For firms, there may never be quite as ripe an opportunity  to rebuild their brands, either, says Dave Swanson, founder and managing principal of SwanDog Marketing.

“There is a great opportunity for firms that begin investing in their brands now to have a greater share of voice,” he says. The cost of ad space is still generally depressed, he says, and firms that get out now have a greater chance of capturing consumers’ attention.

How Principal executes its campaign will be critical. Relying on third parties like NBC's Chatzky to provide advice can be helpful if such information gives investors frozen with fear the confidence they need to start talking to an advisor. But advisors sometimes bristle when clients come in second-guessing their advice or asking about investment ideas they’ve heard on TV, says Practical Perspectives’ Schneider.

While the rebuilding theme implies a return to the American dream and aspirational messages the industry promoted during the last bull market, dwelling on what was lost can also be overwhelming to investors, says SwanDog’s Swanson. “There are some people for whom all the wishing and patriotism is not going to get them where they dreamed they would be,” he says.

Still, he says, the messages of advice and risk management and the idea of delivering a similar message from different perspectives fits in well with The Principal’s core insurance business and intermediary-sold models. “It’s keeping with their roots,” says Swanson.

Excerpted from Principal’s New Campaign Sign of Revived Ad Budgets, Ignites; March 18, 2010