St. George Bank (Australia) - Partial Rollout

Over the past few years a number of the leading Australian banks--many of whom are now consolidating--invested heavily in upgrading their branch infrastructure in an effort to regain direct relationships with their customers, as the 'broker' model had made inroads in home lending, small business, and other key customer/product segments. St. George Bank, long viewed as the "fifth" of the "four pillars" (the four large banks who control >80% of most financial product categories), was chief among them.

Starting with its branch-of-the-future prototype in 2007, St. George began investing in branch upgrades and refurbishments across their ~500 branch network, with the key objective being to create an environment more conducive to sales / exploratory discussions. Elements of the new plan included a more open floorplan which minimized barriers between customers and staff, better training for sales personnel, and both dynamic and interactive digital signage elements to prompt enquiries and facilitate sales conversations.

Screens displaying product promotions, community news, and providing updates on customer queue position ("now serving...") are located above teller stations, and large-scale plasmas (50-65") are placed in windows in high-traffic locations. St. George's digital signage content engine is integrated both with its queue management software (to drive queue prompts) as well as its CRM engine, which dictates what product advertisements should be displayed at what location.

Larger, higher-volume locations also receive a "lifestyle wall" treatment--grouped into themes such as simplification and retirement--which includes a series of interactive touchscreens, which enable customers to access product information on a self-directed basis or, more commonly, serve as sales tools for staff to conduct more detailed product conversations. Interactive screens are supported by collateral materials, located proximately on the wall.

It is not known what branch design, software, content, and integration partners St. George uses, nor is it clear in the wake of St. George's acquisition by Westpac (who have their own digital signage solutions) how far the program will continue to be deployed. It is, however, an excellent example of how digital merchandising elements can play a pivotal tactical role in changing the nature (and/or frequency) of important branch interactions.

If our Australian readers have additional information to share, it would be much appreciated!

BankWest (Australia) - Partial Rollout

While it is unclear what will occur post-acquisition by Commonwealth Bank, we thougt it merited noting for now that BankWest (Halifax Bank of Scotland's Australian subsidiary) adopted digital signage as a key component of its merchandising strategy when it unveiled a new retail branch format two years ago.

The branches, which were designed to capture attention and generate interest in "true" retail locations -- shopping malls and highly pedestrianed urban areas vs. sharing a parking lot near grocery stores or standing alone at intersections -- adopted a number of concepts pioneered by Commerce Bank in the US, including a bold color palette and better lighting, longer hours, free coin counting, and more promotional marketing. The stores also sell related non-financial merchandise, such as piggy banks ("money boxes"), personal accounting software, and financial advice books.

Scant information is available about the marketing and technology partners who support(ed) the effort, nor does the single but it is believed that the digital signage network made it into 50-100 locations.

Rumor: Commonwealth Bank Network Rollout

Ring the bell! Rumor has it that another market leader has adopted digital signage as its primary form of branch communications, and if true then we have our next entrant in the rapidly expanding 1,000-site network category.

Commonwealth Bank, the largest of Australia's "Four Pillars," is said to have begun network-wide digital signage deployment to its more than 1,000 retail branches. Although details are sparse at the moment, the bank is said to have made the decision after a lengthy pilot process, and that Fujitsu Australia (long a player in the Aussie digital signage market) is the lead supplier, which suggests that TelEntice could be the software engine behind the network.

More information as it becomes available--please email it if you have it!--and hopefully I'll be able to come upon some photos while in I am in Australia later this month.