The banking environment of today is rapidly changing and the rules of yesterday no longer apply. The corporate and legal barriers that separate the various banking, investment and insurance sectors are less well defined and the cross-overs are increasing. As a consequence the marketing function is also changing to better support the bank in this dynamic market environment. The key marketing challenge today is to support and advise on the focus, positioning and marketing resources needed to deliver performance on the bank's products and services. Marketing, as an investment advisor, is about re-defining the delivery needs within not only key strategic market segments, but increasingly refined to relevant micro-segments.
Barriers to better marketing insight and performance management can include:
- Defining the "size of the prize" has become more complex.
- Lack of integrated and enhanced information.
- Number-crunching verses creativity.
As investment advisor, Marketing guides strategic and operational activity, which focuses on the potential of specific markets and how the organization can meet these market needs. In this role, Marketing can also be an early detection system for how changes in the market lead to changes in products and services, selling strategies or even more far-ranging operational elements of the business. The Performance Manager for Banking book from IBM helps Marketing use technology to define, understand and lead four core areas of the bank's decision-making including:
- Marketing opportunities: What is the profit opportunity?
- Competitive positioning: What are the competitive risks to achieving it?
- Market and customer feedback: What external verification process will enhance and confirm product and service value propositions?
- Demand generation: How do we reach and communicate value to customers?
