Banking Insights from Forrester

Forrester Research has some interesting banking observations by analysts Bill Doyle and Jost Hoppermann. “Customer Advocacy”, Doyle says, is a phenomenon among customers that firms have their best interests in mind while catering to them, and is becoming an increasingly common key driver of deeper customer relationships. Learn more on how Canadians rate their banks on customer advocacy, read the report here. Doyle also points out in another report that a class called the “Early Adopters”, or high-income technology optimists, who form the most active online bankers and investors. Among the top 10 US banks, online pioneers Citibank and JPMorgan Chase have the highest share of Early Adopters. Hoppermann brings to light how European financial services are working with enormous budgets for renewal, with the focus lying in being tactical. Read the report here.

The Neighborhood Bank Branch, Now A Brand Differentiator

In a competitive market, Danske Bank in Sweden employs a unique tactic to rise above its peers – focus on advice, rather than transaction. With 65% of consumers now making transactions through the internet, the bank also sees them coming over to the bank for some face to face financial advice. Danske Bank offers a local flavor in its branches, paving the path to immense personalization so that the consumer feels special. This initiative includes resizing branches to be more boutique-like, investing in property away from prime locations to give its consumers ample parking and lots more. Read more.

New Way To Pay

Billeo, a new software may have well begun a revolution in the e-commerce and bill payment arena. This is a software that takes care of all your bill payments by paying companies directly through their website where your payments will be instant and secure. The Billeo Bill Payment Assistant will also set reminders and keep a record of all payments made. Additionally, Billeo’s Shopping Assistant will make e-shopping easier by filling out forms and recording all payment confirmations and its Password Assistant will memorize password for all your online account and store them securely in your computer. Take a virtual tour to see how it all works right here.

Carbon Conscious Loans

Starting to get environment friendly is becoming increasingly common with the banking sector. With HSBC’s Green initiative already doing its bit for a better future of the world, we will also soon see a “Carbon Conscious Card” in summer 2008. Barclaycard is all set to launch the Breathe Easy card, a linked credit card and loan product aimed at homeowners who want to reduce household carbon emissions and make their homes more energy efficient. Barclays says customers using this card to buy home-efficiency products from selected retail partners would receive an initial discount on the purchase. They would then repay the cost of the purchase as a loan where their monthly repayments are expected to be in line with the savings they would make on their energy costs. More here.

Credit Card Rings

Banking is known to have kept pace with technology to make spending power as easily accessible to its consumers as possible. We recently discovered a fine example of people’s perception of what future banking products may be like, a perception dating back to even as early as the 1960’s. How else would one explain this print ad run by Sheaffer pens in the New York Times Magazine in 1964.

Everybody Loves Viral. But How?

Have you ever watched a video with 100,000 views on YouTube and thought to yourself: “How the hell did that video get so many views?” Chances are pretty good that this didn’t happen naturally, but rather that some company worked hard to make it happen. Dan Ackerman Greenberg heads The Commotion the company that claims to know how to make a viral, go, well viral. Here are his top tips on getting videos to go viral. Secret #1: Not all viral videos are what they seem . #2 Content is NOT King. #3 Core Strategy: Getting onto the “Most Viewed” page. #4 Title Optimization. #5 Thumbnail Optimization. #6 Commenting: Having a conversation with yourself. #7 Releasing all videos simultaneously. #7 Strategic Tagging: Leading viewers down the rabbit hole. #8 Metrics/Tracking: How we measure effectiveness. From TechCrunch.

The Art Of Baseline

Nobody reads any more. How often have you heard this recently? Writing, however short or pithy, is an art that can’t be discounted even in today’s world. As Seth Godin writes, “As more and more advertisers wade online, competition will raise the bar for the steps you take to find the right people in the right frame of mind at the right moment. Some of that will require more cash, but mostly it’ll be about being smart and sometimes, funny.” Elsewhere the folks at Ad Slogans were looking for the best ad slogan ever. They compared some of the all time greats; Avis “We try harder”, Hamlet “Happiness is a cigar called Hamlet”, Heinz “Beans means Heinz”. Read more at AdSlogans. And a lot more at A List Apart.

Television And The Writers Strike

Many experts think that the current standoff in Hollywood between studios and scriptwriters could have a huge impact on media consumption habits of people. A similar strike in 1988 cost the industry some $500 million in lost revenue. The 1988 strike lasted for 22 weeks, and resulted in about a 9 percent decline in primetime viewing to the broadcast networks. Today’s media landscape, however, is substantially different. But so too is the broadcast viewing environment. The first programming to be immediately affected by the strike was Late Night, with Letterman, Leno, and Kimmel immediately going into repeats. For the first few days of the strike, their ratings are already down more than 10 percent, and that should only get worse as the strike progresses. Not everyone is predicting dramatic changes in the way people consumer media but with channels like YouTube and MySpace vying for people’s attention, the damage this time could be far more substantial. Read more from the future of media blog.

Marketing’s Missing Impact

We’ve typically thought about marketing as the creation of moments – communications, events, spectacles, launches, etc. These moments, however make up only a very small part (less than 15%) of the view customers have of a brand. Instead the vast majority of what informs a person’s view of a brand is the day in, day out usage of the product/service. While the world of marketing and advertising has focussed on this 15% newer and more sophisticated marketers are looking to creating products and building services around them so that the brand has the opportunity to make a more deeper connection. Nike+ is an such experience, and one that is spoken of as the product + service that is showing marketers the way into the future. Another interesting product that starts as a simple, ubiquitous product and then moves into a service is Wattson from DIY Kyoto Wattson is a simple device that helps you monitor energy use in your home or office. With the world walking up to energy conservation, this product can also store up to 4 weeks of energy-use history which can be downloaded to your computer and viewed using software. The community section of the Wattson, still under construction will let users share and review their electricity usage and conservation statistics. Read more from Zeus Jones. The new Amazon reader is being pushed as a service and not a just product by Jeff Bezos.

Facebook Banking

Finextra reports that Silicon Valley-based KeyPoint Credit Union has teamed with mobile banking outfit MShift to develop an application that enables customers to access their Web accounts from within online social networking site Facebook. KeyPoint CU – which serves technology companies including Apple and Google – is the first financial institution to launch account access via Facebook. The application provides customers with secure, one-click access to online bank account information. The CU says all account information data is encrypted with a minimum of 128 bits and no user data is stored on the Facebook servers. The system also provides users with information from and about KeyPoint CU and includes a social forum for members. The application has been developed using MShift’s mobile banking technology and the Facebook API, which enables companies to integrate applications and gain access to Facebook’s 24 million users. “The Facebook banking application is our latest secure channel providing access for our high speed members,” says Juli Anne Callis, EVP and COO, KeyPoint CU.

“Our current membership is significantly younger and more globally mobile than the typical credit union member. That means we need to be out there scouting for the ways to bring value in the form of the latest convenience to our existing members or risk losing them,” adds Callis. “What better way to make a difference in the overly commoditised retail banking market, than to link our banking service into our member life style experience and their main social networking platform.” Read the press note.