We asked an executive of a well-known core processing company with a CRM component what “people issues” their call center and trainers were asked repeatedly. After surveying these groups, the executive found they were receiving many questions on culture and behavior and how they could help the clients in these areas. Here are three examples of questions they get all the time:

1. The Relationship Manager concept. Does it make sense for our bank credit union? How should we use it?

Many financial institutions have invested in or are thinking of investing in some kind of a CRM system but they focus more on the tech side and very little on “the people side”. They forget that technology does not build relationships – their people do. Identifying lists of target customers for outreach and training key staff in member or customer relationship management skills are two of many considerations.

Lesson: Any implementation must integrate the tech side with the people side, get the crucial employee buy-in and have a process to make it all work.

2. What more do we need to know about the onboarding process and best practices?

We tell our clients that onboarding is a good practice for connecting with NEW customers or members but banks and credit unions just don’t focus enough on connecting with existing customers or members. Plus, “onboarding” drops off dramatically after 90 days so employees are not capturing customer or member life events and recording them in some kind of a profile to build the customer relationship.

Lesson: A bank or credit union won’t reap the benefit of repeat business a CRM system can help with if they are just focused on “newbies” in the first 90 days. They need an outreach process to get staff using the software on an ongoing basis with existing customers or members.

3. Training new staff and keeping staff current on sales processes and application usage. Many of our staff still don’t like cross selling. What’s the answer?

Banks and credit unions want to differentiate themselves by creating a relationship culture and building trust with customers or members. Yet most are still focused on a transactional cross selling and product pitching model and rewarding the wrong behaviors.

Lesson: They need to be educated on how the old sales model is a never-ending treadmill. Realize that many employees hate selling but love relationship building. Implementing an organizational process to reach out to those who don’t come into the branches and equipping staff with member and customer relationship management skills will reap great rewards.

End of Post

Agree or Disagree?  Do let us know what you think by scrolling down and commenting below.

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If you’d like a preview of the 12 areas we’ll be covering that impact building banking customer relationships or member relationships or you would like to rate your bank or credit union on 12 key areas to build customer and member relationships and trust, create loyal advocates and increase referrals and business. Just click on the icon to the right.

Read How To Increase Revenue and Profitability Through Relationship Building and Creating Advocates

Get Our Complimentary White Paper

The research shows that customers who become advocates for their banks are the most desirable in terms of loyalty and profitability. Learn what the research recommends to create advocates and to implement a banking relationship management culture that builds deeper relationships and trust with customers or members.

The Banking Relationship Management Experience -
A Strategy for Becoming a Trusted Financial Partner and
Increasing Revenue and Profitability

**********

Why This Blog Series

We see a big problem for many bank and credit unions: they’re missing out on a golden opportunity to grow organically by expanding relationships with existing customers and members. In this series, we’re going to stimulate your thinking by providing some insights into 12 topic areas that determine whether your banking customer relationships or member relationships will grow and become more profitable or just stagnate.

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Many banks and credit unions will adopt CRM and the initiative will either fail or hobble along without their expected return on investment.  A big reason is they will put more thought into implementing the technology than they do on a plan to get their staff to buy in and use the software as a personal tool to generate business and serve the customer.   Success depends immensely on your company’s ability to change your employees’ mindset on how they do their work and to consistently use the software to build trust relationships.  With all due respect to even the best CRM vendors, some may not be in a position to make this happen.

CRM software is a powerful tool that enhances bank and credit union staff’s ability to better serve their customers or members and to obtain more profitable business. This business might never surface if your staff is not using the software to manage the relationship.  CRM is merely an enabler. Entering customer or member conversations and creating member profiles must become second nature to staff. If the information isn’t current, it’s of no use to anyone. Banking relationship management must become part of your culture. What’s your plan to make this happen?

Many CRM companies readily admit they are ill-equipped to ensure their clients’ staff input information learned about the customer or their situation after each interaction, to create these critical profiles and to view the customer or member as more than a quick sale. CRM companies show you how to use the features of their software. They don’t teach relationship management skills because that requires a whole different mindset and they’re not in the “attitude and behavior change business”.

Another needed behavior change (but not necessarily a difficult one) we see when helping our clients to implement a member or customer relationship management culture is getting staff to throttle back on always trying to immediately close a sale. Organic growth comes from first getting to know the customer and building a banking customer relationship built on trust. This approach always leads to more business in the long run than if staff is always in a “close a sale” mode. See our post Your Front Line Staff is Leaving Money on the Table When Cross Selling.

To get the huge ROI possible from a CRM system and avoid failure, we recommend that your management team reach a consensus that half of the plan for your CRM initiative must address “the people factor”. This includes getting employee buy-in to consistently use the software and changing their mindset to one of developing relationships first, knowing sales will follow.

