Jack Rants: Live!

Helping bankers improve their sales conversations, marketing approaches, and sales leadership skills. This is Jack Grant's Live. Hello everybody. Welcome to Jack Rantz Live for a Friday, July 30th, a special day. And it really is a special day. And we'll talk more about that in, in just a couple of seconds because we have the guru of digital bank marketing with us. And I just wish you could have been in the, in the background here as we were getting ready to start this whole thing, because we were talking about PlayStation 5s and Metallica And dogs, and, and, and I'm sure it'll all come up as I interview my guest today. So welcome, and we're, we're absolutely thrilled that you are, uh, with us here today. Hi, Ashley, great to see you, and, and all the rest of you that have joined us for this very special edition of Jack Rantz Live. And, and what is it? Well, typically on Thursdays, uh, we get together with, uh, some of the industry's top talent, um, And we tried to do this in such a way that a 71-year-old who has no clue about technology could follow a script. And part of that script is, hey, authors on the first week of the month, typically, and we've got a great one coming up for you. The second week of the month, we do bankers. The third week of the month, we do consultants. And the fourth week of the month, we talk about digital. And so ABCD, I can remember that kind of stuff. So, um, who are some of our upcoming guests? Look, we've got, we've got the best of the best, uh, coming up. My good friend Larry Levine is going to join us. Larry wrote an amazing book called Selling from the Heart. And when you talk about authenticity and trust-based selling, Larry coined those phrases. So we're going to be with Larry Levine on August 11th. And then Jennifer Reisman is going to join us. Jennifer is the Chief Marketing Officer at Seacoast Bank down in Florida. Jennifer was named one of the top 25 most powerful women in banking by the American Banker recently, and Jennifer and I are going to talk about bank marketing. And so if you are a marketing professional, a CEO that's looking to improve your marketing, this is the program for you. And then my good friend, somebody we partner with at St. Meyer and Hubbard, Joe Friedman. from Zarin Friedman. And we're going to talk about negotiation skills. And that is one you're absolutely not going to want to miss. But today, today is the day. I met Eric Cook, our guest today, at the Indiana Bankers Association. I was speaking at the IBA's mega conference, one of the best state marketing conferences around. And I was talking to the organizers and I said, Hey, who should I go see? Because I got a little downtime. And they said, you gotta go see Eric Cook. And I saw Eric Cook and I was absolutely hooked. Eric teaches at a lot of banking schools. He speaks at every great marketing conference. You'll see him at the Financial Brand when it comes back, I'm very, very sure. And I'm really proud to have him on our faculty of GSB's Graduate School of Bank Marketing and Sales. And we'll We'll talk about that. He also is a coordinator of the Digital Banking School for GSB, and we'll discuss that as well. Now, to establish a little bit of credibility here, if you think that Eric is, yeah, who's this Eric Cook guy? St. Myron Hubbard doesn't do a lot of work with outside counsel, but we picked Eric Cook to help us with some projects, and he absolutely rocks it. Here's one other key fact, and I'm sure Eric's gonna talk about this today. In fact, You'll see the t-shirt in a second. About a year ago, around now, Eric launched something called The Linked Banker, and it's a subscription series for bank marketing professionals and others, and it's absolutely spectacular. So without any further ado, um, Eric Cook, join us. Glad to have you, Eric.

Hello.

Eric's got his 2 dogs.

I've been tapping on my webcam the whole time. It's hard to get a word in edgewise with you. So I want to know, are those your fingers on the typewriter in the intro? That's the biggest— that's the burning question that I have for you right now.

Whose fingers are they?

Yeah, are those your fingers? Is that your typewriter?

100%.

Of course.

And my son Adam did the intro. And so, well, I wanted to get a word in. I didn't want you to get a word in edgewise because I know when I start asking you questions, I'm not going to. Show your dogs, show your kids.

Yeah, we got it. So we've got one of them's, one of them's down there, the other one is, uh, so yeah, we've got, uh, moved into a new office space. We've got bare walls and probably a little bit of echo, but my wife doesn't have to listen to me jabber on from the spare bedroom any longer. So I've got like formal space and I'm looking to make it my own. So you'll, you'll see something in the background. I was, uh, having bookcase envy from Jack when he went live and much more of an attractive background than what you're getting from me here today, but that's all right.

Well, so you got me into this thing. You, you started this problem, uh, and, uh, we did this program for you on the LINC Banker one Friday afternoon, and I said to Eric, dude, this is really fun. And he walked me through how to do it, and we'll talk a little bit more about that as we go forward. But as I was saying in the, uh, In the intro, Metallica came up during this. Walk me through Metallica. You know, by the way, I'm not surprised, but walk me through Metallica and what do you guys do on the top of the hour here?

