Nick Collin - Collin Consulting Ltd - London 17 July, 2008, 13:22 0 likes

Check out the articles by Claus Nehmzow on "Branding in Virtual Worlds" at http://method.com/#/thoughts/all/ .  An excellent series on what does and doesn't work in environments such as Second World.  Claus has himself done some very interesting work in this field and I'm sure he'd be happy to share his insights with Finextra.

A Finextra member 17 July, 2008, 16:41 0 likes

What specifically are you looking for...lending? payments? marketing? We're researching all these areas and more.

Steve Ellis - Finextra Research - London 17 July, 2008, 18:23 0 likes

James - I'm sure Javelin would be worth an interview about the typical scenarios and issues you are experiencing around the use of social media in your client consultations - I'm sure Paul, Elton and crew are keeping an eye on this post to follow up :-)

But, personally, I'd really welcome hearing more about their experiences from the early adopters inside banks.

Too often banks have to put up with ranting technology advocates thrusting new things at them, right now its social media tools. The Tim Collins/Wells Fargo piece constructively illustrated the broader issues that banks have to work within when exploring the application of these tools.

Judging by the 800 visits to this post so far, other people find this sort of insight interesting too. Doubtless the Finx team will spot this nudge and see what they can get started.

A Finextra member 23 July, 2008, 15:04 0 likes

Isn't the real issue adapting with the times - and your customers?

If social networking is what many people are doing - it's not like wearing sneakers, it's communication, a new medium your customers have adopted and you had best adopt it to if your objective requires communication with customers. 

The internet has not provided it's full potential to banks, email is an example. Perhaps social networking can be 'managed' better than competing with phishers and spammers.

Tim Collins makes an important point about mistakes - if you make a mistake - fix it and use it as an oportunity to increase customer loyalty.

That is not to say dive in the deep end, but you had best put a toe in the water, just tread carefully, but someone has to blaze the trail.