By Salim Mhanna
How to Get Customers to Your Bank?
Ideas to Increase Banking Customers
Abstract
Private banking is a
rapidly growing business in the world. Arab investors are heading towards
private banking investment aggressively, where lots of money is being invested.
The competitors in financial industry are fighting to attract wealthy clients
with huge portfolios.
Private bank offers the
most sophisticated form of banking service available to the individual. Modern
private banking is not a single activity but comprises a range of a very
different business, which are targeted at different client segments.
Banks are facing more
challenges than they ever did due to the rapid and dynamic growth. The banking
environment is constantly in evaluation in all countries of the world,
including international and correspondent banking. With the growth of
international economic activity, consequently international trade and payments,
hence financial flows between trading partners, the business of banks is
showing dynamism and innovation in serving world economy.
Success requires
customers’ satisfaction to achieve profit and growth. Clients are the goal of
the entire marketing process, and they are the pivot of the bank's activities.
A study by "Fortune magazine 500”, dealing
with the ability of industrial companies to make a profit and the possibility
of continuing to obtain profits in the future, showed that companies that put
in mind customer satisfaction issue as preliminary, recorded rates profit
during the period of five years, higher than those that put profit as a
preliminary issue in their objectives.
Who are the bank customers?
Three quarters of the world’s poor don’t have a
bank account, not only because of poverty, but the cost, travel distance and
amount of paper work involved in opening an account, according to new data
released by the World Bank.
About 25% of adults earning less than $2 a day
have saved at a formal financial institution, according to the 2011 survey of
about 150,000 people in 148 countries. The problem of being “Unbanked” is also
linked to income inequality: the richest 20% of adults in developing countries
are more than twice as likely to have a formal account as the poorest 20%,
according to the data collected by Gallup, Inc. for the World Bank’s Global
Financial Inclusion Database. The Bank’s Development Research Group is building
the database with a 10-year grant from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.
The research offers the most comprehensive
picture of how adults around the world save, borrow, make payments, and manage
risk. Worldwide, 22% of adults report having saved at a formal financial
institution in the past 12 months. More than half of the population in
developing countries doesn’t have a bank account, compared with just 10% in
rich countries.
"Providing financial services to the 2.5
billion people who are ‘Unbanked’ could boost economic growth and opportunity
for the world's poor,” said World Bank Group President Robert B. Zoellick.
“Harnessing the power of financial services can really help people to pay for
schooling, save for a home, or start a small business that can provide jobs for
others. This new report on the world's 'unbanked' makes the case: the more poor
people are banking today, the more they are banking on their future."
Few adults in developing
countries use formal financial products to manage risk. More than 11% of adults
in developing countries have an outstanding loan for emergencies or health-care
needs, but more than 80% of these adults use only informal sources of credit.
Of adults in developing countries working in farming, forestry or fishing, only
6% of them have crop, rainfall or livestock insurance. http://go.worldbank.org/72MAKHBAM0
The activity of the bankaffects most social and
production sectors, so, it is difficult to make direct marketing efforts for
certain class of customers, except in some of the products that are totally
dedicated to a specific category of customers, or a certain class alone.
Marketing Department at the bank responsible to
raising people's attention to the services provided by the bank, it should take
into consideration the task of developing awareness among the people and
continue to do so.
The higher awareness of the importance and
benefits of the bank services will make people eager to get these services, and
consequently it becomes possible to invent newmodern products and raising the
level and the quality of banking services.
We find a lot of people who do not deal at all
with the banks, and do not have personal accounts, because of the many
misconceptions and negative perceptions constituents about the nature of the
banking business, despite the evolution of media and the development of methods
of public outreach.
On the other hand we also find a large
proportion of people who do not have the motivation or incentive to deal with
the banks, and do not feel the need to banking services, at a time when you can
pay bills online and deposit checks remotely using a cell phone, and at a time ATMs are placed not only near or inside
the premises of banks, but also in locations such as shopping centers/malls,
airports, grocery stores, petrol/gas stations, restaurants, or anywhere
frequented by large numbers of people.
It’s
amazing how many people don’t have bank accounts!
Accordingly, we clearly recognize that there is
a problem lead to prevent millions of potential customers around the world from
dealing with banks, and this what we will try to know about, based on a
scientific research study, searching for the main reasons for this situation
Negative
beliefs and concepts
It can display some of these negative beliefs
and concepts that prevent many potential customers from dealing with banks, as
follows:
-
Religious worldview to bank interest as
“dirty" surplus does not permit to grip. Is interest prohibited in Islam?
