retail bank, furniture store or traffic department?

there is a famous saying that goes something like…

“marketing is the most important function in any company, far too important to be left to the marketing department”

this broadened the scope of marketing as well as the responsibility for it. there is a similar move afoot in retail, and nothing demonstrates it better than the recent acquisition of ellerines by african bank. now the bank looks like a furniture store and is a pucker retail environment

contrast this with the major “retail” banking environments. there is little distinction between their branches and the licensing hall at your local traffic department, apart maybe from the quality of the finishes. they provide a good bank but a lousy shop. this may give us some insight into why we hate going to the bank but see shopping as relaxing or even entertainment.

so, as much as we want to improve the experience for our shopper, as retailers, we could show other organisations, like banks, a thing or two about people, product and space.

pick n pay made a customer promise a few years ago that the manager will always be available, and will spend most of his time on the sales floor. in the bank, the manager is furthest person from the customer. the only time you get to see her is when you are in trouble.

another promise, made by many grocery retailers, is that the moment there is more than one shopper at a till, another till will be opened until all are open. imagine a bank where all the tellers were open.

in a fashion retailer, the shopper can interact with the product. he can look at it, touch it, price it and try it on. think of all the information that he can gather from this process…colour, size, style, fashionability, fabric, quality, price, fit… to name a few. the challenge for the bank is to find a way for him to easily gather enough information to make a decision. if a bond or a savings account was a thing, what would it look like?

these are just a few of the thoughts i have had when pondering the question…

what would my bank look like if it was run by a retailer?

for those non-bankers amongst us, replace the words “my bank” with “my office”, “my reception”, “my department”, “my charity” or anything else for that matter.

would people want to come to it?
would they easily find what they needed?
would the offering make sense to them?
is the balance between self service and assistance correct?
would they be happy to give you what you want in return for what they got?
would they come back?
what would your returns percentage be?

…worth a thought

if i wanted trailers, i'd have gone to the movies!

i have written previously about the story we tell our shoppers. i believe that this story has to be constant and consistent. that each retailer must be able to be relied upon to deliver something. a cold and pretty miserable weekend in cape town reminded me of the effect we have when we disregard this in favour of the corporate greed story.

i have two beautiful daughters and regard myself as a hands-on, enlightened, modern etc etc dad. i must admit, however, to having resorted to renting dvd's for the girls to watch, just to give my wife and i a break. we dont have a television, so these dvd's are played on a laptop in the lounge. i am constantly annoyed by how long it takes to actually begin watching the movie from the time i insert the disc. now, i am not sure if you can avoid the experience when watching on a conventional dvd player and tv combo, but on a laptop you may have to wade through between 4 and 10 trailers and adverts, before you can settle down to watch what you bought or rented. the adverts normally include a pretty scary and disturbing anti-piracy advert, and occasionally include an inappropriate trailer.

my friends know me as the guy who actually purchases all the music and movies in my possession. some regard me as antique or even quaint. i just failed to believe that, as napster and torrent so convincingly taught, from this point hence all music and movies are free.

now to the subject of my gripe. i pledge to purchase or legally rent all the movies we watch. in return i would like to be entertained.

i do not however want to be sold to!
i have already paid!

the amount of selling i am subjected to every time i put on a dvd for the girls, makes me wonder why i don't just copy the movies off the network. "coming fall 2005" doesn't quite have the same ring in the southern hemisphere winter of 2008! it just builds resentment.

how often do we just disregard our story to see if we can get a few extra rands out of a shopper? woolies do it consistently with their hell run of sweets. just thank the shopper and ask them to come back. they are worth much more, over their lifetime with you, than a hard sell impulse buy. remeber your story, tell it at the point of sale! besides, if you push shoppers too far they may just stay home and download a pirate copy!

what's a wienie?

as a rule i am trying to publish original and insighful content. i do however come across some great content and this one i felt was worth sharing. do you have a wienie?

what is a wienie anyway?

have a great week!