On New Year’s Eve in Sedona, Arizona, when hiking with my family on Bell Rock, we found people had made totems for good luck all around the base. So, after making them ourselves, it got me to thinking…what about having a totem on my desk about a goal or dream for the New Year that I wanted to achieve? Here is my Totem Challenge, a kit for building a totem your goal or dream for 2013! Because a totem can …
“The year is 2015. Don dials up his credit union from his interpersonal telecomputer, which he carries everywhere. It’s his telephone and window to the world, containing all his family’s personal data. As the screen comes up, Don chooses a live interface mode instead of direct account access because he needs information about a new investment the credit union offers…” Recently, when doing some research, I came across an article I had written in 1995 for CUNA’s Credit Union Executive …
With online access so prevalent and easy to use by PC, tablet or smartphone, the shift to self service has meant losing the helpful sales person. With retail, the advantage of shopping in-store was the ability to ask questions and have someone knowledgeable help you make a decision. Online, the move to searching for reviews or information about the item to buy can be more “convenient” but some risk. The answer is often offering online chat or instant messaging. Are …
In the coming years, Gen Y will be the largest demographic wave of young people competing for jobs. For those of us Baby Boomers who remember coming out of college and having so many of “us” that the jobs paid little and you had to really compete to get an interview, that will again become the norm. So, what can give those young people an edge? Having a good online persona requires crafting it like a good resume. Here are …
In October, attending the ATM-Debit & Prepaid Forum made my head spin as speaker after speaker talked about new technologies for making payments. One group showed a solution with its own currency called BitCoins. Another, called PaidPiper showed the solution for a one-time credit card payment. This type of payment can be made at the merchant if your son or daughter just has to buy something and you’re not with him/her. There was a large amount of discussion over how …
Here are just a few of the items that are good things to think about in your marketing strategy for 2013 and beyond: Every 30 seconds, two non-Hispanic consumers turn retirement age while every 30 seconds a Hispanic youth turns 18. (from Scott Scovel, Univision, ATM-Debit-& Prepaid Forum). 90% of 18-29 year olds sleep with their smartphones and 95% of people use the phone for something just before going to bed. (Mitch Joel, Six Pixels ) More than 700,000 apps …
Find ways to let your customers/members easily do business with you and other retailers online to increase your revenue all year long! Here are some items to consider: Preferred Partners – Do you have a list of preferred partners that you can create affiliate links to such as Sprint offers a credit union member discount, insurance products, identity theft service, digital safe boxes or back-up options? You can make revenue off of linking your customers/members to good quality companies who …
The following is an interview with a wealth management bank executive, Trish Stark, about her career. While she is close friend going all the way back to college days, Trish has had an amazing career in banking and is definitely an honored member of my own Success Network! When changing careers, what were the first steps you took to discover new opportunities? TS: I reconnected with my extended network using email and LinkedIn, to identify potential opportunities. I then used …
Last month, a blog post in Bank Think really hit me regarding the approach to banking today. In his post, author Dave Martin of SunTrust Bank, commented about how important it is to have people know the name of your staff. It is so true that the more consumers are using technology to handle their banking needs, the fewer occasions they have to develop relationships with the financial institution. In the “old days” before online banking, mandatory direct deposit, and …
For many organizations, the economy has caused a focus on cutting expenses to compete, to survive or to eek out a profit. However, you can only cut expenses so far before bleeding to death as an organization. Cuts in marketing mean you disappear from the minds of your customers/members, so leads and new accounts fall. Cuts in training mean no talented staff to serve customers/members for the service experience that keeps them coming back. And, no profit means there is …