Posted by Brent Dixon on December 19th, 2008
Great credit union awareness campaign from the fine folks at Boom Creative.
Check out the other two spots here and here.
(via the WhatTheB.com)
Posted by Brent Dixon on March 24th, 2008
I thought it’d be nice to start the week off with a rant inspired by three things:
If you want to reach Gen Y, why not be where they are? The more than 68 million Facebook users (many of them young people) spend an average of 20 minutes a day on the site. And about 250,000 new users sign on every day. Some CUs are already there, waiting to greet them.
Social networks…
Real estate. If you look at online communities as an opportunity to park your caboose and head people off at the pass, you’re missing the point. Go buy a TV spot, pop up or newspaper ad – stick to the proven, tried and true methods of interrupting and annoying people.
To brands who treat conversations like billboards: you’re not just old marketers, you’re also posers. (And I should note that I’m not talking about Lisa here at all.)
There are 140 Facebook apps added every day. This is Noise 2.0. The apps that are the most successful are those that help Facebook users do what they came to Facebook to do rather than react to the fact that they happen to be there. More on that in a second.
Communities. If you bust in on that without immersing, participating, understanding, you are a door to door salesman. If you show up, you and your toothy grin, you’d better be adding value to the community by helping them interact, grow, and have a deeper connection with each other (that’s why they’re all there in the first place). The Cluetrain Manifesto said communites are groups “of people who care about each other more than they should.” And each community/platform is unique, but also interwoven. Engaging the Facebook community looks different from engaging the Second Life community looks different from engaging the Twitter community.
Why is Facebook’s iLike so successful (361,568 daily active users, $15.8 million in funding…for a Facebook app)? Because people use Facebook to communicate themselves, learn about and connect with people. iLike enables that and, as a result, enhances Facebook for its users.
This is shown across the board in the numbers too. According to Adanomics data (made sense of by Asi Sharabi) the most widely used apps (44%) are “Identity Formation / Social Comparison.”
Why do I think Fiserve’s MyMoney will not succeed as it is right now? Because, frankly, who cares that you can access your account within Facebook? It is not that difficult or time consuming to open a new window or tab and get to my online banking login. Thank you for saving me three clicks, but until MyMoney brings more to the table I’d rather keep my applications clean.
What if you could use MyMoney to visualize your progress as you saved for a vacation, a new toy, or the secret to time travel. What if a few trusted friends and I could use Facebook’s social tools to build a cross-FI collective overdraft protection account that auto transfers cash in a time of need, notifies each person on the account, and in doing so: 1) saves me fees and 2) builds in the obligation to replace that money as soon as I can?
By the same token, Financially Fun Island™ (not a real thing, but almost a real thing) in Second Life will, at best, attract a lot of industry insiders who are interested in this “innovative new tactic.” But the citizens have better things to do than go to your island and play money games. They’re building an active economy. However, a financial institution that offers home, land, and small business loans in Second Life for Second Life is enriching the in-world experience…not just capitalizing on it.
I’d much rather be enabled than greeted.
Alright, that’s all I’ve got. You can yell at me now.
Posted by Charlie Trotter on February 25th, 2008
I just signed up for a service called WOWIO. Don’t panic, it’s not another blog/microblog/social network. WOWIO is an ebook seller (giver, actually). You sign up for an account and download the books free and legally.
Who pays for it? WOWIO’s model is for sponsors to pay for a run of an ebook that will be offered as a free download to WOWIO’s users. In return the sponsor gets to tastefully bookend each file with their logo and sponsorship message.
Types of sponsorships include:This weekend I downloaded Winsor McKay’s Dream of the Rarebit Fiend (I highly recommend it, but I’d point you toward his Little Nemo in Slumberland series first. Absolute magic. Not available on WOWIO.). The book was sponsored by Verizon Wireless. This is what I saw when I opened the file:
Page 1
The text reads: “Verizon Wireless is proud to sponsor this ebook for Charlie Trotter. Verizon Wireless proudly sponsors free books for free minds.”
Page 2
This is a video ad for their VCast feature that, classily enough, I can choose to play or not play. Well played! (I didn’t actually play it.)
