Zions Bank Continues to Improve Onboarding Process by Expanding Channels and Touches

Instead of simply sending a single letter to new account openers to thank them for their business, Zions Bank has expanded their onboarding program to include a 30 day 'engagement' mailing and a 60 day 'cross-sell' mailing. In addition, they utilize their centralized call center for follow-up and reach all new customers with email to reinforce the written communication. This integrated focus towards new customer communication has resulted in a significant reduction in new customer attrition and enhanced cross-sales of services.

Five Steps to Improved Customer Engagement Through Email

According to Peter McCormick, co-founder of one-to-one communications firm ExactTarget, there are five steps for engaging customers via email.

1. Express Gratitude: According to McCormick, fewer than 50% of marketers send a welcoming email thanking a customer for accepting communication from a brand. This should be the first step after a customer provides their email address. This communication also sets the tone for future dialogue so this is a great time to include a coupon for expansion of the banking relationship and/or a research report or white paper for a B2B client.
2. Take a Genuine Interest: Let the customer tell you about their communication needs and interests to enable more relevant content delivery. A preference center can achieve this where a customer expresses what they want to know going forward.
3. Let Customers Talk and Share: Embed social network icons directly within your email that is sent so your customer can share offers and research with friends. In addition, invite customers to contribute to your bank's blog.
4. Know Your Brand Advocates: Reward those customers that respond to emails, contribute to blogs and share your offers. Expand the loyalty and engagement by inviting those customers who are brand advocates to special events where they can further discuss and share their experiences. Email provides the springboard to a much stronger social media strategy.
5.  Build a VIP Area: Create private subscriber-only access to social networking groups, events, and special resources that address the needs expressed in step 2. This heightened level of engagement not only rewards the customer for their loyalty and engagement, but also provides a source of insight not available through traditional channels.

There is no doubt banks are getting better at leveraging the power of email and social networks. The most progressive organizations are now beginning to differentiate their email communication based on customer engagement and benefiting from improved insight which can assist in future customer service and product development.

Banking on Social Sites Unlikely

According to a new research report by Forrester, Banking On Social Sites Is A Work In Progress, while social networking sites have a 30-day active population of more than 400 million users of which more than half visit on any given day, that love doesn't extend to banking through social networks. In fact, more than 70% of online households surveyed showed little or no interest in accessing their accounts through social sites like Facebook. Not surprisingly, the reasons for the lack of interest revolves around privacy and security concerns more than anything else.

So, while the majority of large financial institutions continue to look for more ways to leverage social networking's ability to engage customers, resolve problems and ultimately build loyalty, the reach of these sites beyond stronger interactive communication remains to be seen. At the very least, consumers will need the stronger security guarantees, authentication and more that is already afforded customer who use online and mobile banking.

Banks Can Accelerate Revenue Growth by Managing Digital Experience

According to the March issue of the McKinsey Quarterly, digital channels can assist companies in unifying the customer experience and help move customers from interest to loyalty. In the article, "Four Ways to Get More Value From Digital Marketing", David C. Edelman discusses how companies can increase revenues through a better coordination of the digital end-to-end experience (see exhibit).

By focusing on the capture of a larger amount of Internet traffic through improved mass media key word positioning and SEO, increasing customer engagement through easy to navigate sites and targeted messaging, converting more of the digital leads to sales with strong offers and building digital loyalty through online and offline channels, revenues can be optimized.

The article discusses how marketing investments need to be proportional to the influence they will have on the consumer's purchasing decision. But any shift in investment will only yield results if the channels are integrated and coordinated and if the appropriate metrics are established linking investment to performance. This may require marketers to move out of their comfort zone and to step back from tactical, day-to-day execution and take a more strategic view of where to invest and make changes.

Alternatives to Online Bill Payment May Drive Stronger Engagement

Research has shown that one of the strongest engagement tools for new and existing checking customers is to have the customer set up online bill payment. Unfortunately, even with aggressive 'switch' programs, the success banks have had trying to get customers to sign up for online bill payment has been less than overwhelming.

To try to simplify the signing up for online bill pay (and reduce first year attrition), some banks have moved to promoting the payment of bills using debit and credit cards. In the case of using a debit card, the payment still is taken from a customer's checking account and the process for signing up can actually be easier than with a traditional biller. In addition, using a debit card for bill payment can generate interchange income for the bank, rewards for the customer, and if the payment is recurring, it will not be subject to the new Reg E stipulations.


Chase Bank has done an excellent job of promoting bill payment using debit and credit cards through an online tool called Chase Payee Directory. With this tool, a customer can select the company they want to pay with an interactive directory.

With the goal of getting new and existing checking customers to use their checking account becoming as important as retaining the customer, these forms of moderate innovation will certainly become more commonplace.

Effective Onboarding Begins with Good Insight

In 2003, the BAI released a research study entitled, 'The Ninety Day Window of Opportunity', where interviews, deposit statistics and segmentation models revealed that nearly 75% of all cross-sell opportunities and the vast majority of attrition occurred in the first 90 days of a new customer relationship. These findings continue to be verified in the marketplace, with expanded concern recently around the lack of funding, engagement and use of new products by these new customers.

More than ever, financial institutions need to begin the onboarding process by capturing an accurate and robust view of the customer which can be used across the organization to enhance the customer experience and expand the relationship with the bank. In short, to optimize the customer experience during the first critical months and year of the relationship from both the customer's and bank's perspective, you need a 360 degree view of the customer. With online account openings, this process becomes even more critical.


Unfortunately, with so many data entry points and so much emphasis on operation efficiency and regulatory requirements, the capture of many key elements of customer insight gets overlooked or is done inconsistently by the front line. Beyond address, birth date, gender and identification information, financial institutions need to begin to collect insight such as email addresses, primary decision maker on the account (it is often the female in the household even though we usually address correspondences to the male), the preferred channel of communication (which is often email), the reason for coming to the bank (move, dissatisfaction, previously unbanked) and what services they use elsewhere (the holy grail of insight). Of course, with more and more of the collection process occurring online, organizations are under increased pressure to validate this insight (especially the address).

With this insight, you are in a much better position to communicate with the new customer in a personalized and relevant manner, using the right channels to the best person in the household offering a service or solution that is geared to their needs. These communications should begin on day one and continue throughout the early stages of the customer relationship enhancing the customer experience and increasing loyalty and retention. Multiple channels should be utilized to improve effectiveness and measurement of all touches should occur to gauge the ROI of the process.