This question is often repeated at different social gatherings because some
people tend to argue that it is ribâ which has been prohibited by Islam
and that ribâ is not equivalent to interest.
-
Some
people don’t trust banks and may doubt the safety of banks. Some people
fear that their money would be lost in the event of bankruptcy.
-
Potential
customers lack financial literacy. The most difficult cause to quantify is
whether people go outside the banking system because they don’t really
understand how consumer finances work or how much nonbank alternatives charge.
Each individual transaction costs relatively little, even though cumulatively
they can add up to many times what a basic checking account would cost.
-
Services
aren’t always available. Banks typically want to attract customers
who will eventually want services that are more profitable. As a result, some
institutions don’t offer products for customers with limited resources. In some
countries, banks are required to offer a low-cost basic banking service. But
they have no reason to promote it and typically encourage new customers to
choose a more expensive package of services. In addition, banks may not
maintain many branches in areas with lots of low-income customers.
-
People
don’t have enough time or money. Workers who have long hours or a long
commute to work may not be able to get to a branch during banking hours. If
they are living paycheck to paycheck, they may not be able to wait for checks
to clear. In such situations, getting immediate cash at a check-cashing service
may be unavoidable.
-
Many people belief of the needfor "plead"
when they ask of some services, especially loans, not believing of
complementary relationship based on common benefit between the two parties.
-
"Banks for the rich only,"
Which make small depositors and potential borrowers, are reluctant to deal with
banks and think it will not be caring for them as poor or small project owners.
-
Unbearable cost: Some
people believe that the high-interest loans and the highly commissions cost is
the reason behind the bankruptcy of some business owners and individuals,
fearing they would be at the same risk.
-
Expected hidden surprises when
going into the details of products purchased.
-
Fear, uncertainty and doubt, some
people may distrust electronic banking and prefer paper transactions.
-
Incur charges: Many low-income people who could afford a
basic account but would have a minimal balance worry that they might incur charges.
In addition, although the use of direct deposit makes money available more
quickly and typically reduces monthly fees.
-
Rejects the right of customers to protest. "You
cannot be a protester and a customer at the same time." Many potential clients avoid complying with
the one-side conditions and terms that the bank can be imposed or amended
without informing customers in advance.
-
"Ruthless bank", some
people believe that the bank may claim them in order to receive its debt
without mercy.
-
Monetary
Mystification, not to deal to hide the true financial
situation. Some people do not want to appear rich while others are trying to
show that they are not poor.
-
Not dealing for the purpose of tax evasion.
-
Not to deal to hide the true source of funds.
-
Some people do not deal with the bank because
of their feeling of not belonging to the place; they think that they
will not attain the respect and recognition they deserve.
-
The fear of some people, especially the elderly
and the illiterate of being cheated due to lack of knowledge of
financial issues.
-
Not to deal because of the desire to keep
cash by hand, due to the ease dispose of them at any time and in different
conditions (Security incidents, war), especially in the remote areas of the
city, where there are no bank branches or ATMs nearby, and no available
point-of-sale system (POS).
-
Some people do not deal simply because they feel
ashamed or lack of self-confidence.
How to Get Customers to Your Bank?
What are the
methods that should be adopted to convince them to deal with banks?
With the high level of
competition in the banking industry, individual banks must invest in marketing
and public relations efforts to recruit new customers. As you consider ways to
increase your bank's customer base, consider how you can work with their needs
and preferences to offer a convenient, safe service.
Bank marketing has evolved
through the years, and marketers who used to be stifled by rigid creative
constraints, have found that financial marketing can be innovative while at the
same time maintaining that fine line of conservatism.
Bank marketing strategies aren't
all that different from those used in other industries. John Peskuric, a
marketing executive with banking experience from Austin, Texas, says bank
marketers need to differentiate a bank's value proposition from other financial
services companies, particularly in an environment where larger financial
institutions might be harming their own reputations. Remember to research the
results of your marketing program to determine what tools are most effective.
Using a reference list of
creative marketing ideas can assist the business owner as a source of
inspiration for planning new ideas about everyday events. The idea is not to
repeat a marketing idea verbatim but to create a variation, a personalized
version of the marketing idea. Once a list is created it should be kept, added
to and referred to when inspired ideas are slow to form.
