Quite the trend appears to be unfolding in the Great White North as TD Canada Trust and RBC join Scotiabank, representing three of Canada's five biggest banks, in embracing social media to engage with existing and potential customers.

Today, RBC announced that they are looking for a crew of student bloggers to "speak openly and honestly about their financial struggles and successes", as part of a peer-to-peer site that is expected to go live at the end of this month. This adds to the bank's existing investment in its just-launched Campus Connection sponsored Facebook Group.

Alongside RBC, TD Canada Trust has also unveiled its own sponsored Facebook Group - The Money Lounge - with an accompanying Facebook app - "Split it" (thanks to Kate for the heads-up) - which, like RBC, is targeted exclusively at the university and college student population.

All of this, however, falls on the heels of Scotiabank's earlier forays into this space with the Money Clip podcast and My Vault community. Unlike RBC and TD Canada Trust, however, Scotiabank's efforts have focused less exclusively on students and more on the broader retail banking customer (although it will be interesting to see if that changes).

Given the skyrocketing cost of Facebook sponsorships, I'll be curious to discover if the results justify TD's and RBC's investment. I'll be watching with interest.