hello@thefinancialbrand.com
206-661-5070
April 14-16, 2025 | Las Vegas
REGISTER

Breakout Sessions

Learn innovative strategies, advanced techniques, and best practices from the brightest minds in banking in these actionable, how-to sessions guaranteed to build your brand and your bottom line.

How-To Strategy Sessions

Predictive Data-Driven Digital Marketing Strategies for Customer Acquisition & Deposit Growth

Tom Sullivan, CEO of Princeton Partners

Banks and credit unions are losing market share to the largest financial institutions in the U.S. Why? Because they underinvest in marketing. Research encompassing 2,500 banking providers now clearly demonstrates the proven mathematical relationship between marketing investments and revenue growth.

This session will show you how smaller institutions can now apply the same strategic, data-driven tools and best practices that megabanks use to attract and acquire new customers. You’ll learn how to design strategic digital marketing programs that accelerate deposit growth with higher-ROI and more predictable outcomes.

This session will teach banking executives:

  • How to optimize media investments, prioritize markets, and target segments to drive more market share over time
  • How the power of AI-enabled tools optimize campaign performance by managing offers, messaging and media mix
  • How progressive marketers are using big data to discover hidden prospects and untapped marketing opportunities
  • How human-managed generative AI creatively helps you to better reach and convert your target audiences
  • How to determine if your marketing investments are at the right % of assets in your peer group to drive maximum revenue growth

Bonus: Attendees will get a free copy of the Princeton Partners’ study of 2,500 community banks, “The Proven Relationship Between Marketing Investments & Revenue Growth.”

Digital Banking Showcase (Live Demos): From PFI to ‘Primary Financial Interactions’

Dave DeFazio, Principal at StrategyCorps

In the battle for banking relationships, fintechs and neobanks are vying for dominance. And they may be winning. In the last three years, digital banks have the largest growth rates of primary relationships. And now, more Millennials and Gen Z consumers name a digital bank as their primary institution than all of the community banks and credit unions combined.

In this session, you’ll experience live demonstrations of breakthrough apps that are reimagining the digital banking experience, changing consumer behaviors, and fundamentally redefining what “PFI” now means.

This session will teach banking executives:

  • The secret to growth in retail banking, and how it hinges on understanding the emerging digital trends driving consumers’ rapidly shifting attitudes towards the banking products they now prefer
  • How AI-powered chatbots like ‘Erica’ from BofA are evolving at a breakneck pace, and how they are stripping complexity out of the mobile banking experience
  • How challenger banks like MoneyLion use unique fintech features designed for low-income segments, including friendly subscription pricing strategies instead of the penalty-based fee structures that dominate traditional banking
  • What the intersection of retail and payments looks like from Amazon One, an innovative new merchant payment system using a palm print to reinvent the shopping and payment experience

Optimizing Onboarding & Cross-Selling in Banking: A Roadmap to Deeper Relationships

Tricia Hrotko, Chief Customer Officer at Digital Onboarding

Banks and credit unions typically prioritize new account acquisition over deepening existing relationships. Even those institutions with onboarding and cross-selling programs still often rely on brochures, mailers, and phone calls. That might have worked in 2005, but it doesn’t anymore. You need an omni-channel onboarding process ensuring a seamless transition between channels, including mobile apps, websites, and in-branch visits.

This session will show you what a best-in-class onboarding experience looks and feels like in the Digital Age, including the timing, messaging, and tools needed to turn new account openers into deep, profitable relationships. You’ll see how the most advanced institutions are leveraging data analytics and artificial intelligence to create personalized onboarding journeys for customers.

This session will teach banking executives:

  • The onboarding and cross-selling mistakes many financial institutions make (and why they fail)
  • How, when and where to implement cross-selling and upselling within the onboarding process
  • How points of friction during a customer’s first 90 days are your worst enemy, and how to fix them
  • Predictive strategies to recommend next-best products based on customer signals and their initial path-to-purchase
  • How AI and chatbots can accelerate and augment your onboarding and cross-selling initiatives
  • How to integrate the principles of gamification into your onboarding process
  • The onboarding and cross-selling metrics you need in your KPI dashboard

Harnessing the Potential of Generative AI in Banking

Vivek Jetley, EVP/Global Head of Analytics at EXL

Explore practical, real-world business applications and multiple use-cases of generative AI in consumer banking. You’ll see how generative AI is reshaping the banking landscape by optimizing customer interactions, streamlining processes, and enhancing decision-making for improved financial outcomes. In this presentation, you will hear how banks are using generative AI applications to create operational and cost efficiencies, and improvements in customer service.

This is the conversation that every CEO, CIO and CMO needs to have.

