Click. Connect. Communicate.

"You've Got Cake!" A Tribute to AOL and its 25th Birthday

by Jimmy Marks

It was a phrase so popular, it became a movie title. A friendly little cheer from a friendly-sounding guy that let you know...

"You've got mail!"

AOL turned 25 this week, and I, for one, am a little nostalgic over it. When the "dot-com bubble" burst in 2000, it set an unhealthy precedent for tech and online service companies. Here today, gone later today - don't bother with tomorrow! 

When a web company turns 25, it's pretty remarkable. AOL (or "America Online", for those of who've forgotten) started in 1985 providing services via the Commodore 64. As time progressed, AOL helped shape the face of Web 1.0 and helped young dreamers get their feet wet in the Internet space. 

How you ask? 

1) Easy-to-understand interface - AOL wasn't the fastest, nor the most stable, browsing platform. But for dial-up service, it was still pretty handy. What's more, it was easy for a skeptical American public to comprehend. Remember how every commercial was "go to www.example.com, AOL keyword: Example"? Doesn't get much easier than one-word access to websites. It was bright, colorful, and almost idiot proof. 

2) 1,000,000 hours free! - We all got them, those colorful floppy disks (and eventually CD-ROMs) with hours and hours worth of AOL access for free. It set the gold standard for "trial use software", where you get x number of hours with access to a credit card. If you go over, you're paying for it. If you don't, no harm done...but you WILL be getting more of those CDs.

3) Instant Messenger - private chat sessions with your friends for free? Profile pages that you could customize as much as you wanted? Group chats? Sounds like a lot of Web 2.0 web apps I hear about these days. Instant messenger was free to download, and opened up folks to chatting all over the world. Now, there's chat on gmail, Facebook, and one might even argue it's an early father of Twitter. 

AOL is seeing some gray days (spinning off from Time Warner after that much-talked-about merger, re-branding, and when's the last time you got one of those disks in the mail?), but it was still where most Americans got their concept of how the Internet was supposed to work, what it was supposed to cost, and what to expect when you got online. If you ask me, I say they did a fine job of laying the foundations for where we are, and where we're going. 

Happy birthday, AOL. Keep on keepin' on. 

Social Finance - Is It Working?

by Jimmy Marks

Look at your watch. Let eight seconds go by. Boom - another social media consultant has just appeared and has come up with an article about how much impact social media has on people's finances. 

It's getting a little crazy. It seems like every time we turn around, we get one more guy saying that users of X social media site are Y% more likely to put their money in your credit union than any other human being alive. Whoops, another eight seconds went by, that's another guy yelling about how all those Facebook fans you have are the same as alternative capital!

Let's get serious for just a second. We've been talking social media for the last two posts (if you haven't read them, go do it). Come to think of it, we've been talking about social media for the last two YEARS. But we've never really taken the time to look at the impact "social finance" and whether or not there were numbers and trends you could count on when it comes to social media and online finance. 

America (Banking) Online

Louis Hernandez at Open Solutions wrote an article (It Takes a (Global) Village: How to Use Social Media - CUJournal, 4/19/10) about social media. Some interesting facts about deposit balances and social network users (most of which, it seems, were culled from a report by Raddon Financial Group): 

• MySpace users have the lowest amounts on average, with $11,891. 
• LinkedIn users has the most with $29,794
• Twitter users had $20,562 on average
• The average Facebook user has $19,339, but daily Facebook users average about $16,586. 

I found these numbers surprisingly high, given that we only started seeing a resurgence in savings in the past year-and-a-half or so. 

I differed to Ron (Daly, my boss), who said "Ask what the average amount is among people who want nothing to do with this stuff." He's betting it's going to be a lot more. Anybody got numbers, comment on this article and let us know. 

Other interesting numbers regarding getting financial advice via social:

• Only two percent of consumers have interacted with their FI while visiting a social networking site.
• Three percent would be interested in taking advice from a blog or SM site. 
• Only four percent said they had solicited advice about finance from a social media site. 