See how well your bank or credit union is handling “the people factor” of a CRM initiative. Take our evaluation.

End of Post

Agree or Disagree?  Do let us know what you think by scrolling down and commenting below.

Rate Your Organization on Banking Relationship Management Basics

If you’d like a preview of the 12 areas we’ll be covering that impact building banking customer relationships or member relationships or you would like to rate your bank or credit union on 12 key areas to build customer and member relationships and trust, create loyal advocates and increase referrals and business. Just click on the icon to the right.

Read How To Increase Revenue and Profitability Through Relationship Building and Creating Advocates

Get Our Complimentary White Paper

The research shows that customers who become advocates for their banks are the most desirable in terms of loyalty and profitability. Learn what the research recommends to create advocates and to implement a banking relationship management culture that builds deeper relationships and trust with customers or members.

The Banking Relationship Management Experience -
A Strategy for Becoming a Trusted Financial Partner and
Increasing Revenue and Profitability

**********

Why This Blog Series

We see a big problem for many bank and credit unions: they’re missing out on a golden opportunity to grow organically by expanding relationships with existing customers and members. In this series, we’re going to stimulate your thinking by providing some insights into 12 topic areas that determine whether your banking customer relationships or member relationships will grow and become more profitable or just stagnate.

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Bob Tramontano, Vice President of Marketing at NCR Corp, had an insightful observation in yesterday’s NAFCU Services Blog. He questions how much the member or customer experience is enhanced and service is increased by “beautifying branch design, speculative ‘prototype innovation’ or ‘using popular modern communication methods’ like texting, etc”.  Despite all the investment in branch innovations and high-tech, bankers still need to close customer loyalty and intimacy gaps.  Here’s what he suggests:

“Retail banking organizations can be so pre-occupied with trying to define an ultimate ‘experience’ that they all but forget… the simple fact that the ‘branch transformation’ road map is best designed around a return to traditional relationship banking methods and using available modern technology to simply ensure the member can access and consistently enjoy this ‘new banking landscape”. We agree that the best approach combines high-touch with high-tech.

In a nutshell, the ultimate member or customer experience is found in their knowing they have someone at your bank or credit union that has their best interests at heart, someone they can trust and count on to meet their financial needs because their banking relationship manager has established credibility over time. The technology is icing on the cake. What the customer or member really values is the banking relationship.

You can read Mr. Tramontano’s entire post, “The Future of Retail Branch Banking: Waltons or Jetsons?” here.  Also reference our previous post “Points Don’t Build Loyalty… Relationships Do” for further ideas.

End of Post

Agree or Disagree?  Do let us know what you think by scrolling down and commenting below.

Rate Your Organization on Banking Relationship Management Basics

If you’d like a preview of the 12 areas we’ll be covering that impact building banking customer relationships or member relationships or you would like to rate your bank or credit union on 12 key areas to build customer and member relationships and trust, create loyal advocates and increase referrals and business. Just click on the icon to the right.

Read How To Increase Revenue and Profitability Through Relationship Building and Creating Advocates

Get Our Complimentary White Paper

The research shows that customers who become advocates for their banks are the most desirable in terms of loyalty and profitability. Learn what the research recommends to create advocates and to implement a banking relationship management culture that builds deeper relationships and trust with customers or members.

The Banking Relationship Management Experience -
A Strategy for Becoming a Trusted Financial Partner and
Increasing Revenue and Profitability

**********

Why This Blog Series

We see a big problem for many bank and credit unions: they’re missing out on a golden opportunity to grow organically by expanding relationships with existing customers and members. In this series, we’re going to stimulate your thinking by providing some insights into 12 topic areas that determine whether your banking customer relationships or member relationships will grow and become more profitable or just stagnate.

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Don’t get the wrong impression – Bob and Barb are all for selling. We acknowledge the thousands of front line staff that use cross-selling skills with a mindset of genuinely serving their clientele. But that doesn’t change the proven research: many customers and members feel your staff is more interested in selling them something that fills an immediate need but does not necessarily address their “big financial picture”.  Regardless of your organization’s intention, perception is reality and the very nature of transactional cross selling is part of the problem.

In this post we’ll tell you what some bank and credit union staff members do to turn this perception around and convert your customers or members to advocates who view you as their financial partner. We also challenge you to consider whether there is too much emphasis on one type of selling or the other.

So, if your management team could only pick one of two customer revenue-generating strategies, which one would they choose?

