1 year, 10 months and 23 days. That’s how long it’s been since my last post on Open Source CU. I would say I’ve had a bad case of writer’s block, or that my latest project has kept me exceptionally busy, or that we focus on clients first, but really it goes beyond that. Let me explain.

Our early vision for OSCU was to help credit unions use the Internet to take advantage of their inherent cooperative nature, both among themselves and, more importantly, between themselves and their members. In fact, here’s a quote from our about page:

Created as an idea exchange, Open Source CU is an outlet and resource for credit union leaders toward the goals of opening communications between members and management, using technology that fits the movement’s inherent cooperative nature, and converting marketing sales-speak into legitimate conversation.

As an early participant and observer of social media among credit unions, I’ve enjoyed seeing the community of innovators and enthusiasts that have found new outlets for sharing their ideas and inspiring others, whether through Twitter, their blogs, podcasts, or commenting on the posts of others. Truly passionate people like Shari Storm, Tim McAlpine, Matt Davis, and others have demonstrated how to “open communication between members and management” and “convert marketing sales-speak into legitimate conversation”. They’ve done the industry a tremendous service by sharing what’s worked and – more importantly – what hasn’t.

The challenge, and the reason for my personal absence on this blog, is that social media doesn’t really need OSCU as a cheerleader anymore. I’m proud of the role we’ve played in helping encourage a community of collaborative innovation, but the community has quickly grown to the point where it doesn’t need a centralized soapbox.

So where do we go from here?

Of the original goals of OSCU, the one I’d really like to focus on is using (or in this case, envisioning) technology that fits the movement’s inherent cooperative nature. While I may write a few posts about technology that’s already available, my plan is to introduce one half-baked idea at a time and then gradually shape a prototype based on your input. I fully expect that we’ll have to trash a prototype or idea completely and either start over or call it a bust, but I think we’ll learn a lot from the process.

The ideas introduced will be open source – if anybody wants to build a real product based on the idea then they are free to do so, and if a credit union or group of credit unions wants help implementing the idea then I’ll try and connect them with someone who can make it happen (or determine whether it’s something Trabian would like to tackle). Also, if a credit union, league, or other group would like to have a more in-depth, on-site brainstorming session then I’ll travel to them, schedule permitting and at my discretion, as long as they’ll cover travel expenses. I’m also planning a weekly Campfire chat to discuss the current prototype.

I have a few of these ideas in mind, and those of you who were at last year’s symposium may know which one I’m planning to start with. However, I’m always open for suggestions. If you have an idea for a product you think would be a good candidate for an online prototype, let me know in the comments.

I’m really excited about this and look forward to collaborating with you! In my next post I’ll introduce the first idea I’d like to work through and give more details about how you can participate in the process.

In the spirit of open source and cooperation, I thought it would be good to share a few tools and resources with readers that I have used or found recently on the web. All are free and easy to use with tremendous ROI.

Brand Monitoring and Research

“It’s about conversations, and the best communicators start as the best listeners.”
- Brian Solis, Social Media Manifesto

If you are going to embark on a social media campaign in the near future or even if you are not, you need to know what people are publicly saying about your credit union on the internet. Whether it’s news stories, blog postings (good and bad), tweets from Twitter, etc. – you need to listen…and take action if needed.

Why? Aside from being aware of press coverage, if a customer calls your call center and has a bad experience, they can blog about it for the whole world to see. And Google loves blogs. If someone Googles your credit union and related keywords, that information can very likely go to the top of the search results. Not good.

So how do you respond in cases like that? How do you even know when you need to respond? “With honesty. And if they put thought and effort into their post, it deserves a response,” says Vancity’s William Azaroff in a great blog post on the subject.

Google Alerts

Now you can Google (& Google Blog Search) your credit union name every day, but that takes time and a good memory. What you need are internet spies – meet Google Alerts. Google Alerts takes keywords that you give it and emails you any mentions of those as frequently as you want it to, searching the web, news, blogs, and even videos somehow. Many of you more savvy readers probably know about this tool already, but I was surprised recently at a recent social media presentation I was giving when only half the credit union marketers in the room raised their hands when I asked if they’ve heard of Google Alerts. And those of you that use the tool know that it’s worth repeating.