This session will teach banking executives:

  • The challenges, capabilities and potential impact of generative AI in retail/consumer banking
  • The right way to plan and prepare, including the investments that need to be made, and the operational costs that should be considered
  • The key foundational components and technology infrastructure considerations that should go into your generative AI strategy
  • How the right generative AI strategies are based on a prioritization framework that balances time, value and certainty

Data-Driven Loyalty: How to Engage & Retain Banking Customers

Joe WeluJoe Welu, CEO of Total Expert

Traditional financial institutions constantly fight a war of attrition. But to effectively engage loyal customers, every banking executive must understand how consumers’ demands are evolving, and how to effectively meet these needs.

In this session, you’ll see what modern consumers seek from financial partners,
and the crucial role data plays in shaping banking relationships. You’ll learn how to identify and respond to shifts in consumer loyalty, and which engagement strategies yield the greatest benefits. We’ll also explore the latest tools and technologies you can leverage to enhance customer engagement and foster loyalty.

This session will teach banking executives:

  • The crucial importance of leveraging data analytics to deepen customer relationships and foster loyalty
  • How to effectively segment and prioritize your customer base, and where to focus your engagement efforts for optimal retention
  • How to recognize critical moments in a customer’s financial journey and when to intervene for maximum impact
  • Techniques to detect changing customer expectations and how to adapt your engagement strategies accordingly
  • How to effectively tailor your engagement strategies to appeal to diverse demographic segments
  • How to foster a culture of customer-centricity in your institution that prioritizes customer needs and satisfaction

Supercharging Financial Marketing Content with ChatGPT

Ben UdellBen Udell, SVP Digital Innovation at Lake Ridge Bank

ChatGPT and similar generative AI tools are gamechangers in marketing. This session will give you a roadmap to supercharge content creation with ChatGPT using a repeatable process that achieves amazing results. It’s easy, inexpensive, and you can get started immediately when you return to your office.

You’ll get a step-by-step demonstration as we build various components of an actual marketing campaign together, including a first draft of a client email, marketing taglines, a direct mail piece, FAQs, internal communications, a training guide, banker quiz, and even compliance disclaimers.

This session will teach banking executives:

  • How to use ChatGPT to generate and accelerate a full spectrum of marketing content for more engaged, dynamic campaigns
  • How little work is required upfront to build an effective model that will save your marketing team significant time and create repeatable results
  • How to create a “marketing persona” so that your brand voice is applied consistently when AI tools like ChatGPT generate content
  • What a “Generative Pre-training Transformer” (GPT) is, and how to create, implement, and refine your own
  • The dos, don’ts and pitfalls of generative AI, with tips to address privacy, bias, and other risks

Innovative Marketing Strategies to Launch Next-Gen Financial Products

Andrew Davidson, Chief Insights Officer at Mintel

In today’s rapidly evolving financial landscape, banks and credit unions must constantly innovate to stay ahead of the curve and attract new customers. This session will equip you with actionable insights to effectively launch new banking products and financial services. Learn from pioneers in the financial industry who are pushing the envelope with innovative go-to-market strategies, and see case studies illustrating how they ensure success. Whether you’re launching a new fintech tool, credit card, BNPL program, debit/deposit product, wealth/investment service, or small business solution, this session will inspire you with innovative ideas for your next rollout

This session will teach banking executives:

  • Creative launch strategies to amplify awareness of your new products, generate buzz, and accelerate speed to market
  • How to position new products and features that cater to consumers’ evolving preferences and expectations
  • How to target specific customer segments with personalized, hyper-relevant campaigns
  • How to strategically plan for product enhancements and updates to keep your offerings fresh
  • Emerging trends in new product innovation and untapped market opportunities that will give you a competitive edge

Conquering the Competition with Advanced Targeting Tactics

Jim PondJim Pond, Co-Founder of JXM

This session will arm you with a range of hyper-effective tactics you can use to target potential customers who are currently considering- or already engaged with your competitors.

You’ll learn how to leverage competitive intelligence effectively, and see how advanced concepts like addressable geofencing, device ID lookback techniques, and automatic content recognition (ACR) are enabling some truly remarkable and jaw-dropping results. Financial marketers will see how these ridiculously powerful new marketing strategies and innovative martech tools are completely rewriting the rules of warfare on today’s digital marketing battlefield.

