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Is your credit union guilty of any of these?
The Wells Fargo scandal has placed a magnifying glass on the sales practices at all financial institutions. If you answer yes to any of these 10 questions, your credit union’s selling practices may need tweaking.
- Our people are so incentive-driven they sometimes avoid solving member problems in order to focus on opportunities that can lead to a sale and extra cash.
- Our staff makes excuses and avoids making onboarding calls so they don’t get to know the member well enough to generate follow-up opportunities.
- We’ve been using the same sales training approach for years, focusing mostly on identifying cues and matching a product.
- Our managers tell staff they need to generate more sales but they spend more time focusing on numbers and reports than actually coaching, observing and developing their staff.
- Our brand and/or mission statement says we are focused on improving the financial well-being of our members; however, our goals and incentives encourage a short-term “sell whatever you can” approach.
- We’re not growing organically because we focus heavily on walk-in and new members, neglecting to reach out and do relationship building with existing customers who no longer visit our branches.
- Our staff doesn’t consistently capture members’ conversations, life events, dreams and challenges in a member profile, so we really can’t anticipate members’ future needs and be viewed as a financial partner.
- Our staff has not embraced and adopted our customer relationship management system as a true relationship-building tool.
- Our onboarding and sales processes are very transactional and product- driven, which sometimes repels members.
- We have financial calculators and resources on our website, but our staff still functions more as order takers than financial coaches.
Bob Romano and Barbara Sanfilippo are co-founders of High Definition Banking®.
