The Social, Connected and Human Post-Crisis Changes In The Financial Industry

Recently, I had the pleasure to talk with marketing executives at some financial institutions and banks in mainland Europe. You might not immediately think “pleasure” when thinking about banks but to me, it really was a pleasure. The reason: during these conversations, I was surprised to see how far many of them stood regarding social CRM, cross-channel marketing, customer-centric business processes, mobile and increasingly content marketing and social media.

In fact, when comparing the companies I talked with (of course I didn’t talk with all banks), with businesses from other verticals, it occurred to me that the financial industry was probably among the most innovating ones right now, if not the most innovating one.

If my observations are more than that and indicate a trend, clearly  there must be a reason for it. And of course there is a very good reason why many corporations can learn a lot from the banks and financial institutions I had the pleasure to connect with.

I do not have to say that these companies have been hit very hard during the financial crisis. As were their customers. It has been a true blood bath here and there and trust in the industry sunk deeper and faster than the Titanic.

So how did many businesses in the industry react from a marketing perspective? Among those I talked with four key trends emerge:

1. An almost obsessive desire to be as transparent, “human” and participative as possible

A big turn-around that still might not always show but that is clearly going on in this industry that traditionally has an image problem. It is clear (look at advertising campaigns, for instance) that many banks are working on that. It shows even more when looking at the underlying changes, regarding both processes and organization.

2. An almost equally obsessive desire to provide a consistent and integrated customer experience

And this across all channels: email, social, mobile, website, call centre and certainly the bank centres, local branches and bank managers. This leads to a remarkable change, in fact: when online banking became mainstream, financial institutions reduced head count and closed smaller branches. Now many banks are opening them again to restore the personal contact with their customers.

3. A clear move towards data centralization, cross-channel marketing and getting a single view on the customer.

The need for consistency across all channels obviously plays a role in this. But the local bank managers as well: they are becoming more important in feeding data warehouses and CRM systems. The same is done using online channels and social media, getting banks more in the social CRM space with a clear focus on the customer who is key in defining the how, when, where and what of all interactions. The opposite goes as well: all data are provided to everyone that is in touch with the customer, anywhere and anytime.

4. The adoption of social media and social CRM processes and strategies

These include sometimes very far reaching cultural changes and profound change management. Customer centricity is key and social is used both for campaigns (to strengthen the human dimension and transparency message, while regaining trust) and business processes.

These observations are obviously personal and based on some meetings with a few banks. On top of that, I only talked to businesses in the European financial industry. I guess there are also several surveys and reports that look at these changes.

However, I’m quite impressed and convinced about how the execs I talked with are really getting it. It’s probably again a proof that sometimes a crisis is necessary to change things for the better. And I’m sure it’s more than a personal observation. Banks have no choice than to regain trust, put customer first, involve their ecosystem and get very close and personal in customer relationships.

So, if you want to see how corporations are changing their culture to be customer-centric, consistent across all channels, more participative, intensively use data and turn them into action, and embrace the social changes, my suggestion to you would be to take a close look at what the top banks that “get it” are doing out there. With top banks I don’t mean the biggest ones. I mean those that have learned from a crisis and reach out to their customers in really every possible way.

You’ll learn a lot.