One Downside to Online Statements
Banks and credit unions would love nothing more than to persuade, or perhaps force, all checking customers to accept online statements.
I suspect that the day is not far off when the paper statement sent through the mail goes the way of paper checks returned in your monthly statements.
While banks and credit unions will definitely save money by eliminating the cost of paper statements, they’ll be surrendering a valuable marketing opportunity in the process.
Since I have two checking accounts at my local credit union I have the luxury of comparing online statements to the traditional paper statements. For about two years my primary checking account has online statements while my secondary account still provides the old-fashion paper statement that arrives each month via the U.S. Postal Service.
The only reason I retain my paper statement is that it provides me with both a hardcopy of the credit union’s informative newsletter and a statement insert from the marketing department.
Sure, I can go online to read the newsletter but I don’t and probably never will. As for the sales opportunity – it’s lost forever.
Upon landing on the typical bank or credit union website homepage, the consumer is bombarded with an array of messages which makes it almost impossible to determine what message replaces the statement insert message – if any.
This point was driven home to me a couple of days ago after opening my paper statement and discovering both a newsletter and an insert advising me that I can now use my credit union debit card, surcharge-free, to make a deposit or get cash at more than 2,200 7-Eleven stores nationwide.
This is great news as a 7-Eleven store is located a few blocks away.
Reading the insert carefully, I discover a reference to something called a CO-OP Network along with a website URL.
Mind you, it’s possible that my credit union has been a member of this network for years but this is the first time I’ve paid attention to this bit of information.
I immediately visited the CO-OP Network website and was delighted to discover that my debit card is also welcome at local Walgreens and Costco stores.
More great news – a new Walgreens store is located just down the street from my house.
Thanks to this informative insert shown below, I now have two more ATM locations that are closer to me than the one I use frequently in the grocery store a little over a mile away.
Not only is this more convenient for me, it’ll help lots of my friends, neighbors, family members – even complete strangers – who also bank at a local credit union. It’ll help them as I’ll be able to direct them to a closer ATM when asked – which happens frequently.
Often deemed an irritant by some consumers, the monthly statement insert arriving along with the paper statement was an excellent opportunity for the bank or credit union marketing department to inform its customers of a new product, a new service, a change in pricing, or some product or service enhancement.
The push for online statements means a lost marketing opportunity for the nation’s thousands of community banks and credit unions.
Oh, by the way, sending an email marketing notice in its place will simply get lost in the daily email clutter.
As I can understand your view, given your demographic, I do not agree with your opinion. Studies show that paper (in general) will decrease drastically over the next decade. The decline of the USPS proves this trend. With the younger demographic coming up, these computer savvy individuals will not disregard email and online communications from their financial institution. Social media, email and push mobile notifications will account for the majority of customer communications. From the cost savings strategy alone, financial institutions will force their customers to adapt to these channels. I would bet marketing efforts will be also primarily focused on the most used channels of communication.
As great as paper communications have been in the past, the communications world is changing and offering paper statements is not going to stop the world. My kids, 16 and 12 years old, will never receive a paper statement in their life. Online communication is rapidly changing. As a member of a credit union you should be warare of the cost of sending paper communications. After payroll, print and mail is the biggest expense for a financial institution. Financial instituions have no choice but to offer a cheaper and more effective way to communicate to their member base. Welcome to the internet.
The point of this post isn’t paper vs. electronics. It’s about the loss of a marketing channel as paper statements are replaced by e-statements. The more effective marketing channels you have to use, the better it is to reach prospects.
While electronic communications are growing, be careful what you predict. We were all supposed to be working in paperless offices — twenty years ago.
Electronic media are still in their infancy and marketers are exploring their uses, but nothing is guaranteed. Email didn’t become the death knell for all other marketing media, as was predicted.
The age-old adage says, “Don’t put all your eggs in one basket.” Marketers should use multiple marketing channels to get their messages out.
Steve, I have to respectfully disagree with your statement that the push for online statements means a lost marketing opportunity for the nation’s thousands of community banks and credit unions. The downside is not in the online statement.. it’s a simple disconnect by the organization in assuming that electronic statement users want everything switched to electronic delivery. Credit Unions and banks consistently fail to ask customers how they want to receive communication from their organizations and are making decisions for them. We’re seeing an upswing in the number of credit unions asking (and honoring) this question on their new account survey
“What is your preferred method of contact from us?
__ Mail
__ Email
__ Text Message
__ Cell Phone
__ Home Phone
__ Other
I’m betting that the credit union never asked after you signed up for electronic statements how you would like to receive other important information from them. If they had asked you and recorded your mail preference for all future correspondence both you and the credit union would be happy. They get and eStatement and save postage and printing and you get a paper newsletter mailed to you when they are produced.
Beside that, communicating with customers in their preferred method can also save the institution money and increase the speed of information flow between the FI and customer.
A couple of other points if I may….
• I can understand the push for credit unions and banks to persuade checking account customers (if not all customers) to get online statements. A checking account, with a debit card attached, is known for being one of the longer statements produced each month because of the required reg disclosures on all electronic transactions. Many statement printers charge for each page, the supplies and postage.
• We’ve delivered over 28 million eStatements in the past 12 years and at $.50 savings each that’s at least $14 million in capital that went into our clients’ coffers for marketing and other programs. Some Marketers have negotiated annual increases in their marketing budgets based on the percentage of paper and postage savings they help drive for the CU or bank.
• Online statement technology and digital communication is well beyond presenting just statement PDFs and account history. That 7-11 coupon can be delivered via mail, inside the eStatement library, email, mobile or SmartApp depending on the preference of the customer.
Your readers might like to check out the post on the CUSoapbox Blog “Are you Delivering Financial Telephone Books and Newspapers?”
Ron Daly
President/CEO
DigitalMailer, Inc.
http://www.digitalmailer.com
Just because I have an online statement doesn’t mean I want my credit union sending me marketing messages via email, text message, or calling me. Unlike a statement insert that arrives with my monthly statement, I consider the other channels intrusive given the volume of them on a daily basis. I stand by my position that moving away from a paper statement is a lost marketing opportunity for the credit union to communicate with me and probably lots of other customers. I seriously doubt that my credit union is willing to spend the extra money to send me a hard copy of its statement inserts and newsletters as an online statement customer. And, I wouldn’t want them to do so. I’m very happy with my online statement and wouldn’t want to go back to paper statements. In making that decision I was willing to give up the hard copy newsletter and inserts. Still, my decision eliminates one marketing channel that my credit union once had to communicate with me. It’s gone and cannot be replaced with another channel that has no interest for me.