Ron linked over to this white paper which makes for provocative and useful reading during these economic times. I say useful because I believe are in an industry transition time that will re-define companies including banks, and the economic situation is symptomatic. The report also happens to fit with my belief that amongst other things, banks are still focussed on products, and not on customers. My belief is that is not a winning formula at the best of times, but with the advent of customer empowerment, and expectation of self service, product centric is a disastrous strategy. It only works … Continue reading Why Banks need to make a fundamental shift away from a product centric view

Charlene Li offers a good description of Open Social and how Google is ensuring the web remains open and useful to al. more about “fop_wrapper.swf (application/x-shockw…“, posted with vodpod Continue reading Open Social explanation | Video – Charlene Li

Ron Shevlin of Aite Group thinks the potential Goldman Sachs move to online account opening has advantages over traditional banks. This makes sense. While Bruce Cundiff at Javelin notes the lack of experience at Goldman in this space, my thought is that could be an advantage. Banks are constrained by risk, organisation and cultural hurdles, and Goldman may able to avoid those. Mr. Shevlin said any online start-up would benefit from the Goldman name and could avoid issues such as those faced by Citigroup Inc., which required customers who wanted to earn the higher interest rates of its high-yield online … Continue reading Goldman Sachs as an online bank – UPDATE

We can expect innovation in these difficult banking times. It will come in ways that no-one expects. innovation is often non linear, and always counter-intuitive. Here is an example no-one expected. Goldman Sachs mulls online bank – Wall Street Journal | finextra.com Goldman Sachs is considering launching an Internet banking operation in an effort to build its deposit base, the Wall Street Journal reports. Citing unidentified sources close to the bank, the Journal says the new unit will seek deposits that can be used to fund future business initiatives. The company has not ruled out the possibility of buying an … Continue reading Innovation in banking from a former investment bank

Fascinating debate kicked off at Social Media Conferencec. #cdninst It was kicked off by Ira Bassen and supplemented by another journalist at the back of the room. While many other good points were made throughout about PR and MSM, the big debate was when journalists essentially stated social media is fake, and the underlying premise of “friending” me is to sell more things. A theme throughout the conference is the very role and definition of social media. Traditionally PR and marketing were disconnected from product and service quality and were instead focussed on messaging and brand awareness. If the quality … Continue reading Social Media and journalists