Conversation Signposts

What They Asked at Summer School

By Jack Hubbard
Chief Experience Officer

Summer is a busy time around here. We teach at four major banking schools between May and September and we also are engaged in speaking for RMA Chapters around the country, not to mention state banking organizations that make us a part of their conferences and workshops. Some interesting questions came at me this year and I thought readers might benefit from answers to these thought-provokers.

“You talked about Reboarding. What is that and how do we do it effectively?”

Lots has been written about Onboarding. Banks are recognizing that taking a strategic approach to welcoming totally new customers to the bank pays big dividends. Done over a period of time, Onboarding is executed through letters, phone calls, notes, and other communications. In our zeal to roll out the red carpet for “newbies”, we sometimes forget current clients that have been loyal to us over the years. Several of our partner banks have asked us to teach a Reboarding process–both in business banking and on the retail side of the house.

Similar to Onboarding, Reboarding has a rhythmic communications back beat. It links such things as CRM, segmentation, profitability modeling, and a consistent touch point process to articulate value. One bank employs a Sunset Selling strategy whereby every evening before bankers leave the office, they select one current client to reach out to. This can be done through the use of an article or some other snippet of value. The banker might attach the information to an e-mail or send it via fax/snail mail. Do the math. If each of your retail bankers and business bankers were to Reboard one customer a day, imagine the value you would be articulating to the marketplace.

Other banks are using sales assistants in the Reboarding process. Most business bankers have 125 or more clients–many of which they don’t get to on a regular basis. Assistants trained to look for opportunities to enhance current clients’ experiences are profit centers, not overhead. One bank’s assistants forward a list of business books to selected clients, pointing out two or three that might be of particular interest. What a great idea! A significant number of business owners are successful because of their sales or marketing acumen. They are always looking for new ideas and any bank that provides that level of care and attention is sure to get some of that mind traction we wrote about in the July Conversation Signposts.

The keys to success? You can’t do this for every customer so an integrated tiering process has to come into play with some solid criteria as to what a Tier One looks like, etc. This approach helps to isolate the banker’s finite time and allows him or her to market one to one. Second, and perhaps more important, the banker should not send an article and two days later contact the client with a “special offer” or to attempt to sell them something. That approach becomes manipulative and defeats the entire purpose. Relax. Reboard and they will come.

“You suggest all these value added things that we should be doing. What are they and where do we find the time and the resources to do it all?”

It’s impossible for the bank to dictate every sales activity it wants its bankers to execute. High performers carry a passion for performance in their hearts and find ways (and time) to become significant to clients–without being told or “tick-marked”. Every sales associate has to decide what works for him or her given their overall life objectives (what they want to become), revenue goals, life balance, and all the rest of it. Then go try some stuff. Heck, this is sales and every time you do something you paint outside the lines. We’re not trying to land on Pluto here and it’s certainly not brain surgery or I wouldn’t be doing it. Here’s one idea that works for our people. We use Google News Alerts tenaciously.

Google News Alerts is a service (yes, it’s free) that lets the Internet proactively search for information that is important to any consumer or business owner. Let’s say your territory has numerous commercial printers and you have no clue that ink prices have risen 5.5% in the past year. Register one time and create a password. Then, you can type in either the industry name, words/phrases like “printing presses”, “commercial printing”, “paper”, “offset lithography”, or even the names of printers in your territory. Be sure to insert your name and your bank name too.

As you sleep, over the weekend and during the business day, Googlites scour data on your behalf. The information comes to your desktop in headline form containing hyperlinks. Click on them to read the articles or quickly discount them. The articles that are relevant can be printed for personal delivery, e-mailed, or even faxed.

My News Alerts list is full of client names, names of senior bankers with those clients, all of our major competitors, our own company name, the names of each individual within our company, and even such things as graphic design and wedding planning as those are the fields our children are in. Sure I get a ton of e-mail every day, hundreds in fact. And no, I can’t look at those during business hours. That’s the time when we are all focused on having conversations with clients and taking care of unexpected issues and opportunities. But, while others sleep you can reap rewards if you have a passion for helping clients exceed their needs.

Are you into blogging? We don’t have one now but lots of bankers are asking for it. If you want to find out who is blogging on your favorite sales topics, click on http://blogsearch.google.com. It’s a new beta site from the nice people that brought you the News Alerts. Try it out, it’s pretty cool.

Try these too: bizjournals.com and bizwomen.com. These are two great sites where you can glean some amazing information and best practices in a variety of industries around the country. I really like bizwomen.com because it features a success story every day that can be e-mailed anywhere to anyone.

