Tag Archives: banking

As boring as banks and soap.

I was recently meeting with my friend Bryan who handles marketing at Lush Cosmetics, and we were talking about ways our companies could harness social media. We were thinking up some really good ideas to further our brands, both of which are well immersed in corporate social responsibility.

At some point Bryan pointed out the elephant in the room: Most companies point to banks and soap as THE two boring verticals that couldn’t possibly engage community around their brands. It just goes to show that engaging community has more to do with your positioning and activism, having something real to say, than the industry you’re in.

Black Hole Blog.

An article in the newest (September 2007) edition of Enterprise Magazine features an interview with me. Black Hole Blog covers social media and how credit unions can embrace it. I talk about how CUs can respond to bloggers, and the writer, Laureen Griffin, also writes about ChangeEverything.ca.

She also interviewed Gene Blishen and Trey Reeme.

I’ve seen a few articles like this, but I thought this particular one was insightful. It must be hard to write an article that is at once basic and also helpful, knowing that your readers will range from those who don’t know social media at all, to those who are eager to try it out.

I like this quote a lot:

If a member of your credit union was standing in the middle of a town square in front of a rapt crowd, praising or criticizing your service or products, would you go outside and listen? If you could go to free credit union conferences to learn about the biggest innovations in credit union marketing, would you go? If your credit union could be the Roman Forum of the community, where people shared their concerns, and spoke from their hearts, would you do it? If you answered “yes,” then you are ready to dive into the blogosphere.

A nice way of framing the issue, I think.

Two great people from the conference in Spokane.

I met some great people at this past week’s Washington Credit Union League’s Annual Conference, and one of them was Matt Vance from Industrial Credit Union in Bellingham, Washington. He had a very neat idea.

Over a beer, Matt was telling a group of us about Industrial CU’s new Seahawks Super Saver Account, in which the weekly annual percentage rate of the savings account is based on the total yardage gained by the Seattle Seahawks in that week’s game.

For example: if the Seahawks gain 300 total net offensive yards in their next game you would earn 3.00% APY. The rate will then reset to the new total net offensive yards the first business day following the next game.

Now, personally, I couldn’t care less about football, but Matt was so into this product and the Seahawks, that his enthusiasm was infectious. Here’s a way to show that his CU is a part of their community and can offer a product to authentically capture local spirit. I thought it was great.

The other great person I met this week was Morriss Partee of EverythingCU. Moriss is great, I’ve followed his blog for some time and it was great to finally meet him. He wrote up a very funny anecdote that Matt shared – the downside of CUs trying to shorten their names down to just the acronym. A dangerous tactic, especially if your name is Industrial Credit Union.