Ten Steps to Onboarding Success

Later today, I am presenting at the Oregon Bankers Association 105th Anniversary Convention at Sunriver Resort on the topic, Stemming Attrition and Building Relationships Through Effective Onboarding.

In addition to sharing recent statistics from J.D. Power and Associates around the positive impact of increased attention early in a new relationship and the positive impact of using multiple communication channels from case studies across the banking industry, I will be sharing the ten key steps to onboarding success that I have seen over the past five years.


These ten steps are:

1. Acquire the right customers: The most important component of a successful onboarding program is to acquire customers that have a greater liklihood of future value based on modeling and geographic targeting.
2. Communicate early and often: The sooner you can build dialogue with the customer and the more often you can connect in the first 90 days, the more successful you will be in retaining and building relationships.
3. Integrate across multiple channels: Reaching out to the new customer using phone, direct mail, email and personal 1:1 communication will greatly improve the success of an onboarding program. We have seen lifts of 25-50% when multiple channels are used.
4. Build in learning from day one: An onboarding program should not run on auto pilot. The competitive environment, customer behaviors and transaction trends change all the time. Your onboarding program also needs to adjust on a dynamic basis.
5. Engagement is key: Cross-selling the new customer should not begin until after you encourage engagement with the new account. This can include direct deposit, online banking and bill payment, autosave, credit utilization, debit/credit card utilization, etc.
6. Build a cadence of communication: A successful onboarding program uses a sequence of communication to improve the customer experience by helping the customer understand their new account, get to know the bank brand and eventually build trust and a stronger relationship.
7. Develop personalized offers: Once the customer has demonstrated a satisfactory level of engagement with their new account, offers targeted to the specific needs of the customer should be communicated.
8. Use a test and learn mentality: Testing should always be done with an onboarding program to determine the right offers, timing, channels and cadence for each customer segment.
9. Measure results: Results should be measured consistently against a control group. Common metrics include changes in attrition, engagement, cross-selling, balances and satisfaction on both a customer and household basis.
10. Provide a single point of responsibility: Since most banks do not have Directors of Cross-Selling or VP of Retention, it is important to assign the onboarding process to a single person who will 'own' the development and impact of the onboarding process. This person will work with segments, product managers and marketing teams to ensure the success of your program.

There has never been a more important time to develop a successful onboarding program. With fee income being attacked by Reg E and net interest margins at historical low levels, it is imperative that financial organizations attract and keep customers with the highest potential lifetime value.

Onboarding Communication - How Much is Too Much

As I discuss multichannel new customer onboarding program development with financial organizations, it doesn't take long before the client asks about how much communication is too much early in a new relationship.

Interestingly, according to our research at Harland Clarke as well as research from J.D. Power, the number of new products sold and the customer satisfaction ratings both increase as the number of contacts increase during the first 90 days. In fact, according to J.D. Power, the average number of accounts sold increases from less than 2.5 to more than 3 if the customer is communicated with 4-7 times or more. In addition, the satisfaction ratings increase by more than 10% if more connections are made with the customer who opened up a new account.


Unfortunately, there are still several institutions who do not have a robust communications sequence with customers who open a new account, which impacts new customer engagement, cross-sell potential, customer satisfaction and even retention. For those banks that effectively reach out multiple times using email, phone, and direct mail, the results are consistently better across the board.

One of the strongest onboarding programs I am aware of is at a regional bank in the west. Their robust onboarding process proactively takes control of the customer experience for the entire first 90 days, stressing engagement and by offering products and services that are best matched to the customer's needs. The process begins at the new account desk, where there is a selling mentality but also an emphasis on collecting key information that will assist in future communication with the customer. Email addresses are collected from as many as 85% of customers opening new accounts, which is significantly above industry averages and which allows the bank the leverage for multi-channel communication throughout the entire customer lifecycle.

An initial email that is delivered in the first two days of the new relationship discussing what the customer can expect from their bank in the upcoming months are to provide key contact information if there is a problem. This is followed by a branch personalized Thank You letter with a series of engagement service offers. Subsequent communication (beyond standard debit card mailings, etc.) include a welcome call on day 15, an engagement reinforcement letter and email on day 30, and a cross-sell direct mail and email communication based on next most likely product modeling on the 60th day of the relationship.

The bank has found that the ability to offer integrated, multi-channel communication is critical in their quest to achieve the best engagement and sales results and to reach the highest levels of customer satisfaction. Delivering early, relevant and persistent communication has help them improve retention by more than 5%, significantly increase engagement levels and improve both cross-selling and balance build efforts compared to their control group. They achieve these results by 'touching' the new account opener 6-8 times during the first 60 days and by using personalized jump pages to enhance the experience.

While the planning and development for this program was definitely more extensive than a single touch welcome program, the return on investment using all metrics validated the effort.

How many contacts does your bank use to onboard new customers? What channels do you use to reach and engage the customer?

Onboarding Needs to Reflect Bank Customers' Diverse Preferences and Needs

According to a new Javelin Strategy and Research report issued today, many banks are not leveraging the insight available early in a new relationship to develop customized offers and to utilize preferred channels of communication. In their study entitled, 2010 New Account Onboarding: Using a Systematic, Tactical Approach to Deepen Financial Customer Relationships, the importance of collecting key pieces of information such as age, income and the customer's previous banking experience is emphasized. With this baseline insight, Javelin proposes that communication channel determination and messaging can be improved, thereby leading to improved engagement, retention and cross-sell results.

The findings in the robust 44 page study are a refinement of a previous Javelin onboarding study from 1997 and are consistent with what I have found visiting and speaking with banks across the country. In fact, two of my clients (Zions Bank and KeyBank) are referenced in the study.
Both banks initially communicate with all new account openers, focusing on the engagement process, with an emphasis on online banking and bill pay, debit card utilization, direct deposit and more recently autosave and overdraft protection (in response to Reg. E). In addition, both banks leverage multiple channels for communication, including email, direct mail and either centralized or branch-based phone calling. At both institutions, segmentation of the customer base and the process of customized messaging and cross-selling is done after the more overarching process of getting the customer familiar with and engaged with their service. The collection of transaction history provides the foundation for leveraging propensity models to drive cross-selling later in the relationship.