Last page
The text reads: “Verizon Wireless is proud to have sponsored this ebook for you. If you would like to know more about our company, or our products and services, please visit us online at www.verizonwireless.com.”
This is so tastefully done it makes me glad I’m already a customer of theirs. I’m also glad to see them aligning themselves with he idea of people expanding their minds with books and sponsoring an effort to get me those books free.
This model is right up the credit union’s core value alley: promoting thrift. It would be bang-on for a credit union to look into a sponsorship and have their brand aligned with providing people with free books.
Just a thought.
Posted by Brent Dixon on January 25th, 2008
Last week Tim McAlpine from Currency Marketing launched a podcast devoted to highlighting and interviewing passionate and inspirational people from the credit union movement. His first guest is Gene Blishen, the tech-and-people-savvy General Manager of Mt. Lehman Credit Union.
One of my favorite parts is Gene discussing the future of credit union survival:
The question I would first and foremost ask any board or credit union manager is “Are you relevant to your members?” and, “Do you have passion to exist?”
Word on the street is there’s talk of an interview with the CU Skeptic. Sweet conflict!
Listen to it on the web here or subscribe to the podcast in iTunes here.
In late October of last year, the Garland Group launched this social knowledge hub for financial institutions. Now don’t get in a tizzy just because of the word “Bank.” Here are a few discussions happening in Banktastic:
The community is currently in “semi-private beta” What does that mean? “We have no idea,” says Brad Garland. But you will need an invite to join. I have a few, and I know several others do too. Post in the comments if you’d like to join, and I bet you’ll get hooked up.
Update: The Banktastic Invite Fairy hooked me up with quite a few more invites. If you want one, email me at brent [at] trabian [dot] com.
If you haven’t taken time to look at the best credit union social media campaign in existence (only rivaled by ChangeEverything), please go check out CommonWealth CU’s Young & Free campaign (orchestrated by the crazy Canucks at Currency Marketing).
After running a contest to find the most charismatic and expressive person under 25 in Alberta, Canada to take a year-long gig as the CUs spokesprson, they hit a goldmine with winner Larissa (see yesterday’s post).
She blogs, she makes videos, she digs up free stuff, and she positions CommonWealth as a youth-centric credit union. And the entire campaign ties to their Young & Free Checking Account.
It’s brilliant.
Says Gabriel Garcia in a comment on Netbanker (link added):
”...I created and iPhone icon for the Tech CU Blog. One of our members had coincidentally inquired about the same thing the day before. We tested it on his iPhone and enjoys it!”
What a cool way to engage tech-savvy members (of which I have a feeling Tech CU has many) while raising awareness of their blog.
Next stop? iBanking:
(Video of German bank Postbank’s iPhone account interface. Sorry, the video is in German…but the demo speaks for itself.)
I’ve always dug the content Gen-Y experts brass|MEDIA put out in their made-for-gen-yers magazine, brass. It’s relevant, on-point, and an entertaining read.
In early Feb, they’ll launch the brass|SHOW. brass CEO Bryan Sims described it nicely in an email:
We developed a 3-5 minute video podcast about young adults, money and real world stuff, that credit unions can license and place on their site to begin delivering updated content rather than many of the static sites that are out there.
I’m looking forward to seeing what they come up with. And I’m especially looking forward to seeing how it is received by young members.
Check out an example of how the brass|SHOW could play out on a credit union site here
Did I miss something? Post other instances of CU New Media Awesomeness you’ve found in the comments.
Posted by Brent Dixon on January 24th, 2008
This is a straight-up re-post from Currency Tim’s blog, but I don’t care because this video needs to be posted as many places in Credit Uniondom as possible.
Please watch 19-year old Larissa, spokesperson for Commonwealth CU’s Young & Free campaign, explain the difference between credit unions and banks.
To quote Charlie from an earlier tweet:
“Larissa’s vid is just what I have in mind when I picture a national CU vs Bank differentiation campaign.”
Question for Tim:
Would you ever consider re-editing, and re-releasing a less-Y&F-branded version for CUs to put on their own homepages, “about us” pages, and blogs?
Question for CUs:
Is this something you’d like to put in front of your members?
Posted by DB Williams on January 16th, 2008
Ron Shevlin said something to Matt and I at dinner a few months ago that resonated with me. Credit union websites should be operational. Sites should be a resource for staff to solve problems, not just a marketing tool.
