By Abiola Ayankunbi
This is a very challenging period for those that are saddled with the responsibilities of managing banks in the country in this season of Coronavirus induced stay at home.
Yes, some of them have made donations towards the eradication of the scourge. In fact, they have been out doing one another in terms of the amount being donated and their public relations departments are not wasting time in sharing the pictures of the donations on the social media incuding online media platforms and regular newspapers.
However, their responses seem inappropriate, not good enough and not adequate enough because the customers who are the main reason they set up of their business are yet to be taken care of.
What they have done so far are to the detriment of the customers. The Banks can never place too much emphasis on their customers because they are the foundation of the business success. They the chickens that lay the golden eggs. Without them there will be no banks. It won’t be an overstatement to put it out here that there is a “deliberate conspiracy” by those managing the banks to ignore the welfare of their poorest of the poor customers whom they can deal with directly without going through a third party.
The management of these banks should consider measures that will be directly beneficial to their customers. It can be in form of profiling the customers database, studying the cash flows (in and out) over a period of time before zeroing down on the beneficiaries. As a suggestion, any customer with a closing balance of between N0.00 and N30,000.00 can be a beneficiary of the agreed/planned palliative stipend.
In as much as no approach will the best but the above suggestion may likely earn 90℅ acceptance level.
This present approach of giving everything to government and it’s agencies are not adding value for a customer, it should simply be discontinued and replaced without delay.
The concerns of the banks should be identification and meeting the immediate needs of their customers during this trying period thereby ensuring a repeat business. Customers’ satisfaction impacts morale and retention of customers. This will serve as a key of differentiation, which will help to attract fresh customers in a competitive business environment after COVID 19.
In conclusion, the leadership of these banks should adhere strictly to code of conduct in order to secure compliance towards results and should be able to formulate policies on a continuous basis for the banks during the lifetime of their business as a going concern.
…Ayankunbi is the MD/CEO of AbingMO3 Marketing Management Consultancy.