Think of all of this as VIP: Value Impressions Positive. If you were the client and you received an article, a book list, best-in-breed ideas from your banker that can help your business prosper, how would it make you feel? If the answer is more connected, more loyal, more apt to provide referrals and do more business, then the question is not why do you do the VIP process, it is when can you start?

“You sounded very negative on marketing campaigns. Should we stop having them?”

In sales everything is gray. It’s all about your objectives, your markets, your people, and so much more. Given those and other variables, there might well be a place for campaigns at your bank. One of my challenges is “campaign creep”–they seem to always multiply on themselves. I know a bank whose president thrives on campaigns and that is pretty much the sales environment. He likes them so much the bank always has a few going. “The more products we feature and push, the more sales we’ll make,” he believes. This allows the naysayers to become “so confused over what we are supposed to sell that I don’t know what to say to my customer.” Even the best salespeople at this bank have trouble keeping all those campaign balls in the air. The ultimate loser, however, is the customer who is continually bombarded with those ever powerful sales queries, “Would you be interested in free checking with overdraft privileges today? No? How about a home equity loan then?”

Another challenge with campaigns is the way they are executed. Specifically, I am talking about the sales conversation and sales management tools that should be distributed along with the advertising slicks, banners, and merchandising. If you are a marketing person or product manager reading this, tailor some job aides for your bankers when you run a campaign. Put together a sales meeting in a box so branch managers can provide some targeted learning. Provide some high payoff referral questions the tellers can place in their windows so they can become better askers. Give your personal bankers sales-related questions, a product profile, and some benefit statements they can make when they are trying to hold customer conversations.

I’m waiting for a bank to have a Customer Campaign. The entire goal of this campaign is to glean information. How does the customer like to use the bank, what do they find valuable about their banking relationship, how can the bank provide better peace of mind and exceed their financial needs? Think of it…an entire 60 days when the focus is on asking–not pushing products. Two straight months of putting opportunities to help customers in the top of the sales funnel that can be followed up on…forever. The tracking sheets can show how many questions everyone asked and the winner of the trip to Orlando is the one that linked information gleaned in conversations with the best solutions that made the customer’s financial life rich and fulfilled. Alas, we are in a widget world where senior managers, stockholders, and Wall Street seek short-term results from a long-term asset: the customer.

Two final words on campaigns: unintended consequences. Building a Performance Culture is a multi-faceted discipline connecting the buying cycle, needs, and attitudes of customers. When a bank allows product campaigns (which are really as much marketing as they are sales) to take the place of a holistic approach to performance, managers are stripped of their tools. And when the campaign is over, the entire culture collectively exhales and waits for the next one.

		Bullets from Bob By Bob St. Meyer President This summer Jack Hubbard, our Chief Experience Officer (he’s really the Chairman but he hates that title), reached a highlight in his professional career. As many readers know, Jack is a prolific writer and speaker. They are two of his passions. Last year for Christmas we all chipped in and got him a “Where in the World is Jack Hubbard?” tee shirt. Believe me; the back of it looked like a concert tour for the Stones (or some other group as old as Jack). In June, Jack celebrated his 20th anniversary of teaching at the School of Bank Marketing & Management, sponsored by the American Bankers Association. In the middle of his sales class, he was surprised by other faculty members and ABA staff with a presentation and certificate commemorating that milestone. Word has it he was speechless for one of the first times in his life. The students responded with a lengthy standing ovation. We also learned that Jack is the only consultant to serve on the faculty of three ABA Schools, Stonier Graduate School of Banking and the Commercial Lending School being the other two. We value our partnership with ABA and appreciate that they would include us along with many other outstanding presenters as members of their school’s faculty. Bob Neuhaus Joins TNS We’re also pleased to announce that Bob Neuhaus has been named Executive Vice President of TNS Financial Services. He will lead the North American Financial Services practice. We’ve had the privilege of knowing and working with Bob since the mid-1990s when he served in a senior commercial banking capacity at M&T Bank in Buffalo, New York. In his new role, Bob is responsible for all aspects of TNS’ U.S. practice including custom research, syndicated programs, and new product development in addition to sales and marketing. Bob can be reached at 203-618-8511 or at bob.neuhaus@tns-global.com. All the best in your new career, Bob.