Coast Capital Savings Credit Union does a great job of communicating its voice. It’s aggressively casual. It communicates the personality of the credit union and is an extension, perhaps even the center piece, of the marketing campaign. Creatively, it’s good work.
I hope more credit unions don’t do this. I hope they realize Coast Capital is a rare breed, willing to cop an attitude in a very conservative, very attitude-less industry. There’s only room for one smart-ass in the class.
Instead, when creating content for a site, credit unions should focus less on what the Coast Capitals of the world are doing and more on what their MSR’s are doing. Don’t worrying about fluffy, fun, catchy content – go the other way. Become operational. Become informational. Creative writing is expensive and difficult to maintain (insert picture of frazzled brand manager wringing her or his hands and asking “is it ON BRAND???!!!” with every update).
This idea of sites being operational is something that as a web development firm, I’m going to discuss with our clients. It’s something any of you in credit unions out there reworking websites and creating copy might consider. Leverage what you do well when developing content.
Don’t be flashy. Inform. Solve problems. That’s what CU’s are good at. And consider the first audience to be your front-line staff. Put information on the site that they can use to solve member problems when they call or come into a branch. Consider what information CAN go on the site. I’m sure most operational CU documents might find a home on the website for your staff and membership to use. PDF’s of forms; outlines of procedures; how to find your routing number.
At that point, it really DOES become a resource. It informs. And information drives traffic.
Posted by Tim McAlpine on January 7th, 2008
By this stuff, I mean this new stuff. Web 2.0. User-generated content. Social media. Whatever you want to call it.
All this stuff you live and breathe. All this stuff that continues to come in waves. All this stuff that you know is perfect for your credit union. All this stuff that you can’t explain to anyone who is not involved. All this stuff your members are doing online. All this stuff that you know is passing your credit union by.
How about the brand and name experts? No, they’re too busy helping credit unions merge to waste their time on this stuff. They’re telling credit unions, “Skip this stuff. It will pass.”
How about the ad agency? Not likely. They make their money in 30 second increments. If they can’t monetize it, forget it. They, too, are telling credit unions, “Skip this stuff. It will pass.”
How about the PR consultants? Nope. User-generated content with no editorial review is too scary for them. “We need to control this stuff.”
How about the IT department? Yeah right. They’re too busy with bank system security and making sure your in-box isn’t filled with spam. Just try to convince the techies that embedded code from a third-party website is a good thing to do. “Nope, that stuff is not touching my stuff. My job is to block stuff, not touch stuff.”
How about the young person in the organization with a knack for computers? Maybe, but this person will never have the influence or the resources to really implement this stuff. “OK old dudes, this stuff is so cool. Trust me, we really need this stuff.”
How about your marketing and communications department? They would be the natural fit, but with a steady flow of branch requests and with the production of your ingrained annual sales promotions, time and resources are spread too thin. “We’d love to help, but we just don’t have time to do this stuff.”
How about the digital agency or the web consultancy? Possibly. They are definitely capable of doing whatever your credit union wants to do. But they can’t go it alone. “OK, before we do anything, we want to make sure you guys understand this stuff and are comfortable with us doing all of this stuff.”
How about hiring an expert on staff? Good idea. But you better be prepared to listen and give him or her the freedom to experiment or he or she will get frustrated and leave. “I have been telling you about this stuff for months now, but you all still don’t get this stuff. I’m packing my stuff and leaving.”
So, who’s left? Your senior management and, especially, your CEO. Until credit union CEOs and the senior executive team are actually involved in this stuff, it’s not going as far as I know it can go to propel the credit union movement forward.
CEOs and the senior executive team need to feel the anxiety of not being able to see what their Twitter crew is up to while on a flight. CEOs and the senior executive team need to feel the exhilaration of receiving a slew of comments on a controversial blog post that they just posted. CEOs and the senior executive team need to understand the power of this new form of community firsthand. It cannot be explained. It must be experienced.
And CEOs and the senior executive team need to be seen participating in social networks like Facebook and LinkedIn by staff and members. CEOs and the senior executive team need to give permission to experiment and innovate.
