Make Sure The Pluses Exceed The Pain

Drew McLellan Written by Drew McLellan
on June 20th, 2008 / 7 Comments / Print this

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I can remember being a little kid and going with my mom as she changed from one bank to another. There was a display table in the lobby covered with stadium blankets, an AM/FM radio/alarm clock, an umbrella, a camping flashlight and a bunch of other cool stuff.

Free gifts or incentives for changing banks.

Back in the early 70’s, banking was pretty simple. Conveniences like payroll direct deposits, ACH auto payments, recurring payments and online banking hadn’t even been conceived.

So, it was pretty easy to lure a customer to your bank. Offer to deposit $5 to a new account or toss in a free stadium blanket. But times have changed.

The pain of changing bank accounts is significantly higher today. You have to call the phone company, the utilities, switch your direct deposit, re-create your entire online bill pay set-up, and cancel all your auto payments. Ugh. We often stay with a bank we don’t even like, rather than go through the hassle of making a change.

Today, I received a postcard offering me a personal coffee maker if I’d change banks. Are you kidding me? Go through all that pain for a $10 coffee maker? No thanks.

The moral of this story? Make sure the incentive you are offering is commiserate with the pain of becoming your customer. Otherwise, the message you are sending is that you’re out of touch and don’t understand where your potential customer is coming from.

About Drew McLellan

Drew McLellan

Drew McLellan gets branding and marketing and he desperately wants you to get it too.

So he tells stories, asks questions, and milks sacred cows. All to help clients discover their brand so they can create authentic love affairs with their customers.

Drew has not only survived 20 years in the advertising and marketing arena, he’s thrived in it. After working for several other agencies, including Young and Rubicam’s CMF&Z, Drew created McLellan Marketing Group in 1995.

Considered a national branding expert, Drew is a highly sought after speaker and has given about a zillion presentations at national conferences, key note addresses, training for his peers in the profession, college students and even his daughter’s eighth grade class.

Over the years, Drew has lent his expertise to clients like Nabisco, IAMS pet foods, Kraft Foods, Meredith Publishing, John Deere, Iowa Health System, Make-A-Wish, University of Central Florida, SkiDoo and a wide array of others.

When he’s not out preaching the good word of marketing & branding at work and on his blog Drew’s Marketing Minute, Drew spends time with his family and pondering why the Dodgers can’t seem to get back to the World Series.

Drew has a Master’s Degree from the University of Minnesota but alas, he cannot remember their fight song.

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7 Comments to “Make Sure The Pluses Exceed The Pain”

  • Vera Raposo
    June 20th, 2008
    11:14 pm

    Excellent post Drew! You’re right it’s far too painful to leave a bank, and in creating or choosing our products, we need to think of ways we can keep our customers not only happy but realize that it is so much easier just to stick with you because of the direct link to having something that they absolutely need.

  • Drew McLellan
    June 21st, 2008
    5:30 am

    Vera,

    And we also need to remember, as we try to entice customers away from their current vendors, just how sticky those relationships are. No wonder we have to work so hard to earn a new client.

    Persistence is a key. We need to be there, ready to welcome them, when they get THAT mad that they’re ready to leave. And we need to constantly remind them that we’re patiently waiting.

    Drew

  • Ed Roach
    June 21st, 2008
    9:55 am

    If the banks were a little bit smarter, they would also take care of all the hassles associated with changing banks. I’m sure they could develop a system where it could be automated.

  • Vera Raposo
    June 26th, 2008
    2:15 am

    Yeah no kidding Ed, it’s really a no-brainer.

  • Drew McLellan
    June 26th, 2008
    4:55 am

    Ed & Vera,

    We’ve worked with several regional banks to put together a “switch kit” as they’re call in the bank biz. They really aren’t that complicated. The customer does have to do a little bit of work in terms of providing some raw data — but the bank can do the rest.

    But as we all know, most banks and bank marketers are not on the cutting edge. Which is good news for the few that are!

    Drew

  • Vera Raposo
    June 27th, 2008
    2:24 am

    Drew that is a great solution and so wonderful that you could provide this help. And yes, it is all good news for us, but at the same time I’ve often felt that I’m so busy running my own business and growing it that who has the time for it all. It’s great if they let you run with it and just do what needs to be done instead of explaining it all to them.

  • Drew McLellan
    June 27th, 2008
    1:45 pm

    Vera,

    Some customers are willing to share all their personal financial information and others are not. If a customer is willing to share it — the bank can do most of the work.

    Drew

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