While the Javelin study (which was based on research collected online) indicates that consumers prefer to receive email communication regarding their new account, research done with the majority of my clients show that results are enhanced when multiple communication channels are utilized (even for online account openers). These findings are not inconsistent, but reflect the online banking focus of the Javelin research. In fact, by leveraging personalized jump pages, online banking messaging, help/switch lines and even statement messaging and inserts, results can be further enhanced.

Additional recommendations from the Javelin research include establishing a paperless relationship at account opening and during onboarding (many banks I work with are building marketing programs around this objective) and collecting mobile phone numbers.

In conversations with Mark Schwanhausser, Senior Multi-Channel Financial Service Analyst for Javelin in the development of this report, he found it amazing that banks were not focusing on the collection of mobile numbers as part of the account opening process due to the significant number of households making their mobile phone their primary communication media and the increasing preference of data distribution via mobile channels (alerts). The collection of email addresses should also be a required component of the new account opening process even though many banks still do not leverage this channel effectively.

While an emphasis on a strong onboarding/welcome process seems to be universal throughout the industry, there are dozens, if not hundreds of ways to implement such as process when you take into account messaging, timing, channels, target audiences, etc. I am interested in onboarding success stories and additional insights you can share. Feel free to leave a comment or learnings on my blog.

Can Banks Find Ways to Make Deposits Work Harder?

As was mentioned in yesterday's American Banker article, In Cash Glut, Banks Try to Discourage New Deposits, many banks are currently in a somewhat disadvantageous position of having an abundance of deposits at a time of depressed loan demand. With loan to deposit ratios dropping from a median of more than 105% to less than 95% in less than two years for the 15 largest banks, the excess liquidity is costing banks money.

This inability to earn adequate interest on these deposits, combined with lower overdraft fees and the potential for lower interchange income has banks that I am working with scurrying for ways to make up the revenue shortfall.

Some banks are reconfiguring their checking account pricing either by adding fees for enhanced services such as privacy protection or rewards program participation or are reducing costs by offering new streamlined products that have limited service structures (like Bank of America's new online checking test).

And there is no end in sight to the inflow of deposits, as the confidence level of both consumers and businesses is weak enough to encourage a heavier savings mentality and with the equity markets too risky for many investors. Many banks are seeing inflows even with historically low interest rates being paid on deposits.

While loan demand will eventually pick up and banks will most likely find ways to recoup some of the lost fee income through new products or pricing structures, the best long-term solution is to change from a transaction support mentality to a customer relationship perspective. This holistic view encourages the acquisition of accounts with a greater long term potential, a stronger emphasis on engagement of these accounts to increase fee income and reduce attrition, and a focused effort on increasing share of wallet through needs based cross-selling.

At a time when margins are razor this, loan/deposit ratios are anemic and traditional fee income is being attacked by new regulations, it is imperative that we maximize the value of relationships at every step of the customer lifecycle. Historically, too much revenue has been 'left on the table' and we have been accepting of people who open new accounts simply for a premium (gamers), customers with dormant or low activity accounts, and single service customers. Going forward, we need to refocus our efforts on increasing our value proposition at the same time we reduce delivery costs and maximize relationship value.

Has your bank stopped their deposit acquisition efforts? Has there been an increased focus on the engagement and cross-sell processes at your bank? I would love to hear about your bank's strategy for dealing with the abundance of deposits that currently exists.

Post Financial Reform Checking: Fee, Free or Wait and See?

With August 15 in the rear view mirror, the impact of the new regulations around overdraft protection (Reg E) are beginning to be played out in the marketplace. While most of the larger banks, such as Bank of America, Chase and Wells Fargo have declared an end to free checking without stipulations, most small and some regional banks such as US Bank, Suntrust and Capital One have left the product unchanged while many of the large regionals such as PNC, KeyBank and others appear to be adopting a wait and see approach.

In fact, according to research released this week from Moebs Services, only 63.6 percent of the largest banks currently offer free checking compared to 92.6 percent in 2009, while community banks’ use of free checking declined only declined from 78.3 percent to 71.7 percent.
As an industry, the offering of free checking dropped by 11 percent over the past year according to the study. This differential based on the size of organization may reflect the desire of the largest banks to improve the cost structure of their checking portfolio, while the offering of free by smaller banks may be a competitive repositioning of the free checking account as a possible counter to the national branch network advantage of the larger banks.

As I discussed in a BAI webinar this week entitled, Checking 2.0: Revenue Opportunities in a New Regulatory Environment, with the cost of maintaining a checking account being several hundred dollars a year, it appears that free checking, along with rewards programs and other benefits, could be the first major consumer banking casualty, as many banks reevaluate their checking continuum in the wake of the government’s financial reform.

But, is getting rid of free checking a good strategy? According to most research, free checking still has a strong appeal across virtually all demographic and economic segments. It even has a positive contribution margin (including the impact of Reg. E, Durbin and the current interest rate environment) when you remove shell accounts with little or no activity. Would it be better to eliminate some of the perks that have been added over the past few years such as free competitive ATM transactions? Many banks are also beginning to charge an annual fee for their rewards program after a first year fee waiver for their programs. Still other firms are considering removing rewards program offerings from their entry level free checking program.

Another way to offer a free product within your checking continuum is to offer free accounts only to customers opting for totally electronic accounts (ATM deposits and withdrawals, online statements and billpay) or to your most active or high balance customers. Bank of America is testing and electronic based checking account currently, where all fees can be avoided if the customer opts for electronic statements and does not use the branch for routine transactions. With a mobile banking customer base of over 4 million households, I suspect there is a strong appeal for this structure of product.

What is clear is that most institutions are reviewing the economics of this product offering and are doing extensive consumer and product research to build a new set of needs based products that are driven by the transaction and money management behavior of their customer base. They are attempting to move towards a stronger set of value based products with enhanced features and benefits while eliminating fixed costs that are associated with low margin (inactive) accounts to improve portfolio profitability.

Has your organization decided whether to offer free checking going forward? Have you introduced new products with enhanced benefits for a fee? Have you considered changing your rewards program? I would be interested in your thoughts.

What's Next for Debit Rewards?