As it stands, credit union CEOs and the senior executive team are out of the loop. They see all of this stuff as a waste of time and energy. But guess what, this stuff is real, this stuff is happening right under their nose and this stuff is not going away any time soon, if ever.
Signing off on a message from the president that you didn’t write for your credit union’s quarterly newsletter is not a two-way conversation. Not even close.
Two questions for you:
1. Who owns this stuff at your credit union?
2. What can we all do to prove this stuff is worth doing?
Tim McAlpine is the President & Chief Strategist of Currency Marketing. You can read Tim’s ‘stuff’ on the Currency Marketing blog at www.currencymarketing.ca/blog.
Posted by DB Williams on December 29th, 2007
One of the saving graces of the leftover-filled dead week between Christmas and New Year’s Day are the year-end wrap-ups. No wrap-up story ever won a Pulitzer, but they’re interesting to read. So, to the pot-luck of lists and reprisals, I’m going to add my own.
This being a blog, and therefore collaborative, I’m eager to hear everyone else’s contributions to and opinions on the OpenSourceCU.com Top Credit Union Stories of 2007 (Now With Resolutions!). During this week of warmed-over dressing, think of this list as a sizzling sirloin steak, hot from the fire, ready for you to tuck into (for you vegetarians, think of it as whatever it is you tuck into that’s really satisfying…salad maybe? potatoes? tofu?)
My seven top credit union stories of 2007…bon appetit!
It has its flaws. It’s wildly expensive. It’s great-grandfather was the Newton. But this zeitgeist-expanding gadget moves the bar for mobile computing and, ultimately, mobile banking services. It also allows for easy use of social media and opens the number of communication channels. Think about the annoyed member posting to a blog while in line to wait on a member service representative to fix a mistake another MSR made. If someone using a iPhone actually stands in lines waiting for MSR’s.
Resolution: It’s an antiquated attitude that technology and social media are just toys. I would love credit union staffers to open their minds to new technology and look at it from a perspective of early adopters and ask some simple questions: How is this used? How does this impact me? How could this impact my credit union?
Sub-Resolution: Personally, I need to avoid being a curmudgeon myself and open my own mind and ask similar questions. Keeping up with technology is hard, but invaluable.
Said Ms. Hyland in January: “The main themes of my remarks were to urge credit unions to continue to be consumer-centric in product and service delivery and to provide insight into the regulatory perspective on current issues, such as BSA and membership growth.”
Okay, this isn’t earth-shattering, and there are discussions like this all the time, but it’s validation from the top that CU’s need to approach their products and pricing the same way other companies do – with a focus on what the market demands.
Resolution: Credit Unions need to leverage that tax-exempt status to continue (or in some CU’s cases start to) offer cost-competitive pricing, provide dividends and serve immigrants and under-served communities. I’d also like to see credit unions trim their product offerings to better serve their membership and community. If you cannot profitably provide dozens of products and services, then take a good, hard look at your product mix and eliminate those that are underperforming or aren’t profitable. Don’t keep up with the Jones’s. Keep up with your field of membership.
On the surface, this is an oxymoronic request, but really, it’s about finding a niche and drilling down and serving it. Some CU’s can profitably operate wide. Most cannot and need to focus on their core membership, find what that it needs and really serving it in ways banks and other CU’s can’t.
The breach of security is the largest in history and reflects the importance of CU ID theft prevention policies. Given that credit unions have a 3.8 percent market share in revolving credit, the breach affected over 1.7 million credit union members. And that’s just credit cards. Debit cards, with fewer consumer protections, were likely part of that mix and even a small percentage would be thousands if not millions of debit card numbers.
Resolution: Credit Unions should treat debit card fraud the same way they treat credit card fraud. See top story No. 4 for support of this resolution. Members need to know all their transactions are secure, credit or debit. From my experience in credit union operations, I know this is expensive, but a credit union should act in the best interest of its members.
At latest count, 141 members of the House of Representatives are signed on as co-sponsors of H.R. 1537. By raising the percentage of assets from 12-ish to 20 percent, this will allow CU’s to better serve under-served areas and small businesses, which in turn creates wealth in a community.