		What They Asked at Summer School By Jack Hubbard Chief Experience Officer Summer is a busy time around here. We teach at four major banking schools between May and September and we also are engaged in speaking for RMA Chapters around the country, not to mention state banking organizations that make us a part of their conferences and workshops. Some interesting questions came at me this year and I thought readers might benefit from answers to these thought-provokers. “You talked about Reboarding. What is that and how do we do it effectively?” Lots has been written about Onboarding. Banks are recognizing that taking a strategic approach to welcoming totally new customers to the bank pays big dividends. Done over a period of time, Onboarding is executed through letters, phone calls, notes, and other communications. In our zeal to roll out the red carpet for “newbies”, we sometimes forget current clients that have been loyal to us over the years. Several of our partner banks have asked us to teach a Reboarding process–both in business banking and on the retail side of the house. Similar to Onboarding, Reboarding has a rhythmic communications back beat. It links such things as CRM, segmentation, profitability modeling, and a consistent touch point process to articulate value. One bank employs a Sunset Selling strategy whereby every evening before bankers leave the office, they select one current client to reach out to. This can be done through the use of an article or some other snippet of value. The banker might attach the information to an e-mail or send it via fax/snail mail. Do the math. If each of your retail bankers and business bankers were to Reboard one customer a day, imagine the value you would be articulating to the marketplace. Other banks are using sales assistants in the Reboarding process. Most business bankers have 125 or more clients–many of which they don’t get to on a regular basis. Assistants trained to look for opportunities to enhance current clients’ experiences are profit centers, not overhead. One bank’s assistants forward a list of business books to selected clients, pointing out two or three that might be of particular interest. What a great idea! A significant number of business owners are successful because of their sales or marketing acumen. They are always looking for new ideas and any bank that provides that level of care and attention is sure to get some of that mind traction we wrote about in the July Conversation Signposts. The keys to success? You can’t do this for every customer so an integrated tiering process has to come into play with some solid criteria as to what a Tier One looks like, etc. This approach helps to isolate the banker’s finite time and allows him or her to market one to one. Second, and perhaps more important, the banker should not send an article and two days later contact the client with a “special offer” or to attempt to sell them something. That approach becomes manipulative and defeats the entire purpose. Relax. Reboard and they will come. “You suggest all these value added things that we should be doing. What are they and where do we find the time and the resources to do it all?” It’s impossible for the bank to dictate every sales activity it wants its bankers to execute. High performers carry a passion for performance in their hearts and find ways (and time) to become significant to clients–without being told or “tick-marked”. Every sales associate has to decide what works for him or her given their overall life objectives (what they want to become), revenue goals, life balance, and all the rest of it. Then go try some stuff. Heck, this is sales and every time you do something you paint outside the lines. We’re not trying to land on Pluto here and it’s certainly not brain surgery or I wouldn’t be doing it. Here’s one idea that works for our people. We use Google News Alerts tenaciously. Google News Alerts is a service (yes, it’s free) that lets the Internet proactively search for information that is important to any consumer or business owner. Let’s say your territory has numerous commercial printers and you have no clue that ink prices have risen 5.5% in the past year. Register one time and create a password. Then, you can type in either the industry name, words/phrases like “printing presses”, “commercial printing”, “paper”, “offset lithography”, or even the names of printers in your territory. Be sure to insert your name and your bank name too. As you sleep, over the weekend and during the business day, Googlites scour data on your behalf. The information comes to your desktop in headline form containing hyperlinks. Click on them to read the articles or quickly discount them. The articles that are relevant can be printed for personal delivery, e-mailed, or even faxed. My News Alerts list is full of client names, names of senior bankers with those clients, all of our major competitors, our own company name, the names of each individual within our company, and even such things as graphic design and wedding planning as those are the fields our children are in. Sure I get a ton of e-mail every day, hundreds in fact. And no, I can’t look at those during business hours. That’s the time when we are all focused on having conversations with clients and taking care of unexpected issues and opportunities. But, while others sleep you can reap rewards if you have a passion for helping clients exceed their needs. Are you into blogging? We don’t have one now but lots of bankers are asking for it. If you want to find out who is blogging on your favorite sales topics, click on http://blogsearch.google.com. It’s a new beta site from the nice people that brought you the News Alerts. Try it out, it’s pretty cool. Try these too: bizjournals.com and bizwomen.com. These are two great sites where you can glean some amazing information and best practices in a variety of industries around the country. I really like bizwomen.com because it features a success story every day that can be e-mailed anywhere to anyone. Think of all of this as VIP: Value Impressions Positive. If you were the client and you received an article, a book list, best-in-breed ideas from your banker that can help your business prosper, how would it make you feel? If the answer is more connected, more loyal, more apt to provide referrals and do more business, then the question is not why do you do the VIP process, it is when can you start? “You sounded very negative on marketing campaigns. Should we stop having them?” In sales everything is gray. It’s all about your objectives, your markets, your people, and so much more. Given those and other variables, there might well be a place for campaigns at your bank. One of my challenges is “campaign creep”–they seem to always multiply on themselves. I know a bank whose president thrives on campaigns and that is pretty much the sales environment. He likes them so much the bank always has a few going. “The more products we feature and push, the more sales we’ll make,” he believes. This allows the naysayers to become “so confused over what we are supposed to sell that I don’t know what to say to my customer.” Even the best salespeople at this bank have trouble keeping all those campaign balls in the air. The ultimate loser, however, is the customer who is continually bombarded with those ever powerful sales queries, “Would you be interested in free checking with overdraft privileges today? No? How about a home equity loan then?” Another challenge with campaigns is the way they are executed. Specifically, I am talking about the sales conversation and sales management tools that should be distributed along with the advertising slicks, banners, and merchandising. If you are a marketing person or product manager reading this, tailor some job aides for your bankers when you run a campaign. Put together a sales meeting in a box so branch managers can provide some targeted learning. Provide some high payoff referral questions the tellers can place in their windows so they can become better askers. Give your personal bankers sales-related questions, a product profile, and some benefit statements they can make when they are trying to hold customer conversations. I’m waiting for a bank to have a Customer Campaign. The entire goal of this campaign is to glean information. How does the customer like to use the bank, what do they find valuable about their banking relationship, how can the bank provide better peace of mind and exceed their financial needs? Think of it…an entire 60 days when the focus is on asking–not pushing products. Two straight months of putting opportunities to help customers in the top of the sales funnel that can be followed up on…forever. The tracking sheets can show how many questions everyone asked and the winner of the trip to Orlando is the one that linked information gleaned in conversations with the best solutions that made the customer’s financial life rich and fulfilled. Alas, we are in a widget world where senior managers, stockholders, and Wall Street seek short-term results from a long-term asset: the customer. Two final words on campaigns: unintended consequences. Building a Performance Culture is a multi-faceted discipline connecting the buying cycle, needs, and attitudes of customers. When a bank allows product campaigns (which are really as much marketing as they are sales) to take the place of a holistic approach to performance, managers are stripped of their tools. And when the campaign is over, the entire culture collectively exhales and waits for the next one.