At a time when banks are trying to catch their breath from the reduced fee income impact of Reg E, the government has proposed a cap on interchange income that could equate to a 70%-80% reduction in fees that a bank can collect as part of debit card transactions. In travels across the country, it is clear one of the first casualties of these regulatory changes has been the reconfiguring or elimination of Free Checking at the largest banks.

Will these changes also eliminate debit card rewards programs that are funded by interchange fees?

Earlier this month, JPMorgan Chase Bank announced that they will be phasing out their debit rewards programs. It is clear in talking to bankers that almost all other financial organizations that offer rewards programs are also evaluating their options as we enter the new year. Even if the proposed limit of 12 cents a transaction is increased (as has been discussed over the past few weeks) banks will need to respond in a way that has the least impact on an increasingly disgruntled customer base, while still compensating for some of the lost funding.

Beyond changes to the checking account offerings already implemented or planned at most banks, potential changes to reward programs could include one or more of the following:

• Elimination of a reward program already in place: A difficult option given that many consumers enrolled and active in reward programs are the higher value relationships at a bank. Some banks are considering the elimination of rewards programs for only certain categories of accounts (i.e. Free Checking). 
• Assessment of an annual fee for reward-based debit cards: Some organizations already have an annual fee that is waived for the first year of enrollment.
• Reduction in the value of point/reward interrelationship: This is an option that impacts the most active and loyal rewards program participants the most.
• Introduction of a relationship-based reward program: Changing a points based reward structure to a program like Bank of America's 'Keep the Change'  provides additional flexibility since the foundation is around an expanded banking relationship.
• Introduction of a merchant-funded reward program: Shifting the cost of the rewards program to the same merchants who will benefit from the change in interchange regulations, hyperlocal rewards program companies like Bling Nation (that recently signed an agreement with PayPal), transaction history rewards company Cardlytics (that recently signed an agreement with ClairMail for immediate mobile reward notification) or one of several other merchant-funded programs may either replace or supplement current rewards offerings.

The last option above can actually be a revenue generator for banks since the merchant not only funds the reward, but usually pays the bank a marketing fee.

Any of the changes to reward programs discussed above will require significant customer communication to avoid a negative customer experience at a time when many household checking accounts may also be changing. It will be the role of bank marketers and product managers to try to retain the loyalty of some of the most valuable households who have enjoyed the benefits of these rewards.

At the same time, it will be important to heavily promote the use of debit and credit cards to help offset some of the impact of these regulations. The benefit is not only the increase of interchange income from increased transactions, but also improved retention achieved from the more engaged customer.

If you have a rewards program at your bank, I would love to know how you are planning to respond to this most recent challenge originating from a supposed consumer-focused regulation.

Ten Bank Marketer Resolutions for 2011

It is the dawning of a new year in banking with many of the same challenges that we saw in 2010. Our industry continues to be viewed in a less than positive light from both the consumer and small business marketplace. 

The need for new customer growth and share of wallet expansion underpins the need for new sources of non-interest fee income at a time when regulations are dramatically reducing many traditional sources of revenue. In addition, the expansion of transaction and communication channels are changing the ways we interact with customers. 

These challenges are combined with an historically low interest rate environment and a credit environment where there is a massive amount of money to lend at a time when borrowing is more difficult and less desirable for many.

According to a national survey, the majority of personal resolutions in 2011 will revolve around saving money, losing weight, changing a bad habit and being closer to loved ones. Achieving any of these goals will take commitment, focus and changes in behavior. The same can be said for the resolutions I have developed from traveling the country over the past few months and being involved in a number of banks' annual planning efforts.

Here are areas where bank marketers believe they should focus in 2011:

1. Replace Lost Fee Income
Nothing has impacted banking over the past 12-18 months or will impact banking in 2011 more than the loss of fee income caused by the combination of the Card Act, Reg. E, and the upcoming changes from the Durbin Amendment. Almost all other resolutions for the upcoming year are built to address this need. The role of bank marketers in achieving fee income replacement goals will include checking product restructuring and new fee-based product development, increasing card transactions, improving customer engagement and better resource allocation for results.

2. Improve the Customer Experience
Another overarching resolution similar to the personal resolution of being closer to loved ones, bank marketers need to view all of their initiatives using the lens of understanding customer's needs, looking out for customers and rewarding their relationship. In an environment of heightened scrutiny of how we are treating customers, it will be more important than ever to market to consumers and small businesses on a more personalized basis from the day they open their first account and to build a reward structure that reinforces our commitment to relationship retention and growth.

3. Focus on Incremental New Customer Growth
A new balance between quantity and quality of new accounts needs to be struck. With the elimination of Free Checking occurring at most banks I visit, new acquisition models need to be developed that take into account the new checking account continuum. Instead of generating as many accounts as possible, banks will be focusing on the potential value of relationships including the likelihood of engagement and retention. A premium will be paid for those households that will immediately contribute to the bottom line.

4. Gather Email Addresses
When presenting at the BAI Retail Delivery Conference this Fall, it amazed me that there were more banks that collected cell phone numbers than collected email addresses at the new account desk. I suppose this phenomenon may be caused by the combination of more households using a cell phone as opposed to a land line for home communication and the relative ease of having a bank's IT team build another phone field into the new account process as opposed to an email field. But with other communication channel cost increasing and the improved results achieved when email is combined with more traditional channels, the importance of collecting (and using) email addresses has never been more important. Some banks are even considering stand alone marketing initiatives to address this need in 2011.

5. Reduce Customer Attrition
At a time when the cost of acquiring a new customer exceeds $200 and the annual income potential from a new relationship is at least as high, banks can ill afford to accept first year attrition rates of 30-40%. Multichannel onboarding programs that encourage alternative channel use, enhanced services (such as online bill pay, automatic savings, privacy products, etc.) and increased transactions need to be leveraged to stop the massive outflow of accounts that occur early in the customer's lifecycle. Improved tracking of relationship diminishment and win-back programs will also be used to achieve this resolution.

6. Expand Share of Wallet Through Lifestage Marketing
To compensate for the increased difficulty of generating high value relationships, there needs to be a much greater focus on organic growth, including behavior based cross-selling and lifestage marketing. While the movement from product centricity to being customer-centric has been discussed for decades, the removal of product silos is no longer an option for those banks who are seeking optimal resource allocation. More banks than ever are investing in improved models and strategies for relationship growth which will improve both engagement levels and retention in the long term. New service introductions such as privacy protection and enhanced personal financial management (PFM) tools will further allow for relationship deepening in 2011.