This session will teach banking executives:

  • How to target users who receive your competitors’ emails
  • How to target customers who’ve previously purchased from your competitors
  • How to target people using your competitors’ mobile banking apps
  • How to target users exposed to your competitors’ ads
  • How to use advanced geofencing tactics to target consumers who’ve visited a competitor’s branch locations
  • How to target potential customers who are searching for your competitors online
  • How to create custom audiences using competitor-related online footprints
  • How to exploit specific social media signals to identify and engage potential customers interested in similar brands

Humanizing Digital-First Banking

Doug Brown, President & GM, Digital Banking at NCR Voyix

Banks and credit unions know they must build a digital-first strategy, but “digital-first” does not mean “digital only.” In the Digital Age, it’s easy for the human element to get lost — especially in banking. As the number of digital transactions and touchpoints increase exponentially, ensuring a seamless blend of technology and empathy is critical to building long-term, profitable relationships.

This session will take a deep dive into what it means to truly adopt a digital-first mindset throughout your entire organization while also applying a human touch.

This session will teach banking executives:

  • A deep dive into the future of digital-first banking and how banking providers need to prioritize customers
  • How to create a digital-first culture throughout your organization while still prioritizing “the human behind the screen” (both customers and employees)
  • How to navigate the delicate balance between digital and personal, regardless of channel
  • Real-world experiences of banks and credit unions that have successfully blended technology and human experiences together
  • How data and AI can be your biggest ally when personalizing and humanizing experiences in digital channels

AI for Growth: Unleashing Data to Personalize, Predict & Profit

Rex Briggs, Chief AI Officer at Claritas

AI is a game-changer, and its transformational impact on the banking sector cannot be overstated. This session will demystify the intricacies of AI, as you explore the groundbreaking technologies and latest innovations in artificial intelligence that are completely reshaping the future of banking.

You’ll see case studies and learn actionable strategies that are driving innovation and growth at an unprecedented pace. We’ll also unpack results from new research covering multiple industries showing how to double conversion rates and other critical KPIs.

This session will teach banking executives:

  • How to remain competitive in today’s rapidly evolving landscape by successfully integrate AI into your growth strategy
  • The strengths, weaknesses, limitations and creative potential of artificial intelligence in financial marketing
  • How to apply AI effectively and responsibly with hands-on, applicable marketing strategies (e.g., “next best product” recommendations, cross-selling, and upselling)
  • How to leverage AI to enhance your CX strategy, personalize interactions, improve customer satisfaction, and foster deeper connections
  • How to create efficient AI workflows with strategies that streamline marketing operations, reduce costs, and increase productivity
  • How to handle complex data and queries with database vectorization and multimodal systems
  • A risk framework for AI focused on precision and input control, and where it is especially important to be cautious

What’s your growth strategy?

Meet over 2,000 of the brightest minds in the banking world at The Financial Brand Forum, and see how innovative C-level leaders are solving their biggest growth challenges.

Read Attendee Reviews

Demographic Disruption: Banking in an Aging America

Joe Sullivan, CEO of Market Insights

America is on the verge of a demographic crisis that will disrupt every aspect of our society, our economy… and the banking industry. Millennials are entering their 40s, birth rates are falling, death rates are rising, and by 2034, older adults will outnumber children for the first time in U.S. history. Most industries — financial institutions in particular — are ill-prepared to meet the challenges, pain points, and opportunities presented by a customer and employee base that is both aging and shrinking.

This powerful session explores how bankers must rethink their strategic plan for long term relevance and success in the face of accelerating demographic shifts. If you work in banking (and aren’t retiring in the next 10 years), you need to prepare for how consumers will spend, borrow, and save… now.

This session will teach banking executives:

  • How the inevitable tectonic shifts in demographics (i.e. birth rate, mobility, diversity, debt, etc.) will impact demand for financial services
  • Implications for service delivery and how consumer spending/savings trends will shift
  • Key metrics to gauge, estimate, measure and forecast the long-term viability of existing markets
  • How you will need to redefine your workplace, attract talent, and adapt your workforce for the future

Reimagining Retail Banking: How to Revolutionize CX with Generative AI

James DeanJames Dean, Global Generative AI Specialist, Financial Services Lead at Google

Generative AI represents a critical turning point in the future of retail banking, and understanding its potential is crucial for any financial marketer looking to stay ahead of the curve.

This session will explore the many ways in which Generative AI can be harnessed to create a differentiated customer experience and unlock new possibilities for growth and innovation. You’ll see the tangible benefits of Generative AI solutions, and showcase concrete, real-world examples that will help you maximize the impact and ROI of this emerging technology.

