Social Media - Visible Banking Interviews and articles in 2009 - emarketer, EFMAG, Information World Review, Intellectuell Kapitaal Magazine

Just a short post to invite you to read my interviews and articles published in 2009 in a few industry leading publications and websites in the US, the UK, the Netherlands and in France.

You will find the full list of my contributions as speakers, chairperson and guest writer in the about section on Visible Banking.

* Intellectuell Kapitaal - De bank kan zichzelf opnieuw uitvinden
* Information World Review (IWR) - Christophe Langlois' Blogosphere
* EFMAG - Trends - Not embracing social media presents a new risk
* emarketer - Social Media 101 for Banks 

I am delighted to announce that my latest interview has been published on the homepage of emarketer on 11th June 2009.

Please find below an extract of the transcript produced by Karin von Abrams, Senior Analyst at eMarketer, after our 1-hour meeting in preparation to econsultancy's 'the Future of Digital Marketing 2009' event which is taking place on Wednesday 17th June in London. I am one of the 20 guest speakers.

I loved the transcript, Karin did a great job capturing my views and vision of social media in the financial services industry. Thanks again Karin! I hope you will like it as much as I did. As usual, your comments are more than welcome.

Please find below the first two questions.

eMarketer: Your aim is to put social media at the service of banks and other financial firms. Your blog, Visible-Banking.com, offers “a new world of opportunities for the banking industry.” How would you assess the financial industry, in terms of familiarity with social media?

Christophe Langlois: Most financial institutions don’t really know what to do. There’s more awareness than two years ago, but we’re still very much in the educational phase: explaining social media and helping firms understand where to start. For example, you don’t have a blog just for the sake of it. You need to plan your strategy, develop the content, and so on.
And be smart. Don’t spend too much money promoting it. If you do it right, people will spread the word. My emphasis is always on people more than technology. For example, you need to have a champion inside the organization. People are the key, from the advocates within the company to people outside the firm and online.

The important thing is how you, as a company, can engage with people and reward your customers for the time they spend with you. Understanding this is the key to acquiring new customers, retaining them and improving loyalty.

eMarketer: Is a blog the best first step for most banks before they branch out into other kinds of social media, such as pages on Facebook?

Mr. Langlois: Let’s step back. The very first step to social media should always be to listen and learn. In fact this advice is valid for any industry, not just financial services. You need to understand what’s being said about you online by your clients, your advocates and detractors, wherever they are. Then participate, engage and respond—whether on an industry blog or on Facebook, Twitter or wherever. Then become proactive. Launch your own blog or create your own online community.

As for Facebook, YouTube, Twitter—yes, generally you should be on those sites, because other people and companies are already doing it. And there will be many pages or groups about you that are unofficial. So if you want to take control of your brand, you have no choice. You should have one official page, group or channel on Facebook and YouTube. For me these would be essential requirements in social media.

(...)

Related Articles on Visible-Banking.com
* Visible Banking Twitter Watch
* Directory 2.0: Social Media in Banking
* People First! Global Survey on Social Networking

December issue of the Journal of Internet Banking and Commerce

If you missed it, I invite you to check the December issue of the JIBC.

The following research articles are focussed on Innovation (online/mobile):

* UAE   Exploring Factors Influencing the Adoption of Mobile Commerce
* Spain   An Analysis of Web Navigability in Spanish Internet Banking
* Greece A TAM Framework to Evaluate Users’ Perception towards Online Electronic Payments
* Thailand E-Payment Strategies of Bank Card Innovations
* Malaysia Internet Banking Adoption Among Young Intellectual

Journal of Internet Banking and Commerce, August 2007

A short post to inform you that the August issue of the Journal of Internet Banking and Commerce is now available online.