7. Don't Confuse Channel Economy with Channel Efficiency
No communication channel is 'free'. While email may seem like a far less costly channel to use for reaching customers, the lack of clear targeting and message development may prove costly as customers opt-out of future communications or simply ignore email messages. In my experience within the banking industry, email has not proven to be as good of a replacement for channels like direct mail as it has been a good supplement for improved results. In 2011, banks will develop much better processes for measuring the incremental impact of alternative channel communication and will continue to expand communication channels to include mobile, ATMs, social media, etc.

8. Leverage Social Media Personally and Professionally
Social media channels definitely can be beneficial or a distraction. Not many of us have time for reading about someone else's dinner plans or personal political opinions on Twitter, yet Twitter can be a great source of timely financial industry or marketing insight and competitive research delivered in a very compact format to the desktop for consumption at a time and place desired. Banks have also realized that social channels need to be used differently in financial services than with retail or other industry verticals. As opposed to trying to find 'friends' of our brands, social media has been used most effectively for customer service (Twitter) and for the promotion of broad based public relations initiatives (Chase's very popular Community Giving Campaign). The coming year will be a year of expanded testing of these new channels for the banking industry. Unlike the past, however, investment in these channels will need to generate a tangible ROI.

9. Deliver On The Mobile Banking Promise
The opportunity to be a 'first mover' in the mobile banking marketplace is quickly closing as more and more financial organizations are introducing products that work on multiple platforms. Bank of America has found that their market leading mobile banking customer base has significantly less attrition than a customer without a mobile banking application. USAA has continued to push the envelope on ways to use the mobile phone for financial convenience including remote deposit capture, receiving auto insurance quotes, requesting proof of insurance cards, etc. While building a concrete business case for mobile banking may be challenging, the marketplace will eventually demand this channel for P2P payments, geolocational applications and even low cost banking alternatives. Next year will also see the first wave of iPad and Android tablet applications that go beyond minor adjustments to current phone applications and leverage the enhanced capabilities of the popular tablet hardware.

10. Reconfigure The Branch Bank Model
The most challenging resolution for 2011 may be the testing and development of new branch banking models in light of the shift in channel use by the consumer. As branches are increasingly used primarily for account openings and small business servicing, the physical and operational configuration of branch networks will need to be evaluated. But what will be the best model for the future? While Citibank introduced a refined branch model late last year similar to an Apple Store, Huntington Bank went in an opposite direction by expanding their branch network and increasing hours and days of operation. With such a significant investment in real estate and human resources to support branch operations, each bank will be testing a variety of options in the next few years with multiple configurations most likely winning based on specific market dynamics.
I am sure there are several more important resolutions that can be added to my list, but there are already more than many of us can handle. This will definitely challenge the ability to focus and to achieve meaningful results especially in an environment of continuous change. Similar to personal resolutions, however, we all need to start as soon as possible and focus our attention on those resolutions that have the greatest impact and opportunity for success.

Let me hear where you will be focusing your efforts in 2011.

New Email Marketing Study Highlights Missed Opportunities for Bankers

As social media channels continue to proliferate and traditional communication channels become more expensive, bankers struggle with how to maximize the effectiveness of the email channel within their marketing mix according to a just released study from SubcriberMail, a Harland Clarke company. The study entitled, Email Marketing Within Financial Services Institutions, surveyed 71 banks and 191 credit unions, finding that email marketing among these organizations to be strong and growing.

But, while many organizations are leveraging email to inform and communicate news and product information (50% for both banks and credit unions) and even cross-sell existing customers (56% of credit unions/42% of banks), a far lower percentage of credit unions and banks use email as part of a multi-channel onboarding and/or activation process (26% and 27% respectively) or use email for delivery of an electronic receipt.

This is a missed opportunity since studies show that new account holders are very open to all channels of communication early in their relationship and that as many as 75% of customers open and read transactional emails. In addition, in working with financial organizations across the country in the development and implementation of onboarding programs, early customer engagement, cross-selling and retention are all positively impacted by adding email marketing to the communications mix.

At some organizations such as Chase, email welcoming messages many times arrive at the customer's home before the customer returns from opening a new account. This communication is used to thank the customer for opening their account, encourage usage of engagement services (online banking, debit cards, direct deposit) and describe future communication the customer will receive from the bank.

So why the hesitation in using email as a communications tool? According to the survey, while the fear of phishing or fraud was a significant concern, the primary controllable challenges to successful email marketing included the effective collection of email addresses in the first place in addition to subscriber churn (or addresses going bad). Roughly 40% of banks and credit unions found both of these issues to be an impediment to success.

To address these concerns, the SubscriberMail study suggested a holistic, company-wide approach to collecting and confirming customer's email addresses at every touch point. This would include collection and verification at the branch level, call center, and even as part of direct mail efforts and at the ATM. The key is to establish the collection and maintenance of an email address database as an overarching corporate initiative that will result in both lower communication costs as well as improved marketing effectiveness.

Unfortunately, senior management support of such an initiative was far from a reality according to the survey, with less than 30% of the bank respondents stating that senior management was supportive of email marketing strategies. With a subscriber email address valuation estimated to be an average of $118 according to a recent DMA Email Experience Council calculator, marketers need to continue to seek managerial support for their email collection initiatives.

Another challenge to keeping a subscriber database up-to-date comes from the customer's perspective, since allowing email communication is directly correlated to the relevancy and value derived from the emails a customer receives. As with traditional direct mail, relevancy depends on effective segmentation of the email database and timely communication of opportunities, events and offers. Again, both banks and credit unions were found to fall short in their efforts to segment customers, with far fewer than 50% segmenting their email database in any manner. Interestingly, only half of the responders had email initiatives planned in the next six months, indicating a less than robust email strategy and the potential for the customer to undervalue email communication from their financial institution.

Overall, the SubscriberMail survey results illustrated a tremendous amount of untapped potential with the email channel and the need for the same type of discipline with email marketing as with other direct channels. With increased focus on the collection and cleansing of email database files, improved segmentation and more consistent use of this communication tool, return on marketing investment can be improved at a time when bank marketing budgets are being reduced.