Attracting
customers to banks in an era of instant national interest-rate comparisons is
an extraordinary challenge, particularly as increasing rates of bank failures
decrease customer confidence in the sector. Small and large banks alike may
leverage their advantages in targeted marketing campaigns to attract deposits
and new loan customers. Competition in retail banking also means that you
should alter your marketing campaign as different banks adopt similar strategies
for reaching new customers.
The function of marketing activity with
customers
The highlight
functions of marketing activity between the bank and its customers are:
-
Dividing customers into categories and
determine the size and capacity of each class of them.
-
Identify the category of target customers and
study their characteristics and behavior and lifestyle habits and purchasing.
-
Identify their needs and desires and aspirations
and guide the bank's efforts towards product innovation and services that
satisfy their desires, price and quality appropriate.
-
Directing the bank's efforts to inform the
target group to the availability of the product through promotion and
advertising.
-
Define the rules of behavior of staff and
assets, especially during the first meeting with the customer.
-
Rehabilitation and training of staff to use
appropriate methods for each of the product and the customer, and urged staff
to act with the customer, and provide them professional assistance.
-
Seeking to increase customer satisfaction.
-
Seeking to reaffirm the commitment to the
conditions stated and authorized.
-
Efforts should be directed towards the
development of an appropriate pricing policy consistent with existing laws and
conditions in the market environment, and with the expected market share and
the impact of competitors.
-
Facilitate procedures for applications for bank
services.
-
Facilitate the procedures for the delivery of
services through various distribution channels.
-
Invent new types of products and services aimed
to specific groups of customers.
-
Continue to study the behavior of customers and
monitor the degree of their loyalty to the bank, and the development of methods
to measure their satisfaction levels for the services offered.
Ideas to Increase Banking Customers
Education
For many consumers, personal finance is a difficult,
confusing topic. To position your bank as an expert and to help potential
customers understand their banking options, hold a series of educational
seminars. Contact a local community center or university for the use of
neutral, non-threatening facilities, and set up sessions about saving for
retirement, banking basics, choosing the right checking account or managing
money. Put up flyers around town to advertise the event and ask your staff to
conduct each class. By helping potential customers get past their fears and
misconceptions about finance, you can access a new group of people looking for
banking services.
Online Services
Because consumers are conducting more and more business
online, your bank can gain more customers by making it easy to choose and use
your services on the Internet. Invest in a series of banner advertisements to
reach out to customers, and place them on websites that are visited by your
target audience. Tailor each advertisement to the readership of the site. For
both existing and new customers, streamline your operations and web interface
so that they work smoothly with mobile phones and personal computers. Your
customers should be able to perform their banking duties without trouble,
maintain a sense of security and have easy access to customer support.
Transparency
Hidden fees can be an unpleasant surprise for customers,
particularly when it makes a significant difference in the total end cost of a
banking product. By being transparent in your advertising, you can create trust
in your target audience; mention any fees immediately so that it is easier for
consumers to compare account types. Announce your intentions of transparency in
your advertising and marketing efforts and follow through so that your bank
becomes associated with trust and openness.
Innovation
Attract more customers to your bank by creating innovative
options. Offer accounts that allow the customers to receive interest in a
unique form, such as online gift certificates, music download credits or
donations to charities. Let clients deposit their checks remotely, speak to
customer service agents on instant messenger and make it easy for travelers to
access no-fee ATMs abroad. Poll your customers to find out what would make
their lives easier and find creative solutions to their problems.
So Many Products, So Many
Ways to Promote Them
In general, banks offer similar products--checking,
savings, money markets, loans and CDs, just to name a few. Marketers find that
they need to create different ways to promote the same products over and over
again, while at the same time maintaining that same voice of safety and
soundness.
Additionally, a marketer needs to identify what makes his
bank's products different from the competition in order to entice prospective
customers to his bank versus the bank down the street. The banking market is
extremely competitive so marketers need to be especially creative.
Luckily, thanks to the Internet and the vast number of
channels available to marketers, banks have no trouble reaching nearly any
demographic or mass market within reach. In fact the traditional means, such as
radio, TV and newspaper, are slowly being replaced with e-mail blasts, targeted
direct mail and Internet banners.
Banks also have the advantage of promoting rate and
structural changes. You can feature the same checking account but at a higher
rate. Or many banks are promoting step CDs where the customer can step up to
the next highest rate once during the term.
Different Approaches to
Marketing
Some banks are taking a more interactive approach to
marketing. Customer contests engage an audience and make a campaign a little
more interesting.
