It’s Spring: Time to Grow Your Online Bill Pay

Author: Lauren Gleim, lgleim@jackhenry.com

Tomorrow is the first day of spring, warmer days are coming, and I can hear The Beatles “Here Comes the Sun” playing in my head. Spring is the time of year where the world is a little brighter, and what better way to celebrate than to do a little sprucing.

You may be asking, “How can I grow our online bill pay?”  Here are three helpful ways to spring your online bill pay adoption:You can do it all.  It’s spring!  Brighten up your financial institution by planting those online bill pay seeds for your customers.   

1. Employee Engagement – You want to increase your online bill pay adoption? Start with your financial institutions’ best asset: your staff. Because you can’t sell what you don’t know, why not train and encourage team members to use your online bill pay?  Employee engagement will lead to customer engagement. It’s a win-win. 
2. Social Media Platforms – Your institution may be leery of sharing on social media sites. However, the best forum to have a conversation with your customers is through these platforms. Engage with your customers, educate them, and share the benefits of using your online bill pay.
   
   Spring into action by utilizing these popular social media sites:
    
• Facebook – World’s largest social networking site connecting people with “friends.” Every business should start with this one. You can even track how many people saw your post with Facebook’s Insights Data.
• Twitter – This online social networking and microblogging site allows you to communicate the latest and greatest news with your followers. Announce your online bill pay, ask questions/opinions, and receive instant feedback.
• LinkedIn – Looking to build relationships and do some business networking? Share with other businesses about how they can utilize business bill pay. Your institution’s staff can connect, and share your information too!
• Google+ – This is a relatively new, Google-owned platform, but it is growing fast! It’s an excellent means to strategically interact with customers/businesses by targeting your audience through circles. Get people to +1 your post and drive traffic to your website.
3. Email Marketing– Email is still one of the best vehicles to use when communicating with customers. However, keep a few things in mind before you press send:
• Timeliness –Send out your communications at optimal times/dates.  Take advantage of sending timely emails when you know your customers are most engaged.  For example, when a customer enrolls in your product, send them a welcome email that day.  This email will not only confirm their enrollment, but it provides an opportunity to help them get started using your product. 
• Relevancy – If your customers are online banking users, then they are also likely to be interested in your online bill pay. Once a customer signs up for online banking, send them an email that explains the benefits and features of bill pay with a call to action to enroll.
• Frequency – Try to avoid sending too many emails. However, don’t send too little either. Test and determine the perfect email balance based on open rates.

This spring, do your institution and your customers a favor by sprucing up your online bill pay promotion. Don’t know where to begin? Check out iPay’s Resource Center. It’s a free service and contains materials focused on educating customers about online bill pay to help your institution grow.