Westpac (Australian Bank) indicates that online marketing is not for it, because brand experience is not driven online.  When I started to read this article I misread it as a bank that doesn’t get it, but reading on, I feel quite the opposite.  Westpac understand the (Internet) medium well as it applies to big banks. The Better Banking Blog: Why Westpac won’t be spending more online Westpac says three things drive customer satisfaction – customer experience (around 50 per cent), products – their functionality and pricing (around 20 per cent), and brand perception (around 30 per cent). (Note:  this description … Continue reading Why Westpac won’t be spending more online (for marketing)

Petro isn’t a Bank, but this is impressive.  They have developed an infomesssage and put it on YouTube.  Its very friendly, informative, and low key.  Kudos to them.  YouTube – Why are gasoline prices higher than in the past? Why are gasoline prices higher than in the past? Relevance to Bankwatch:Which bank will go on YouTube and talk about service charges or mergers? Continue reading PetroCanada levers YouTube to get their message out

I read this post over at CRM Blog and I just have to give a bit of a rant.  First of all, here is the post: CRM Blog: Benefits of Customer Relationship Management Excellent customer service is about understanding the customer requirements and reacting to them efficiently. CRM helps companies understand, anticipate and respond to the customers’ needs in a consistent way. Implementation of CRM requires and efficient and integrated internal business system. Many businesses benefit from the organizational discipline offered by the CRM. Customer relationship management (CRM) has the following characteristics: It develops better communication channels It collects vital … Continue reading Why CRM often (usually) fails

That perennial topic is back, this time raised by Tara. It used to be the thick client/ thin client debate. In any event it its worth examining, because it has implications for how we design online banking over the next 5 years. It is a safe bet that it won’t remain the way we see it today. But first the browser debate. ::HorsePigCow:: life uncommon: R.I.P. Browsers But, after spending some intensive time with Chris, our clients and really starting to think about it, I feel more and more that someday – and it may be sooner than we think … Continue reading Browsers or no browsers; implications for online banking

This is a great post and Banks would do well to listen to this. Kudo’s to Heather the manager for correcting it right away, but this story should define how a bank can improve.  The core point here is that the Bank  needs to know each customer real time.  It is no surprise the customer used the the ATM,to make their deposit. 85% of all transactions are handled electronically nowadays.  So the focus of development should not be on the branch anymore;  it needs to be on the place the customer spends their time … the electronic channels. So its … Continue reading Why does this customer have to have their deposit held!

User communities will drive incremental improvement, but the big moves are probably up to us.  Good article on inovation, and the role of users/ user testing/ user input. Creating Passionate Users: We can’t leave innovation up to our users Our users will tell us where the pain is. Our users will drive incremental improvements. But the user community can’t do the revolutionary innovation for us. That’s up to us. Technorati Tags: user+community, online+banking Continue reading We can’t leave innovation up to our users

Seattle PI does a nice summary of the workings of prosper.com. Web site offers real personal loans Prosper brings together lenders and borrowers. Lenders can make loans as small as $50, togain deiversification, while borrowers get what they need. The interest rates are attractive, and the piece makes the point that many view Propser as part of their investment portfolio diversification. Payment News point out that recently Online Banking Report predicted this market could reach $1Bn within 5 years. At that level the impact on tradtional banks is small in the near term. But I wonder if that assessment is … Continue reading Summary of prosper.com

Great post from Javelin, with a simple message.  Javelin Strategy and Research » Here’s a lousy idea: banks offering a “shred day” Bankers, don’t undermine your safety and marketing efforts. …… why in the world should my customers be advised to destroy what they can eliminate? Apparently a couple of Bankshad a “shred day” where they invited customers to bring in paper documents, statements etc, to have them shredded in the interests of security.  Relevance to Bankwatch:Online banking is having to be continually defended for security reasons, yet its much simpler for criminals to steal identity using things in your … Continue reading Misguided messsage – Banks “shred day”

Courtesy of Customer World, here is a great interview with Kamath, CEO of ICICI Bank.  It is now India’s 2nd largest bank. This first quote is fabulous. Customer World: ICICI Leadership Secrets So our challenge is to invent a new business model where we can create a distribution base effectively in 600,000 villages in India, and to learn to do that at one-tenth the cost of urban India. Just to put that into a scale that someone could understand, we believe that to succeed in urban India, we need to do be able to do business at one-tenth the cost … Continue reading ICICI Leadership Secrets