I am interested in your results and use of email within your bank.

If you are interested in this free survey, simply follow this link to the download.

Checking Changes Make Onboarding and Cross-Selling More Important

Over the past several weeks, many of the larger banks across the country have announced significant changes to their checking account continuum, including elimination of traditional Free Checking, discontinuation of rewards programs, ceasing reimbursement of foreign ATM fees, as well as potential fees and transaction limits on debit cards.

While each of these strategies are intended to reduce costs or generate revenue in response to Reg E and the Durbin Amendment, these changes could also present a challenge to banks as they seek to increase engagement and gain share of wallet. This is because debit card use and rewards program enrollment were two of the more important account engagement criteria and basis for a broader relationship growth.

According to an economic analysis on the effects of the Durbin interchange amendment presented to the Federal Reserve Board on February 22, between $33.4-$38.6 billion of debit card interchange will be lost during the first two years the new rules are in effect. This reduces the revenue on a personal checking account by $56-$64 and by $79-$92 on a small business checking account according to the study. These impacts make it more important than ever to optimize onboarding and cross-sell efforts for retail and small business customers thereby reducing costly attrition, improving engagement and providing a stronger foundation for ongoing relationship expansion.

Here are several of the steps financial institutions should consider as they begin to implement changes to their deposit accounts and debit products.

• Double Down on Onboarding Initiatives: While most banks currently have an onboarding process for new retail customers, many have yet to build an onboarding process for small businesses. In addition, many programs only reach out to the customer once or twice and don't leverage a robust mix of communication channels. The impact of recent legislation makes the opportunity cost of attrition more expensive than ever. Banks need to increase the number of 'touches' a customer receives by email, phone and direct mail with the message centered on maximizing the benefits of using the account the customer just opened. When the account becomes active, then begin to expand the relationship.
• Don't Walk Away From Debit: While the economics of the debit card have definitely changed, the use of this payment vehicle remains better than many of the alternatives and provides the consumer with constant brand reinforcement each time they open their wallet. David Stewart from McKinsey & Company wrote in a recent BAI Banking Strategies article entitled, "Keeping Debit in Focus Post-Durbin" that debit cards remain an important component of the anchor DDA. As a result, getting new customers to activate and use their debit card as part of the onboarding process should continue to be a primary objective.
• Expand The Definition of Engagement: In the past, most banks focused on debit card utilization, enrollment in online banking (with bill pay) and the sign up for direct deposit in their onboarding messaging. While you don't want to cover too much in the onboarding communication, there are some households you may want to encourage to apply for a credit card and/or activate an autosave transfer as part of welcome process.
• Encourage Channel Migration: Another way to stem attrition, potentially reduce cost and build share of wallet is to increase alternative payments channel use. As part of the onboarding process, some of my clients are building messages around the use of mobile banking early in the relationship lifecycle. This makes sense based on recent trend research done by Javelin Strategy and the potential for offline customer mobile adoption found in research done by Fiserv. While there may only be minimal channel shift from a payments perspective initially, there could be significant savings if call center inquiries are reduced.
• Focus on Share of Wallet Early: While I totally agree with Ron Shevlin in his Marketing Tea Party blogs (Honeymooning and Why Engagement Matters) that a new customer must be courted and engaged before they can be cross-sold, customers define the pace of this trust building as opposed to the bank. This level of engagement/trust is usually found by looking at transaction volumes and whether engagement services are active. Once actively engaged, the customer should be offered additional services that may improve their overall banking experience. This is where product propensity models and behavioral segmentation can be effective.
• Leverage the New Account Desk: Many of my clients have found that the new account desk can  be an effective cross-selling environment for the customer, especially if credit services such as credit cards, personal or small business lines of credit and even equity credit are pre-approved at the point of sale. The point of sale is also the best place to discuss the correct account to open in the first place and the benefits of engagement services and rewards alternatives.

The effective communication of your checking account changes to existing customers has been discussed in my recent blog (Minimizing the Impact of 'Unintended Consequences'). It is just as important to communicate well with new customers at the new account desk in the days, weeks and months immediately following the new account opening. Without an aggressive communication process, leveraging multiple channels and customized to the customer's stage in the engagement process, the investment in acquiring the customer will be lost or the value of the relationship will not be optimized.

How are you going to ramp up your new customer communications to maximize your marketing ROI? Are you considering new ways of onboarding your customer in the first 30, 60 or 90 days? Have you found a way to leverage any social media in your onboarding process? I would love to hear your ideas.

The Business Case for Onboarding

SELLING STRATEGIES

Over the past several months, I have spoken to large and small groups of bankers from organizations of all sizes and have been surprised by the number of banks that still do not have a formal onboarding process for customers opening new accounts. 

Given the amount of trade press, webinars, white papers and research done on the value of onboarding, I would have thought that virtually every bank would be communicating with customers aggressively during the instrumental 90 days after account opening.

According to a J.D. Power and Associates study, 2011 U.S. Retail Banking Satisfaction Study, one of the most powerful ways to unlock customer value is to build a multi-channel, multi-touch onboarding process that begins at the new account desk with needs identification and extends to a post-sale communication sequence that builds engagement and share of wallet.

In a presentation at the Retail Financial Services Symposium in Miami, J. Michael Beird from J.D. Power and Jean Lubbert from BBVA Compass shared that a strong onboarding process is needed in response to the 'perfect storm' of challenges facing banks including:

• A reduction in core deposit growth from customers opening new accounts
• An increase in customers switching their primary financial relationship
• A rise in the average number of financial institutions considered before final selection

The best onboarding practices shared reinforced results of the same study done in 2009 and 2010, where it was shown that both satisfaction and sales increased with relatively rudimentary steps such as a thorough needs identification, a timely post-sales follow-up, and a series of communications that emphasize early product engagement. In fact, the studies even showed that satisfaction and sales increased with each subsequent contact in the first 60 days up to seven touches.

The good news is that, compared to last year's report, each step in the onboarding process is being done more frequently than in the past. Unfortunately, only 64% of households surveyed indicated that there was any follow-up done (vs. 61% in 2010), with only 17% of the households saying that any contact was made within 2 days.

