When I was a kid, I remember walking to the local bank branch to open my first savings account. Our community bank was a kind of hub for much of our small town life. And I will never forget the big deal they made that day about my new account and the feeling that I had crossed into a new stage as I was growing up.
Many years later, I still work with the kind people in our banking community. While many of the people I know talk about the huge banks and their impact, just about everyone has a story about how a local community bank or credit union has impacted their life.
Anyway, thanks for inviting us at Cappusocial to join BankInnovation. We look forward to sharing stories and ideas about the power of social media and banks, coupled with the challenge of regulatory compliance.
I too, would disagree with you JJ and agree with most of the comments. As a habitual entrepreneur, innovation comes from a variety of sources – sometimes it’s building a better mousetrap (my personal favorite), sometimes it’s creating an entirely new market, and sometimes it’s simply a me-too. All have the potential for success.
I personally believe very strongly that now may be the BEST time for people to enter into the PFM market. What better time to embrace end-users fears than by supplying software that abstracts the financial institution from the software used to engage with said institution? You accurately state that facilitating greater transparency for consumers may be low on the list of Top 10 priorities for things needing fixing in banking. The companies you’re referring to aren’t trying to fix banking – and in most cases banks/credit unions aren’t the clients.
I believe that end-users want total and complete control over their finances and their data – which they don’t get from most PFM tools such as Wesabe, Mint and Thrive. Most of these tools only allow users to view their financial data but not manipulate it (make transfers, pay bills, etc.) I believe that the data belongs to the end users and that end-users should be free and open to manipulate their finances and their data using the software of their choice in real-time.
The major point I think financial institutions are missing when it comes to PFM tools is this: if financial institutions aren’t careful, as these personal financial management tools become more and more sophisticated, end-users will view the bank as “simply a place that holds my money” – as quoted from a recent Intuit press release for FinanceWorks.