Should you use television in your branch?
Over the past couple of months the integration of television in the branch has been a hot topic. So hot in fact that we have begun development of an enhancement which will allow our customers to control when T.V. is displayed, the duration it is displayed and even the channel that is on the screen. Better still, this control will be available through our web portal. But this feature was not added without careful consideration of both our application and the effect this ability might have on the impact of marketing oriented media at the branch level. There were several large concerns, but the biggest ones fell into three categories; Competitive brand intrusion, effectiveness and control.
1- Competition- The unfortunate reality of television is that the advertising displayed during normal program breaks cannot be controlled by the user. In other words, there is no way to select that your competitors advertising does not display in your branch. This is something each customer will need to confront when deciding on the use of television. The only way around this is to purchase custom produced content which is available but very expensive.
2- Effectiveness- The vast majority of our customers (90%+) do not employ sound during branch hours. This poses a problem because T.V. by nature is very dependent on audio. And, although closed caption can certainly mitigate the confusion created by displaying television without sound, it is still is not as effective as intended.
3- Control- I have visited many a branch only to see Oprah being played on the screens in the branch when a news oriented channel like CNN or CNBC was intended. Without a method to control the channel at the corporate level, there is very little that can be done to ensure the channel your management has selected to play is actually being used.
Television integration and use in the branch is something we will most likely not be able to avoid in totality. Special situations such as severe weather storms, pressing news or sporting events will always be requested by customers. So, for those financial institutions which choose to use television in the branch, the critical detail is choosing a system that allows you to control, to the best of your ability, when, what and how often television is used. This control should help you control the frequency of competitive intrusion and help limit any drain on effectiveness.
With the above in mind, we have set out to build a feature in our application which will allow our customers to have this control. Through our web based interface it will be possible to schedule what plays on an individual screen or a group of screens based on various time/date parameters.
This feature will be available in August 2006 and we hope it will add control to the use of television in the branch. To learn more about this feature, please call your sales representative at 502-896-0947.