A) Train and coach your front line staff to achieve a 3.0 or higher cross sell ratio with walk-ins and call-ins to your branches

B) Train and coach a select group of your staff to build trust and earn the business from customers or members who are disengaged and/or don’t visit branches

C) A combination of both

We bet most management would choose option A. This is where banks and credit unions have invested their time and hard-earned dollars for the past 20+ years and it’s what we all know best. Besides, it’s generating revenue. However, it’s mostly transactional selling for immediate gain with little thought about the greater long term potential of working on building a more solid relationship with customers and members. We recommend C, a little of both. But we also recommend you transition from purely transactional business to building relationships so people view you as their financial partner.

Cross selling is mostly transactional

With cross selling, the emphasis is mostly on staff getting just enough information to help them sell multiple products in a short time frame to walk-in’s and call-in’s. These transactional sales are focused on a quick result by going for the immediate sale rather than gaining a holistic understanding of the customer’s or member’s future needs and goals. These transactional sales lead to immediate revenue. However, the most casual customers may or may not think of you when a significant financial need comes up. The most loyal and profitable members are advocates. To earn their loyalty they want you to have an understanding of their long term financial goals (see the research). Most transaction customers are not likely to be advocates. To them you’re “just another errand”.

Banking relationship management is more consultative

Bankers who have mastered consultative selling  resist the temptation to “pitch” product and get a quick sale but take time to understand the person’s “emotive drivers” and develop a customer relationship over time that’s based on trust. If you ask people who have a relationship manager if they feel like they are being sold, chances are the answer will be “No”!

While relationship managers certainly can cross sell, they are essentially account managers who develop their book of business. They build trust and build customer or member profiles capturing key facts, hobbies, needs, goals and dreams. This powerful information is updated periodically in a CRM system and helps them anticipate and recognize future opportunities. Theses opportunities are likely to be missed when you rely only on transactional cross selling.

Skilled Relationship Managers build a trust relationship over time with a variety of touch points and only sell at the appropriate time. They ask questions to understand their customers’ financial goals and then give advice to improve the customer’s financial well-being. In fact, this approach prompts customers or members to call you! However, in our relationship management training classes, we find many employees are not comfortable at engaging members about their goals and need help.

Which is better – consultative relationship management or cross selling?

You will always need a combination of both. Many members are happy conducting transactional business with you so it’s best to give them what they want. However, as the research shows, you have customers who welcome a deeper relationship with your organization right now. Trust needs to be developed with them first so you can uncover their hidden needs (Are You Uncovering Customers’ Hidden Needs). Once this happens, instead of feeling “sold”, your customers or members will view you as their financial partner and you will generate more organic business from them.

End of Post

Agree or Disagree?  Do let us know what you think by scrolling down and commenting below.

Rate Your Organization on Banking Relationship Management Basics

If you’d like a preview of the 12 areas we’ll be covering that impact building banking customer relationships or member relationships or you would like to rate your bank or credit union on 12 key areas to build customer and member relationships and trust, create loyal advocates and increase referrals and business. Just click on the icon to the right.

Read How To Increase Revenue and Profitability Through Relationship Building and Creating Advocates

Get Our Complimentary White Paper

The research shows that customers who become advocates for their banks are the most desirable in terms of loyalty and profitability. Learn what the research recommends to create advocates and to implement a banking relationship management culture that builds deeper relationships and trust with customers or members.

The Banking Relationship Management Experience -
A Strategy for Becoming a Trusted Financial Partner and
Increasing Revenue and Profitability

**********

Why This Blog Series

We see a big problem for many bank and credit unions: they’re missing out on a golden opportunity to grow organically by expanding relationships with existing customers and members. In this series, we’re going to stimulate your thinking by providing some insights into 12 topic areas that determine whether your banking customer relationships or member relationships will grow and become more profitable or just stagnate.

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Why is it some of your people have no problem generating business while others seem reluctant to pick up the phone? Why does it seem like you have to constantly lean on some people to get their sales numbers up? The short answer to all these questions is all businesses have three different types of people with different propensities and even aversions to sell: Finders, Minders and Grinders. Management at banks and credit unions many times don’t understand the differences and place staff in the wrong slot assuring their failure. You can improve sales performance significantly by recognizing these three types of staff and reassigning them as appropriate.

1. FINDERS are good at getting the business

Finders are aggressive go-getters and natural “rainmakers”. They love the thrill of the hunt for new business. However, don’t expect them to service the account. As soon as a sale is made they’re off looking for their next one. He’s not well suited to doing paperwork or servicing the customer or member.He tends to be smug and leaves service and follow-through to others. A Finder is best suited for seeking new business.

Recommendation: Assuming they are well skilled and motivated to sell. let this person do what they do best and not bog them down with details and burdensome paperwork. Place Finders into positions such as Business Development Officer and outside calling. Get them an assistant for the paperwork or hand it off to a Minder.