Resolution: Credit Unions need to mobilize staff and, in turn, membership to ensure members of Congress support H.R. 1537 and understand the difference and mission of credit unions. An adage of advertising says that when the marketing director of a company is tired of hearing his/her advertising message, it’s at that point that its impacting the consumer. Talk about it until you’re sick of it.
Resolution: Stop doing this.
Peer-to-peer lending could be a threat to credit unions, given credit unions’ philosophical mission. Instead, Zopa is partnering with credit unions, each improving each other’s credibility and reach. I’m excited about this partnership.
Resolution: Like the No. 7 resolution, credit union staff needs to be more plugged into technology and how it affects their products, services as well as how members use it. It’s a competitive advantage to embrace it and folly to ignore it.
Although credit unions didn’t seriously contribute to the questionable practices that puts the country on the precipice of recession, every credit union every member will be affected. As much as credit unions need to compete, they also must council and advice as part of their financial services product mix.
Resolution: With a tax-exempt status, strong capitalization (in general) and sound, conservative policies and procedures, credit unions are primed to be part of the solution, right?
There you have it, my year-end list complete with a side of resolutions, served hot and fresh. Enjoy!
Posted by DB Williams on December 17th, 2007
Discussion of branding – major, national brands in particular – is akin to a lively discussion of battle. The players are intriguing. Heroes and states engaged in a struggle for life and death tear at each other for wealth and power. Indeed, Sun Tzu is often referenced in marketing classes. Which is silly or inspiring depending on your viewpoint.
CUNA just released a white paper that takes a measured look at a nationwide credit union brand. Currently, major brands are struggling with how to engage customers more deeply and relevantly; it’s a little baffling that a national credit union branding campaign is something discussed.
A national branding campaign is expensive. It’s terribly wide. It requires an existing infrastructure. And technology is coming into existence design to create communities and thwart mass marketing.
For CU’s to engage in a national branding campaign is akin to storming onto the battlefield, weapons drawn. Without sufficient resources (if you’re in battle, that would be other people, and in business, that would be capital), the campaign is doomed to fail. And failure in the case of a national campaign is in terms of wasted dollars and wasted impressions. And in a movement with limited resources, failure is harder to absorb.
Not only is it expensive on the national media side, any branding campaign must be activated at a local level. Unless credit unions spend money in addition to the campaign (a rule of thumb is that activation is three times as costly as the sponsorship), there is no direct tie to the actual credit union, and the message is lost.
In any great story of underdog triumph, strategy and cleverness trumps sheer strength. Leonidas knew not to fight the Persians on their terms and met the invading force at Thermopylea. Paris would’ve failed fighting the immortal Achilles head on.
It’s time credit unions stopped envying the mighty and, instead, become crafty and wise.
The solution lies apart from the Siren’s song of a national campaign. Credit unions should invest in creating real competitive advantages:That’s the credit union’s battle ground: local not national. Getting sucked into a national campaign is costly, difficult and ultimately, nearly impossible to win.
Posted by Trey Reeme on September 19th, 2007
Sometimes I believe we work in the most uncooperative cooperative industry in existence.
This may seem unrelated to Bellco, but hear me out: While Wings went about it all wrong, Continental FCU had become complacent.
Maybe I was so upset about Wings because it seemed the most uncooperative action possible between cooperative credit unions. At the time I thought it would trigger a rash of similar attempts throughout the industry.
Hey, I’m an idealist and a “worse-case scenario” kind of guy.
That said, I voted “Great Job, Bellco” on Tim’s poll.
85% of respondents agree as I type this.
Competition = good for consumers. Right?
Posted by Trey Reeme on September 4th, 2007
I heart NY. Hat tip to Chuck and Ron.
Other than the solid website and TV spots, here are a few points that are brilliantly executed but might not be so obvious at first glance.
Overall, this campaign and the corresponding website explains eloquently that we are cooperatives, not banks. Every league should take a long look at this site, consider it the benchmark, and get campaigns like this launched in their state.
Posted by Brent Dixon on May 1st, 2007
Credit unions have the benefit of being a part of a close-knit powerful network, the credit union industry as a whole, while being tightly woven into the communities they serve at the same time. This opens up huge opportunities for competing with banks and other financial institutions at every single level.