Reviewed Research Papers
* USA The Diffusion of Online Banking: Research Trends from 1998 to 2006 (By: Guosong Shao, The University of Alabama)
* South Korea Factors Influencing the Adoption Behavior of Mobile Banking: A South Korean perspective (By: Ki Soon Lee, Korea University, Hyung Seok Lee, Sahmyook University, and Sang Yong Kim,Korea University)
* Malaysia and USA The Influence of Trust on Internet Banking Acceptance (By: Khalil Md Nor, Universiti Teknologi Malaysia, and J Michael Pearson, Southern Illinois University @ Carbondale)
* Malaysia The Impact of E-Commerce Security, and National Environment on Consumer adoption of Internet Banking in Malaysia and Singapore (By: Yahya Dauda, A. Solucis Santhapparaj, David Asirvatham, Multimedia University Malaysia, and Murali Raman, Monash University Malaysia)
* Turkey Phishing Attacks and Perceptions of Service Quality: A Content Analysis of Internet Banking in Turkey (By: Murat Hakan Altıntaş and Necmi G¨¹rsakal, Uludag University)
* Nigeria M-Commerce Implementation in Nigeria: Trends and Issues (By: CHarles K. Ayo, Uyinomen O. Ekong, Fatudimu Ibukun Tolulope, and Adebiyi Ayodele A, Covenant University)

Opinion Articles
* India Online Frauds in Banks with Phishing (By: N. P. Singh, Management Development Institute)
* UAE A Preliminary Empirical Investigation of 'Brick-to-Click' Banking Presence in the United Arab Emirates (By: Bruce Budd, Zayed University, and Daniel Budd,  Edith Cowan University)
* Malaysia Correlation between Internet and ICT, Web Site Development, and Internet Marketing: Perception of Marketers in Malaysia and Singapore (By: Chai Lee Goi, Curtin University of Technology)
* India A Strategic Analysis of Search Engine Advertising in Web based-commerce (By: Ela Kumar, YMCA college of Engineering, and Shruti Kohli, Birla Institute of Technology)

Wells Fargo 2.0

My goal with this post was to list and comment the key online initiatives & features Wells Fargo launched in the last couple of years.
Please note my list is surely not exhaustive.

I started to keep track of Wells Fargo (WF) a few month ago, at the Online_Banking_Summit_2007 in Charlotte, North Carolina. I was one of the key speakers and my panel was on banking and web 2.0.

Among my fellow speakers and the attendees, there were a few people from Wells Fargo. I am glad I had the chance to meet Richard Weeks, Senior Vice President - Business Internet Services, and his colleagues David and Barry.

Best of breed: Innovation, customer experience and web 2.0
As far as I am concerned, WF is the most innovative bank online: they use many web 2.0 features and provide one of the best customer experience on the web.

They even have a VP, social media: Ed Terpening.
Check Ed's interview.
Ed, what a great job you have!

Wells Fargo online banking services won many awards in the last couple of years: Global Finance Magazine (2005), Global Finance Magazine (2006), NetBanker (2006).

Please find below a list of articles published in 2002, 2004 and 2005 demonstrating Wells Fargo's core strategy to integrate all channels and to provide the best possible online customer experience:
* Wells Fargo: All ATMs Now Web-Enabled, All Banking Stores with Online Stations (2005)
* Wells Fargo Re-Envisions Online Banking for Corporations As It Moves to Bank of the Future Today (2004)
* Wells Fargo Leads Customer Service as First To Market, Offering Real-Time Web Collaboration To Online Commercial Customers (2002)


New Homepage: 50% increase in online application
This is one of the most recent initiatives from Wells Fargo. And it will surely be one of the most successful.

WF recently launched a new homepage designed to better meet the expectations from both visitors and customers.

Video sharing and social networking sites (like YouTube, MySpace, Facebook or Linkedin) became extremely popular and Web 2.0 is all about giving the power to people: nowadays, you can easily generate your own content (articles, audio, video), share your ideas, publish your comments... Your expectations have changed too: you expect companies to listen to you; you want your bank to act as a trusted financial partner.

With this re-design, WF has dramatically improved its customer experience, which will surely translate in better customer acquisition, better customer retention, and more online sales. Well done!

From Paul Penrose, finextra: methodology and early results
The updated Wells Fargo website takes a highly customer focused approach to ease access to most wanted features. The results have been spectacular with a 50% increase in online applications.
(...)
The bank’s Internet Services Group used site stats, survey data and internal search information to pick up on customer requirements and shortcomings in navigation and fed this back into the re-development.