		What’s New? At First Research Has your bank signed up for First Research yet? No? What are you waiting for? I was pleased to hear from Bobby Martin, President of First Research, Inc., recently about a terrific enhancement to an already amazing tool. First Research has introduced Executive Insight. Now each profile isolates key issues for various C-level managers on an industry-by-industry basis. If you are calling on an architect, with one click you can get a sense of what challenges the CEO is facing, what is on the CFO’s plate, and even a feel of some key talking points for HR and Marketing professionals. Check out First Research at www.firstresearch.com.

		Survey of Business Banking Issues For our latest Survey of Business Banking Issues please visit our website: http://www.smhtechnologies.com/surveys/busbank/bankingsurvey.htm

		Exclusive Retail Banking White Paper Call Julie for your chance to receive the White Paper Finally this month: an offer to any bank that wishes to participate in our exclusive Retail Banking White Paper project to contact Julie Ruffolo. We will not be publishing results to anyone that has not completed our telephone survey. We will not sell, distribute, or otherwise mass market the information. We’ve had tremendous response and the surveys will be completed on September 30, 2006. If you are interested in learning what some of America’s finest retail sales banks are doing, facing, and planning, call Julie at 630-541-6519 or e-mail her at jruffolo@stmeyerandhubbard.com.

		Register for Conversation Signposts The third quarter is OVER. Ideas in Conversation Signposts are generating sales funnel opportunities to create a mojo for 2007. Bankers tell us the tips they find in Conversation Signposts have contributed to some significant wins on behalf of their clients and pre-clients. If someone else at your bank could benefit from Conversation Signposts, forward this edition and have them click on the hyperlink below to register: it’s FREE and you’ll not find anything about our products and services here. Why aren’t all newsletters like that? http://www.stmeyerandhubbard.com/signup.html Allowing us to be an Approved Sender In today’s security-conscious environment, many times our newsletter ends up in the wrong e-mail bucket. To make sure you receive every issue, why not put us on your “approved sender” list? StMeyerandHubbard@lb.bcentral.com newsletter@stmeyerandhubbard.com