2. MINDERS are good at managing the relationship

Minders are relationship builders and good at keeping the customers or members happy. She’s a people person and enjoys customer service, solving customer problems and follow up activities. The minder is committed to client satisfaction and considers ongoing service part of the sale (whereas a Finder just wants to get onto the next sale). Minders are also good at administrative tasks and coordinating efforts of the Finders.

Her goal is not the conquest of the sale, but forging mutually beneficial long-term relationships. Although a Minder will not usually generate as much business as a Finder, they are excellent at generating add-on business from existing clients. They are good at member or customer relationship management making them excellent banking relationship managers.

Recommendation: Place Minders into positions such as Relationship Managers and Customer Service Rep. Let the Finder get the new business and then turn the account over to the Minder to solidify the relationship.

3. GRINDERS are good at managing the paperwork

A Grinder thrives on detail and accuracy, doesn’t mind paperwork and doesn’t need much people interaction. A Grinder has neither the Finder’s flair nor the minder’s service personality and is not a good candidate for the type of sales your bank or credit union requires. They fear putting themselves out there only to get rejected but are happy to do the paperwork.

Recommendation: Let them team up with the Finders and/or the Minders to support their efforts. Remember that without Grinders, Finders and Minders would not be able to reach peak performance.

Why you may be hindering staff sales performance

Banks and credit unions have their biggest need for Minders. However, management causes themselves and some of their staff grief because they expect their Minders to become enthusiastic Finders and their Grinders to be Minders when it’s not really in their DNA. By expecting all your front line staff to fit a mold they’re not well-suited for keeps them from focusing on their unique abilities and drives down performance. We suggest you ask your staff what they enjoy doing most and consider moving some people into different slots. One organization we’re aware of created teams with team goals composed of the three types maximizing the abilities of all. It worked very well.

Thanks for reading our blog. Feel free to call us with any questions.

End of Post

Agree or Disagree?  Do let us know what you think by scrolling down and commenting below.

Rate Your Organization on Banking Relationship Management Basics

If you’d like a preview of the 12 areas we’ll be covering that impact building banking customer relationships or member relationships or you would like to rate your bank or credit union on 12 key areas to build customer and member relationships and trust, create loyal advocates and increase referrals and business. Just click on the icon to the right.

Read How To Increase Revenue and Profitability Through Relationship Building and Creating Advocates

Get Our Complimentary White Paper

The research shows that customers who become advocates for their banks are the most desirable in terms of loyalty and profitability. Learn what the research recommends to create advocates and to implement a banking relationship management culture that builds deeper relationships and trust with customers or members.

The Banking Relationship Management Experience -
A Strategy for Becoming a Trusted Financial Partner and
Increasing Revenue and Profitability

**********

Why This Blog Series

We see a big problem for many bank and credit unions: they’re missing out on a golden opportunity to grow organically by expanding relationships with existing customers and members. In this series, we’re going to stimulate your thinking by providing some insights into 12 topic areas that determine whether your banking customer relationships or member relationships will grow and become more profitable or just stagnate.

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Do these words from a recent Wall Street Journal article explain why your loan business is down: “Unemployment remains high, driving consumers to spend less, and small businesses see that and they’re not going to put the money into expanding or hiring new people.” Yes we know, it appears the “low hanging fruit” has been picked but if you buy into that reasoning and are resigned to waiting until things turn around, you need to read on. For all those bankers bemoaning the effects of the economy on their business, there are progressive ones turning up loans and additional revenue from customers and members they’ve never even met.

In this post, we’ll tell you the approach the progressive organizations are taking, what customers and members are responding to and describe the experience of an FSR at one of our clients as she uncovers some loan business.

This is not your old sales and service culture

We predict that just as the old account passbook morphed into a more efficient and profitable electronic version, eventually so will the old transactional selling model that’s been around in banks and credit unions since the early 1980’s: staff is trained and given incentives to sell isolated products to the “walk-in masses” (Cross Selling’s Unintended Consequence). However, progressive banks and credit unions are proactively connecting with targeted customers or members who don’t visit the branches and may even be disengaged. This is a huge untapped market segment. (These skills can also be used with face-to-face customers or members.)

Once they make a connection, they’re building relationships by engaging them in conversation about their financial goals, dreams and aspirations. Why? Research shows that this approach builds trust and loyalty and creates advocates so when they need to borrow or get any service for that matter, it’s less likely they’ll shop around. As you’ll see from the real life example below, sometimes the mere intention of connecting with a customer or member without having to sell them a product comes through and puts them at ease enough to bring up a need. In fact, in our relationship management training, we ask the staff to begin making introductory, thank you calls from their assigned list and highly discourage pitching any product.

So what does that look like in real life?

Example of a real life, outbound introductory call to a member

Recently Andrea, an FSR with a credit union client of ours was excited to share her experience with us.