Two, three, and four percent? That's terrible. Is it because there are few FIs online and they're doing a bad job of social media, or is it that people aren't interested in "friending" B of A or their chief banking institution? (Yeah, B of A's Twitter has 7,000 followers, give or take, but I'm doubting all their followers are customers with issues, and with 53 million customers, you're looking at <.013% of customers being helped by their Twitter account.)

Some fresh perspective from Jeffry Pilcher's Financial Brand blog, which ran a "Datahead" article about online banking and social finance (his data's from Forbes, Mintel and ComScore to be clear): 

• 76% of online banking users have visited a branch in the past two months, while 68% have visited an ATM and 37% have called their call center. Mr. Hernandez's article says there's been a drop-off in branch visits even between '08 and '09, but 76% is still plenty high. 
• 75% of members/customers don't realize their bank/CU has online banking. Half of those that DO realize there's online banking USE online banking. That's 12.5% of consumers that are actively using OLB on average. But 87% of those are accessing OLB more than once per week.
• Half of all online banking users have mobile internet on their phone and less than half of those access their bank's services online from said phone - so, on average, about 23% of consumers are accessing their bank's site via mobile. 
• 65% of members wanted to get emails about their accounts(!) while only 8% wanted account updates via social media. 

On this evidence, I'm willing to make a few guesses about where social media fits in the big picture. 

1) Social media is good for ad hoc feedback, event coordination and notification, casual chat and (maybe) some selling. But most folks don't want advice from their social networks. And it's not specifically the networks, it's the people using said network. 

Think about it - do you want to talk about your Roth IRA or your Mortgage with the person who keeps sending you "Which Twilight Character Are YOU!?!?!?11?!" Quiz on Facebook? No, you don't. At least, I HOPE you don't. You trust a few people in this world to tell you what you should do with money, and that conversation doesn't have to happen in front of an audience of hundreds.

According to this article from eMarketer Daily, the number of people using social media is going to be growing to about 66% by 2014. Getting a foot in the door now is smart, given that the trend is increasing and the risk is relatively low, but expecting it to be "the fix" for your institution is unrealistic. People don't start a financial relationship with some bank or CU that they found on Facebook. They go find their bank on Facebook because they already have a relationship with them. 

People are loyal to a dependable product first, its associated brand second. Slap a member or customer with $200 worth of fees and all the social media in the world won't make a difference - they'll feel cheated and complain, and might even leave. Doesn't matter if they brought it on themselves -they're going to say it's your fault.

2) OLB, email and websites all need to be better. There's a reason you started offering online bill pay/banking, eStatements, eLerts and so on. It's because the more people are leaning on your online channel, the less they have to come all the way to the branch to deal with their money issues. Little things like transferring money between accounts and making payments are time sucks for a branch - let people work it out from home. 

Emails, eStatements and online notices are popular (it's why we exist), but we still have people who are on the fence about communicating with members via email. Why? What's stopping you? You don't have to put a ton of personal info into the thing and you aren't spamming anyone. "We might get phished," you say? Yeah, you might. But if you're actively engaging members with emails and getting them accustomed to what an email from you looks like, you're training them about what the real messages look like versus a fake one. Come on, people, it's 2010. "I'm scared of email" stopped being a valid excuse in 1998. Get in there.

If your OLB, emails and websites aren't up to snuff, you're missing out. This is Web 1.0 stuff, and 2.0 is about to hit the bricks in favor of Web 3.0 (does that blow your mind, because it should). You're going to see the big banks and their big websites increase functionality in the next few years, and as Robbie Wright of CU Innovators recently said: 

I will immediately think poorly of a product if they have a crappy looking website. crappy site=crappy product

less than a minute ago via CoTweetRobbie Wright

Let's just cut to the chase: you have a budget of $1 million. You can spend it on your websites and online banking, or on your social media initiatives. You can only spend it these two ways, and you can split it any way you choose. What are you going to spend it on, knowing what you know now? 

