The exact definition of a statement can vary from one organization to the next, but typically statements are created and mailed to provide customers with a record of transactions for a defined period, and to demonstrate compliance with regulatory mandates that may govern your industry.

But a statement can be much more than just a summary of transactions and balances. If you ask yourself a few questions about the purpose of the statement beyond the simple “obligation to deliver”, there are a lot of things that actually merit some additional thought and action.

When analyzing your statements, consider this:

• Who is your audience? Why are you sending them a statement and how will they use this information when they receive it?
• Is your statement simply a transactional document or is it also a marketing tool? If so, is it there to market the brand or products and services as well?
• Do you want to include additional information on, or with the statement? If so, which other mailings could you eliminate if you did this?
• What are your key demographic segments? What do you know about these people?
• Are you in a position to really “speak” to each demographic? If so, what are the key messages (cross-sell or up-sell) that you might want to deliver to these different demographic segments?

By developing a better looking statement design, you can closely align it with other branding initiatives to support and enhance the reader’s overall brand experience, while significantly reducing Customer Service Representative overheads.

Want to know more?

Download your copy of Doxim’s latest eBook: Unleash Your Statements True Potential: A Complete Guide to Enhanced Statement Design & Delivery to find out how you can maximize the value of your statements.

When deciding which eStatement adoption strategy you plan to implement, remember that the most important stakeholders in the conversion are your customers. Whether you choose a gentle voluntary opt-in approach or more hard-line, reverse opt-in approach, be sure to pay attention to your customers’ reaction and manage them accordingly.

In all cases, it is important to ensure you take the time needed to send out sufficient notification to your customers to inform and educate them on your eStatement implementation strategy. When doing this, talk to the improved service levels and efficiencies that they will experience as a result of the change.

Put yourself in your Customers Shoes

When rolling out an eStatement adoption campaign, especially if you are planning to launch one at the more aggressive end of the spectrum, it’s very important to put yourself in the shoes of your customers so that you can gauge and anticipate their reactions. Two specific things to think about when developing a campaign are:

Demographics

More specifically, the age of your customers base. If a good proportion of your customers are over 55, it may be a good idea to opt for a more gentle ‘encouragement-based’ campaign vs. a reverse opt-in campaign, as people in this in this age group may not be as internet savvy and may be more resistant to change and prefer to just stick with statements in paper format.

Geography

If a reasonable volume of your customer base is spread across rural areas check into internet service quality. In many cases it might be slow, spotty or only available via dial-up, which will affect the speed and convenience of viewing and browsing eStatements online. In some cases there may not be any access to Internet Service for customers – which means online banking and eStatements are simply a non-starter.

Interested in finding out more?

Doxim has worked with numerous organizations to implement well defined, well planned and well executed eStatement adoption strategies and as a result, the average Doxim client enjoys eDelivery levels greater than 50% and Doxim’s top 10 percentile of clients achieve over 85% eDelivery levels!

Download Doxim’s eStatement Adoption Kit today which contains real life case studies of Doxim customers who have successfully implemented their eStatement adoption campaigns with impressive results. It also includes helpful tips and important things to consider when developing your own campaign.

Read more about Doxim eStatements.

Include A Going Green Initiative

Many organizations choose to wrap their eStatement adoption programs in with a very prominent Going Green campaign. This lends credence to the program by drawing attention to the positive environmental impacts that eStatements bring. Going Green campaigns also resonate well with customers, as it’s hard to fault you for demonstrating that you’re being environmentally conscious.

Internal Campaigns and Education

It’s very important to take the time to educate all internal staff, especially customer facing personnel, about why an eStatement adoption campaign is important and valuable – to both your customers and your organization.

Internal campaigns are also a great addition to your overall eStatements program roll out. Customer facing personnel are very important drivers for campaigns as their established relationships with customers allow them to easily communicate the benefits of eStatements and accelerate the eStatement adoption rates.

Interested in finding out more?

Doxim has worked with numerous organizations to implement well defined, well planned and well executed eStatement adoption strategies and as a result, the average Doxim client enjoys eDelivery levels greater than 50% and Doxim’s top 10 percentile of clients achieve over 85% eDelivery levels!

Download Doxim’s eStatement Adoption Kit which contains real life case studies of Doxim customers who have successfully implemented their eStatement adoption campaigns with impressive results. It also includes helpful tips and important things to consider when developing your own campaign.

Read more about Doxim eStatements.

Access last week’s post here.

Proven eStatement Adoption Strategies

Whether you’re new to eStatements or currently have an eStatement solution in place, employing a proven eStatement adoption strategy is essential to help drive and improve eStatement adoption rates.

There is no right or wrong approach to the promotion of eStatement adoption. The strategies you choose depend on the needs of your customers and your organizational goals as a whole. They can vary from a gentle informative approach to a more hard line negative opt-out approach, or a myriad of combinations in between. In many cases, organizations end up implementing a mixture of these approaches.