I left two voicemail messages for Tom Givens (pseudonym used), one of my assigned members asking him to call me.  I’ve never met him as he doesn’t visit our branches.  As his relationship manager I thanked him and let him know I’m there to help him in the future. He didn’t return my calls, so I sent a nice note with my business card.  About a month later his wife Susan called, told me she handles all the banking and was pleased I would be their personal contact.

We chatted casually about her kids and family for a few minutes.  Near the end of the call I ask her, what expectations do you have for me as your relationship manager and how can I help you now or in the future?  Susan then mentioned she had several high interest credit cards, needed to get a more reliable car and had a baby on the way. She sounded stressed about how they would deal with all this. The discussion naturally led to a home equity loan and she was so thankful that we reached out to her family.  The loan will close this month and I feel proud to be able to help the Givens. I plan on staying in touch and eventually introducing them to our financial advisor to discuss protection (sic) for their family. P.S.  She also mentioned that her husband was about to shop around regarding loan rates and my call was very timely. 

What customers and members respond positively to

Note that it takes a certain amount of effort to connect with a customer or member and initial calls don’t always result in new business. It usually takes time to build the customer or member relationship. What’s important, however, is most customers and members respond positively to being thanked for their business and shown appreciation. They especially like having a personal contact they can call in the future and not getting a sales pitch right from the get-go. There are qualified people out there in need of loans and other financial services and it’s up to us to root them out!

Right now I bet you have some disconnected customers or members just like the Givens.  They may have multiple services with you, but feel no relationship.  Are you seizing the opportunity to reach this virtually untapped market, retain their business and grow your bank or credit union organically? Is your staff trained, confident and comfortable in managing relationships versus transactional cross-selling?

End of Post

Agree or disagree? Do let us know what you think by scrolling down and commenting below.

Rate Your Organization on Banking Relationship Management Basics

If you’d like a preview of the 12 areas we’ll be covering that impact building banking customer relationships or member relationships or you would like to rate your bank or credit union on 12 key areas to build customer and member relationships and trust, create loyal advocates and increase referrals and business. Just click on the icon to the right.

Read How To Increase Revenue and Profitability Through Relationship Building and Creating Advocates

Get Our Complimentary White Paper

The research shows that customers who become advocates for their banks are the most desirable in terms of loyalty and profitability. Learn what the research recommends to create advocates and to implement a banking relationship management culture that builds deeper relationships and trust with customers or members.

The Banking Relationship Management Experience -
A Strategy for Becoming a Trusted Financial Partner and
Increasing Revenue and Profitability

**********

Why This Blog Series

We see a big problem for many bank and credit unions: they’re missing out on a golden opportunity to grow organically by expanding relationships with existing customers and members. In this series, we’re going to stimulate your thinking by providing some insights into 12 topic areas that determine whether your banking customer relationships or member relationships will grow and become more profitable or just stagnate.

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The Wall Street Journal article last Friday 11/4 was titled, “Starbucks Profit Surges on Loyal Sales”. A telling paragraph said, “Like the rest of the industry, Starbucks has been battling rising coffee costs and a struggling economy, but it has shown more resilience than many of its competitors, as consumers remain loyal to the brand despite its regular, modest menu-price increases”. Wow, wouldn’t we all like to be in that position? Coffee is a commodity and yet Starbucks maintains a loyal following and still feels they can raise prices! So with so many people viewing their bank or credit union as a commodity, how do you create customers or members that automatically think of you when a financial need comes up and decide not to shop around?

In this post, we’ll talk about how you can build true loyalty without bribing your customers or members.

Many financial institutions have had success with loyalty features such as relationship pricing, personal bankers and special events for certain tiers of customers. There are also many loyalty programs banks and credit unions can purchase to reward customer or member points for using their services. Starbucks customers earn rewards such as free drinks when they open a Starbucks account and it’s worked to build customer loyalty. But we don’t think what works for Starbucks necessarily is a good fit for a bank or credit union.

Are people loyal to your brand or just your loyalty program?

The question that needs to be answered about these types of loyalty programs is “Are people loyal to your brand or just your loyalty program?” People change jobs, homes, churches and even spouses faster than ever before. Why would people hesitate to change something as incidental as which debit card they use? Even if a customer has multiple accounts with you, it doesn’t mean they have a personal connection with any of your staff. When it’s time to address the “big financial needs” they might just shop around.

The solution: satisfy people’s emotional drivers

Bankers have to provide their customers or members something very substantial for them to feel “this is my bank” or “this is my credit union”. The member must perceive high, ongoing value to keep you at the top of their mind. Will points and a merchandise catalog make your disengaged customers who don’t come into the branch see you as a trusted financial partner? We don’t think so. But research shows people will become loyal advocates of their bank or credit union when you build a relationship of trust and meet their emotional drivers. Starbucks should be commended for what they’ve done to build customer loyalty but in financial services, people perceive high, ongoing value and become advocates when you:

• Develop a relationship with them that enables you to anticipate their unexpressed financial needs, not just respond when they bring something up.
• Understand their financial goals, dreams and aspirations.
• Provide advice and education they can see improves their financial well-being.
• Demonstrate you value their business through personal contact by phone or hand-written notes.

