Most community bank executives blame performance pressure on regulation, rates, or talent shortages. Top performers don’t.
In this week’s video, Roxanne Emmerich delivers a blunt wake-up call: overregulation isn’t the problem; execution is. Every bank faces the same regulatory environment. Only a small percentage choose to operate above it.
Top five percent banks stop complaining and start playing offense. They price loans for value, not fear. They build funding strategies anchored in non-interest-bearing deposits. And they execute a repeatable performance system, regardless of who’s in office or where rates land.
Here’s what separates the winners from the whiners:
Premium pricing beats volume chasing when your credit discipline and value proposition are aligned
Low-cost and no-cost deposits are built intentionally, not accidentally
Top performers operate from a franchise system, not hope, hustle, or heroics
The market always rewards banks willing to execute at a higher level. It punishes those waiting for conditions to improve.
If you’re ready to stop reacting and start running your bank like the top five percent already do, this video will challenge your thinking and your excuses.
Discover how elite banks win inside the same constraints you face.
Watch now.
Are we overly regulated as an industry? You better believe it. And yet, when I get my CEOs together on Fridays, many of them are the top five percent performers in this country.
One of them said it best. He said, “You know what? I don’t care who gets elected. I don’t care who does whatever, because at the end of the day, I still have to go out, make some loans, bring in deposits, and make a profit for my shareholders. So all I can do is just do what I do best in a world of crazy.”
That’s a really good attitude. I got a lesson that day.
Stop whining about the overregulation.
Stop whining about the interest rates.
Stop whining about how hard it is to get people.
Go get good people. Go understand that all of your competitors have the same overregulation you have—and get on with it.
At some point, we’ve got to pick it up, put on our big boy pants and big girl pants, and get out there and get it done.
The world is always creating space for those who make good quality loans at premium pricing and bring in non-interest-bearing deposits to fund them. Those are the ones whose names end up on the door.
If you keep complaining about overregulation—unless you’re going to get in there and fix it, which for many of us you can’t—here’s the thing:
Overregulation will continue. But all you’ve got to do is make premium-priced loans and bring in low-cost or no-cost deposits, and the world is your oyster.
Join me at the next Breakthrough Banking Blueprint™ Bootcamp, where I’ll show you the blueprint the other top five percenters use.
They weren’t top five percenters until they discovered it.
Why wouldn’t you want the franchise system that has taken hundreds of banks to top five percent performance? If they can do it, you can do it.
Am I going to see you there? I hope so.
Can you give them what they need to succeed? Not unless you’ve created a franchisable system to help them duplicate your success.
Here are the seven crucial elements of building a franchisable system in your own bank:
The coming bank consolidation isn’t a surprise. It’s been predicted for years. In fact, the next 18 months are destined to be a major “shake out” period when weak banks will be acquired or closed—and banks that are in a position to capture the best customers in town will become stronger and more profitable.
Culture asks, “Will your people leap over tall buildings in a single bound to make sure your client is successful in their business or personal financial goals?” “Will you go beyond bank “product” to create Unique Selling Propositions that rock their world and cause hundreds of thousands of dollars of impact for them? And will your people have fun doing it so that your system is sustainable?
Ready to stop wasting your marketing dollars and grow your profits and safety with a predictable model of organic growth of top and bottom lines?
Thousands of bank executives are waking up to 2013 saying, “SALES training! Of course! It’s SALES training we need.”
Yeah, well sometimes the first thing that pops into our heads isn’t a keeper. Sales training is fine, but it’s NOT what you need to solve your problem and create a sustainable solution.
So you’ve decided to acquire another bank. For nearly 25 years, I’ve been giving the same advice about acquisitions: DON’T DO IT. I’ve had good reason to give that...
Growing a bank isn’t some mysterious process that involves tea leaves and oracles. It’s more like building a house or tuning up a car’s engine, with a power tool for every step and a hand tool for every part you need to work on. Effective builders have a “franchise system”—the proven best way to do things that minimizes mistakes and maximizes results per hour spent.
The process begins with one crucial step: Find out what matters to your best customers, then build hundreds of Unique Selling Propositions (USPs) around those components and list them explicitly in your marketing materials.
Most banks focus on what they should do. That’s a good thing. But too few seriously evaluate what they are currently doing that has to stop. Awareness of the common characteristics of low-performing banks can keep you from falling victim to any of these practices before you join the group.
Let’s start with the first four:
Let’s face facts. You know it is true. Banks stink at sales culture.
Most say they’re working on it…but most have been “working on it” for three decades now