A new component of this year's study was the correlation between an optimal onboarding process and both the intent to reuse the same financial institution in the future and the intent to recommend the bank to others. According to Beird, "intended advocacy is an additional bonus to implementing a high contact onboarding process". He also shared that BBVA Compass sets the bar on almost all components of a strong onboarding process with a resultant recommend rate at the high end of all banks reviewed.

So, given the potential positive impact on retention, engagement, sales and customer satisfaction, what are the key components of building a business case for onboarding?

When working with clients, I always begin with the impact onboarding has on attrition, since it is both the easiest to measure against a control group and because the financial impact almost always exceeds the cost of the onboarding program. While first year attrition at banks across the country usually range from 20% to 40% (dependent on aggressiveness of a bank's acquisition efforts), a conservative benchmark for first year reduction of attrition is between 2-3% assuming a multi-touch onboarding process. While that may not seem like a significant movement from norm, the cost of this attrition is significant.

In the example above, I provide a very simple calculation using different annual account opening levels, different attrition rates and the financial impact of $400 for each account lost. I use a $400 cost of lost account based on a $200 replace cost for the lost customer (very conservative) and an additional $200 in annualized revenue potential lost due to attrition.

Moving beyond retention, a well constructed onboarding program also has a positive impact on the level of account engagement compared to control groups. For most banks, engagement includes the cross-sell of direct deposit, online banking, bill pay, the active utilization of the debit card and in some cases mobile banking and reward program enrollment.

According to Novantas, the positive impact of direct deposit and bill pay alone can increase relationship value by more than $400. Assuming an increase in engagement compared to control of 5%, the financial impact for a bank opening 10,000 accounts a year would be $200,000, with the impact jumping to $2 million for a bank opening 100,000 accounts annually.

Capital Performance Group found similar results with banks they worked with when evaluating the impact of households adding online banking, bill pay and direct deposit.

Finally, onboarding definitely has a positive impact on average account ownership and share of wallet as illustrated by the 2009-2011 J.D. Power and Associates studies. In my experience, however, the financial impact on cross-sell effectiveness is the most disputed within banks where an onboarding program is implemented due to factors including an inability to set aside a control group large enough to measure product level results and the desire by many banks to focus on new account engagement as opposed to cross-selling during the first 30-120 days of the relationship.

The critical nature of the first 90 days of a relationship has been known to the financial services industry for years but internal obstacles and a lack of focus on organic growth has limited deployment of this foundational program. Today, as the cost of new customer acquisition continues to escalate and the need for revenue replacement increases, the most successful banks are discovering ways to implement and enhance onboarding programs using multiple channels and customer touches. The result is improved retention, increased engagement, accelerated cross-selling, an improved customer experience and optimized customer lifetime value.

Successful onboarding can quickly cover the both the cost of new customer acquisition and the deployment of a robust onboarding program in a very short period. Instead of having a period right after account opening where nobody from the bank communicates with the new customer, you can reach household profitability faster and achieve a quicker return on investment.

I have covered the onboarding and engagement processes extensively within my blog over the past year and will continue to focus on the benefits of using multiple communication channels to generate positive results. I am interested to know how well your onboarding program is going or, if you don't already have an onboarding program, what hurdles to implementation still remain.

7 Common Sense Ways to Increase Bank Cross-Selling

SELLING STRATEGIES

Every financial institution needs to generate a steady stream of new customers, yet one of the easiest and most steady sources of new businesses and related revenue is to reach out to current customers for additional business.

With the cost of acquiring new retail, small business or commercial customers being five to ten times the cost of retaining an existing one, and with the average spend of a repeat customer being 50- 100 percent more than a new one, bank marketers need to remember that the most efficient investment of marketing funds is to market to customers that already bank with you.

Here are 7 relatively easy techniques to do just that:

1. Start With the Lowest Hanging Fruit: The easiest sales that can be made to current customers are engagement services that help a customer use an account they already own. These 'sticky services' include a debit card, online banking, direct deposit, bill pay, automatic savings transfer, personal line of credit and security solutions such as privacy protection. These services help to ensure the customer will use the products they own more frequently, will significantly improve retention and will help to improve the overall customer experience.
   
   
2. Stay Connected: About a year ago I was talking to a friend who said, "I was very impressed with how much love my bank gave me when I opened some new accounts, but amazed that I never really heard from them again except to tell me about new fees". While some banks have very successful onboarding programs to help stay connected with new customers, a surprising number of banks still rely on the customer to onboard themselves. And unless the customer expands their relationship, their bank may never include them in a model-driven cross-sell program.
   
   
3. Continually Evaluate Upsell Opportunities: Rather than using product-driven programs that are done seasonally, consider funding more customer-focused programs that evaluate each customer's propensity to open one or more of the products and services you offer. With some of my clients, we evaluate each customer's transactional, product ownership and even behavioral characteristics to determine what would be the most likely next purchase and whether the propensity to purchase is high enough to make an offer. In some of most successful programs, this evaluation of opportunities is done monthly, with smaller mailing universes, but much higher response rates.
   
   
   
   
4. Empower Your Customer Contact Teams: For most customer facing employees of your bank, their primary responsibility revolves around efficient processing of transactions and/or customer service. To leverage the thousands of customer engagements these employees have each year, you need to provide easy ways for them to extend their conversations to include relationship expansion opportunities. Many banks provide prompts on their employee's computer screen around recent sales communications received by the customer, most likely products that may interest the customer and even special offers that can be made as part of their transaction or service conversation. The best programs don't stop there, but include tools for the customer to take advantage of the offer. This may be an immediately generated custom printed sales document, a follow-up email or sales call or a referral form.
   
   
5. Ask for Referrals: One of the easiest ways to generate new business and increase loyalty of current retail or business customers is to ask (and possibly incent) for referrals. If a customer is happy with the way they are treated at your organization, they usually want others to know. This is especially true with satisfied small businesses, private banking customers and with retail customers that are part of a bank-at-work program. And it doesn't hurt if you provide an incentive to your current customer. At a time when new customer acquisition offers often exceed $100 and when the overall cost of acquisition is more than $250, offering a 'bounty' of $50 would be less expensive and would most likely generate a more loyal customer.
   
   
6. Leverage All Channels: Never assume that customers understand all that your organization offers or absorb communication the same through all channels. Remind your customers continuously that you know who they are, understand their needs, are looking out for them and that you are willing to reward them for their loyalty. And use as many direct channels as possible to reach out to your current customer base, including direct mail, email, statement inserts, banner ads on your website, ATM messaging, outbound calling efforts, etc.
   