This session will teach banking executives:

  • How to identify specific customer pain points and opportunities best addressed by Generative AI
  • How to build generative AI search and conversational AI experiences with text, voice, images, and video that help customers and employees quickly get relevant information
  • How to automate complex tasks to proactively answer customer questions, resolve common issues, and automate routine processes, freeing up human advisors and service reps/analysts to focus on high-value interactions
  • How to enhance financial literacy by creating interactive simulations and personalized learning experiences
  • How to develop innovative financial products and generate new ideas based on real-time market data and customer insights
  • How to build a roadmap for successful Generative AI integration within your existing technology infrastructure

Navigating the Future of Partnerships in Banking: Strategies for Success

Bill Dworsky, Senior Manager at Deloitte

The convergence of banking, payments, retail, consumer technologies, travel, and healthcare have created new competitive threats for financial institutions, but also enabled more integrated value propositions outside traditional offerings. Meanwhile, innovative new technologies and APIs have made connections with third-party partners easier and faster, opening up a whole new world of opportunities for community banks and credit unions.

Still, not all partnerships are created equal, and not all have happy endings. Many stagnate or die altogether. So what should financial institutions do to position themselves more strategically and successfully to take advantage of partnerships? In this panel discussion, leaders from across the ecosystem will discuss the critical issues and share their experiences with partnerships of all shapes and sizes.

This session will teach banking executives:

  • How expanding partnerships help banking providers address top-line revenue pressures and develop new pathways to growth
  • Ways to create win-win partnerships and how to align incentives in deal construction
  • How to enter and exit partnerships — keys to success as the business evolves
  • Where partnership-enabled innovation is happening now, and where will it be going over the next five years
  • Why strategically balancing standardization vs. customization is key when managing a portfolio of partnerships
  • Why partnering will matter more in the future, particularly where banking and payments intersect

Winning in Digital Banking Channels: Leading UX Practices from Across the Globe

Mark Donohue, Founder of iSky Research

This session will show you how banking providers are differentiating themselves in digital channels as they raise the stakes with innovative CX, security, marketing and sales strategies.

Founded on one of the world’s most comprehensive and longest-running longitudinal studies examining over 80 different benchmarks, you’ll explore the designs, experiences and tactics that are driving positive outcomes for customers and financial institutions via web and app UX.

Take this candid, behind-the-scenes tour of what actual banking customers across the U.S. and around the world experience *after* they’ve entered their online banking and mobile app passwords.

This session will teach banking executives:

  • The latest digital banking trends, including new innovations, new features, updates, changes, and additions
  • The digital banking experiences that are resonating the most with today’s consumers
  • The differentiators vs. tables stakes in today’s digital banking game
  • How digital is shaping the trajectory of the customer lifecycle
  • The latest digital practices in onboarding, servicing and selling

The Brand Advantage: Harness Your Most Valuable Asset to Drive Differentiation

Gina BleedornGina Bleedorn, President and CEO of Adrenaline

Your brand is one of the most powerful — but often-overlooked — assets on your balance sheet. A powerful brand strategy that differentiates your financial institution from the sea of competitive sameness catalyzes growth and maximizes business value. And in this session, you’ll see the data that proves it.

Explore the business advantages of branding, as you delve into the critical considerations and metrics that matter in tracking ROI. Drawing on real-world case studies of banks and credit unions that recently rebranded, you will hear best practices that will maximize the impact of brands across all constituencies.

This session will teach banking executives:

  • How to craft a brand strategy that drives business value and creates a competitive advantage
  • How to identify and amplify the strengths of your brand’s DNA with a proven methodology to create true brand differentiation (the ‘Five Whys’ method)
  • How to build an airtight business case for brand change and evolve the core elements of your brand to support growth goals
  • How to define the KPIs and success vectors of your brand strategy
  • How to drive internal advocacy across your organization, and leverage your brand to ignite growth from the inside out

The BaaS Revolution: Leveraging Embedded Finance as a Catalyst for Growth

Peter Hazlehurst, CEO & Co-Founder of Synctera

Embedded finance isn’t the future, it’s happening right now, and Banking as a Service isn’t just for megabanks. In fact, community banking providers are the driving force behind the embedded finance revolution. Over 78% of financial institutions actively engaged in BaaS have less than $10 billion in assets, and one-third have less than $1 billion.

In this session, you’ll see how financial institutions of all sizes benefit from BaaS and embedded finance programs that create significant growth opportunities and drive increased engagement.

This session will teach banking executives:

  • How to build a BaaS program to support embedded finance programs at scale, and the best ways to get started
  • The crucial role every department — including compliance, operations, finance, risk — must play at every step of the BaaS journey
  • Real-world examples of businesses leveraging BaaS for embedded finance solutions and innovative “super app” experiences
  • The big trends and latest regulatory concerns shaping the future of BaaS and embedded finance
  • The technology and talent it takes to ensure a risk and compliance framework that is “best in class”

The ROI of CX: Success Strategies from Banking’s Best

Brandon Gerena, former leadership executive with IBM, Accenture and Razorfish

Banks and credit unions still struggle with CX despite pouring billions into experience management tools, new marketing technologies, data analytics and personalization platforms.