New Accounts Only

A good place to start your eStatement adoption strategy is with all your new accounts. These customers have never received a statement from you, so why not start where you mean to go on?

Voluntary Opt-In

For your broader customer base, probably the gentlest approach is Voluntary Opt-in. This approach requires a good bit of marketing support as you need to create good awareness, likely supported by incentive programs, to encourage customers to request that their printed statements be turned off in favour of eStatements.

Online Banking Customers

Online banking customers have already demonstrated that they are comfortable with online activities. Turning off paper statements and having your online customers access their official statements through their online banking portal should be a fairly simple transition.

Reverse Opt-In

A very effective, albeit hard-line approach is to implement a customer-wide ‘reverse opt-in’ approach. This requires you to turn off all statement printing at a pre-announced future date. With this approach it is very important to saturate all customer communication channels with pre-advice, to ensure everyone is well aware of your intentions.

In all cases, you can always provide customers with an option to opt back in for paper statements. However, you may choose discourage this by initiating a monthly charge for continuing to receive paper statements.

Interested in finding out more?

Doxim has worked with numerous organizations to implement well defined, well planned and well executed eStatement adoption strategies and as a result, the average Doxim client enjoys eDelivery levels greater than 50% and Doxim’s top 10 percentile of clients achieve over 85% eDelivery levels!

Download the Doxim’s eStatement Adoption Kit (The Secrets Behind estatement Success – Tips and Best Practices on eStatement Adoption) today to find out about real life case studies of Doxim customers who have successfully implemented their eStatement adoption campaigns with impressive results. It also includes helpful tips and important things to consider when developing your own campaign.

Or stay tuned for part 3 next week!

Access Part 1 – Best Practices in eStatement Adoption

For most financial organizations, electronic statements, or eStatements, have become a standard offering. They look just like paper statements and contain the same information, but are available to customers quickly and easily through a secure Internet web portal. eStatements are stored in a secure, centralized online archive and are also available to authorized staff across your organization.

Unfortunately, most organizations employing eStatements do not have a well-defined strategy or plan to drive adoption beyond simply offering eStatements as an alternative to paper statements. They often find that despite employing an eStatement initiative, paper statements are still being churned out month after month with little change in eStatement adoption rates.

Yet the benefits of eStatements are hard to knock:

• mproved Customer service responsiveness
• More effective customer communications
• Improved convenience and access to statements
• Reduced operating costs of print and mail
• Reduced carbon footprint

Come back next week as we let you in on the proven adoption strategies secrets that have been implemented by many other financial institutions.

Interested in Learning More?

Download Doxim’s eStatement Adoption Kit for strategies, more customer success stories, helpful tips and important things to consider when developing your own eStatement adoption campaign.

Read more about Doxim eStatements

The main event in Ottawa will be broadcast through a live webcast at 12:30 PM EST, held by the Canadian Co-operatives Association (CCA). Kathy Bardswick, President and CEO of Co-operators, and Monique Leroux, President and CEO of Desjardins will be featured speakers. Co-operative musical group, Samaja, will also be performing live from Ottawa.

The International Year of Co-operatives is a chance for the Canadian Co-operative Association to raise awareness of the significant role co-operatives play in building communities and revitalizing economies in Canada. Fittingly, the theme of IYC 2012 is that “Co-operative Enterprises Build a Better World” and the celebration of this event across Canada will carry forward this message to all communities.

Tune in to the live webcast later today and stay updated with features from the event by following the hashtag #IYC2012 or #coopjan12 on Twitter. If you’ll be participating in the event in your city, tweet about it or tell us about how you’re celebrating in our comments section below!

Co-operatives are a great example of how businesses can merge social and ethical values with economic interests. As Ban Ki-moon, UN Secretary General puts it:

“Cooperatives are a reminder to the international community that it is possible to pursue both economic viability and social responsibility.”

The main goal of co-operatives is to meet the core demands of its members by operating under a different organizational structure , compared to traditional businesses. With the value of democracy and autonomy in mind, co-operatives use a one vote per member system allowing each member to voice his/her needs to the business. The share of profits is also worked out differently: member-owners collect profits based on how much they use the co-operative rather than how much they invest.

The Canadian Co-operatives Association will be holding an event tomorrow to launch United Nations’ International Year of Co-operatives in Canada. The event will feature 14 different events in 14 cities across the country. Stay tuned to our blog to learn more about the event!

Like Us And Win an iPod Nano

To celebrate the launch of our Facebook Page, we’re holding a free prize draw!

“Like” our Page and you’ll be entered in a draw for a chance to win an iPod Nano. Click here to Enter! Hurry – the contest closes January 31st.

Visit us at www.facebook.com/doxim and “Like” us today!

Once you become a Doxim Facebook fan, you’ll receive access to industry-related updates, tips and tricks, and news content through our Wall and your News Feed. You’ll also be able to download our eBooks, view our Doxim webinar series and much more.

Check out photos of our Festive Cube Competition on our Facebook Page!