Market Strategy, Engagement Consulting & Experience Design

North Shore Bank

Engagement Needs:

North Shore Bank sought out NEWaukee to engage next generation young professionals and their families, to increase their brand mindshare among this target population, and to generate new customer leads.

Key Insights:

NEWaukee hosted a series of design sessions with several North Shore Bank team members across areas of the bank, including the VP of Marketing, Marketing Manager, SVP-Head of Retail Banking, VP-Sales Manager, and Product Manager. Through these sessions, NEWaukee uncovered the following insights:

• The bank is in a right-time, right-place position in being able to offer personalized service in an age of personalization.

• Existing market segmentations account for age, rather than stage of life. There is an opportunity to focus on points of transition when individuals need the support of a banking partner the most.

• Point of acquisition for next generation customers is much younger than expected, so strategy must account for long-term relationships with young families and their children.

• Current sponsorships and community activations can be leveraged more fully to showcase the North Shore Bank brand in the community, generate leads, and build new relationships.

Here’s What Working with NEWaukee Can Do:

Building on the discussions from the design sessions, NEWaukee proposed a partnership to create a new job position at North Shore Bank – Community Engagement Manager – and to act as an implementation partner to train, empower, and measure the impact of these individuals.

The role of the Community Engagement Manager is to act as an ambassador for the bank in their target markets: connecting with local organizations, building key relationships, activating sponsorships, planning events, creating and maintaining contact lists, and developing processes for meaningful follow-ups with prospective customers.

In addition to writing the job description and setting metrics for the role, NEWaukee produced a full-day orientation followed by a four-part intensive course to train seven new Community Engagement Managers in five target markets. Training included topics such as: asset mapping, market research, customer discovery, personal networking, storytelling 101, board and committee readiness, and experience design.

Following the four-part intensive, NEWaukee reconvened the Community Engagement Managers every 45 days to share wins/best practices, review their community engagement plans, feedback with marketing on progress, and provide additional training or support.

Results:

• Empowered Community Engagement Managers to host high-attendance, high-publicity events within their communities including the Welcome Party and Southside Dining Week

• Hundreds of new business leads gained through the activities of the Community Engagement Managers

• Community Engagement Managers saw increases in Communication (19.6%) and Collaboration skills (14.4%), as well as Sense of Belonging (13.8%) through their training, based on pre- and post- survey data

• Positioned the bank as the go-to partner for financial literacy with a new program called the You Can Series.

Following the success of the first year of the program, North Shore Bank re-engaged NEWaukee to implement the training for a new cohort of 5 Community Engagement Managers in 5 new markets.

Make NEW Possible

Talk to Angela to get started: angela@newaukee.com

NEWaukee

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