Don’t keep beating your head against the wall trying to win loyalty from disengaged customers who just give you their transactional business. Don’t think you can win customer or member loyalty by bribing with points. To find out how to create a structured banking relationship management process in your bank or credit union that enables your staff to build solid member or customer relationships and develop long term business organically, call Bob Romano at 760-738-9100 X103.

End of Blog

Agree or disagree? Do let us know what you think by scrolling down and commenting below.

The Research on How to Create Loyal Advocates

The bulleted items above are emotional drivers of loyalty taken directly from groundbreaking research conducted by IBM Global Business Services on what makes customers and members advocates. Get your complimentary copy of our white paper to learn what the research recommends to create advocates and to implement a banking relationship management culture that builds deeper relationships and trust with customers or members. See link below.

Rate Your Organization on Banking Relationship Management Basics

If you’d like a preview of the 12 areas we’ll be covering that impact building banking customer relationships or member relationships or you would like to rate your bank or credit union on 12 key areas to build customer and member relationships and trust, create loyal advocates and increase referrals and business. Just click on the icon to the right.

Read How To Increase Revenue and Profitability Through Relationship Building and Creating Advocates

Get Our Complimentary White Paper

The research shows that customers who become advocates for their banks are the most desirable in terms of loyalty and profitability. Learn what the research recommends to create advocates and to implement a banking relationship management culture that builds deeper relationships and trust with customers or members.

The Banking Relationship Management Experience -
A Strategy for Becoming a Trusted Financial Partner and
Increasing Revenue and Profitability

**********

Why This Blog Series

We see a big problem for many bank and credit unions: they’re missing out on a golden opportunity to grow organically by expanding relationships with existing customers and members. In this series, we’re going to stimulate your thinking by providing some insights into 12 topic areas that determine whether your banking customer relationships or member relationships will grow and become more profitable or just stagnate.

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Last week I (Barb) was honored to make a presentation at the annual Symitar (a core processing company) users conference. It was on maximizing the ROI of CRM software by developing a banking relationship management culture. I also facilitated a CRM users roundtable and served as one of three people on a marketing panel. What a valuable experience!

Between all the discussion on the panels and people who came to talk to us at our exhibit booth after my sessions, we were intrigued by three powerful themes we kept hearing from attendees determined to develop deeper member relationships in their credit union. To our readers in banks, please read on. Although this was a credit union conference, the three insights we’ll share in today’s post are valuable for developing customer relationships as well.

1. Many credit unions are making member relationship management a strategic objective – We’re passionate about member and customer relationship management but we were pleasantly surprised to see that more credit unions are making it a strategic priority to evolve their cross selling culture to building a deeper level of relationship with members. We call it building a member or customer relationship management culture. In fact, three people we talked with said they came to the conference specifically to gather information to decide what action steps they would submit for their strategic planning sessions. They got quite a few ideas from users of the Synapsys CRM component at my roundtable. A good amount of the discussion was on how to get employees to use the software more effectively to build deeper relationships (think better ROI). In my breakout, I presented a nine step process on how to build a member relationship culture. (If you would like to learn what the nine step process is, click on Webinar and let us know if you’re a credit unions or a bank so we can contact you for the date of our next webinar, Turn Your Customers or Members Into Loyal Advocates and Grow Your Business Organically.)

2. Even credit unions with a CRM system are missing out on future sales opportunities by only focusing on filling immediate needs – There are three statements from a credible study by IBM Business Services that correlate most highly with customers and members being an advocate of their bank or credit union. One is “The bank (or credit union) has an understanding of my financial goals”. When we asked our audience to fill in the last word of the sentence, the vast majority confidently shouted out “needs”. The survey statement used the word “goals”. Here’s the point.

Most staff has been trained well to find an existing customer’s or member’s financial need and fill it. However, most have not been trained to find out the customer’s or member’s financial goals to help with a future need. The attitude is “let’s sell what the customer needs today”. That in itself is not bad because it’s a win-win for your credit union and the member today. The problem for both banks and credit unions is it’s a short-sighted approach because staff is not asking the right questions to build a customer or member profile and a relationship (see the third insight). It’s the relationship that usually leads to untold unexpected future business. When a future need arises, people will buy from those with whom they have a trusted relationship with. (To find out the other two statements that highly correlate to customer or member advocacy and how to turn your members or customers into advocates, read our white paper The Banking Relationship Management Experience – A Strategy for Becoming a Trusted Financial Partner and Increasing Revenue and Profitability.