Yeah. So I was fearful because when Jack and I had our conversation, we went over an hour because the two of us just can't seem to shut up when we talk. But at 10:00 AM Pacific time, Metallica is offering a very special coupon code only for 5th member fan club members for a second chance drawing at a 40th anniversary show that they're having in San Francisco in December. And I have Ticketmaster loaded up on my other screen with the coupon code and my credit card preloaded, um, and, uh, at At 10 a.m. Pacific, which is one o'clock here in Michigan, I'm jumping on and my brother and I we try to go to a conference, a concert every year as our Christmas birthday combo. We both love music. He actually has musical talent. I just love it. And so we haven't been able to do that for the last several months thanks to COVID, and we're both big Metallica fans growing up and continuing on into our older years. So. I surprised him with a screenshot of the fact that I got— my number got pulled for the lottery, and I'm gonna fight like heck to get in, and we might be in San Francisco in December. So any bankers that are also Metallica fans that happen to be part of the 5th member fan club that would like to spend some time in San Francisco, look me up.

So that's just great. Well, Amber, my producer Amber and I were talking with you about her desire to get a PlayStation 5 for her twin boys and all the things that you have to go through these days.

Yeah.

I can remember a long, long time ago when I was a kid, if you wanted to get tickets to the association or whoever it is, you had to call into a radio line and you kept calling and calling and calling. and call until you'd be the 15th caller. It's a lot— it sounds to me like it's a lot more sophisticated now.

Same concept, but yeah.

So now you got to use technology, which I'm not terribly familiar with, but you are. You're the son of a bank president, you were a banker, and now you're one of the top consultants in the world around digital marketing. Talk about that transition. That must have been really interesting and a tough decision to leave Community Bank.

Yeah, absolutely. So I am one of those accidental bankers, and I meet lots of those where they start in banking just because they got that job while they were in college or something that they decided to do. And the next thing you know, they're in it for 10, 15 years, which was the case for me. I returned back home after college. My intent was to get away from Marshall and away from banking. The only banking that I ever really did while I was in high school and younger was mowing the lawn and trimming hedges. And I've got the stitches, scars from that to prove it. So I really didn't have any desire to go into banking 'cause I didn't really understand all that it was. My father was very much the traditional banker, the mortgage community guy. And when I came back and took what I thought was gonna be a short-term job at the bank, Started as a teller and I really enjoyed the interaction with the customers. And then I got into marketing and technology, some compliance, some operations. And I realized that it wasn't all just numbers because accounting was really not my thing in undergrad. I got through it, but that was one of the necessary evils of getting your degree. And I realized that not everything in the banking world focused on, you know, debits and credits and making sure that you balance at the end of the night. There was a lot of other opportunities. And when we started to digitize the bank, I talked the bank into buying a computer, a Gateway 2000. It came in the black and white Holstein box from South Dakota, and that had America Online pre-installed on it. And I would go into the bank, and I had some special privileges because my father was the CEO, so I had keys and I could go in. But I was spending evenings and weekends kind of nerding out on America Online in chat rooms, and that's before hanging out in chat rooms on a weekend wasn't like a creepy thing to do. But I taught myself HTML. I started playing around with this thing called the World Wide Web. And in 1995, I launched marshallsavings.com as a $65 million community bank with 2 offices in little Marshall, Michigan. And we got customers that came back to us and said, who did your website? It's better than Michigan National Bank or the credit union. And we really like it. We've been thinking about maybe getting online and having a website for our business. So I started building websites on the side while I was a banker, and I did that for, you know, 13 years. And in 2007, there's a lot of other stuff that went on in between there, but in 2007, I stepped away from banking and I made the decision that I didn't want to be the CEO of a publicly traded bank. My father had done that very well. He retired 2 years prior after a merger, and I didn't want to move into that spot. It was more regulatory and compliance focused than what I wanted to do, and I really started seeing an opportunity for this digital space, this internet, this information superhighway is what it was called back then, of a way to be able to build relationships with one another. And I saw this as being a way to use this technology for good and being able to help other community bankers use it as a way to connect with their communities and to tell their story. And not just to advertise, but relationships and credibility and all the stuff that we do from a WSI perspective, as well as what we do over at The Linq Banker for individual bankers. So there's a lot more in there that I could unpack, but I know we've only got about half an hour, so.

Well, it's a great story. And I think you're right, accidental bankers are many of us.

Yeah.

But good for us because we have that passion for the industry But yet we can kind of stay a little bit distant from it and be able to help in any way we can.

Sure.

And speaking of help, one of the things we want to talk about today is digital marketing. So you could riff on this for days, and you do it at some of the great banking schools that you teach at.

Absolutely.

What's digital marketing today in banking?

