Electronic commerce, say the experts, is all about the creation of value. Some call it "digital value", others "business value". They all agree, however, that electronic commerce can confer significant advantages to an offer. The possibilities are only limited by our imagination.
What value did e-commerce create in the financial services industry? And what technologies made it possible? These are the questions I set to answer when I scoured the web last week.
I stopped for directions at Ask Jeeves, an intelligent agent that lets you ask questions in plain English. Mine focused on banking and credit cards. I ended up by visiting ten large banks and two credit card companies in North America.
Well, Internet banking has hit the mainstream. You can view and print your account, transfer funds and pay your bills. In short, real- time transactions anywhere and anytime. Convenience aside, the underlying value here resides in the ability to transfer account information directly into personal financial management software such as Quicken. This has no equivalent in our physical world. If you have not tried yet Internet banking, I recommend the free test drive at the Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce.
Let's move to the information lane. Here, knowledge transfer characterizes the landscape. Some personalization features and attempts at engaging the client round up the scenario.
Knowledge: As you would expect, there is a wealth of product information. Long gone are the days where information on products and their benefits were scarce. In addition, calculators enabled by JavaScript or CGI (Common Gateway Interface) programming let you calculate mortgage and loan payments, explore different scenarios or plan your retirement, all with a view to aid decision-making. The Bank of Montreal has organized all such tools in a single location for ease of access.
However, unlike the retail sector, comparison shopping in the financial services industry is almost non-existent in Canada. A notable exception is Insure Xplorer, a service pioneered by CEBRA and currently restricted to insurance comparison in Ontario. This is not the case for the U.S. market where best rates for loans, mortgages or insurance can be obtained with a click of the mouse at Money.com.
Added value also takes the form of rich-education content and bi-directional information exchange to build communities and react to consumers' feedback. I particularly enjoyed Master Card University and plan to attend the Royal Bank's live chats on money issues.
All this leads me to wonder if electronic commerce is not after all the successful commercialization of knowledge management. But more on this subject some other time.
Go To Page: 1 2