   
7. Measure and Reward What You Want Done: By providing ongoing measurement of the cross-selling objectives you want to achieve and paying for this achievement of these objectives, you have a much better chance of reaching your goals. This continuous reinforcement of your cross-sell mission allows your team to be focused on what's important. You can also turbocharge your results by communicating how you are assisting in their efforts. Provide Opportunity Reports of the customers where they may have the greatest opportunity for success. As part of these reports, it is also helpful to provide background as to why the customer is being selected for a specific offer.

Finally, remember that current customers like to be rewarded for their loyalty. One of the best ways to do this is to remember to include an offer with any cross-sell or upsell message. Without an offer, you may be perceived as simply 'pushing product' without leveraging the relationship value already in place. A strong offer will not only generate a better response to your communication, but also remind the customer of the value of doing business with your organization.

I would love to know other ways you are improving cross-sales within your bank, credit union or investment firm. I know I have missed some great ideas and I would love to hear from you.

How Effective Is Your Bank's Social Media Strategy

Whether it is a company asking you to visit their Facebook page and 'Like' a product or brand or a peer wanting to keep in touch on LinkedIn, people are continually being driven to social networks according to Nielsen's latest report on social media. In this first report of its kind by Nielsen, it was found that social networks and blogs reach nearly 80 percent of active U.S. Internet users, and that social media accounts for 22.5 percent of the time Americans spend online. As expected, Facebook was by far the strongest social media brand.

In addition, it was found that nearly 40% of social media users access content from their mobile phone and that Internet users over age 55 are driving the growth of social networking through their mobile devices. As a result, "there is a need for companies to engage more strategically in the social space than they do currently," according to Radha Subramanyam, senior vice president for media and advertising insights and analytics at Nielsen.

Social Media Demographics, Nielsen Q3 2011 Report on Social Media

With networking continuing to increase, and the need to connect with customers and prospects in the most efficient and effective manner possible, more banks are using social media as part of their overall communications strategy. But, while interacting with customers through social channels can be effective, measuring the effectiveness of your marketing investment is no easy task. In fact, while many of the largest banks in the U.S. and overseas are leveraging many of the primary social networks, their strategies usually involve non-financial initiatives such as sweepstakes, charitable causes, etc. 

For instance, on August 16, Citibank used the front page of the Wall Street Journal to promote its Facebook page. On the Facebook site for Citibank US, visitors were prompted to hit 'Like' to learn how to get special access to Beyonce tickets. According to Jim Bruene from NetBanker there were 36,500 likes by midnight of that day for an increase of around 2,000 fans. Today, the page registers more than 125,000 likes (see below). But what is the return on investment for this strategy?

Citibank US Facebook Page, September 13, 2011

To show how fast what is considered a success in social media changes, we only need to look back to last March when Chase used their Chase Community Giving Facebook page to serve as the foundation for a voting process to allocate $5 million in charitable donations. At the time, this program was considered the industry standard with around 2 million 'likes'. Again, however, there was not a clear linkage between the buzz and revenues.

Chase Bank Community Giving Facebook Page

American Express, on the other hand has built very direct link between their Facebook page and credit card acquisition and engagement with their 'Link. Like. Love.' program. Unlike the Chase strategy described above, the American Express strategy is not limited duration and the program is all about their card product. With 'Link. Like. Love.', followers link their AmEx card using the Facebook platform to receive merchant-funded rewards. As rewards are communicated via Facebook (as opposed to on an online bank statement), the customer can link the offer to their card and are prompted to share the offer on Facebook with others in their network for a word of mouth marketing (WOMM) impact. As of today, AmEx has over 2 million fans with over 100,000 'likes' being generated each month based on a comparison to results on July 26.

American Express 'Link. Like. Love' Facebook Page - September 13, 2011

So how do you build a social media strategy that is effective from a financial perspective? How do you know how much to invest in a strategy and whether the strategy is successful from an ROI perspective? There is a great deal of debate today around 'attribution' and the real value of efforts that may not be directly tied to sales. And until we can do a better job of tying intangible benefits such as traffic, fans, mentions and views to some traditional metric, we should continue to be challenged by the finance departments of banks to provide more accurate measurements.

As shown in the infographic below developed recently by MDG Advertising, the vast majority of current measures used by CMOs are 'intangibles,' which by their very definition should prompt caution when using besides metrics like revenue, average order volume, reduced call volume or sales. And while 72% of CMOs cited that social media helped to close business, there was no direct connection between the investment and the return. 

Finally, even though the infographic indicates which social channels were thought to have the best ROI (Facebook), the majority of respondents didn't know what the return was on their investment or did not think there was an ROI. Obviously measurement and correlation needs to improve for social media to continue to grow as a viable financial institution marketing channel.

Infographic from MDG Advertising, September 2011

As with any marketing strategy, your social media strategy should begin with a clear establishment and understanding of your social media objectives. Look at how your competitors and those outside the industry are establishing goals and make sure that your measurement criteria is fully integrated with your current analytics system. Will your social efforts be to increase sales, improve customer service, generate customer engagement/loyalty, assist with product development or simply increase awareness of your brand? 

Once your objectives are delineated, you need to determine what percentage of your marketing budget should be allocated to your efforts. Be careful. Social media is not 'free'. Not only is there a cost for the internal team that manages the program, but there are usually external agency costs as well. In addition, since most banks don't have the luxury of simply implementing a social media strategy and getting immediate traction, most programs will need to integrate traditional media to promote social media efforts (advertising costs). Finally, there are creative, placement and tracking costs that also should be considered. 

The banking industry is known for moving en masse towards the next 'shiny object'. I would suggest viewing The Financial Brand's 'Reality Check 2.0: Myths and Facts' Webinar to understand some of the 'false reads' you could be getting from industry publications. While social media should definitely be part of every bank's strategy (customers expect a social presence), be cautious of building strategies that do not have a clear metric associated. Until key performance indicators (KPI) are established and agreed upon, bank marketers would be well advised to move conservatively and focus on integrating all communication channels.

Let me know: How are you leveraging social media at your bank? How are you measuring success? I am interesting in any success stories.