The key features and tools available on the homepage are:
* Direct access to all the key features of Internet Banking,
* ATMs & Stores locator,
* Rich text content (video),
* Open an Account for the key products (you land on the first page of the application process)
* Check today's rates.

WF listened to their clients and online visitors, and they showed they were listening: this is exactly what customers were looking for.

If you want to know more about this re-design, I invite you to check the excellent case study from Forrester Research, published on 23rd May 2007.

In addition to this case study, I found some useful insight in a couple of blogs: finextra, the EDM blog and the Bankwatch.


Wells Fargo 2.0
WF use an impressively long list of available web 2.0 features such as blogging, social networking (presence on MySpace and Second Life), Podcasts, RSS Feeds, Tagging and Video sharing.

I invite you to check out the excellent Wells Fargo posts on the brilliant NetBanker blog.

Please find below some stats on Wells Fargo:
* First U.S. bank with a blog (though Verity Credit Union beat them to it by more than a year)
* First bank with a student loan blog
* First bank with a business banking blog
* First bank in the world with a Second Life presence
* First bank on MySpace at <www.myspace.com/stagecoachisland>
* First bank with 2, 3, and 4 blogs
* First bank with an avatar persona on MySpace
* First bank with a VP Social Media

It is impressive. Indeed, even though research companies such as Gartner in August 2006 advised banks to use web 2.0 features to target the youth market or increase customer retention, most banks are still cautious and are not using web 2.0 technologies.

Blogging
Most banks still refrain from launching a blog for instance. They are concerned with the potential brand damage.

Wells Fargo is extremely involved in blogging with 4 blogs.
"The Student LoanDown" blog is extremely popular among students. They have just celebrated the first anniversary of their first blog, "Guided by history".
 
Personal Finance
In a previous post, I talked about the increasing importance of providing good Personal Finance tools.

Wesabe is one of the most famous communities built around Personal Finance. 

WF provide a comprehensive service to help manage your finance: the My Spending Report service.

With this service, based on tagging, WF customers can:
* Automatically tracks their accounts in one place
* Sorts card and Bill Pay purchases into familiar categories
* Updates information automatically, every business day
* Organizes spending view by month, up to three months
* Download a year or more of your spending history
 
Podcasts
Event though their offer is not as rich and comprehensive as a first direct and its first direct interactive service, WF provide podcasts. It is another web 2.0 box you can tick.


Social networking
Banks have four options with social networking: they can
* launch a new social network from scratch with a brand new platform
* launch a new social network using one of the leading platforms such as Xing
* develop their presence on the most popular social networks such as Facebook or MySpace
* develop their presence in virtual worlds such as Second Life

Wells Fargo has a presence on MySpace (an avatar and a page) and in Second Life.

Mobile Banking
Wells Fargo is also active in Mobile Banking. They recently launched a CEO Mobile Banking service for their business banking customers.
* Wells Fargo Launches CEO Mobile Banking Service - 18 May 2007
* Wells Fargo introduces mobile banking for business customers - 18 May 2007

Site Search
Providing a search feature (or not) is a commonly debated topic in the banking industry. Indeed, it is quite challenging: ideally, you would like to access the info after one of two clicks maximum. Providing a search engine is easy. Providing useful, optimized, results is extremely challenging.

Banks have two key goals: provide the best user experience and sell more online.
The key problem is the lack of patience from the visitors: the more clicks, the bigger the drop off rates... It is a major problem which has a significant impact on the top of the sales funnel.

Usually, media agencies advise banks to encourage their users to browse their website using the navigation bars.

WF provide an elaborated Search feature: you can enter a specific question or a phrase, and the results are categorized in 4 sections: Individuals, Small business, Commercial and about Wells Fargo.



Wells Fargo Online Tour
Wells Fargo offer a good interactive presentation (in flash) to introduce its comprehensive internet banking service.

Hands on banking
This training and resource center is available at handsonbanking.org.

