Gen Y, Party of 70 million...Your table is ready.

It seems like I talk a lot about marketing to Generation Y. If fact, I have used the term so many times in this blog alone that I am beginning to question whether or not I will ever get through to anyone. Maybe I am a lone soldier fighting this uphill battle.

Nevertheless, I will carry on.

Did you know that Generation Y makes up 21% of the American population? Did you also know that 4.8 billion pieces of direct mail were sent by financial services companies in the first quarter of 2007? The good news is that number fell to a meager 4.2 billion in the first quarter of 2008. UGH...it's no wonder that the anticipated response of a direct mail campaign has fallen below 1%.

A recent report from Mintel Comperemedia states that 69% of Generation Y (the kiddos between 14 and 31 today that make up 21% of our population) workers who can participate in a tax-deferred 401k retirement savings plan are not doing so.

Why? Are they not receiving those 4.3 billion pieces of direct mail? Mintel also reports that "In 2007, adults aged 30 and under received only 2% of investment direct mail offers tracked by Mintel Comperemedia. In contrast, adults over age 60 got 41%."

Right. While we talk about brokerages and insurance companies having all the sales skills, they are also clearly missing the boat on the greatest opportunity that will propel them into the future.

So what does this mean to you? It means that you need to identify those Gen Y customers and potential customers in your marketplace and help them understand not only WHY they should start saving now, but HOW to start saving now. In theory, it should not be that hard. A little creativity, ingenuity and segmentation and you should be good to go.

So go get 'em already!!

Make it an extraordinary day :)

Jenna

For those who have been predicting it...

it seems like the time has come: Facebook Blows Past MySpace in Global Visitors in May.

Although I don't think that MySpace is disappearing anytime soon, I would continue to encourage organizations to find creative ways to capture contact information from their MySpace friends (think product giveaways and contesting).

National Performing Arts Convention: The Value of a Seat

Notes from the session "The Value of a Seat"

Moderators: Charles Isherwood, theatre critic, The New York Times; Joanne Steller, vice president, strategic communications, Target Resource Group Speakers: Jon Limbacher, vice president and chief operating officer, St. Paul Chamber Orchestra; Phillip Matthews, director of communications, Theatre Communications Group and manager, Free Night of Theater; Ellen Walker, director of marketing and communications, Pacific Northwest Ballet

Phillip Matthews (Free Night of Theater – TCG)
-started out as a pilot program in 2005
-now in over 100 cities and expect to offer more than 500,000 free tickets this year
-1/3 of audiences made under $50k, and were non-white
-suggestion: when theaters offer complimentary tickets, they should collect the contact information for each attendee so that they can follow up with them and invite them back (as a paid attendee).

Jon Limbacher (St. Paul Chamber Orchestra)
-he felt that if an organization doesn’t have a significant, growing, sustainable audience, it should make you question your purpose
-viewed price as a really important factor in the relationship that an organization has with its patrons. They designed their pricing (most by drastically lowering their prices) to create a “philanthropic” relationship with their patrons rather than a “consumer” relationship with them.
-In their community concert series, their original prices were between $11 and $47. They lowered the prices so that 60% of all tickets are $10 and 40% are $25. They went from have houses at 60% capacity to 90% capacity.

Ellen Walker (Pacific Northwest Ballet)
-their goal is to maximize price for each seat sold
-when a performance is sold to 80% capacity, they raise all tickets by $5. Once the performance is sold at 90% capacity, they raise all tickets by $10.
-they continue to have access programs for patrons that cannot afford full price tickets.
-on average, this dynamic pricing structure brings in $200,000 more in earned revenue per year than the previous model
-the company has several hundred thousand attendees each year, and in the five years that they have had dynamic pricing, they have fielded one complaint from a patron
-there was much more internal debate over dynamic pricing then there was customer dissent

Soap is smarter than the bank?

