You’re a bank and banks are boring. Worse still your business is in the headlines of the newspapers, every single day. You’re all tarred with same brush: you steel our money and overpay your managers. You could fall over to-day.
You have an image problem: people don’t like you, what you do, or what you stand for.
T H E S T O R Y
Give me a reason to love you
Banking is not about money. It’s about trust. It’s about giving all your money to someone and asking that same person for advice. You would want that person to be really involved in your life. You would like that person to be sincere, warm and caring, with real emotions, and a real interest in your future: your problems as well as your successes.
How do we put the stroopwafel in an online transaction?
Rabobank is a bank. As solid as rock: with over 6,000 employees safeguarding its triple AAA status. It’s the largest mortgager in the Netherlands, and while the critics point and whisper ‘crisis’, Rabobank feels safe with its cooperate history firmly rooted in Dutch agricultural clay.
But. At the same time...
There are a lot of banks, some are safe, some offer high interest rates, others want to salvage our environment. So, what’s the added value? Why should I open a savings account for my children, and why should I stay with bank ‘X’ for the rest of my life?
There are many challenges. Regaining trust is the first: trust in your business, your people, your branches, your online world. It’s time to get re-acquainted with the people you have known since they were young. How do you address them in a personal way? Not just in real life but also in a secure web transaction. How and where do you give advice? What’s your tone of voice? Do you look people in the eye, offer a hand, a cup of coffee?
S O L U T I O N
Give me your hand
Show real interest in the life of your clients. Sit with them, take time for a kitchen table talk. All banking services should be bespoke. People’s dreams, needs and fears might have a lot in common. But no two clients, no two households are the same. You can’t box your products. Rabobank has a head start, they’re nearby, local: one of the few banks still to be found on the streets of small towns. They know the community, they are part of it. Rabobank is more than a bank, it’s a partner in the (financial) walk through life. They should claim this advantage, be more local, more involved. Their background is in cooperation so, let’s do things together.
R E S U L T S
In all work Ping-pong does for Rabobank, and we do plenty, we try to address the question through the eyes of the Rabobank client. What’s in it for her? What are her needs? Does she need what we have to offer, or can we improve our offerings. Forget marketing targets, forget internal agendas, forget about pushing new products. Be honest. Rabobank’s brand identity is rooted in involvement and closeness, so we show this. We help them to be and show themselves as a caring bank: with a sincere and honest interest in people’s lives.