How Banks and Credit Unions can use Zoom Video to Communicate With Confidence During Times of Chaos, Confusion, and Crisis

As your financial brand marketing, sales, and leadership teams work to keep communication lines open with internal and external audiences, one very quick and practical recommendation I've been making to banks and credit unions is deploying remote or virtual meetings with teams and account holders via a platform like Zoom video.

This will be even more important if you are in a community that has been locked or will get locked down in the weeks, months, and perhaps even years to come.

I've been recommending this type of remote communication strategy for the past 2-3 years for financial brand digital sales teams as it bridges the DX (digital experience) + HX (human experience) divide with face-to-face video.

Remote video platforms like Zoom help to further increase empathetic communication as 93% of communication is nonverbal --55% of communication is body language while 38% of communication is vocal tonality. Having face-to-face communication --even if remotely-- is even more important than ever during times of chaos, confusion, and crisis such as we are in now.

Table of Contents:

1. The New Normal: Living, Working, and Banking Remotely
2. Add "Request a Video Meeting" as a Secondary CTA
3. Invite Account Holders to Schedule a Remote Video Meeting
4. Conduct 1-on-1 Remote Video Coaching Calls With Account Holders
5. Facilitate Daily Huddle Meetings With Key Team Members
6. Video Humanizes Your Financial Brand's Digital Experience

The New Normal: Living, Working, and Banking Remotely

I predict quarantines and isolations will be extended much further into the summer months (May through August) as I follow the recovery trends we're seeing out of China. I would also not be surprised if we are living in a "new normal" of sporadic isolation, suppression, and lockdowns for another 12-18 months based on the Imperial College's COVID-19 Response Team Report.

My recommendation is to plan for the worse and hope for that best. That means, get prepared for remote operations for at least a year. How would a long term scenario of remote operation force your financial brand to quickly transform the way you communicate --both internally and externally-- if branches are closed for an extended period of time? How would your marketing and sales strategies have to quickly evolve to meet the changing trends in consumer behavior? What are new products that can be created to solve the biggest pain points for consumers and small business?

Thinking now about how you might be able to apply video communication creates additional value and further deepen relationships with:

1. Internal teams working from home
2. Consumer account holders not able to visit a branch location
3. Small business owners shut down and struggling to survive
4. Your community at large

To speed your thinking along, we've already researched the security of the Zoom video platform for other financial brands as Zoom is built on a globally distributed tier-1 colocation data centers with SSAE 16 SOC 2 Type 2 certifications. Furthermore, Zoom encrypts network connections using 256-bit TLS encryption standard for all meeting communications (more on this here for your IT or security team if interested).

Add "Request a Video Meeting" as a Secondary CTA

Projecting physical branch locations could be closed until the summer months (May through August), and perhaps even longer on and off over the next 12-18 months, bridge the longterm DX (digital experience) and HX (human experience) divide for account holders and prospects by adding "Request a Video Meeting" calls-to-action  on key website pages, including: 

1. COVID-19 Primary Landing Page
2. COVID-19 Financial Recovery Product Pages
3. Branch location pages (even more important if your branches are closed)
4. Contact pages (even more important if your branches are closed
5. All product pages underneath your primary CTA's of "Apply Now" or "Open Account"
6. Social media accounts 
7. Consider adding a new location on Google places (Digital Services) with link to "Request a Video Meeting" landing page

Invite Account Holders to Schedule a Remote Video Meeting

Step 1: Send an email out to account holders (segment consumer and business) letting them know you are there to help and also, just as important, listen to their questions and concerns.

Step 2: Wrap the email in an empathetic tone of hope framed around your financial brand's position and commitment to confidently provide clarity during this time of confusion, chaos, and crisis

Step 3: Primary email CTA --> We're here to guide you through the coming weeks and months. "Schedule a Remote Video Meeting With an Expert Banker" to talk through your unique situation.

Step 4: Link the email CTA to a landing page reinforcing an empathic tone with a meeting request form for them to "Schedule a Remote Video Meeting." Platforms like HubSpot Sales, Calendly, and Timetrade can connect with calendars (and Zoom) to streamline the booking process even further. Meeting request leads will then filter to applicable internal leaders (branch managers/loan officers/call center reps) for them to schedule and conduct the 1-on-1 Zoom video meeting. 

Conduct 1-on-1 Remote Video Coaching Calls With Account Holders

In today's world of exponential confusion, chaos, and conflict, financial coaching --delivered remotely via video-- will calm the nerves of account holders as your Financial Coach reduces their fears and anxieties during this time of chaos, confusion, and crisis.

Start with a pilot Financial Coaching Program as you invite a select number of account holders to register. In return, they will first receive a strategic blueprint with recommendations for their unique situation delivered via a remote video meeting.

Through an initial objective diagnostic, your Financial Coach will look for opportunities to capture additional deposits and loans while providing recommendations the account holder might have never considered before. It is important for the Financial Coach to not push a hard sell for your products.

Instead, the Financial Coach provides guidance and advice to position your financial brand as the trusted expert by sharing practical ways the account holder can stop losing and start saving even more money through your recommendations.

Next, the Financial Coach will follow up the initial diagnostic meeting to provide additional guidance and accountability through personalized 1-on-1 or peer group coaching (monthly, bi-monthly, or quarterly).

Looking ahead towards the future, your Financial Coach Team has the potential to generate additional non-interest fee income but that's not the goal over the next 90 - 180 days as you commit to provide account holders with help and hope during this time of chaos, confusion, and crisis.

Facilitate Daily Huddle Meetings With Key Team Members

Use Zoom to conduct daily standup or huddle meetings (15-30 minutes max) with key team members.

The goal of these daily huddle meetings is to:

1. Get out of digital communications like email and chat to maintain the human connection as you limit the negative impact of longterm isolation when working remotely.
   
   
2. Keep everyone on the same page to move forward in a unified direction.
   Celebrate wins and progress to keep morale high.

The best way to kick these meetings off is to commit to Go BIG (Begin in Gratitude) by asking team members one simple question:

1. What was the best thing about your day yesterday?
2. What are you excited about most today?
3. What are you looking forward to tomorrow?

Video Humanizes Your Financial Brand's Digital Experience

Once again, digital growth is not about technology but how we use technology to bring two human beings together for good.

And Zoom provides a platform to add an empathetic and human touch to those you might not be able to meet in person as you confidently provide a sense of clarity and calm to account holders during this time of chaos, confusion, and crisis.