ABA School of Bank Marketing and Management
May 15 - 22, 2012 • Southern Methodist University, Dallas, TX

School Overview | Application | Curriculum Year One | Faculty
 

2012 Curriculum - Year Two

Asset/Liability Management
The largest contributor to a financial institution's profitability is the balance sheet. This profitability does not come without risk. Asset/liability management is the process of understanding the implications of customer behavior, managerial actions and interest rates on the balance sheet and subsequent earnings. Once that understanding is accomplished policies can be developed to enable the institution to operate within acceptable guidelines relative to the risks taken. Methods to monitor these risks are set in place. Strategies are then developed to optimize the earnings capacity of the balance sheet while staying within acceptable parameters.

Course Objectives

• The dynamics of the bank's balance sheet
• Basic ratios of a financial institution's performance and how they interrelate
• Interest rate sensitivity and it's implication to a financial institution's risk profile and performance
• Strategies to assist management and the board of directors' in the management of a financial institution's interest rate risk
• Understand how liquidity plays a key role in the financial flexibility of the institution
• How marketing can be a part of the asset/liability management process.

BankExec^TM
Using a dynamic, interactive learning strategy that maximizes the group experience, this computer program simulates the activities of a mid-sized commercial bank allowing participants to make decisions regarding a variety of bank management operations. Working in bank teams and competing against other teams, participants make "quarterly" management decisions that are recorded in the computer. Their results are reflected in "quarterly" bank financial statements. Each team immediately sees the effects of its decisions reflected in their bank's financial position and stock price.

Course Objectives

• Apply both the financial and managerial skills necessary to effectively manage a bank
• Experience "real world" competition while practicing "real-life" job skills (decision-making, financial analysis, communication, goal-setting, risk-taking, teamwork, etc.)
• Make the connection between the bank's products and services and the key performance indicators for bank clients
• Apply theories and assumptions about factors that affect a bank's performance in a protected environment
• Develop rapport with bank clients based on a common understanding of banking terms and issues.

Commercial Business Development: Building Business Banking Partnerships
Trust-based selling is the only way banks can optimize a return on their greatest asset – their clients. This course puts marketing professionals in the center of the business development process from sourcing leads and prospecting, to executing pre-calling strategies and making calls through using LIP (Lasting Impression Positive) to add lasting value to commercial partnerships. Using a case study, students will experience an initial call play out from sourcing to booking.

Course Objectives

• Analyze the sales process and the nuances of each call in a long-cycle sale
• Review sourcing and prospecting strategies that have the greatest impact on success
• Discuss key factors in efficient call planning
• Use a sales conversation model to generate curiosity and increase the likelihood of getting back in the door
• Create follow up strategies that add impact and value.

Digital Marketing
The Internet has rewritten the rules of business, creating a dramatic shift from traditional media to a fast-evolving menu of interactive strategies that offer immediate, measurable results. Today's highly competitive financial services environment has accelerated that change as banks demand more accountability for marketing dollars than ever before. With this increasing emphasis on integrated digital strategies, the opportunities for marketing professionals and banks with Internet expertise have never been greater.

This course provides an overview of digital marketing, including website usability, Web 2.0, web analytics, search engine optimization (SEO), and pay-per-click advertising. It provides the foundation to help students to develop, implement and evolve integrated online strategies to maximize their marketing budgets.

Session Objectives
After successfully completing this course, students will understand concepts and processes to:

• Build a knowledge foundation and set goals
• Understand online marketing risk management and potential compliance issues
• Create and manage Internet marketing policies and strategies
• Align digital strategies with brand
• Integrate digital marketing into existing/traditional marketing strategy
• Measure success

Effective Marketing Leadership
The course is designed to help students develop their leadership skills. The students will learn how to position the marketing team to be leaders. This course will provide students with strategic thinking about how to best engage peers in the workplace to achieve desired outcomes, and practical tips for implementing actions. The students will assess their Marketing Departments credibility in their organization and learn how to develop a plan to improve credibility.

Using the DISC as the basis for self assessment, the students will learn how their characteristics play a critical role in daily interaction with others in the workplace. DiSC is a model of human behavior that helps people understand "why they do what they do." The dimensions of Dominance, Influencing, Steadiness, and Conscientiousness make up the DiSC model and interact with other factors to describe human behavior. DISC will be administered prior to the school session.

This course will provide practical examples in which students can, armed with this information, make sound decisions.

Course Objectives
After successfully completing this course, students will be able to:

• Identify key leadership challenges and solutions
• Better understand their model of behavior and "why they do that they do" (DISC)
• Assess Marketing's credibility and develop a plan to improve credibility
• Identify key partners and develop a plan for building mutually beneficial partnerships
• Effectively manage people, relationships and interactions for results
• Gain practical peer advice to resolve situations

Leading Brand Strategy
Leading and activating a powerful brand strategy within a bank is the biggest challenge most bank marketers will face, and it is the most effective path to organizational fulfillment. To be successful, marketers must understand the fundamental concepts that comprise "brand," and lead bank management and staff through a defined organizational process that will culminate in internal audiences embracing their brand.

Successful brands influence thought and motivate desired behaviors. They reside in the mind and are both an institutional promise and an asset. Effective brands must reflect banks' business strategies. Brand attributes are the building blocks from which positioning concepts can be created. The brand positioning spectrum provides a comprehensive structure for organizing positioning concepts and identifying core brand assets. Aligning brand assets brings together the logic and the magic that result in the brand experience.

Bank employees are the caretakers of the brand. Education and motivation are required to create a common understanding among employees and to connect their personal values to the bank's organizational values. Employees become brand ambassadors when they are fully engaged in the bank's brand. Brand success is measurable through financial outcomes and research results.

Course Objectives
After successfully completing this course, students will understand the concepts and processes to:

• Build a knowledge foundation and set goals
• Crystallize a brand strategy
• Align brand elements
• Engage internal audiences to "live the brand"
• Measure success

Profitability & Strategic Issues
The information age has made available a wealth of data for financial institutions to utilize in managing and making informed decisions. Key to all of this is connecting strategy through the management ranks and ultimately to the front line. The ability to measure and manage performance of people, locations, delivery channels, products, markets, customers, etc., is also critical to success. This course will give marketing professionals the understanding of issues that directly and indirectly relate to the marketing function, as well as specific strategies and techniques to assist in better analyzing slices of performance, market areas and demographics, strategic direction, product offerings and each Bank's unique situation and issues.

Course Objectives

• The various types of management information being utilized in financial institutions and related support functions of information gathering
• Six phases to a comprehensive strategic planning process
• How to understand markets and opportunities, including important measurement components and metrics
• The integration and connection of information, strategy, and analysis with front line staff to successfully service, sell and perform.

See Year 1 Curriculum