3. Staff is not recording member conversations nor building profiles – A significant feature of any CRM software is the ability to build customer and member profiles so that a relationship manager (or anyone in the organization for that matter) can anticipate future needs and life events. A number of people told us that if staff does discover something valuable about a member, this information is not being recorded and is lost to the ozone. We found a good number of credit unions (and banks) are looking for ways to get their people to enter that information. The problem usually is most banks or credit unions don’t have a process in place to fully implement a banking relationship management culture. CRM software is only as good as the data that staff keys into it. You need to focus on The People Factor™ in addition to technology. (Again, if you would like to learn what the nine step process is, click on webinar and let us know so we can contact you for our next webinar.)

WE WELCOME YOUR COMMENTS BELOW

Rate Your Organization on Banking Relationship Management Basics

If you’d like a preview of the 12 areas we’ll be covering that impact building banking customer relationships or member relationships or you would like to rate your bank or credit union on 12 key areas to build customer and member relationships and trust, create loyal advocates and increase referrals and business. Just click on the icon to the right.

Read How To Increase Revenue and Profitability Through Relationship Building and Creating Advocates

Get Our Complimentary White Paper

The research shows that customers who become advocates for their banks are the most desirable in terms of loyalty and profitability. Learn what the research recommends to create advocates and to implement a banking relationship management culture that builds deeper relationships and trust with customers or members.

The Banking Relationship Management Experience -
A Strategy for Becoming a Trusted Financial Partner and
Increasing Revenue and Profitability

**********

Why This Blog Series

We see a big problem for many bank and credit unions: they’re missing out on a golden opportunity to grow organically by expanding relationships with existing customers and members. In this series, we’re going to stimulate your thinking by providing some insights into 12 topic areas that determine whether your banking customer relationships or member relationships will grow and become more profitable or just stagnate.

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Cross selling is overrated

In our last blog we demonstrated that many front line staff are literally leaving money on the table because they’re not skilled at uncovering unexpressed needs, i.e., financial needs customers or members have but don’t tell your staff. Some of the time staff is skilled enough to pick up on a cue AND lucky enough that the customer or member is receptive to being asked questions at the moment AND they’re not in a hurry even though they only came in to complete a quick transaction. Then it might turn into business. Let’s just say the stars have to be aligned.

Cross selling is a needed skill and is not going away but sales in banking has evolved. There’s a more effective way to bring customer and member needs to the surface which even the customers or members appreciate.

How unrecognized needs can be filled through a trust relationship

But there’s another level of needs most frontline staff usually never get to fill and these are referred to as unrecognized needs – needs customers and members have that they don’t yet recognize as a need, much less one you can fill. The good news is there are many banks and credit unions that have staff members who are able to anticipate, decipher and comprehend these unrecognized needs and turn them into opportunities to help the customer or member. These financial institutions have progressed beyond a cross-selling culture and have developed a banking relationship management culture. Here’s an example of how their staff makes this breakthrough.

Brandy is a Banking Relationship Manager with a community bank client who went through our relationship management training program. It’s important to note, she built up trust by phone over a period of time with an assigned list of customers who rarely came into the bank. Disengaged customers are a prime segment for organic growth. Because of this trust, the customer openly shared her mother was in assisted living and not doing that well. Brandy was astute enough to know there could be some negative tax consequences if the mother did not have a trust. In this sensitive situation, by asking some excellent questions, she was able to identify a potential problem and suggested the customer see someone in their Trust department. The customer was grateful to learn about the value of a trust and eventually did use the services of the Trust department.

Is your organization there yet?

Th e key is your staff needs to be skilled at going beyond the transactional business with walk-ins and building a trust relationship by phone with disengaged but high-potential customers and members. As a guide to see where your organization is on the continuum, how would you respond to this statement? Our staff is comfortable with going beyond simply recognizing a cue and pitching products to engaging customers and members in conversation, recognizing life events and uncovering their goals, dreams and aspirations. (rate your organization on its banking relationship management culture by answering the 11 other statements).

Sure, there’s a little bit of luck in many sales but people buy from people they like and trust.  The way to grow organically is to get your customers or members to start opening up and volunteering a lot more information because they have a trusted, banking customer relationship with your staff.  At that point your people won’t be relying simply on basic cross selling skills and a little luck; they’ll be confidently and proactively using their relationship management skills.

End of Blog

WE WELCOME YOUR COMMENTS BELOW

Rate Your Organization on Banking Relationship Management Basics

If you’d like a preview of the 12 areas we’ll be covering that impact building banking customer relationships or member relationships or you would like to rate your bank or credit union on 12 key areas to build customer and member relationships and trust, create loyal advocates and increase referrals and business. Just click on the icon to the right.