Messaging
Banks
have many means in which to market their campaign. Great marketing ideas need
an impressive communication vehicle. Some of the top ways marketers are
bringing their message to their target audience include email blasts, online
banner ads, newspaper ads, radio, TV, direct mail, in-branch merchandising
(including posters, handouts and flyers), newsletter, statement stuffers, ATM
receipt messages, online banking messages, parties, events, educational seminars,
press releases, newspaper editorials and social media.
Grassroots Marketing
Grassroots
marketing is a technique that utilizes word of mouth and untraditional ways of
marketing a product. In grassroots marketing, you target an audience made up of
ordinary people by bringing them to a close level with your product, brand and
business. You give your target audience a voice and make them your prime
decision makers.
Recruit Influential Followers
Grassroots
marketing depends on word of mouth. The best way to start this is to appeal to
a few highly influential people such as celebrities and athletes, or on a
smaller level by appealing to influential people in your local community. Get
them on board with your product or brand by giving them your product, or
providing them with a sneak preview. Try basically anything to get them trying
your product. Ordinary people will trust these influential people and pretty
soon you will have people talking about your business or product.
Good examples
of this technique are presidential campaigns. Celebrities will jump on board
and support a candidate and all of a sudden, ordinary people are sitting up and
taking notice.
Utilize Free Media
Start a blog
that informs about topics that would be of interest to your audience. If you
talk about topics that interest people, they will start to trust you and your
products. You will gain recognition in your area of expertise and you will
watch your profits increase as you gain trust.
Another
option is to create a YouTube video or an online newsletter. Make it
informative and appealing and email it to your current clients, or your
influential followers from above. These are free forms of advertising, take
advantage of them.
Put Your Product Everywhere
Make your
product visible to your audience. Think about making fliers and asking other
businesses that have a similar target audience but are not competitors to put
them at their cash registers. A good example of this would be a gym asking a
sporting goods store to place their fliers at their checkout and vice versa.
Sponsor local
events that target your audience, too. Again, if you are marketing a gym, think
about sponsoring a local 5k run and hang your sign where all of the runners
will see it. Using these techniques will gain you recognition and branding.
Use Your Imagination
When you are
brainstorming grassroots marketing ideas, think outside the box. Really strive
to use your imagination and see what you can come up with. There are really no
limits on how far grassroots marketing campaigns can take you, your product and
your business.
Advertising
As much as consumers complain about excessive advertising,
such as what's seen on television or billboards, bank customers claim
advertising is the main way they find new banks or reason for switching from
one bank to another. Advertising that taps into an emotional component, such as
the feeling that your current bank doesn't understand a change in your
financial circumstances, can be a powerful and persuasive tool.
Promotional Items of
Value
A promotional item that has a value to a customer will be
more of a draw during economic hardship -- even more so than reduced fees or
lower interest rates. J.D. Power reports that offers such as gift cards can
strongly influence customers' decisions to change banks, and banks typically
use them to entice new customers rather than offering such incentives to
current customers to invest in new banking products.
Public Relations
Customer experience and relations, along with bank
reputation, rank high among the reasons why banks reel in new customers and
prevent customer turnover. Public relations tactics offer excellent
opportunities to enhance the customer service experience, as well as publicize
positive customer case studies and stories. It can also be used to publicize a
bank's financial reputation, acquisitions that might increase branch or ATM
presence, and money available for lending.
Collateral Materials
Many bank customers enjoy Internet or mobile banking, but
not everyone is comfortable relying solely on technology; many people still
like to go to their neighborhood branch, or get their statements in the mail.
Collateral materials inside bank branches remain an important part of bank
marketing. Banking brochures convey information on account types and features;
interest rates and other fees; and branch and ATM locations. Inserts sent with
statements promote new services and fulfill other information requirements,
such as privacy laws, new services, or promoting the value of paperless or
online banking features.
Use Photos
Words are not always the best form of marketing.
Photographs or images can direct the customer to action: purchase, consume,
request further information. Start photographing what the business does or
creates. If it's baking cakes, then take photos of chefs making cakes,
decorating cakes, happy customers with their cakes, delivering cakes, artful
photos of ingredients for baking cakes. Ask a student photographer or local
photography teacher to help set up a photography corner in the business, to
capture products as they are created.
