How to Maximize Relationship Depth
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Why do banks spend over $400 to acquire a new account only to lose half within a year?
Your bank and credit union probably spends over four hundred dollars to get a new account. Then you watch nearly half of them go dormant within a year. My guest has built his entire company around closing that gap. Harai Kulsa, who's a co-founder and CEO of SwayStack, and he's one of few people who really understand account activation or primary account ownership better than him. You know, we've we've been friends for a long time. We see each other at a lot of conferences, but we're really going to get into today something that everyone who knows me knows I'm very adamant. About, and that's how to get the 30 days going on not just an onboarding process, but more importantly, an activation and engagement process to make account valuable.
So, hurry. You know, as I mentioned, you spent your career on getting new accounts activated from your lending days through MK Decisions, your time at Alchemy, and now Sway Stack. What made this problem worth building a brand new company around?
Yeah, Jim. So when we started SwayStack, we opened accounts with banks and credit unions of all sizes and our inboxes were completely empty. There was no guidance on how to activate the account, how to fully utilize it. To make matters a little bit more challenging, when we finally stumbled into digital banking itself. There was also no clear account setup guide, no instructions on how to move over our primary banking relationship. So we asked ourselves, you know, what was the business impact of this? Came across one of your articles in the financial brand calling out over 40% of accounts open, going inactive, with over a $400 cost of acquisition. So we started surveying community banks and credit unions early days when we were getting.
Sway stack going. We thought we might be a cross-sell or engagement tool. And then they said, hey, the products that are being opened aren't going utilized. And that's a huge negative business impact to us. Before we focus on cross-selling a second or a third product, help us get the first product fully operational.
You know, it it's interesting because we just did a I just did an insight video on this. Is that when a person's opening a new account, I think in our minds in the financial services industry, we think, oh, this is a brand new account like in the world. The reality is probably the second or third account this person has. They may have had an emotional moment. They said, doggone, I'm leaving my organization. I'm open an account here. But As you said, that moment of opening, in some cases, the easiest part is actually using it. And as you mentioned also, it's not like you get any notification. You were looking for notification that something happened and you didn't get it. How about those people that aren't necessarily looking for it?
If you're only reaching out once to say thank you, that that's not even that's not even table stakes. That's that's less than table stakes. And I think that we forget that, you know, it's not just signing up for direct deposits. It's not just a one-step process. And, you know, as I mentioned, nearly half of accounts go dormant. And what's even worse is less than half of organizations really have a active onboarding process. Where does this go wrong from the financial institution's perspective?
Yeah, I think it comes down to the gap in the data flow. So after an account gets opened, you know, maybe it gets booked to core. And then the account opening system will send a welcome email congratulating the customer for getting that new account. We're seeing some of the newer account opening systems create email drip campaigns after that initial account opening. So they are doing better at community. Communicating more frequently. But then again, you know, maybe 300 to 400 institutions in the nation are using those best of breed account opening solutions. So what about the other 8,800? Those folks, either they're one day late or two days late picking up the data from the core and maybe sending a manual email.
We're seeing some folks who are still having their uh in-branch uh customer service.
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Chapters
8 chapters
1
Why do banks spend over $400 to acquire a new account only to lose half within a year?
0:01–5:12
2
What problem did Har Rai Khalsa discover that led him to launch SwayStack?
5:12–11:06
3
How does SwayStack’s product‑specific onboarding differ from generic welcome emails?
11:06–18:01
4
Why is the first 30‑60 days critical for turning a new account into a primary relationship?
18:01–23:23
5
What strategies does SwayStack use to drive account funding and direct‑deposit adoption?
23:23–29:43
6
How can banks use transaction data to personalize “re‑boarding” campaigns for existing customers?
29:43–34:51
7
What measurable lifts (e.g., 5% deposit increase, 71% opening boost) have clients seen with SwayStack?
34:51–39:49
8
What immediate actions should a financial institution take today to improve account activation?
39:49–41:59