If you don't use iGoggle, you should. I see my email, the weather, my countdown to vacation and all of my RSS feeds on one simple (and colorful!) homepage.

My Google Reader (those RSS feeds I subscribe to) showed this headline: "Banks: Less Differentiated Than a Bar of Soap." Seriously? I read the article and think that the author and I share a similar vision of bank branding. Take a read for yourself! Click here

I would love to hear your thoughts!

Make it an extraordinary day :)

Jenna

I won't tell that you swore!

Thanks for the lead-in, Bruce! And thank you, Robert for the excellent question and completely point!

In banking, there are more swear words than you will find in the Handbook for Drunken Frat Boys (I am making that up, and mean no offense to anyone!). And I am not talking about the typical four letter words. Our version of swearing include words such as SALES, PROFIT and COMMISSION. I am not afraid of those words and am doing my best, one client at a time, to change the way our industry thinks!

For eons, insurance agents and investment brokers have been associated with sales. Their compensation was primarily based on the number of clients and the types of products they sold in a given time period. As these business units started dabbling in banking, they found tremendous success in leveraging their current client relationships AND SELLING THEM BANKING PRODUCTS. I know this drives you nuts. It drives me nuts too...but for VERY different reasons!

Go back to the above paragraph and re-read the sentence that is italicized. Do you get it? That's where the lack of sales culture comes into play in the banking industry. Leveraging existing clients and maximizing the relationship. Some may call that sales, others will avoid the "s" word and call it customer service. I call it smart.

As bankers, we need to get better at that. Call it what you want, but in an environment of shrinking marketing budgets we are being asked to do more with less. This is a training function that will cost you very little but can increase profits tremendously! Your greatest investment should be in the way your highest performers are compensated. Salaries are overrated and generally overpaid. To compensate with no regard for goals, exceeded expectations or increased portfolios makes about as much sense as paying a teenager to sleep in. It's what they are expected to do and shouldn't be rewarded until they do something remarkable (like get out of bed before there are four digits on the clock!)

Robert, I could ramble all day about this topic...and I have some very strong opinions on this subject matter. But getting right down to your question, "what stands in the way?" The answer is simple: The Banker Mentality.

It is tragic that the industry I am most passionate about is also the slowest to change. You can ask a majority of the CEOs out there why they do the things they do and the answer will unfortunately be, "because we've always done it that way." The "if it ain't broken, don't fix it" frame of mind seems to hold much of the industry hostage. Banks will not experience unparalleled success until we, as an industry, break away from that thought pattern.

On the plus side, there are banks and credit unions that do very well. They embrace change, compensate based on goals vs. expectations, and spend the necessary time to TRAIN their employees that there is a difference between the plaid trouser used car salesperson and helping customers meet their financial goals.

Keep the ideas rolling :) We love to feed you the knowledge you are hungry for!

Make it an extraordinary day!

Jenna

Baseball and Bank Marketing....

Greetings...

Today, I went to a minor league baseball game. It was a great game and I was able to spend time with my brother and his family. The unfortunate piece was that I am in Philly travelling and I am not with my family...its Father's Day and I miss the crew!

So...back to my point. Minor league baseball. Some "no names" playing a game, you may think. Actually, it is a brand of entertainment that is amazing and provides a platform for my blog entry. I will make a two-for-one hit today...addressing Robert's question to Jenna and adding a twist!

First, Robert had a great question that I will jump in and add my two cents. He wanted to know why in most "true" sales organizations, a top salesperson can and routinely does, earn more than the CEO. Why is that not the case in banking? Think about your bank...does your BEST salesperson earn more than the CEO? Is there an endless ceiling to the compensation plan? If you said "YES" then your bank is in rarefied air...elite among the banking industry.

This is my connection to baseball...minor league players abound. The best of the best, no matter from what school, geography or background, can make it to the big leagues and earn an amazingly contract an salary. So same should be true in our banks. The goal is profitable growth for the bank...getting hits, right? The more hits we get the better our average and the better the average the more attention (pay) we should receive. When the ocean rises so does the ship! The ocean is EVERYONE participating on the sales and service process and the Ship is the Board and CEO. If we can take this approach then everyone wins...