Some ideas for keywords:

• Your credit union name (in quotes so it doesn’t pick up every mention of every credit union in the world)
• Local competitors names
• Your credit union name + “sucks,” “awesome,” “customer service,” “complaints,” etc.

TweetBeep

What if someone talks about you on Twitter? You don’t have time to spend all your time typing your credit union name in Twitter Search. No worries – meet TweetBeep, which proclaims itself “like Google Alerts” for Twitter. It’s pretty neat – you can get email updates every hour and have a lot of control over what you want it to search for.

In addition to the keyword ideas above, you might also want to get a alert on TweetBeep for “credit union” + your city or surrounding area. Many people like to tweet, “Anyone know of a good credit union or bank in so and so?” What a great opportunity for you to tweet back “Check us out – we are a non-profit financial cooperative that is safe, sound & secure. Let me know if you need more info” or something similar in your own voice.

Yelp

How is your credit union being reviewed by others at yelp.com? I recommend checking the site out periodically or setting up an RSS feed to see what and how reviewers are rating your credit union. Use the feedback to amplify or retool your services.

Additional Tools

Local Business Center at Google Maps

Ever do a Google Maps search for a business and see that little pin pop up with more information? Did you know you can edit and add to that? Do it here for your credit union and any branches. Upload relevant photos and videos, web address, specify search categories, business hours, and much more. That way if someone searches Google Maps with “bank or credit union + your city,” you are ensuring accurate and relevant information is displayed.

Google’s Search Engine Optimization Starter Guide (SEO)

Here is another Google tool because, well, Google knows a little something about the internet, people use Google a lot, and almost everything they release is free. Do you want people to find your credit union and your web content in search results? Help members and non-members find you by optimizing your website and content for search engines – search engine optimization. There is a wealth of information on the subject on the web, but recently Google put together a nice little introductory .pdf with the essentials for you to download here. Once you understand the basics of SEO, you are on the road to better visibility.

Others? Tips? Tricks?

I hope you find these useful. If you have any other good free tools or have tips or tricks on the ones here, please add your thoughts. Together we are better

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Christopher Morris is the Web Manager for the CUNA Councils, a national organization for credit union professionals. Previously, Christopher was Manager of Communications & Information for the National Credit Union Foundation. As part of his marketing and public relations duties at the Foundation, Christopher built cuaid.coop, the first national online disaster relief fundraising system for credit unions. Christopher is also a blogger at the YES CU Blog: Serving 18-to-30s and a member of Filene Research Institute’s 30 under 30 group.

From David Armano’s Logic + Emotion :

Also, this graph looks like a frown.

Finovate, a fast-paced annual showcase of new financial startups, is happening all day today. Although I can’t be there, and wish I could, I’ll be keeping up with attendee (and presenter) coverage and commentary over Twitter using Summize’s #finovate08 stream.

Update (11:30am): Thanks to Caitlin Rosberg’s suggestion, click here for a broader Summize feed, including a search for #finovate08, #finovate, or finovate.

Also, click here to follow the Banktastics’ videos and presenter reviews.

Update (9/22): We’re done, and it was a fantastic event. Many high fives to William, Tim, and Gene for all of the work they put into it. Check out archived video from sessions by clicking the “On Demand” button in the video player.

Our CEO came for a visit today. He asked each member of our seven-person team this:

“What projects are you working on? What roadblocks stand in your way?“

A year ago, Cam said:

Being ahead of your own time is not a badge of honor unless the idea saw the light of day. Let this serve as a call to action to all the ThinkTankers, BarCampers, Bloggers, and organizations who have been spending too much time talking about ideas.

Roadblocks. At the lower levels of any organization, too often the roadblocks are constructed from above. “We don’t do business that way, so that idea won’t work.”

Or maybe they’re seemingly too tough to move. “The core system won’t do that.”

Remarkable organizations have visionary leaders who remove roadblocks.

