Archive for the 'Financial Marketing' Category

Shortly after opening a Money Market Account with SunTrust Bank, I received a cross-sell letter, promoting their CD options. The concept is excellent: talk to a customer who has just opened a fluid MMA and try to lock them in to a longer-term CD product. The concept is good; but the execution could have been [...]

The ante is going up for new checking account openings. People’s United Bank (Connecticut) has a great checking account offer — $100 if you open with Direct Deposit – but they could have improved their mailing piece with some copy changes. (link to the ABA Bank Marketing Magazine, Sept. 2010 – http://magazines.aba.com/bmmag/201009?sub_id=AmkkXzJP94Ql#pg6)

Welcoming and cross-selling new customers is a critically important function for banks/CUs that is done both in the branch and with a structured mailing program.  This  letter, submitted by a reader, is part of a “three-touch” program of welcoming and then offering “the next most likely product” to each household.   The piece is nicely positioned [...]

The Bank of the West submitted their new customer Onboarding (Welcome) letter for review and comment. It does a good job and with some small changes, could do even better.

Afrequent question: what kind of response rate should I expect from my mailing? The answer can vary as widely as the product/service being offered and the target audience receiving the mailing. Here are some general guidelines:

Financial services are finding a basic marketing truth: business people are one of the toughest target markets to penetrate.

While many banks are now setting significant sales goals to increase their commercial business, they are also finding that there is a major obstacle … the “boss’s screener.” Sitting outside the office of every prime business target is a person who recognizes one of their responsibilities is to: Screen the phone calls, screen the visitors and screen the mail.

How To Break Through

“To app or not to app, that is the question!”
Paraphrasing Hamlet from his soliloquy, the question frequently faced in doing an equity line, or any kind of loan mailing, is whether or not to include an application in the mailing package. There are several reasons to take this route, and some solid cautions on the other side.

An application can take many forms: from the two-page, complex variety to the four-question ‘mini application,’ depending on the requirements of underwriting. But in each case, the prospect is being asked to do more work in responding to a loan offer.

Two common mistakes most companies make in writing their own direct mail letters center on what they choose to emphasize. Usually it involves the company name and the featuresof the product.

The first error is normally the mentioning—and over- mentioning—of the company name in the letter. Coupled with this is the over-mentioning of the product name that has been developed for a normally generic product like an equity line of credit.

Many writers have successfully used long letters to make the sale. These are effective when the reader is really interested in the subject and will take the time to wade through long copy.

But bank direct mail usually doesn’t have that luxury. Our readers are usually busy people and the products we are selling are seemingly of modest interest. So the letter length should fit their desires — or it won’t get read.

Developing a successful customer cross-sell program involves many steps;but the return on investment of the marketing dollars makes it all worthwhile. One of the final steps is creating a mailing calendar, which will put all the plans in place for the upcoming year.

Bank Intelligence ScoresTM

The starting point is to analyze the bank’s customer database in order to identify the best prospects. WordComand Customer Intelligence’s unique study of bank customers showed that multi-service households have the greatest likelihood of purchasing additional products in the near future. Single- service households have the second highest likelihood, and totally free checking households are the least likely to purchase additional products.

One of the first things customers or prospects notice in a letter is a bad salutation. A good greeting will help maintain the illusion of a personalized communication; but a poor “Hello” is a bad first impression.

What does it say about your personalized service, when the salutation reads: Dear JOHN L JONES JR, ITF?

Without gender designation affixed to each record, creating the ideal “Dear Mr. Jones” salutation will become very difficult. The file can be run against a computer library of first names to affix a proper salutation; but there are still some risks (unisex names, initials, etc).

Did you just send out thousands of letters promoting a product and get a lower response rate than you had hoped for? Well, it could have been a result of the list… the offer… the mailing package… or, perhaps it was your letter copy. Everyone thinks they can write a letter; but it is a [...]