This session will show you how to overcome the competing priorities that stifle cooperation between internal stakeholders by creating a shared CX vision with actionable success metrics across customer touchpoints. You’ll see how some of the world’s most respected financial institutions deliver an experience that consistently engages and delights, including USAA, American Express, Barclays, and Goldman Sachs.

This session will teach banking executives:

  • How to reframe business objectives around CX metrics for customer growth and retention
  • How to engage relevant stakeholders in end-to-end CX management
  • How to prioritize new features, products, and marketing campaigns all focused around CX
  • Opportunities to launch tangible “minimum viable products” (MVPs) that achieve near-term results with measurable business outcomes
  • How to repurpose and upskill existing human resources to support CX
  • The importance of every employee in understanding customers and utilizing data
  • How to identify “moments that matter” across various banking functions

The Future of Retail Banking: Growth Strategies in an Age of Industry Convergence

Kristin KorzekwaKristin Korzekwa, Managing Director at Deloitte Consulting & Former VP with SunTrust and National City Bank

Traditional banking providers have been rocked by volatile macroeconomic trends and massive shifts in credit markets while also contending with a slew of fresh competitors from all angles. These forces will only accelerate the pace of consolidation in the banking sector.

In this new competitive landscape swirling with uncertainty, what can- and should banking providers do to fuel growth? This session looks at the future retail banking through the lens of industry convergence, showing you how to pivot and strategically position your brand successfully in the marketplace.

This session will teach banking executives:

  • How to identify new growth opportunities on the edge of conventional boundary lines in the banking sector
  • How to shape new value propositions for consumers whose expectations of banks are increasingly set by organizations outside financial services
  • How to adapt and proactively develop strategies more commonly used by non-traditional competitors
  • How to create competitive differentiation by creating digitally-enabled omnichannel customer engagement
  • How to develop new analytical capabilities that utilize non-traditional data sources

Deposit Growth & Retention Strategies in a Falling Rate Environment

Adam Stockton, Managing Director at Curinos

With falling rates in the forecast, many bankers are breathing a sigh of relief. But rate sensitivity is not going away, and competition for deposits will remain challenging in 2024 and beyond. In order to win, banking executives need to ensure consistent and accurate measurement of deposit value — which deposits are worth spending scarce marketing dollars to acquire, and which are worth using rate to defend?

This session will show you how to tackle the specific deposit challenges you’ll face in a falling rate environment. You’ll see how the right CD strategy will balance retention and interest expense, and how to contend with checking and low-cost savings deposits as they migrate into higher-cost MMDA and CDs.

This session will teach banking executives:

  • How deposit value will shift and evolve over the next two years
  • How to build a plan that maximizes deposit efficiency in a cost-constrained environment
  • The tactics financial institutions have used to drive above average deposit growth at below average cost
  • How to avoid attrition of valuable deposits, and the specific risks associated with pricing down in a falling rate environment
  • How banking providers need to recalculate their marketing ROI in an environment where deposit value has increased

Engagement Marketing: Taking Data-Driven Personalization to the Next Level

Digital advertising can be expensive, and the ROI is often disappointing. Banner ads like “Open a Savings Account” and “You’re Approved for a Credit Card” have click rates below 1% with conversion rates that are worse — even with effective modeling. That’s why financial marketers have personalized interactions with insights tailored to individuals based on their transaction data. But that’s just the beginning.

This session will show you how to take your personalization strategy to the next level. You’ll learn how to go beyond the basic “advice + insights” personalization model by augmenting offers with evidence that demonstrates how customers will benefit from taking action. You’ll see real-world examples in banking, and the positive impact this advanced personalization strategy has on customer engagement, loyalty and profitability.

This session will teach banking executives:

  • How to combine personalized insights with evidence-based offers into an ultra-effective, hyper-efficient marketing strategy
  • Why customers respond better to an offer when they feel it is in their best interest
  • How to effectively deploy Personalized Engagement Marketing offers that can double conversion rates
  • Advancements in data analytics that make Personalized Engagement Marketing possible
  • Best use cases for Personalized Engagement Marketing
  • The martech stack to deliver on Engagement Marketing

Jody Bhagat

Jody Bhagat
President at Personetics

Liz Wolverton

Liz Wolverton
Head of Consumer Banking and Brand Experience at Synovus Bank

Marketing & Leadership Lessons from the World’s Most Influential CMOs

Eric Fulwiler, Co-Founder & CEO at Rival

If you could sit down with the world’s most successful CMOs, what could you learn? That’s what Eric Fulwiler did. In this session, Eric will share the insights, big ideas, leadership lessons, and habits he learned while interviewing 100 notable CMOs from some of the biggest brands in the world, including Mastercard, PepsiCo, Procter & Gamble, and GE. You will also hear principles and practices driving the careers of CMOs at category disruptors like Mint Mobile and Hyperloop.

