The Momentum Effect: How to Ignite Exceptional Growth

Chapter 7. Power Offer Design

A Bank That Doesn’t Like Banking

For most day-to-day clients, recommending one’s bank is something like recommending the local tax collector. The easy joke is that they’re both unavoidable, they want your money, they gobble it like Pac-Man, and they leave you with the vaguely disquieting feeling of having been used as a disposable cash cow. Oddly enough, however, there is one bank whose customers like it so much they have become unpaid cheerleaders: 70 percent of them recommend it at least once a year. That’s the highest, most enthusiastic approval rate you’ll encounter for a bank anywhere in the world.

Its name? First Direct. This exceptional bank is a remarkable example of momentum created from a standing start. ...