Perspective

On Thursday afternoon, just about the time when many of us were wrapping up business to break away for a well-deserved holiday weekend, Newsweek’s Howard Fineman was posting a web exclusive story from the Aspen Institute Ideas Festival in Aspen, Colorado. In case you missed this article entitled “In Search of Optimism”, it recounted comments by JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon to PBS’s Charlie Rose:

"The economy is virtually unfathomable," he began. "I hope we have hit bottom, but I can't really say." On the upside, he said, we all need to maintain some historical perspective. In 1987, he reminded the crowd, the stock market had dropped 25 percent in one day. The current depressing run was months in the making. Nor is the situation like 1982, when we faced a recession driven by sky-high interest rates. By historical standards, unemployment is relatively low at 5.5 percent. But as a country we face rising economies elsewhere around the world—trading partners increasingly turned competitors—energy costs and above all a lack of political will to use government well.

These cautionary comments from a man who many call “America’s top banker”, should remind us about the importance of perspective in times of great uncertainty. While most community bankers and credit union executives don’t have the advantage of Mr. Dimon’s unique situation, they can certainly benefit from his point of view.

Too often, current events and market news prompt us to make hasty choices. But perspective and context can counteract fear and help guide choices that will shape the future of the financial services industry.

"Chase What Matters"

Yesterday the New York Times ran a story about JPMorgan Chase’s plan to roll out a sleek new brand campaign on January 13th that uses the tagline “Chase What Matters”. The campaign, created by Mcgarrybowen in New York, will spend more than $70 million in the first quarter alone to communicate that Chase recognizes and focuses on the things that matter most to customers (e.g. security, recognition, control, protection, access, etc.).

One of the new TV spots follows a man shopping for a new television who uses Chase Mobile to check his account balance via a simple text message to determine how much he can truly afford to spend. Another TV spot shows a woman actively rock climbing when she receives an alert that her checking balance is low. She is easily able to call Chase to transfer funds into her account so she can avoid an overdraft. Chase is clearly trying to brand itself as the bank to keep up with the needs and desires of people with busy, dynamic lifestyles.

This morning NPR carried this story, suggesting that customer retention (rather than customer acquisition) is the likely motivator for a campaign of this size and scope. They noted that consumer confidence in financial institutions is low given the recent credit crisis and housing market problems, and that Chase’s expenditure on this campaign is an effort to shore up their market share. NPR briefly interviewed business journalist Glenn Rifkin, author of Radical Marketing, who essentially suggested that Chase would be better served to put the $70 million into things that really matter to customers, like ATMs, customer service, etc. But it really isn’t that simple – especially for financial institutions.

Chase hopefully understands that you have to do both…you have to make an investment in communicating bold, clear messages that resonate in the marketplace, and you have to back up your words with actions. What will make or break this kind of campaign is whether or not Chase has prepared itself to live and breathe the campaign internally.