Posts Tagged ‘Emotion’
Credit unions: not for everybody
Credit unions aren’t for everyone. There, I said it. And it’s true. The latest numbers bear this out – according to Callahan, credit unions hold 6.6% of assets and 8.7% of deposits nationally. That’s a niche group if I ever saw one. Logically, a whole lot of people – the majority of consumers, really – could benefit…
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Dreams and decisions
Ultra-blogger Seth Godin points out that people are astonishingly bad at making decisions about money. For most of us, that’s hardly news. But is it, where you work? If you’re working at a credit union, you’re probably pretty good with dollars and cents. And you’re likely surrounded by people who are also pretty good with…
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Dirty words
Over the past several years, more and more credit unions have eliminated certain “dirty words” from their marketing and identity. Words like “member”, “join” and even “credit union” are now taboo in a lot of places, and online account access is almost always called “home banking.” And when was the last time you heard “share…
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WIIFM (What’s in it for me)?
With all of the marketing messages being broadcast every day, people have been trained to ignore anything that does not benefit them. In fact, What’s in it for me? is a phrase that has gotten so popular that it has it’s own acronym. If you don’t have something that interests me, I’m gone. So get…
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Culture eats marketing for breakfast
In most companies, brand image is controlled by management, which sets the tone for the corporate culture with a focus on either profits or customers. Amazon.com Founder/CEO Jeff Bezos made news one year for working at one of their fulfillment centers in Kentucky, and has made it a requirement for every employee to spend two days…
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The Internet is Full
The internet is full. Overflowing. Saturated. At least it ought to be, with all the blogs, tweets, news, videos, music, and pictures of cats. But I suppose as long as they can keep making more hard drives there is always more room for content. So I probably need to rephrase that: Actually, what is full…
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The Care and Feeding of New Members
The first few months are the perfect time to solidify your CU’s relationship with new members. Of course, it’s important to increase their number of account relationships and all that, but what can marketers do to really get new members excited about the credit union, and maybe even turn them into credit union evangelists? After…
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Bet on Emotion, Every Time
Credit union members, like all human beings (including the most logical, hard-nosed, by-the-numbers credit union marketers), make almost all decisions solely with their emotions. That’s not to say that rationality has no role at all — being logical or making the logical choice usually feels pretty good, too. Logic and emotion aren’t opposites. “Logic” and…
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Something To Hold On To
I’ve always been fascinated by the psychology of money. On the list of emotional minefields, money is right up there with sex and politics, and there are all kinds of baffling taboos and odd behaviors. It can be very interesting to look at some of these behaviors and think about what we might learn from…
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