Identify Everyday
Activities
Creative marketing does not have to be outrageous or
expensive. Start taking note of everyday interactions with customers by making
a list of the tasks and activities that happen during a day. Assess each
interaction, or task, and note at what point marketing can occur: when handing
the customer a receipt, handing the customer the passbook, dropping off a
completed project or product, meeting with the client, interacting with the
public. For example, using a business logo linked with the word
"quality" on every invoice, envelope or receipt is a subtle reminder
that the business can be trusted.
Create A Newsletter
Send customers a targeted marketing message every month by
creating a newsletter. Target the message by choosing a product or service to
focus on each month. Newsletters can be a single page (front and back) or
several pages. Hire a local creative business writer to assist in writing
articles and brainstorm attention-grabbing headlines. Use the newsletter to
pull customers in by offering a coupon or a special gift each month. Collect addresses (postal and email) through a website, when
services are rendered, or through other promotional events like conferences, trade
shows or festivals.
Go beyond interest rates
to attract new customers.
Most banks will not be able to beat the interest rates
offered on a national level. One of the most difficult things for a bank to
communicate to potential customers is the quality of customer service offered.
Use testimonial-based advertisements to highlight the benefits of customer
service. This is particularly important for long-term loan relationships such
as mortgages. If customers believe that a loan officer at your bank will be
attentive to their individual needs, they may be more likely to overlook
differences in interest rates.
Expanding ATM networks
Increase customer access to funds by expanding ATM networks
and improving online banking offerings. ATMs and online banking are less
expensive than training and paying tellers. But building an ATM network is
expensive, particularly if you're not a franchise of a larger national bank.
Many smaller banks have gotten around this issue by subsidizing fees paid to
out-of-network ATMs. This allows smaller banks to offer the same ease of access
as larger banks at a relatively low cost.
Attract new deposits
Create time-limited marketing incentives to attract new
deposits. Offer to pay termination and transfer fees from old banks. Offer cash
payments for deposits over a certain amount.
To maximize effectiveness, limit the offer to a period of
60 days or less and emphasize that fact in advertisements. Offer tiered rewards
depending on the level of deposit made. In most cases, customers will stay with
a bank that they have opened an account with for years.
Measure the effectiveness
of your marketing.
Try to run only a few marketing initiatives at any one time
so you can more easily measure their effectiveness. Repeat promotions that have
measurable results, and curtail the campaigns that fail. Consider how
profitable a campaign was per dollar spent.
Offer higher interest
rates
Offer higher interest rates on savings accounts and lower
interest on loans to existing customers with high bank balances. It's much less
expensive to keep a customer that you already have than to attract a new one.
Tiered accounts create incentives for your customers to keep their business
with you rather than shop around elsewhere.
Marketing Budgets
One question
often asked by marketers and bank executives is: “How do we determine the size
of our marketing budget?” According to
Mary Ann Pezzullo, author of ABA’s Marketing Financial Services, there are a
few different ways to calculate a bank's marketing budget.
The marketing
budget for a bank generally includes expenditures for five activities:
1. Advertising,
2. Sales promotion,
3. Marketing research,
4. Sales/customer service training, and
5. Public relations.
How a
bank allocates its total marketing budget among various marketing activities
depends largely on bank size. As noted in the 1996 Analysis of Bank Marketing
Expenditures, banks typically spent between 50 percent and 60 percent of their
total marketing budgets on advertising. Advertising plans and budgets are
developed on a project-by-project basis. If, during the year, it appears that
the amount budged for advertising is inadequate, management can either approve
an overrun or lower its goals.
Therefore,
the process of promotion based on:
-
Appropriate set of facts
and information about the bank and its banking services, aims to improve the
image of the bank and to inform people about the advanced services provided.
-
Convince the customer of
the importance of access to bank services and the necessity to satisfy his
needs, by increasing his willingness.
Discussion
and Conclusion
Private banking is being widely promoted as one of the
important growth areas of the global financial services industry.
Private Banks are have to rapidly re-engineer to this
new environment through both product and process innovations as well as
increasingly having to focus on performance and efficiency criteria to all
levels of business operations.
Underlines
the need to count the different category of people as prospective customers,
and communicate with them through various means of communication, and innovate
new products or re-submit existing products to draw their attention, and
motivate them to direct working relationship with the bank even though the
beginning by a simple product or service.
This requires banks to caring and focusing on
the following points permanently:
-
Tailoring services to individual client
requirement.
-
Anticipation of client needs.
-
Long-term relationship orientation.
-
Personal contact and discretion.
Finally, in the light of my describe study, I hope that it
was an attempt to give some light and to discuss in depth a very important
issue related to a very important economic sector.