Why do people choose large banks like Wells Fargo, Chase, and B of A? I’d argue that a large part of that is accessibility. They want access to the same services, branches, and ATMs across the country. When I moved to from Houston to College Station for school, I moved my money from Energy Capital Credit Union to Wells Fargo. I knew that college would be a mobile time – I’d be visiting family at home, friends at other schools, going on trips in the summer, etc. I knew I’d be able to access Wells Fargo pretty much anywhere I went.
I had absolutely no clue about the Shared Service Centers, the Co-op Network, and the depth of service they offered. Credit unions, although appearing more disjointed and less accessible, are actually kicking banks’ collective tail when it comes to POS access. Chase markets the heck out of the 8,500 ATMs nationwide. The credit union co-op network has 25,000.
Yesterday, I needed to grab a cashier’s check from my FORUM account. I was at a Starbucks. I literally looked out the window, saw a GHCU branch, and they were on the network. My credit union (and office), is in Indianapolis, I live in Dallas, I’m in Seattle right now. I couldn’t do this if it weren’t for the network credit unions have created.
Credit unions can compete on geographic convenience. They can compete big where big matters. Right now, communication of this is effectively nil. You folks should be shouting it from the rooftops.
This message is where large-scale cooperative advertising can really make a difference.
Credit unions have the benefit of deeply understanding, at the executive level, the community they are serving. This could mean the SEG or local area. Either way, because individual credit unions are relatively small, this gives them agility to react quickly to the needs of their community.
The Lower East Side People’s FCU (disclosure: they’re a client of ours) has several products that no big bank could have, or would have, pulled off. This includes low-income, cooperative housing loans and a matched education savings account (LES matches savings dollar-for-dollar). LES People’s FCU was created when all of the banks gave up and left the Lower East Side of New York. They are the community, and you can tell.
Vancity’s ChangeEverything is, as always, a great example. Let’s change our community, our city. It’s ours, not theirs. Not one single big bank can ever say “We are Vancouver! Let’s fix it, because it belongs to all of us!”
FORUM’s CGM campaign is an example. Yes, a large bank can say “upload a video of your story and why you love us to YouTube, and we’ll make an ad out of it!” But there is something completely different about FORUM’s campaign – a mass of members lined up at their actual headquarters, some are passionate about FORUM, some just want to be on TV, but all of them are spending the day together, with FORUM, because FORUM brought them together to be a part of the message.
Seth Godin spells it out like this (from “Small is the New Big“):
Small means the founder makes a far greater percentage of the customer interactions. Small means the founder is close to the decisions that matter and can make them, quickly.
Small is the new big because small gives you the flexibility to change the business model when your competition changes theirs.
Small means you can tell the truth on your blog.
Small means that you can answer email from your customers.
Through a combination of their cooperative network and individual agility, credit unions can both compete huge and compete small in a way that no other financial institution can. It’s just a matter of rallying together and understanding what about huge and small will make them outstanding.
(Tip-of-the-hat to Ross Graham from Eli Lilly FCU for the good conversation about this topic over the past couple of days.)
Posted by Charlie Trotter on December 19th, 2006
A funny thing occurred to me in a meeting yesterday. We were talking about how to communicate best to Gen Y, what they/we respond to, turn-ons, turn-offs. A few beats into the chat, several things hit me like several tons of bricks, respectively.
Communication is communication. The base principles of polite, sincere communication, mass or one-on-one, are universal, not generational or demographic.
We say Gen Y appreciates Transparency™. Well, who doesn’t? Who would rather receive salesy, insincere communications on any topic over honest, take-it-or-leave-it communication? No one, that’s who. Even the people writing and distributing the salesy messages don’t like to go home and get bombarded with flashy, circus-style junk over dinner.
What is the best kind of advertising? Most people will respond with the obligatory, “Word-of-mouth.” We abide WOM as a sort of communicative Holy Grail. It’s as good as gold and as traceable as Unicorn tracks. A few businesses claim to rely solely on WOM to get their business. (PS: That’s a would-be-high-road claim for, “I’m immobilized with the fear of communicating.”)
