenting impressive new-member growth. The board is thrilled, so thrilled that they approve a larger marketing budget for the coming year.
There’s just one catch: this time, they’ll be tracking ROI like hawks.
Wendy is a made up name,
but her story is true.
A hard-hitting “A-ha” moment:
Wendy’s not alone. Every CMO who’s ever faced a bigger budget and sharper scrutiny knows this moment—the one where growth stops feeling like momentum and starts feeling like a math exercise with too many out-of-control variables. But that’s where the real insight begins. Understanding what drives your Cost Per Member Account isn’t just about control; it’s about clarity.
Later that week, Wendy sits down to run the numbers in preparation for her new undertaking. She calculates her Cost Per Member Account (CPMA) once. Then twice. The total stares back at her: $1,999 per new account! Growth suddenly looks different.
Her team has delivered steady results, sure, but the math tells another story. Each new member is costing far more than they should for continued growth. Now, with more budget coming her way comes more eyes and even more pressure. Not to mention the realization that “growth” isn’t just a metric anymore. It’s a microscope.
Get your CPMA
the easy way
CPMA = (Total Marketing + Advertising Spend) ÷ (Number of New Accounts Opened)
That number tells a story all its own, and it rarely flatters. Because when CPMA is higher than expected, the issue isn’t usually efficiency. It’s alignment. Between strategy and spend. Between marketing and measurement. Between promise and experience.
Calculate Your Cost Per Member Acquisition (CPMA)
HERE’s What’s
REALLY driving
Up your CREDIT UNIONS’
CPMA
When the CPMA is just stupid high, it’s easy to blame media costs or click-through rates, but the real issue usually isn’t waste.
It’s often a mismatch.
A mismatch between who you target and who actually converts.
A mismatch between the promise in your campaign and the experience in your branch.
When any or all of the above are off, that’s how an otherwise solid campaign quietly turns into an expensive guessing game. When your data lives in silos and your strategy lives on a whiteboard, efficiency isn’t lost; it’s leaking.
A mismatch between the metrics leadership demands and the ones your team can truly move.
Want an expert take on your CPMA?
We’ll explore what’s driving your numbers, what you’ve already tried, and where clarity could create the biggest lift. No pressure. No obligation. Just a perspective you can use, whether you work with us or not.
Discover your
opportunity zones
The good news is that buried in that efficiency leakage is insight waiting to be found. When you start breaking CPMA down by channel—digital, in-branch, partner, referral, etc.—and mapping where costs spike and conversions stall, that’s where your opportunity zones begin to surface.
If the chart looks like the skyline after an earthquake, don’t panic. That chaos is showing you exactly where alignment and growth can happen next.
A Do-It-Yourself Fix
5-Step CPMA
Cutter Method
Here’s how to spot the gaps that are quietly draining efficiency and how to close them:
Audit alignment. Every campaign should ladder to a measurable business goal, not a vague “awareness” box.
Follow the journey. Trace account openings back to their first touchpoint. Spoiler: it’s rarely the one getting the credit!
Tighten your messaging. The clearer the offer and the more on-brand your messaging is, the smoother the conversion.
Balance paid vs. owned. Sometimes your best ROI lives in the assets you already own. Where is yours hiding?
Reinvest with intent. Don’t just cut underperformers; redirect to the channels that actually build relationships.
Cutting CPMA isn’t just a math exercise; it’s also a mindset shift. One that requires cutting costs, keeping conversions, and gaining clarity.
Once you’ve crunched your numbers and mapped out where your opportunities lie, it’s time to dig deeper.
How Wendy
Got Her
Groove Back.
Wendy’s story ends where many of our client journeys begin, at the moment when clarity matters as much as cost control.
That’s where JXM steps in, not as a vendor, but as a partner in turning insight into ROI. For more than two decades, JXM has helped CMOs like Wendy turn CPMA from a staggering spreadsheet stat into a boardroom brag.
We don’t just optimize campaigns. We repair the fractures across marketing, measurement, and member experience that quietly drain ROI. Because the truth is, CPMA doesn’t just measure cost. It measures clarity.
Marketin’ Ain’t What it Used to Be
every dollar demand$ proof
In today’s environment, every marketing dollar has to earn its keep. Knowing your CPMA isn’t just smart; it’s survival. And if the numbers still feel uncertain, that’s where we can help bring focus. Plus, it’s exactly the kind of problem we love solving.
At JXM, we’ve seen what happens when CMOs move from reactive to proactive. That’s when marketing stops feeling like defense and starts driving measurable growth.
THREE WAYS JXM CAN HELP YOUR CREDIT UNION
Leverage
precise
member data
TO target
high‑value
opportunities
Craft
authentic,
purpose‑driven
messages
that reflect
BRAND values
Measure
ROI with
clear analysis
and reporting,
for all
STAKEHOLDERS
WE HELP CREDIT UNONS
solve for X
There’s a lot you could say about X. It’s a factor. It comes before why. It’s gonna give it to ya. It’s how you jump in most PlayStation games. But around here, X is the power that forms when strategy, creativity, media, and ops come together with purpose.
The partners at JXM have been building together for over a decade, forming a tightly integrated leadership core across business strategy, media, creative, and operations. Each of us owns our domain, but the combination makes the magic.
Like an 1980s team-up robot anime, we lock into place to form the X in JXM.
We’re not interchangeable. We’re interdependent. That’s how we’ve grown this firm and kept it scrappy, hungry, and fiercely effective.
Jim Pond
Co-Founder
Laurie Busby
Managing Partner
John Cain
Partner/Financial Director
Matt Maguy
Co-Founder
Trusted by industry-leading brands
Featured in:
If you’re curious what that could look like for your organization, a 15-minute strategy call is a simple place to start.
We’ll explore what’s driving your numbers, what you’ve already tried, and where clarity could create the biggest lift. No pressure. No obligation. Just a perspective you can use, whether you work with us or not.
WHAT IF YOU CAN’T GET NO SATISFACTION?
We’re confident in what we do because we’ve been doing it for two decades. Our campaigns have delivered results across the spectrum of credit union sizes and challenges. We don’t stop until we get it right. Think of us as the marketing equivalent of The Rolling Stones, still playing and adapting after all these years.
Your investment is virtually risk‑free in a sense (let’s be real; no investment is without any risk) because if you don’t see measurable improvement in campaign performance in the first 90 days, we don’t stop until you do. That’s how confident we are in our process.
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