This session will teach banking executives:

  • The attributes and qualities it takes to be a world-class CMO — innovative, creative, agile, and adaptable
  • The mindset and habits of all great CMOs, regardless of their industry or their company’s level of maturity
  • How successful CMOs demonstrate the impact of marketing on their organization’s bottom line
  • How the best CMOs build and maintain strong brands
  • How effective CMOs build consensus and collaborate with adjacent departments
  • How any marketing leader can apply the lessons and insights of world-class CMOs

Next-Generation Retail Delivery Strategies in Banking

For the last 20 years, retail delivery strategies in banking have focused on redirecting expensive branch traffic and contact center volume to lower-cost digital channels. But today, retail delivery is about more than just improving efficiency and cost savings.

This session will address the complexity of rapidly changing customer behaviors and expectations, as two former banking and fintech executives show you how to improve the service experience in banking with research-based delivery strategies.

This session will teach banking executives:

  • How to create a next-generation delivery model with a go-to-market strategy that will differentiate your financial institution from the competition
  • How to effectively integrate the three pillars of future delivery — digital tech, martech, and outreach — to create a personalized experience
  • Proven methods to determine, forecast, and support a self-service sales model that grows business across relevant target markets
  • How to grow business across relevant target market segments and create revenue based on more than price
  • How to build the right strategy from a combination of options including traditional delivery, fintechs, and embedded finance
  • How to pick the right investments and partnerships needed to remain relevant in the marketplace

Sam Kilmer

Sam Kilmer
Managing Director at Cornerstone Advisors

Jim Burson

Jim Burson
Partner at Cornerstone Advisors

Who Attends The Financial Brand Forum?

One third of the 1,000 biggest retail banking providers in the U.S. attend, and more than 1 in 5 attendees are senior-level decision-makers in the C-suite.

See Attendees

Data-Driven Strategies to Optimize the Retail Banking Experience

Kurt KlassenKurt Klassen, EVP at LEVEL5

When it comes to your retail delivery model, there is no margin for error — literally. You need a deliberate, holistic approach that ensures you’re headed in the right direction for 2024 and beyond.

This session will show you how to effectively reimagine the components of your retail experience, including branch design, CX, staff roles, and technology. You’ll learn how to orchestrate a data-centric retail strategy that balances the local market preferences, branch models, demographics, and technologies required for success.

This session will teach banking executives:

  • How to differentiate your experience from competitors by aligning your network strategy around customers and the markets you serve
  • How to identify future markets, recognize local demand for banking products and services, and ultimately what that means in terms of loan and deposit growth
  • How to understand the performance of your existing branches, and how to identify the coverage model and branch types that will best serve your target audience
  • How to accurately gauge the performance of your existing branches, and how to identify the optimum location for your branches to fuel future growth
  • How to identify concentrations of your best and most profitable customers in both existing and new markets
  • Innovative technologies you can seamlessly integrate into your branch environments and differentiate your experience from competitors

Digital Identity Verification: A Competitive Advantage for Banks & Credit Unions

Sara Seguin, Principal Advisor/Fraud & Identity Risk at Alloy

As digital banking strategies have become increasingly sophisticated, financial institutions are forced to address a complex array of new challenges surrounding identity risk. But effective identity verification should do more than mitigate fraud. It should help fuel growth.

In this session, Sara Seguin, the former Head of Enterprise Fraud Strategy at KeyBank, will share the challenges and lessons she’s learned implementing streamlined and efficient digital identity verification processes. She’ll show banks and credit unions how a seamless and secure digital onboarding process can become a competitive point of differentiation that attracts more customers.

This session will teach banking executives:

  • How to solve for identity risk across the customer lifecycle while cultivating a strong digital user experience
  • How banks can use verified customer data to offer tailored financial products and services, increasing cross-selling and upselling opportunities
  • How to cultivate a partnership between the Business and Fraud/AML teams to effectively increase growth and revenue opportunities while mitigating risk
  • How to implement real-time fraud controls that give you the clearest picture of your customers’ identities at onboarding
  • How identity verification can be expanded beyond traditional compliance requirements

Maximizing Customer Lifetime Value Through Financial Wellness

Vibhas Ratanjee, Senior Practice Expert/Finance at Gallup

When a financial institution helps improve people’s financial wellbeing, it fosters trust and loyalty. Customers who receive valuable financial guidance are more likely to stay with their banking provider for future financial needs, significantly increasing their lifetime value (LTV). Furthermore, as customers become more financially stable and confident, their increased banking activity translates into more deposits, lending opportunities, and increased investment activity, which in turn boosts your revenue.