It hit me that the WOM Unicorn is real, rideable and has a head full of hen’s teeth. When word-of-mouth happens, two people are talking, two friends, two family members, two strangers in the same isle at the grocery store. Just two people talking. If WOM is truly the best kind of advertising, if we really believe that to be true, then why do we burn the formula and dance on the ashes when it’s time to communicate to a broader audience? The reason is, the first steps of Homemade WOM will not give an immediate ROI. And now we have arrived at our drug of choice: Near-instant ROI.
The WOM formula is scalable. The numbers go up, but the principle stays the same. Two people at a grocery store don’t use language like “Act Now!”, “Unbelievable Value!!”, or “SALE, SALE, SALE!!!”. They converse. Your company is people. Your audience is people. Start acting like it. Start talking like two people talking, not like one person selling.
This will all come together here in a second, so hang in there.
Credit Unions are different from Banks in the most profound way. Credit Unions are Not-for-profit and Banks are For-profit. I’m going to give you three empty lines to think about that.
Credit Unions and Banks are as conceptually removed from each other as East is from West. That you both deal in finance is, frankly, immaterial. So why do Credit Unions look, act and communicate like Banks? Why do you continue to send out flash-bang mailers carrying Important Account Information! to share the legitimately good news of your rates and other products? You are literally 85 million people in line at the grocery store. You are a community of commonality, a sort of Financially Conscious Anonymous. You are a support group. And support groups don’t sell each other things. They offer each other good advice, real, honest solutions to their problems, and when their words leave their lips, they don’t appear in a bright red starburst.
Organizations like to run weekend or seasonal specials with bright colors and they slash numbers to get the quick sale. That concept couldn’t be more removed from the Credit Union core values. Becoming financially healthy will not give instant gratification. Saving takes time. Getting out of debt takes time. These are the things you teach, delaying today’s gratification for tomorrow’s stability. Yet, when it’s time to spend a little money and effort to reach people with that news, you want instant gratification. ROI! ROI! ROI! It’s time to drink your own kool-aid.
You are not a Bank. You are a brand new idea. You are the printing press, cotton gin and the wheel.
So quit acting like the never-good-enough-for-Mom step-child of the financial world and be who you are. Roll around in who you are. Gen Y, and the whole world, is screaming out for something different, something sincere, something helpful. Give it to us. Give it to yourself.
Posted by Trey Reeme on December 7th, 2006
We were all over the road with this episode (that rhymed, and I’m leaving it in here). But doggone it, it’s my favorite thusfar.
We know we’d promised to publish this one for a while, but we kept getting distracted. Anyway, here it is, and Brent is already apologizing for the “janky” editing. We had to cut big chunks out of the conversation because we tended to go off on tangents about everything from Oprah to Second Life.
The plan going forward is to record shorter episodes and to release them more frequently. (I really thought it’d only been a month since our last one.)
In this issue we cover:
You can subscribe in iTunes here, download the podcast here, and leave an audio comment or a listener question by calling (206) 350-OSCU (6728).
Posted by Brent Dixon on October 30th, 2006
I had an interesting conversation with Jim Bruene (who’s blog you should definitely be reading) last week about Second Life, a “3-D virtual world entirely built and owned by its residents.” Second Life was opened to the public in 2003, so it’s not exactly new. However, its business implications have made for some explosive hype/conversation recently.
And for all of you who are thinking “what a bunch of nerds”...touche. I thought the same thing. But I’ve gathered some stats that show the degree to which Second Life has broken out of the “dork-in-his-mom’s-basement” demographic:
(some numbers will have changed after the posting of this article)
BusinessWeek writer Bruce Nussbaum made one great point on his blog about using Second Life as a reflection of consumer intentionality:
The more I see in Second Life, the more I realize that one of the most important business opportunities there is mining intentionality. This is a phrase my brilliant colleague Frank Comes came up with to describe what’s going in in that space.
People in SL are expressing what they would LIKE to do in reality. For example, it’s easy to pimp your car in second life and clearly lots of people want to customize their transport there. All the major auto companies are piling into SL to learn about this—and build their big after-market customizing business in the real world.
I’m not saying to run out and start a Second Life credit union, but then again maybe someone should. Either way, this is another interaction tool that everyone should be keeping an eye on.
ps: The picture above is Matt’s Second Life avatar, “Trabian Pro.” It looks way too much like the thing.
