As Sam Cooke sang many years ago, "It's been a long, a long time coming, but I know a change is gonna come, oh yes it will." Our rapidly changing financial system triggers the same reaction from us. Banking is in the midst of a Sam Cooke moment, with technology and competition driving the train. This decade, without question, is the high-water mark for disruption in the … [Read more...]
Community banks – Technology, reliability and a cautionary tale
Back in 1994, in the days when telephone banking was new and transactions were still hand-to-hand over the counter, a friend opened a new account in a North Carolina community bank. He made a $1,500 deposit in cash to open the account. Two days later, he wrote two checks to his new landlord totaling $900 to cover his deposit and first month’s rent. Two days after that, he … [Read more...]
What Banks and Businesses Can Learn from New York’s Yellow Cabs
Searching for an object lesson on why banks and businesses need to adapt and change? Consider New York City’s iconic yellow taxis and the pricey medallions cab owners must have to join a crowded, competitive public transportation market. In short, cowards who fear competition need not apply. For non-New Yorkers, here’s a primer on how the city’s taxi medallions work. … [Read more...]
Informed Delivery. The most valuable tool from the Postal Service since the Pony Express.
Every morning, my friend Sid Haas, a veteran marketing executive in Peru, Ill., checks his e-mail, and gets a notification from the U.S. Postal Service, telling him – in some cases showing him -- what will be in his mailbox that day. This relatively new and little-advertised development in the drive to deliver information faster and more accurately, is called Informed … [Read more...]
Confessions of an Advertising Man
First, a confession: This is not an original headline, but the title of a book written in 1963 by one of the most famous ad men of all time – David Ogilvy. My advertising career began at J. Walter Thompson, at that time the largest agency in the world. In those days, I loved the Ogilvy book, considered to be the Bible for the advertising profession. As a newly-minted … [Read more...]