Talk to me, people.

Your Monthly Balance: Brought to You by McDonald's!

by Ron Daly 

Advertising on the Internet is a funny enterprise. You can create ads that move, almost like mini-commerical spots. You can make interactive ads that play games with potential customers. You can create wildly inventive ads that use dozens of colors and lots of crazy patterns, because unlike print, there's no premium on how creative you get. More importantly, you never run out of room. 

What do I mean by that? Sure, you have to meet file size requirements and format the ad to fit into the seller's ad space. In that sense, you are confined to a certain amount of space. But there's a lot of empty space on the Internet. I mean, a LOT. Have you ever seen the "Million Dollar Homepage"? A while back, a 21-year-old university student in England decided to buy a website and block off one million pixels worth of blank space that he sold for a dollar per pixel. The site was completely sold off in 2006 and all one million pixels are filled up with ads from companies of all shapes and sizes. The 21-year-old student grossed over a million dollars as a result. Quite a way to pay for college, wouldn't you say?

Is there an App for you?

by Ron Daly

I was linked a story about iPhone apps from the CES in Vegas. The big idea from this year's conference? 

Have an App or hang it up.

Not just an iPhone App (though one panelist in the article says that's square one for your company), but apps for Blackberry, the Palm Pre, Google's Android platform, and any other app-supporting mobile phone. Why? 

For one, more is being done on handhelds these days. More email, more video, more music, everything. Data from August of last year shows smartphone sales have jumped 27% over the previous year. More phone companies are rolling out new smartphone models just as more tech companies are rolling out new platforms. Google just debuted the Nexus One, their own phone running their own platform. The Internet is going to be around all the time - in your pocket or at your desk. 

The other reason this seems to be worth paying attention to is the data from this infographic from GigaOM.com on the "App Store Economy". The graphic is worth a look, but some of the highlights: 

• Average price paid for an iPhone app - $2.70
• The App Store raked in $250 Million in revenues in December alone
• App store users downloaded about 4.8 apps each on average

That folks are willing spend almost $3 each on applications for their phone is mind blowing, but they must be doing it to fill some gap in their phone's functionality or just make things they do in the day-to-day easier. What gaps could your company be filling? 

What's your App? What does it do? How does it help? What gap does it fill? 

Sounds like we'd all better figure that out fast, if we're going off the desk and into people's hands.

Should Online Acquaintance Be Forgot? We Think So.

by Ron Daly 

I came across this story the other day from Usability Post which asks "Is it time to make 'Remember Me' the default for password protected websites?" This question comes as the result of a few articles about password memory, one which asks if it's time to do away with the option of "Remember Me" and go with automatic login. Another article by web-genius Jakob Nielsen suggests we get rid of the "dots" in the password field (i.e., "Password: ******"), because doing so would increase confidence in those who have trouble with passwords and save them the trouble of copy-pasting passwords. 

What do I think? No. To all of the above, I say no. No, no, no. 

Maybe I'm a little kooky about auto-login and password protection standards. I have to be, it's part of my business. DigitalMailer has lots of clients to manage and those clients all fall under the heading of "information too important to compromise". So we don't use "auto-fill" here, we don't use "save password/remember me" fields, we don't have "oops, I forgot" lists for passwords - none of that. We don't do those things because we value our client's safety. I don't know that it's such a great idea to do with your OWN information, either. 

Onward and Upward!

by Ron Daly 

"If we can put a man on the moon..." 

After celebrating the fortieth anniversary of doing the one thing that makes it seem like we can do anything, some worthwhile moments of note from around the web: 

Disney doing research on web banner receptiveness

(from the NY Times, via Gizmodo)

Disney, the mega-media conglomerate that owns ABC, Walt Disney World, and ESPN (to name a few) is doing some of the most complex and thorough investigation of the effectiveness of, and attention paid to, banner advertisements. Their goal is to say with some level of certainty which banner ads work the best - full page, pre-content movies, small button ads, etc. 