Is there an echo in here or is it just me? Brent was kind enough to ask me (err, desperate to ask me?) to write a short post on what was on my mind right this minute in credit union land. Well, three things that are related and at the risk of sounding like the CU Skeptic, here they are:

One

“Being comfortable in our business is very, very dangerous” – Daniel Lamarre, President of Cirque du Soleil

Credit unions crave comfort and shall I say are built for comfortableness. Yes, I love credit unions and how they are structured so you can hold your angry comments. However, let’s dissect the structure real quick – a volunteer board of directors who at most credit unions love their role and have no incentive to rock the boat – a CEO that just might be approaching retirement (the statistics show that this is common in credit unions) who have no incentive to be innovative (come on, the regulators will grill us if we launch something new – so many questions) and a management team that is wearing so many hats that they can’t find the time to look at the long view. I base my assessment on my travels in speaking with other credit unions from all over this country.

On a personal level, I don’t experience this at my credit union – we have a progressive board of directors that keeps us challenged and stretching for the next milestone, and a CEO that expects innovation – not just curious, but expects it – big difference. I know there are many progressive credit unions out there doing amazing stuff.

My point with this first item is that there are numerous credit unions that I want to see stay around and they need to wake up to stay around. I have a belief that unless you have an idea how to solve a problem then don’t bring it up. So, my only solution to this is to drive paranoia and innovation from within – it needs to be driven from within ourselves. The current tough times in the economy present us with an opportunity to feel this sense of urgency and do something about it.

Two

Okay, so a credit union starts to feel paranoid and uncomfortable and they react instead of being proactive. Yes, react as in copy something verbatim in the spirit of “me-too ”. Folks, we can’t offer “free’er” checking. In my opinion, there is too much cookie cutter product offerings that are copied and launched with very little thought on what your members want or how they will see the new offering as relevant. Too many times a credit union simply just buys a new product from a vendor and launches it – differentiation is almost non-existent from the beginning and if it does exist it quickly disappears.

Going back to point #1 – we need to challenge ourselves to find niches (not just one but many) that we can serve in our markets with unique products and solutions. In today’s business world, things are moving at a record pace. It used to be that a company would find a new market and eventually would reach a success tipping point and then niches would be filled around this new market. Well, the business world no longer sits on the sidelines for the tipping point before niches are defined. Peer-to-peer lending is a real world example of this. Solution: look outside the financial services industry for inspiration, look and listen for local market opportunities where you can make a difference, and experiment in trying to fill these niche opportunities.

Three

Blogosphere friends – don’t take this the wrong way, but we need more voices in the conversation. It does feel like an echo chamber sometimes. We need more paranoid, uncomfortable, proactive experimenters coming to the forefront to tell us their stories (both the successes and the failures) so we can learn from them. Plus we need challenges to our own thoughts and actions.

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With all of that being said, I do want to let you know that I have been in my credit union career for 20 years now and I have never been as excited about the future as I am now. I just see so many opportunities – the hard part is prioritizing them and figuring out how to best seize them. I say we go make it happen and learn from each other – are you in?

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Doug is a co-founder and President of FORUM Solutions, and SVP of FORUM Credit Union in Fishers, IN. He is a credit union lifer who is paranoid and uncomfortable with the status quo.

The Filene Research Institute is putting on three free innovation webinars next month. From their blog (links added):

The 30-minute Webinars show how you can be an innovator at your credit union. Kent Sugg, Tinker FCU, Oklahoma City, and Maureen Maddox, Filene Research Institute, will present three Filene i³ innovations: MatriMoney®, Savings Revolution, and Prize-Based Savings. Find out how credit unions have rolled these out and how your credit union can benefit from implementation.

The webinar dates are:

• Friday, June 6 at 10:30 a.m. CST
• Monday, June 9 at 2:30 p.m. CST
• Wednesday, June 11 at 10:30 a.m. CST

I’ve said this before, but Filene’s collection of i³ projects are a goldmine of inspiration and innovation. And even better – they’re all open source ideas. Completely free to peruse, use, and abuse.

Update 6/3 You can register by sending an e-mail with your name, credit union and session you’d like to attend to Kent Sugg at kentsugg@filene.org.

Webinar space is limited, so grab a spot while you can.