Your job as a marketer...be the agent of change and focus your efforts on making the ocean rise!

Jenna...the rest of the answer to Robert is for you!!

Thanks for the great question Robert!

Cheers!

Bruce

National Performing Arts Convention: Jim Collins (Going from Good to Great)

Notes from Jim Collins' session "From Good to Great and the Social Sector." Best-selling author Jim Collins discusses his groundbreaking theory on what makes the difference between a "good" organization and a "great" one, and how to achieve superior performance in the social sector.

• We are not imprisoned by our circumstances, but we are freed by choice and our decisions.


• The best performing stock in the history of traded stocks is Southwest Airlines, and there isn’t an industry tougher than the airline industry. Talk about a tough circumstance, and they seemed to outperform everyone.


• It is the wrong ideas to say that the primary path of success for arts organizations is to become more like businesses. Most businesses are average, so why would you want to strive to be average? The critical questions should be what causes an organization or a business to go from good to great, instead of modeling your organization’s behaviors after a for-profit business.


• Greatness is a cumulative process—most major successes are built over substantial periods of time. In their studies, most major successes were twenty years in the making and on average, it took seven years of great work before a company experienced a “breakthrough.” Consider that for thirteen years Starbucks had five stores, now it seems like they are opening five stores everyday.


• The most common cause of substantial decline was found in organizations which made large, undisciplined growth changes. They tried to do too much, too quick and were not prepared.


• Great companies in turbulent times don’t believe that most of their successes or failures lie beyond their control. They believe that their destiny is in their control, and will not settle for excuses.


• Who comes before what. In order to change an average performing organization, you don’t necessarily need an inspirational or motivating leader, the organization needs a leader that seeks to get the right people on the bus, and in the right seats, and the wrong people off the bus, After that is accomplished, then they settle on a collective visions. The ultimate hedge against an uncertain world is who you have with you. Invest in people first, before you invest in a plan.


• #1 Responsibility of a Leader: Make sure that key leadership roles are filled by the best people who are committed and capable of success.


• Great leaders must understand that sometimes the work is too important and critical to be nice. If you know that someone or something isn’t working, make an adjustment as soon as possible.


• In their research, they found that the one key difference between good leaders and great leaders was humility.


• Many people in an organization don’t have enough power to push through a good idea on their own, but there are numerous people in an organization that have enough power to stall or stop a good idea. Great leaders do not seek consensus decisions, but the right decisions. Leaders need to architect an environment to get enough people behind a good idea to send it forward. (He noted that great decisions usually were never made by consensus).


• Non-profit organizations needs to put metrics in place to measure success. In the for-profit world, this isn’t an issue because success is measured on return on invested capital. However, non-profits aren’t measured in the same way. You should know how to tell if your organization is doing well or not. The organization needs to show enough results so it is apparent that the organization is successful, because people (primarily donors) want to support winners.


• Every great organization is clear on who they are and what they do. They also know when they should say no to something that is beyond their scope no matter how “tempting” the proposition is.


• Great companies manage themselves in good times like they were currently in turbulent times. You need to be disciplined enough to build reserves during prosperous times.


• An organization could approach a significant change by using all of its gun powder to launch a large canon ball at its target. This usually results in finding that you aim is 30 degrees off, you haven’t hit your target and have no more gunpowder to fire another canon ball. What you should do is use a small amount of gunpowder to fire a small bullet at your target. When you see that you are 30 degrees off, make the adjustment and you will have enough gunpowder to fire another shot. Hopefully you will find that your aim is off by a smaller degree, maybe 15 degrees. Make an adjustment, reload, aim again, and repeat until you hit the target. Once you hit the target, then get out the big canon ball. You should advance strategically so that you never miss big.