Just when “advanced” thinkers and marketers thought they had it all figured out, it sounds like teens are moving on from MySpace. MySpace No Longer Their Space? – New York Times BRANDS, for teenagers, are fleeting things. For big, slow-moving corporations, this presents a problem. When Rupert Murdoch’s News Corporation acquired the community site MySpace nearly a year ago, the site was at the height of its popularity. But now there are indications that the teenagers who made MySpace cool may be moving on to other things. But there are reasons, and teens aren’t stupid. Popularity with a mainstream audience … Continue reading MySpace No Longer Their Space?

Randy shows the result of his unofficial newsreader survey.  I observed three things: My newsreader, GreatNews is far and away the best Firefox Live Bookmarks suck Of the two big web based readers, Bloglines blows Newsgator out of the park If you want to try RSS feeds, and are new to it, try Greatnews. RSS Reader Survery – The RSS Blog Reader                     % Favorite GreatNews                     86% Bloglines                         39% Attensa for Outlook        33% NetNewswire                  33% News Alloy     … Continue reading Best RSS newsreader – GreatNews

Bank of America display a best practise here, with money remaining in the customers account until the biller receives it. Pay Bills With a Click? More Americans Are Doing It and Banks Are Loving It – New York Times Earlier this year, Bank of America also changed its system so the customer’s money remains in his account until the biller has deposited the payment. In years past, the customers’ checking account was immediately debited. Other banks are also developing systems where customers can pay bills at the last minute and have the biller paid instantly. Online Resources, an online bill … Continue reading Bill payment evolves

Most banks use customer segmentation models, whereas design personas are better suited to web design.  They align stakeholders behind a shared understanding of the customer.  I’d argue they also support product design too. Forrester Research: How Design Personas Differ From Typical Customer Segmentation Models Traditional customer segmentation models don’t provide the key information about users’ goals, attitudes and behaviors that is required for effective interaction design — personas do. Valid personas are derived from primary user research, foster a shared point of view among the diverse group of people who impact the customer experience, and enable design decisions. To make … Continue reading How Design Personas Differ From Typical Customer Segmentation Models

Great piece of research just released at Forrester, by Christine Spivey Overby, with Carrie A. Johnson, & Brian Tesch.  This makes the point very objectively for re-considering marketing.  While marketing claim to be the voice of the customer, they are not hearing the message, and in fact are completely ill-equipped to do that today. Forrester Research: The Essentials Of Consumer-Driven Innovation Marketers live by “the voice of the customer.” But shifts in consumer behavior and the high failure rate of products, services, and experiences suggest that companies must re-evaluate their listening techniques. Products are failing, and trust in brands is … Continue reading The Essentials Of Consumer-Driven Innovation

Tagging is very useful, and there will be lessons from tagging that we can use in bank sites, and online banking.  This post at Bokardo outlines well the current state of tagging, which many think is stuck.  Tagging is continually held up as social computing, yet the primary value is personal. Bokardo » The Del.icio.us Lesson The one major idea behind the Del.icio.us Lesson is that personal value precedes network value. What this means is that if we are to build networks of value, then each person on the network needs to find value for themselves before they can contribute … Continue reading The value of tagging, and why we should care

Go to Capgemini.com to register, and download this report.  Dramatic increase in online sales, and the role of branches changing as dramatically.  The report conclusion says it all. Thought Leadership: World Retail Banking Report 2006 | Capgemini Featuring the most current Retail Banking pricing trends spanning Europe, North America and Asia Pacific with data collected from 20 countries and 41 executive  interviews, the 3rd annual World Retail Banking Report provides in-depth pricing analyses and takes a fresh look at Retail Banking channels and the impact those channels are having on today’s distribution models.   Produced by Capgemini, EFMA and ING. Report … Continue reading World Retail Banking Report 2006

This article co-incides nicely with my own observation, while wandering around Manhattan this week.  The article is contradictory – it says:

1. the best customers are using electronic channels less and less
2. the “worst” customers are using branches

The article goes on to state that banks are building boutique branches, with comfortable seats, LCD tv’s etc.  I saw those and they are still empty.

Relevance to Bankwatch:
More on the role of branches, and the link to strategy to come, in future posts.

TheStar.com – Big bang in retail banking

Banks have a problem. More and more, their most profitable customers are not coming into their branches. As a result, banks are looking to pilfer concepts from the world’s most powerful retail stores. Plasma TVs, plants and comfy chairs are popping up in branches.

Continue reading “is it Too little too late for branches?”

This is a highly useful and relevant alert service, allowing customers to keep track of changes to the fraud sensitive bill registration area. Barclays extra fraud protection | This is Money They will also offer customers a free service which will send them a text message every time a new payment is set up from their account. ‘If a recipient is not on our recognised list of financial providers, credit card companies and the like, we will send the customer a text message to tell them a new payment has been set up,’ a spokesman told This is Money. Technorati … Continue reading Barclays provide smart alert service

This is a seismic shift in consumer attitudes against In-store diversification in grocery stores.  It could be that in 2002, consumers saw it as newer, but are not getting tired of it.  51% of consumers want supermarkets to focus on food Although the percentage of respondents buying or using none of the suggested products or services was significantly lower in 2006 than in 2002, the percentage of those who held the opinion that supermarkets should concentrate on their food offering had dramatically increased over the same period (51.3% of respondents in 2006, compared with 24% in 2002). Continue reading The future for Instore services is not clear