Bank Marketing

Wachovia’s Savings Program: Way2Save

I just saw a television commercial for Wachovia’s new savings program called “Way2Save”. Its similar to Bank of America’s “Keep the Change” program, but instead of the amount of of change required to “round-up”, Wachovia transfers a single dollar from the customer’s checking account into a high interest money market account.

I believe Bank of America filed a patent application for their program. I’m curious to learn if the licensed the concept to Wachovia, or if they will sue for infringement of intellectual property.

These concepts are a great use of technology in my humble opinion, and I expect to see more of this in the near and long term future.

Wainwright Bank

Wainwright Bank has been airing some radio commercials in our marketplace, promoting itself as an environmentally conscious bank. However, they stop short of explaining how they are more environmentally friendly than any other banks out there. Compared to other industries, I don’t think banks are very damaging to the environment in general, so I’m not sure how effective this campaign is going to be, but they did capture my attention.

Valley Green Bank

This is an interesting looking bank I found in Philadelphia, PA. It has a very modern look to it, don’t you think? Their website has a much better picture of it. Check it out so you can see the full effect:

ING Direct Launches “Electric Orange”

Thursday, May 17th, 2007

I just got an email from ING Direct - they are launching a new product called “Electric Orange” which offers higher interest for bigger deposits, and even a MasterCard debit card for making purchases.

Electric Orange delivers all the features of conventional checking plus the speed and convenience of electronic checking:

Apply for your Electric Orange
today and start earning 1% Cash Back.

• It pays high interest
• 4.00% APY on balances up to $50,000
• 5.25% APY on balances between $50,000 and $100,000
• 5.30% APY on balances of $100,000 or more
• A MasterCard® Debit Card for purchases
• Free ATM access at more than 32,000 locations nationwide
• Free Bill Pay
• Automatic overdraft protection

(Annual percentage yields apply to your entire balance=2E All listed rates are variable and effective as of 5/4/07)

That’s right, from June 1, 2007 to July 31, 2007, when you open Electric Orange and use your MasterCard® Debit Card to make signture-based purchases, you’ll get 1% Cash Back, up to $250 per month, on what you spend, anywhere.

I used to deposit my money into ING Direct for many years, but now I use PayPal. For more information, check out our page on ING versus PayPal.