Independent Banker - July 2017 - 15

.COM, we decided to own our new
domain, " she says. " We wanted to
be one of the first banks in our area,
especially as a community bank, to
roll out a .BANK domain. "
First State Bank of Middlebury's
URL was FSBMiddlebury.com at the
time. However, with seven offices
in two counties, the bank had been
working hard during the previous four
years to demonstrate to its customers
that it was not just in one community.
" We wanted customers to know that
we are invested in all of our communities,
so we also made the decision to
do a website update and rebrand. "
Kauffman got a lead on a West
Coast website company that didn't
specialize in banks but did provide
excellent websites in general. " We
hired them to help us rebrand, " she
says. The bank created a new URL,
Bfirst.bank. The idea was to show its
customers in all of its communities
that it wanted to " Be First " in all areas
of banking, from electronic banking
and customer service to small-business
support and support for local
schools and other organizations.
Tech overhaul
Before the bank rebranded in August
2015, it introduced a person-to-person
(p2p) payment platform. " We
worked with our core vendor to
roll this out, " Kauffman says. The
platform allows customers to quickly
send payments to other people, and
its popularity grew from the start.
" People really do want to be able to
send money quickly, such as parents
who want to send money to their
children in college, " says Kauffman.
The platform runs as an ACH
transaction, so payments only take
24 hours or less.
One way the bank helped to market
p2p was, soon after rolling it out, to
create an in-house promotion for
the food pantries in its communities,
" People really do want to be
able to send money quickly,
such as parents who want to
send money to their children
in college. "
-DARLA KAUFFMAN, FIRST STATE
BANK OF MIDDLEBURY
such that customers could use p2p
to make donations that would go to
their local pantries.
Mobile banking is another technology
that the bank has embraced. It
learned from its marketing department
that about 89 percent of its online
transactions and logins were happening
through mobile devices, primarily
phones but also tablets, meaning that
few people were going online with the
bank via its desktop site.
" As a result, we wanted to leverage
mobile as much as we could, " says
Kauffman. " Part of this was to make
sure that our website presented itself
well on mobile devices. " The mobile
app has all of the bells and whistles
that customers expect, such as bill
paying, remote deposit, check images,
statements and p2p payments.
Also in response to customer
interest, the bank introduced Apple
Pay, allowing customers who prefer
to " have their cards in their phones
instead of in their wallets " to engage
in transactions. " The popularity of
Apple Pay has continued to grow
for us, and we are now working on
introducing Samsung Pay as well
as the Google product for mobile, "
Kauffman says.
First Bank of Middlebury's brickand-mortar
locations are also getting
some attention. Last year, the community
bank completely remodeled one
of its locations, including installing
interactive kiosks with touch screens
that allow customers to look up bank
product information, get rates, find
weather information and more. " This
location also has a 'Wow Wall,' which
consists of four 55-inch screens connected
to function as one, on which we
run ads, information on local community
events, customer testimonials and
more, " Kauffman says.
The future? " We are always looking
for new technologies, " says Kauffman.
" For example, we are currently looking
for ways to streamline account
openings, so we are investigating
online account applications, as well as
online loan applications. "
The key to all of it, she believes,
is to continue to identify customer
demands and respond accordingly.
" For all of this, we have strong
support from our board and top management, "
she says.
William Atkinson is a writer in Illinois.
independentbanker.org ICBA IndependentBanker 15
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Independent Banker - July 2017

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