Alternative marketing thinking

YouTube has added ways to annotate and add interactive commentary to videos. With this feature, people who upload videos can add background information, create branching stories or add links to any YouTube video, channel, or search results page. There future of online video is annotated. See it in action in the amazing interactive card trick.

After bringing the Card Lab, Capital One Financial Corporation has now tied up with Flickr to bring the first ever Capital One Image Card. Customers can either choose pictures from Capital One’s gallery of images or upload one of their own. The company claims that personalization will help customers create cards that are distinctly them. Users have to follow a simple online procedure to get their own cards. Last November, Capital One launched the Capital One Card Lab which provides consumers with a new level of transparency and choice in credit cards. Customers are offered a series of interactive choices related to interest rate, annual fee and reward options, where they can click to select the combination of features that are most important to them. As choices are made, the tool narrows the options in the remaining categories, eliminating options that don’t work together. For example, consumers who are willing to pay an annual fee can earn rewards faster. So while banks are focussing on the many benefits that they think will attract customers, Capital One is probably doing something better by going on the creative track. Read what some bloggers are talking about the latest offering by Capital One here.

Some banks look at the most unconventional ways to satisfy their consumers. Wells Fargo roped in Pentagram to design a new User Interface for all its ATMs. Straying away from the usual screen that aligned task buttons only on the left and the right, this new UI saw the entire screen being used up with new visually simplified buttons. The new ATMs have two main features that got everyone raving about them. First, the fact that customers could deposit a stack of checks without sealing them in envelopes made processing time shorter and lowered costs. Up to 30 checks can be inserted at one time, and all checks will be scanned individually and be updated with status. In case the scanning identifies an error in a certain check, the customer is asked to fill in the missing amount. All steps can be reviewed with the history button that allows for a look at the previous steps. The second outstanding feature is an upgrade of the existing Quick Cash button. This feature has been allowing Wells Fargo customers to withdraw an often used amount in one single step, instead of going through a multi-step procedure. Designer Holger Struppek, part of the design team that worked on this in Pentagram talks more about the new ATMs here.

Check out MoneyAisle the next generation online market auction where banks actively bid against each other for every individual customer request about bank CDs and High Yield Savings Account. The customer, of course, emerges as the real winner, as he is the one who’s offered the best rate available in just a few minutes. The auction is on demand, available to customers 24/7 and is absolutely free of cost. MoneyAisle reverses the traditional auction method by making the sellers bid, and not the buyers. Watch the video on the home page about what people are saying about this very fresh concept, and read the blog here.

Wachovia, one of America’s leading banks, has launched its Way2Save, a high-yield, automatic savings tool designed to help Americans save money. Way2Save claims to help people save money automatically, by using their Check Card the way they normally would and offers a competitive interest rate of 5% APR and real incentives for saving money, like a 5% bonus. However, would this really be the way to save for America? The fine print may not suggest so. While the yield per year may look rather promi-sing at 10%, the maximum one can transfer each month is only $100, totaling a yearly saving of $1200. The 5% bonus is actually a first anniversary special that drops to 2% in year 2 and 3. The other part of the account that has created more confusion is the $1 transfer to savings with every debit card purchase, automated debit, and online bill pay. Though many have assumed Wachovia is paying a $1 bonus on each transaction, the $1 is simply a transfer from the user’s checking account to his savings account. Wachovia will apply the 5% bonus to those $1 transfers, but that’s only $0.05 per debit, or $1/month pre-tax for an active electronic banking user making 20 transactions per month. So will the end result be saving? Something to think about, and while you’re at it, read more.

Steve Lubetkin, founder of Professional Podcasts LLC talks about how professional video podcasts can help banks in promoting thought leadership. Using interesting references from Clint Eastwood films and various social media like Vodcasting, virtual worlds and networking sites, Steve explains how the Internet has opened up an entire new range of opportunities to communicate. This communication is what is going to change the face of marketing as we know it today. Interestingly, Steve unravels how marketing, which is all about conversations and engagement, is linked to leadership. Watch the podcast here.

Stemming from the insight that you can choose your bank to handle your investments, but cannot choose your relationship manager; Daniel Isler co-founded the Switzerbank, a website that allows you to choose your very own personal banker in Switzerland and Liechtenstein. The website has a showcase of relationship managers and their portrayals, which are composed by Swiss TV production houses. The website charges remuneration to the managers who are on the website which comprises a production charge and a yearly fee. Isler says that customers get more comfortable while choosing their own Relationship Managers, as they feel they can judge for themselves using a variety of criteria and by trusting their gut feeling. Watch an interview with Daniel Isler where he talks about the potential growth in the market, Switzerbank’s future plans and the reception of this unique idea here.

Bank 30,000 feet above the earth with Absa. The largest consumer bank of South Africa has teamed up with low cost airlines, 1time to allow in-flight passengers to use full banking services that would normally be offered in-branch, except withdrawals and deposits. Two seats on each plane are allocated to banking personnel, where they are equipped with digital cameras and laptops to cater to customers’ banking needs. The pilot project consisted of 10 personal bankers, reaching, according to Absa, over 20 000 passengers on nearly 200 1time flights.

Google is the great brand equalizer online. We all know that any one with a smart web 2.0 strategy can be a GE. Hugh Mcleod a copywriter, artist, internet entrepreneur is a bigger brand online than Hugh Hefner, the charismatic founder of Playboy magazine and actor Hugh Grant. More from Adweek.

Zillow is the real estate valuation site used by thousands. The site started out by analyzing real estate sales records and other public data to estimate values for homes in America. Then it started aggregating listings of homes on sale. Rich Barton founder and chief executive of Zillow is now hoping to revolutionize the mortgage market by introducing it in a shopping style. The mortgage market is particularly complicated because consumers can’t simply compare interest rates. Lenders offer different rates to different borrowers, based on their credit history, the loan terms they want and the nature of the home. Read more here.