This session will show you how to turn a financial wellness strategy into a growth engine for your financial institution. You’ll see case studies illustrating how banks, credit unions, and fintechs have leveraged a financial wellness strategy to increase customer engagement and improve their bottom line.

This session will teach banking executives:

  • The three pillars of a financial wellness strategy — digital adoption, channel consistency, and high-quality conversations surrounding financial advice on wellbeing
  • How banks need to define “financial wellbeing,” and why financial wellbeing is entirely centered around consumers’ emotional relationship with money
  • Key strategies for driving a higher sense of customer wellbeing
  • How improving customers’ financial wellbeing translates into greater cross-selling opportunities (e.g., higher interest rates for savers, investment platforms, or debt consolidation loans)
  • Innovative third-party tools and white-label platforms that banking providers should consider integrating into their financial wellness strategy
  • The latest trends on the state of financial wellbeing in the banking sector

Redefining SEO in the AI Age: Roles, Goals & Metrics for a New World

Wil ReynoldsWil Reynolds, VP Innovation at Seer Interactive

SEO has been an elusive target for over 20 years, forcing financial marketers to continually pivot and develop new skills. Get ready for the ride, as we show you how AI is going to completely rewrite the rules of the SEO game yet again.

In this session, you’ll see the crucial role SEO will play on your bottom line, how AI
is going to reshape your content strategy, and how to time your investments accordingly. We’ll also teach you how to track your visibility in AI-powered search as we explore the impact of generative AI on search platforms and what that means to your financial institution’s web traffic.

This session will teach banking executives:

  • How to protect your brand and ensure you maintain maximum visibility in AI-powered search engines
  • How to track your competitors who are producing and ranking with AI content and how you compete with them
  • How to benchmark competitive threats and relative market share on AI-powered search platforms
  • How to detect when your customers are hitting inflection points in their use of AI-powered search vs. traditional search engines
  • How to uncover new sites and different tools your customers will be using to find answers

Using Gamification to Drive Growth in Banking

John Findlay, CEO of LemonadeLXP

Are you ready to level up your growth strategy game? Dive into the world of gamification and learn how to leverage its power to achieve a range of growth objectives. From acquiring new customers and boosting deposit growth to driving digital adoption and usage, enhancing financial wellness, and motivating staff to become growth champions, this session will cover it all. Get ready to unleash the power of gamification to drive growth at your financial institution.

This session will teach banking executives:

  • How to acquire new customers through gamified marketing programs — from captivating challenges to personalized incentives
  • How to turn prospects into customers who are eager to engage with your financial institution
  • How to boost deposit growth using gamification techniques like goal-oriented savings challenges and interactive rewards systems
  • Innovative approaches to driving digital adoption and usage using game-based marketing and education tactics
  • How to teach and promote financial wellness through interactive challenges, empowering customers to make informed decisions and achieve their financial goals
  • Performance-based incentive strategies, gamified training, and recognition programs that engage and motivate staff to become proactive drivers of growth

The Future of Open Banking & The Customer Retention Challenge

Alex JohnsonAlex Johnson, Founder of Fintech Takes

For decades, banks have prioritized acquiring new customers over retaining existing ones. Loyal customers who felt this was unfair weren’t likely to close accounts in protest, because switching was a such a hassle. But that’s about to change. Advancements in open banking technology will make switching banking providers as easy as pressing a button.

Traditional financial institutions who have relied on inertia as their primary retention strategy are in for a massive wake up call. In this session, you’ll see how open banking is challenging traditional banking providers, and why they will need to work harder to retain customers by offering better, more personalized and automated financial services.

This session will teach banking executives:

  • How financial institutions must completely rethink customer loyalty and retention in the era of open banking
  • Why consumer permission will be the key that unlocks improved customer retention
  • Where the opportunities for product innovation will be in a more competitive market
  • How generative AI can (and will) play an increased role in consumers’ product discovery and research processes
  • How open banking may continue to evolve (past the initial 1033 rules) and the threats and opportunities that this evolution will pose

The Ethical, Legal & Strategic Risks of AI in Banking

Lance SenoyuitLance Senoyuit, Senior Principal/Financial Services at SAP

Everyone has heard about the opportunities and promise of AI in banking. And everyone has been cautioned about the unintentional discriminatory bias that can be baked into AI algorithms (think: “accidental redlining”). But what about the other risks?