Read How To Increase Revenue and Profitability Through Relationship Building and Creating Advocates

Get Our Complimentary White Paper

The research shows that customers who become advocates for their banks are the most desirable in terms of loyalty and profitability.  Learn what the research recommends to create advocates and to implement a banking relationship management culture that builds deeper relationships and trust with customers or members.

The Banking Relationship Management Experience -
A Strategy for Becoming a Trusted Financial Partner and
Increasing Revenue and Profitability

**********

Why This Blog Series

We see a big problem for many bank and credit unions: they’re missing out on a golden opportunity to grow organically by expanding relationships with existing customers and members. In this series, we’re going to stimulate your thinking by providing some insights into 12 topic areas that determine whether your banking customer relationships or member relationships will grow and become more profitable or just stagnate.

Want To Get Notified of Future Posts?

If you were not notified of this post in an email from us and would like to receive notices of future posts, please sign up at the top of this post.

Order taking is not generating much organic growth for you

Imagine I walk into your bank or credit union and inquire about opening a checking account (an expressed need).  Sally your friendly FSR explains my options, opens the account and also suggests automatic savings with overdraft protection.  We assume most of your staff have gone through cross selling training and are skilled at filling these basic transactional needs.  This is the core source of revenue your front line staff generates but, in our opinion, it’s as unproductive as “dialing for dollars” and has a marginal ROI for the effort.

To get a bigger ROI on time spent with customers or members and to grow organically, your staff must engage them in more meaningful conversation to get to know them better.  This naturally leads to their being more willing to open up and share information that can help you match them with additional products and services that never get to the point of conversation.  (You may be saying your people already don’t have enough time to serve all your walk-in business.  No need to worry – building a banking relationship management culture is a stepped approach starting with a core group of select front line employees).

They won’t mention or discuss a need because they don’t have a trust relationship

What Sally doesn’t know is I’m shopping around for a financial planner to help me evaluate my insurance needs, when I can retire and if I should consider an annuity.  I don’t need a product – I need advice and a solution.  However, I choose not to mention this to her (unexpressed need).  Why? First of all, I’m unaware that your bank or credit union can help me.  But what’s more significant is I don’t tell her because I don’t know Sally very well, I don’t feel I have a banking customer relationship with her and she hasn’t built up a very high trust level with me.

The bad news

Here’s the bad news: every day your customers or members have unexpressed needs they just don’t mention to your staff. You may have a few people who can skillfully transition the conversation to my future concerns, uncover my need and refer me to your wealth area.  That’s great, but from our experience, we know the number of front line people who are this perceptive is not what you’d like and they’re leaving money on the table.

The good news

But here’s the good news: there is something every bank or credit union can do capture this business.  Here’s a hint – ask yourself what percentage of your frontline staff this statement applies to: Our staff is comfortable with going beyond simply recognizing a cue and pitching products to engaging customers and members in conversation, recognizing life events and uncovering their goals, dreams and aspirations. (rate your organization on the other 11 statements).

Being able to engage in this way enables your staff to get to the next level of relationship mastery: perceiving both unexpressed and unrecognized needs.

Is your organization leaving money on the table?  Banks and credit unions that have trained their people to engage customers or members in banking relationship management skills are able to build the relationship and trust that encourages them to open up more not only about their unexpressed but also needs they don’t even realize they have – unrecognized needs.  We’ll cover that in our next blog.

End of Blog

WE WELCOME YOUR COMMENTS BELOW

Rate Your Organization on Banking Relationship Management Basics

If you’d like a preview of the 12 areas we’ll be covering that impact building banking customer relationships or member relationships or you would like to rate your bank or credit union on 12 key areas to build customer and member relationships and trust, create loyal advocates and increase referrals and business. Just click on the icon to the right.

Read How To Increase Revenue and Profitability Through Relationship Building and Creating Advocates

Get Our Complimentary White Paper

The research shows that customers who become advocates for their banks are the most desirable in terms of loyalty and profitability.  Learn what the research recommends to create advocates and to implement a banking relationship management culture that builds deeper relationships and trust with customers or members.

The Banking Relationship Management Experience -
A Strategy for Becoming a Trusted Financial Partner and
Increasing Revenue and Profitability

**********

Why This Blog Series

We see a big problem for many bank and credit unions: they’re missing out on a golden opportunity to grow organically by expanding relationships with existing customers and members. In this series, we’re going to stimulate your thinking by providing some insights into 12 topic areas that determine whether your banking customer relationships or member relationships will grow and become more profitable or just stagnate.

Want To Get Notified of Future Posts?

If you were not notified of this post in an email from us and would like to receive notices of future posts, please sign up at the top of this post.