BACKGROUND
Sales and channel management play a critical role in the banking industry and help banks reach and acquire customers, generate revenue, and maintain customer relationships. By effectively managing sales and channels banks increase customer satisfaction, retention, and loyalty, which ultimately leads to increased revenue and profitability. Remaining relevant and successful requires a robust sales and channel management strategy.
THE CHALLENGE
The bank of our Client was founded over 50 years ago and has continued its expansion ever since. The Client wanted to develop and implement a Management Control System (MCS) that would enable them to continue its dynamic growth by being more efficient, and to increase new loans through a more effective selling effort and better customer service. To help drive this effort, Renoir Consulting was engaged
ANALYSIS
The Client commissioned Renoir to analyse the underlying issues, identify opportunity areas and propose high level solutions.
A 3‑week Analysis identified the following major opportunities:
- The Sales processes lacked a systematic approach to planning and consistent delivery of selling and marketing effort.
- There was a low ‘Sales Visits to New Loans achieved’ ratio.
- A perception that customers could be serviced more quickly, enhancing their experience and satisfaction.
- Better utilization of Branch staff during periods of low customer activity to support sales efforts and increase overall Branch productivity.
PROJECT APPROACH
Following the Analysis, the main target was set to increase ‘New to Bank Loans’ (New Sales) by 7–13% through a MCS implementation in 5 selected pilot Branches.
Renoir’s Focus Process® identified, quantified and validated the opportunities from the Analysis phase, beginning the buy-in and solution development process. These solutions became the core of the MCS that was to be stress tested within the five very diverse Pilot Branches.
The Focus Process® structure along with coaching by Renoir, also allowed the Client team to gain a thorough understanding of change management techniques and the new and improved elements of the MCS. The finely tuned objectives along with the process, system and skill enhancements, were brought to bear during the Implementation phase to achieve at least the agreed 7–13% improvement target.
The key initiatives and deliverables were divided into three stages, representing the stages of customer interface: Sales Generation, In-Branch Processes and Customer care.
Sales Generation
Enhancing direct sales planning, developing selling skills, and enriching the monthly Sales & Marketing Activity Plan were the key initiatives for this stage. Their results increased the value of new loans by 38% to 57%.
The Enhanced Direct Sales Planning and Monthly Activity Planner focused on gaining additional market share, reinforcing the need for proper planning of resources and prioritising customers. As a result, the number of face-to-face visits increased by 900%.
Finally, several training sessions and in-field coaching audits were conducted to develop the selling skills and confidence of front-line Sales staff and new sales materials were developed to support sales and ensure a consistent corporate message was delivered.
“ I am confident that Renoir’s high emphasis on sustainability and organisational alignment work, completed within Our Bank, will ensure the continuity of the Sales and Operational performance improvement. ”
In-Branch Processes
Introducing Operational Standards (Reasonable Expectancies), Implementing a Loan Processing Tracker, enhancing Key Performance Indicators (KPI) and a Dashboard tracker, and daily briefings were the key initiatives for this stage. These changes decreased the Loan processing time by over 50%, decreasing customer waiting time and resulted in a causal increase in newly implemented customer satisfaction tracking measures. The In-Branch initiatives also helped double Branch staff productivity and sales by using available time in indirect selling efforts, e.g., opportunity analysis, sales calls, and marketing letters.
The new Operational Standards enabled a measure of productivity and efficiency for each task, the Loan Processing Tracker identified and resolved system bottlenecks resulting in a 70% reduction in customer in-branch wait times and the KPI dashboard tracker and daily briefing allowed each Branch to track the value adding activities, proper reporting of KRAs, on-time follow up of tasks assigned, ability to prioritize and fix problems and for proactive management of the Branch.
Customer Care
To keep customers coming back and being happy with the service, the following things were introduced. They asked for feedback from customers in real-time, used that feedback to figure out how to sell to them better, and made some changes like adjusting branch hours and offering referral programs. They also introduced a tool to help customers compare loan options.
All these actions were aimed at making sure the customers were happy and would thus increase customer retention.
The initiatives resulted to an increase on the monthly net redeemed accounts, i.e., the net number of accounts flowing to/from competitors, and a 50% customer satisfaction score increase using the newly developed feedback mechanisms.
RESULTS
Key results:
38% to 57%
Increased the value of new loans
900%
Increased the number of face-to-face visits
50%
Decreased the Loan processing time
70%
Reduced customer in-branch wait times
50%
Increased customer satisfaction score
CONCLUSION
This collaboration between the Client and Renoir over-achieved the agreed targets of the program. We implemented new systems and processes in a sustainable manner with full adoption. Staff are fully competent and confident with the new systems, processes and understand the goals.
Importantly, the organisation at the customer level is now able to understand and improve their own performance and can make incremental improvements in their organisation every week. This ensures they will keep generating additional value for the foreseeable future, long after the Project ended.