From the article:   

The tools are advanced: in addition to tracking eye movement, Dr. Varan and his 14-member team use heart-rate monitors, skin temperature readings and facial expressions (probes are attached to facial muscles) to reach conclusions.

Wow...that's some impressive technology and expense. Hopefully, we'll be able to see what Disney's results are (somehow)

Ban the book! Then bring it back!

(via AllThingsD.com)

Go to a bookstore. Buy a book. Take it home. You have the book. Now what happens when someone comes in and takes out of your hands. 

It might not happen with a paper book, but with a Kindle? It just did. 

Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos has recently apologized for a rash of deletions that occurred when Kindle users downloaded the works of George Orwell. When users downloaded Animal Farm and 1984, they suddenly found both books gone from their portable reading devices. Amazon has officially apologized for removing the books from people's Kindles, but aren't willing to say it won't happen again. 

Remote deposits just keep getting more so. 

(via the CU Journal)

WVUFCU is now offering a special iPhone app called iDeposit, which allows members to scan a check they wish to deposit with their iPhone and deposit said check in their account (click here for the full article). How many more credit unions (or banks) will be using this in the near future? Only time will tell, but WVUFCU seems very happy with their early successes. We'll keep you posted!

Throwing salt all over "Snail Mail"

(via the Washington Post)

The postal service is still fading. With further losses, billions fewer pieces of mail per year, and further talk of Saturday delivery disappearing altogether to stem losses, bitter feelings are beginning to emerge. 

How do you feel about the disappearance of regular mail? What is the maximum amount of postage you'd pay to send a standard letter? We want to hear from you. 

Onward and upward! If you have a technological innovation you'd like to highlight, contact us. 

Email well-suited for today's changing business rules

by Ron Daly 

[[Editor's Note -- This was an excerpt from an article in this month's DigitalMailer newsletter. To sign up for our monthly e-mail newsletter, click here.]]

We live in an ever-evolving, technical world - one that requires creative thinking and adaptability. Email marketing is not for those who seek comfort in the status quo.

To make this point, a recent Email Insider article ("Put The Old Rules Out to Pasture," 6/8/09) highlighted the new book, Death to All Scared Cows: How successful business people put the old rules out to pasture. The book's authors, David Bernstein, Beau Fraser and Bill Schwab, challenge some of the business world's widely accepted assumptions about marketing. Building on this theme, Email Insider suggests e-marketing professionals should think beyond worn-out business rules, key among them:

Old Rule #1: Focus on the numbers and the rest will take care of itself. Focusing on quantity over quality can threaten your reputation, as well as the usefulness of your email contacts. Emphasizing numbers and data, rather than long-term consequences, can backfire. Building a large email database using precarious list-growth tactics, or sending lots of emails based on watered-down permission tactics may well cause an uptick in unsubscribe rates and spam complaints.

Old Rule #2: The goal of marketing is to sell a product. Not necessarily, marketing's real goal is attracting customers. For email marketers, this means not only inviting contacts to opt in, but also providing ongoing value to keep them subscribed. Going light on email sales pitches will help to attract and retain subscribers, building relationships, not just occasional customers.

Old Rule #3: Business should be serious. More businesses are throwing this rule out the window...and discovering success with a lighter approach. The authors put forth Apple as an example. Within their long-winded, small-print disclaimer on the iPod Shuffle box is the warning: "Do not eat iPod Shuffle." Apple has developed an upbeat, "today" personality, and customers like it. For marketers, emails are well-suited for similar informal, conversational communication. Keeping your messages light - even on the humorous side - can help them stand out in the crowded inbox.

Remember, just because it worked once doesn't mean it's the best tactic now. Take time to review each situation – and then be open to making adjustments. Whether it's via email or mobile messages, DigitalMailer's products can help you make the most of marketing dollars – visit www.digitalmailer.com/arb.html to learn more or email us at info@digitalmailer.com.