Wells Fargo developed this entertaining and educational program for kids, teens and adults as a commercial-free public service. It can help you improve your knowledge of:
* Budgeting
* The importance of saving
* Bank accounts and services
* Borrowing money and maintaining good credit
* Buying a home
* Investing
* Starting and managing a small business

In the library, you will find some tips categorized by topic and available in pdf format. For instance, I invite you to check WF's high level shopping and spending tips.

My Savings Plans
WF provide another interesting tool to its internet banking users: My Savings Plan. It is a clever way to:
* increase customer satisfaction improving customer experience and customer support,
* urge your clients to register to Internet Banking, save money and apply for WF saving products online.

Resources: Wells Fargo and Web 2.0
Please find below some articles on WF approach to Web 2.0.
* Wells Fargo Taps Web 2.0
* Wells Fargo Experimenting with Web 2.0
* Why Wells Fargo bank is different
* Most Business Tech Pros Wary About Web 2.0 Tools In Business
* Adoption of Web 2.0 Is Taking Off, But Some Firms Are Still Reluctant

the online_banking_summit - update

A quick update following up the recent online_banking_summit_2007, organized by Royal Media Group in North Carolina in March. JJ Hornblass, Royal Media's CEO, invited me to speak about web 2.0.

Advisory Board
After this successful first conference, JJ and his team offered me to join the advisory board of this annual event. I am proud to be part of the board, and I very much look forward to helping Royal Media take the summit to the next level.

Keane - Online Services Survey: What Customers Want
Imran Sayeed, VP Global Financial Services, was one of the speakers. We met on the first day, got on very well, and kept in touch. After the event, Imran sent me an excellent study Keane released in 2006.

He kindly accepted to share that presentation with you too: Online Services Survey: What Customers Want.

1,816 banking customers in the US, UK, and Canada responded to a 69-question online survey during Dec ’05 and Jan ‘06.

Please find below the key findings.
* The majority of customers want to improve their financial planning and admit they need help
* Financial services firms are pinpointing online customer experience as a priority for boosting their organic revenue growth
* Customer retention and cross-selling opportunities dominate the justification for investing in online customer experience
* But when customers are asked for more details of their online experience, it’s clear that they are not satisfied... it is obvious that primary institutions are falling short in advisory and planning offerings

Aite - Automating Account Opening In-Branch and Online: A Case Study of Alliant Credit Union
Aite just released a new 21-page impact note: "Alliant Credit Union, on average, was able to drive 13% of new account applicants to its online system in the first six months after deployment, and examines the business case for automated account opening solutions, in-branch and online."

Link to Visible-Banking.com on Banknet360.com
Thanks Sara for the link to Visible Banking in your post on Banknet360, Banks Adding Products Online.

The Journal of Internet Banking and Commerce

The Journal of Internet Banking and Commerce

"The goal of this publication is to inform banking and electronic commerce academics, executives and professionals on principal developments, profit-oriented business architecture, benchmarked practices, compliance, risk and accountability, and future trends in the Internet-based business, management and marketing of governments and industry. This free online interactive journal is a way to provide critical perspectives, distribute results, share information, establish research and business contacts (networking), and keep in touch."

This website is a very good source of information. Excellent initiative from Array Development... and they started back in 1996!
I invite you to join their Yahoo! Group.

Opinion Articles & Peer Reviewed Research
Please find below a list of articles published in 2006.

December 2006
* Nigeria The Adoption of Internet Banking in Nigeria: An Empirical Investigation
* Malaysia Undergraduate Attitudes and Expectations for Mobile Banking
* India Impact of Demographics on the Consumption of Different Services Online in India
* UAE Diffusion of Internet Banking Amongst Educated Consumers in a High Income Country

August 2006
* Malaysia Classifying Users and Non-Users of Internet Banking in Northern Malaysia

April 2006
* India Data Protection in Consumer E-Banking
* USA A Security Concern in MS-Windows: Stealing User Information From Internet Browsers Using Faked Windows
* France Technological and organizational preconditions to Internet Banking implementation: Case of a Tunisian bank
* Nigeria Regulating Internet Banking In Nigeria : Some Success Prescriptions -- Part 2
* India Effective method of security measures in Virtual banking