Keep Those Customers Reading
Make your newsletter more appealing by taking a low-key approach to promoting your products. Instead, provide valuable information such as how to figure one's financial net worth, guidelines on making investment decisions, tips on health and fitness, ways for working parents to carve out time for the family, and how to choose a daycare or elder-care center. In short, give them a newsletter they want to read.
Ask Better Questions
If you survey customers and ask them to rank the importance of features such as convenience, price, quality, security, or availability in selecting a product, you'll often end up with several high-ranking items. However, if you ask tradeoff questions, you may be able to better identify the features which most influence buying decisions. Tradeoff questions are phrased like this: If you were buying a five-year CD, would you prefer a market-rate CD with normal withdrawal penalties, or a below market-rate CD that allowed you some no-penalty withdrawal privileges?
The You's Have It
When you're communicating with customers and potential customers, minimize statements about what "we" are going to do for you. Instead focus on how "you" are going to benefit. The difference may seem subtle, but the effect is not. Doing so communicates that the customer is the most important person in your relationship.
Changing Your Image
Before you create a campaign to change your financial institution's image, be certain you know what the public thinks of you. Traditional research tools such as focus groups, telephone surveys, mail survey and interviews can provide valuable information. Don't overlook interviews with the institution's employees, especially those who have direct contact with customers. Compare your institution's strong and weak points with those of your competition. Then you can choose the creative approach that best fits your goals for the future.
Add Zip to Consumer Direct Mail
The next time you implement a direct mail campaign targeting noncustomers, try this inexpensive, easy and effective way to boost response: zip code penetration analysis. Simply analyze your customer files to pinpoint the zip codes shared by the majority of your customers. Then buy a list for the areas where most of your customers live. Financial institution marketers are finding that this yields more prospects than mailing to a radius around their branches, since many people choose an institution that is commuter-accessible or close to work rather than one near home.
Try Old-Fashioned Etiquette
Look for opportunities to let customers know you appreciate their business. Send personal thank you cards or letters to new customers who open high-balance checking accounts or CDs. Perhaps include a special offer for a service they do not have. Do the same for installment-loan customers. Send thank you notes or letters a several months before they pay off their loans. Enclose an incentive for them to call you for future loans.
Send CSRs Shopping
Want to find out how your institution's service stacks up? Ask your CSRs and tellers to "shop" the competition. Give participating employees a couple of hours "on the clock" to visit a competitor's branch and open an account. Upon their return, ask them to complete an evaluation and present an oral report at your next staff meeting. Offer your shoppers a cash reward of $25 to $50, or give them a gift certificate for dinner-for-two at a popular local restaurant. Such a shopping program can provide valuable competitive information, while giving your CSRs and tellers insight into ways they can improve service.
Divide and Conquer
To better serve the small business market, start segmenting businesses by industry. Then identify the industries in your market that are underserved, have the highest growth potential, or fit well with your institution's capabilities. Once you have targeted particular industries, pinpoint their needs by putting together advisory boards of business owners, or by offering free seminars on topics like retirement planning, cash management, or financing options geared to a specific industry.
Say What?
Conduct a communications audit of all the printed materials your institution sends to customers. Do they clearly communicate what you think they do? Assemble a panel of employees at various levels to assist you in identifying potential problems in brochures, form letters, statements, disclosures, etc. Then look for ways to jettison the jargon, lose the excessive "legalese," and reduce redundancies.
Pick Up the Pen
Looking for favorable publicity for your institution? Start by looking across the conference table. Some of your officers may be ideal candidates to write a column for small weekly newspapers or other local publications. Many editors work under such tight budgets that they may snap you up on an offer to provide a regular column on financial issues. If you can't find an officer to volunteer, hire a ghostwriter to pen the columns based on interviews with the banker. One caveat: Don't try to use this opportunity to push your services. Rather, provide information or insight that will give readers a positive opinion of the columnist and ultimately the institution he or she represents.
Formalize New-Customer Contact
When it comes to cross-selling and customer retention, success often boils down to something as simple as getting to know your customers. One way to achieve this is to do develop a specific plan for keeping in touch with new customers. For example, one institution works with its customer service reps or "sales managers" to initiate several contacts per year. First, customers receive a thank-you note signed by their sales manager upon opening an account. After receiving the first statement, sales managers call to ask if the customer has any questions. Three months later, marketing sends a package of "gift certificates" for additional banking services. Sales managers follow up with a phone call to ask for additional business. At six months, customers receive a survey, and at one year, an anniversary card.