SMTP vs. SMS: What’s best for text marketing?

No doubt about it: We live in a mobile world. A recent PEW Internet study (The Mobile Difference, March 25, 2009) found that 39 percent of consumers have increased their use of and improved their attitudes about mobile communication devices. This is good news for savvy e-marketers who understand the unique characteristics of reaching consumers effectively via cell phones or other wireless devices. But in the area of text marketing, a debate has been brewing: Is it best to send messages to consumers via SMTP or SMPP?

SMTP (Simple Mail Transfer Protocol) was developed primarily as a method to send email messages. Using SMTP, marketers basically send emails to cell phone numbers. To consumers, the messages look just like texts. And like emails, there are no fees for delivering SMTP messages.

Using SMPP (Short Message Peer-to-Peer Protocol) to exchange SMS (Short Message Service) messages, marketers send true text messages, routed through cell phone carriers. There is a fee charged for each message sent.

Twitter gets hacked. Why you need to care.

 

by Ron Daly 

BREAKING NEWS! Fox News has outed Bill O'Reilly, Rick Sanchez at CNN is addicted to crack and Britney Spears...well, the less said the better.

Obvioulsy, ALL THESE CLAIMS ARE FALSE. We have a hacker to thank for all these tidbits, which came from the fount of Internet knowledge: Twitter. 

Yes, Twitter. Folks these days don't know whether to call it a micro-blog or an instant messenger. But they do know, now, that there's a major security hole somewhere through which someone drove a bus (click here to read the story). 

Some of the biggest Twitterers (Tweeters? Tweets? Toots? Honestly, Jimmy's the one who keeps up with this stuff) were hit, including President-Elect Barack Obama, Britney Spears, Fox News and CNN Anchor Rick Sanchez. 

As someone who spends a lot of time talking about online security, I wondered whether or not this was all that news-worthy. Most twitter pages are just little blurbs about what people are doing, links to their favorite news stories, jokes back and forth with friends, etc. But then I read this article from NetworkWorld.com (read the article here). 

What would have happened if this hacker - who just threw out humiliating little gibes - had posted links to a virus? What if he'd have used email addresses or passwords he'd found to disturb people's private accounts on non-Twitter services? Does this tell you, dear reader, anything about how important it is to guard passwords? 

Jimmy and I jawboned about this for a little while. I asked what he thought was the biggest threat facing Twitter and he told me that there are so many peripheral Twitter applications that require username and password to operate. Seems like a tough sell for me, the thought of giving away security information. What do you think, folks? Respond below.

Text Me from the Other Side

by Jimmy Marks

I was browsing the DigitalMedia Newsreel on the right hand column this morning and I saw a story: 

"Bury Me with my Cell Phone" from MSNBC

It turns out that more and more people are being buried with their cells, Blackberrys, iPhones, Game Boys, etc. Trust me, I get leaving things in caskets. When we buried my grandma, my mom added pictures of my grandpa and the grandkids to the casket. Mom also put in some old letters and, if I remember correctly, a little bible. 

These were the things that were important to my grandmother - God, family, and friendship. But I can't see anyone having the same emotional attachment to an LG enV2 (I only mention this phone because it's the phone I have...I like it, but still).

The article linked here goes on to talk about a man who was buried with his phone. His wife put his number on the tombstone and continues to pay his bill so people can leave him voicemails. 

Take a moment and think about that.

If you're like me, you came up with two conclusions: 

1) Mobile is becoming not just a tool, but a part of life. It's taken the place of some key communication methods and it has combined dozens of technologies that only a few years ago were disparate. Thus, we think we can't live without it...or die without it. 

2) Folks these days that are having trouble letting go of their grief are finding out they don't have to... technologically anyway.

Consider this a binding document: when I'm gone, don't put a phone anywhere near my coffin. Or at LEAST put it on silent so it doesn't bug me.