This session will explore the potential downsides of AI in banking. You’ll hear scenarios your risk mitigation team needs to plan for — the ideas criminals and malicious actors are plotting right now, from misinformation/disinformation campaignss to spoofing and phishing attacks.

This session will teach banking executives:

  • How AI can be exploited to harm bank and credit union brands — directly or indirectly
  • How AI-powered models can yield unintentional but devastating outcomes
  • The privacy, security, and regulatory risks presented by AI-powered tools
  • How a platform like AutoGPT could be leveraged to inflict harm on a specific institution and/or the wider banking industry
  • The brand and reputational risks associated with “deepfake” technologies
  • How to anticipate, address, and ward off these threats
  • Where AI presents KYC and GDPR risks
  • How artificial intelligence could be leverages to launch DDoS attacks

Earn CFMP Continuing Education Credits at the Forum 2024!

Attendees may earn credits to maintain their Certified Financial Marketing Professional (CFMP) certification. The Financial Brand Forum has been approved for 23 CFMP credits. (Please note: Attendees must self-report with ABA to obtain their continuing education credits.)

The Evolution of Branch Banking: Lessons from Retail Innovators

Kevin Blair, CEO of NewGround

Has digital banking killed traditional branches? While brick-and-mortar branches are no longer a necessity for many modern banking consumers, it’s not about eliminating retail locations. It’s about how the stores you retain in your retail portfolio adapt to consumers’ needs and preferences in the Digital Age.

To find the path forward, banks and credit unions must look for inspiration in other verticals. In this session, you’ll see how retailers like Starbucks, Microsoft, Panda Express, and Blue Nile use retail branding, storytelling techniques, and breakthrough marketing strategies to attract and engage modern consumers.

This session will teach banking executives:

  • How to fuel growth by embracing new ideas and borrow innovative retail concepts from outside banking
  • What brick-and-mortar strategies are thriving in the Digital Age and why
  • How retailers and businesses in other markets engineer their physical experience to draw in new consumers
  • How inspirational ideas from other retailers can be applied to banking in practical and tangible ways
  • How to integrate local culture, demographics, and evolving generational perspectives into your retail strategy

Human-Centered Connections: Customer Engagement in the Digital Era

Becky Smith, EVP/Chief Revenue Officer at SECU ($4B)

Consumer communication and interaction preferences are intricate. Financial institutions need to strike a delicate balance between high-touch and digital with a strategy that factors how and when people want to communicate, bank, and receive information.

This session will go beyond traditional boundaries, providing actionable insights to transform your communication strategy across the entire customer journey in both the physical and virtual financial realm. Demonstrating positive impact on Net Promoter Score (NPS), referrals, and deepening customer relations.

This session will teach banking executives:

  • Techniques for creating an immersive brand experience with a focus on human connections
  • Insights into reducing your organization’s operational costs and environmental footprint through optimized engagement strategies
  • The importance of choice in communication channels, and the specific channels people prefer for different types of communication
  • How the right combination of high-touch and digital interactions can foster trust and credibility in the financial sector
  • How to analyze data, demographics, and past interactions to segment your audience based on their channel preferences
  • How to leverage people’s communication preferences to boost cross-selling opportunities
  • Metrics and KPIs to measure the success of high-touch and digital integration in driving growth

Unlocking What People Really Want from Financial Brands on Social Media

Mark McDonnellMark McDonnell, Social Media Strategy Expert at Hootsuite

Anyone who works in banking knows: you’re in the relationship business. But the brutal truth? If people don’t like the content your financial institution is putting out on social media, they will take active steps to avoid it, and most platforms make it easier than ever to put you on “mute.”

This session will show you how to avoid the common pitfalls banks and credit unions make with their social media strategies explores. You’ll learn how financial marketers should utilize social media channels to foster relationships and create engagement at scale while staying compliant and keeping their brands safe.

This session will teach banking executives:

  • How to create entertaining content that financial consumers will actually engage with on social platforms
  • Steps to mitigate social brand risks and increase the security of your social media assets
  • Real-life financial brands that are succeeding in social channels (e.g., Monzo, Chime, Wealthsimple, TD, and others)
  • The importance of balancing AI and the human touch to keep your financial brand as authentic as possible
  • How to ensure compliance and brand safety concerns don’t suck the life out of you and your social media campaigns
  • Key metrics for tracking the success of your social media campaigns

Grow Your Bottom Line with a Guaranteed ROI

If you don’t come away from The Financial Brand Forum with at least a dozen big ideas that will grow your brand and your bottom line, you can have your money back — no questions asked.

Money-Back Guarantee
The content on this page is dated. But you can take a look and see what happened at last year’s conference.