Aussie brings Sascha Hunt on board as head of marketing
Mortgage broking giant Aussie has a new head of marketing, with Sascha Hunt joining the team from Allianz.
Hunt was industry head of finance at Google, before becoming head of digital marketing, strategy and innovation at Tabcorp. She then moved on to insurer Allianz for four years, ending up as group general manager of marketing.
Hunt joins Aussie from insurer Allianz
In addition, she has held roles at Qantas, ING Direct, Citi and BT Financial Group.
Hunt will be joining Former Toyota CMO Brad Cramb, who came on board at Aussie in 2017 after a short stint at Audi. Cramb has the role of general manager of distribution at Aussie, and is charged with helping the group achieve its 2020 strategy – which includes expanding its network of retail stores, recruiting more brokers and expanding the size of its loan book.
Despite Aussie’s growth aspirations, the broking, and indeed the wider banking, sector has a number of marketing and public relations challenges to overcome in the wake of Kenneth Hayne’s scathing Financial Services Royal Commission report.
Aussie is a wholly-owned subsidiary of the Commonwealth Bank of Australia (CBA), which took full control of the mortgage broker in 2017.
In March, however, CBA put plans for the demerger on hold to focus on compensating clients and responding to the Royal Commission.
The mortgage broking sector now accounts for close to 60% of new home loans written, however it has faced some uncertainty in the wake of the report. Hayne suggested the broker remuneration model of commissions leads to conflicting advice which won’t give consumers the best outcomes. Hayne instead recommended a fee-for-service model.
The government, however, ignored the recommendation to scrap trail commissions, and said it would review the structure in three years should it hold onto power.