You know, it's really a hard term to pin down. I often hear it referred to as SEM or search engine marketing, but that's not even really a one-stop-meets-all. When I think of digital marketing, I think of ways to engage and interact people through digital mediums, and that can be through your website, for example. And then you get into things like search engine optimization, organic visibility, content creation, conversion strategies and landing pages, and Google Analytics and all the metrics that go into that. But then you get outside of your bank website and you start thinking about ways that you're building awareness and visibility in search, through advertising, through promotions, through video. And then you get into social media. Social media has banking-related advantages. So the bank, the brand, the organization itself. But now what we're really starting to talk about, and this is where I think you and I are two peas in a pod, is figuring out ways that individual bankers can help represent themselves in the best possible way Because my father has said it when I started, you, you want to make people think of you as their banker, not somebody that just works at the bank. And it's the credibility, it's the relationship, it's the friendliness, it's the helpfulness, it's the guidance and the counsel. But we're starting to try to get people to think about how they can do that electronically. So digital marketing also conveys into that brand building, relationship building. Sometimes it's referred to as social selling, but I don't even like using that because You're not really out there selling products and services. You're just trying to get people to know and like and trust you as an individual. And maybe even like is too gentle of a word. We want people to fall in love with us because they see us as a valuable resource. And wherever Jack goes, I'm going to follow him. And some banks make that a little uncomfortable because if my lenders get really, really well respected and connected with their clients and then that lender leaves, maybe that book of business floats along with them. And that's, that's a scary prospect. So then you have to figure out how do I create an ecosystem that makes bankers want to stay here and support them so that they can do that? And even though that doesn't really sound like marketing to me, that's marketing as well. So it's a, it's a pretty broad net. But from a digital perspective, I think there's just a lot of things that fall into that digital marketing, digital relationship building topic.

Well, and Eric made an interesting point that I want to make an editorial comment on. And I, he, you know, I got through accounting and all this kind of stuff, but here's what you need to understand. If you work with Eric and his team, not only are they incredibly creative, but there's a lot of backend analytical stuff that they can do to really help, which is really, really important. So you need to know that. I'm wondering, because we were talking about analytics, I always look at zero-sum games and I think it's interesting how sometimes people look at it. It's like it's all digital or it's not, none digital. Where is traditional advertising now in banking, Eric? What are you seeing? Because I got to believe you have to blend those together.

Yeah, well, and it depends on the organization. It depends on their strategic priorities. You know, I'll often get asked, you know, what's the best mix? What's the best platform? What's the best social networking, you know, site that I need to be in? And you can't really answer anything absolutely until you figure out what the institution, the organization really wants to accomplish. I know some banks that their customer base is an older customer base. They might not be active on social media. They don't spend a lot of time in the business community. They're traditional. Community bank with a retail residential focus, they don't need to spend time on LinkedIn. Maybe the newspaper is the best place for them. Maybe the local radio station, maybe the local television, because that's where their customers are actually paying attention. Before you pick your media, you need to figure out where your customers are at. It's like fishing. If you want to go out and catch some fish, you have to know where the fish are swimming. You can't just go to the part of the lake that you think has got the prettiest view because that's where you want to go. And in the social world, that would be, well, I want to go to Instagram because I like pictures and sharing information. If there's no fish swimming there, it doesn't matter how great it is, you're going to come home with an empty boat. So you need to think about where those customers are swimming basically, and then figure out what's going to be attractive to them, what is going to be engaging. And there's some institutions that they've shifted and most everything is digital. And there's some that still have 50 or more percent of their advertising. Now, what you can do and what we've started seeing some incorporate is a digital component to traditional, and QR codes are kind of coming back. I don't know if the skinny leather tie is going to make the same comeback, although I am a proud owner of many of those in my day. But the QR code, because most of the devices that we have today will automatically— you don't have to download a separate scanner in order to do that. You can take a printed media element that goes in front of one type of client, but if somebody else happens to see that and they're more digital focused, they can scan that. That can be tied to a referring URL with some special analytic code attached to it, and you can now start seeing, well, how many people are actually visiting our website or coming to our landing page as a result of a printed piece of material that they happen to come across, or a poster that's in our lobby, or something that's a QR code in the drive-up as people are waiting to get their transaction done, which is what a lot of bankers had happen during COVID And, you know, those can go out to video links and personalized messages from CEOs, and you can blend those offline and online advertising and promotional methods But you got to think a little creatively and how are we going to be able to measure some of those things?

Well, you talk about QR codes and I interact because, as you know, Adam works for me, my son, and he is really good at websites and different things like that. You talk about QR codes and about the second or third sentence that I talked to Adam about when I asked him about websites, it's lost in translation on me. So you've got these veteran bankers out there who have traditionally kind of come up through the ranks as a chief marketing officer, who have done a lot of traditional stuff. And now all of a sudden digital is kind of foisted on them, I believe. And we're getting calls and banks saying, when should I get a digital marketing specialist? So I'm gonna throw that question to you because we do sales training, we don't do marketing.

Right.

question as well. When do I get a digital marketing specialist? How big should I be to have that? And if I, if I need one, where do I find them?

Well, I'm gonna avoid the obvious self-serving answer, and I'm just gonna leave that as an unspoken. Um, but I will tell you, the banks that we work with as an agency, we work with a lot of banks that are a billion and under. And many of them are to the point where they just simply don't have either the commitment yet or the budget to be able to bring a digital person on full-time. They have a marketing person that might be occasionally helping out with some loans or maybe even running a teller window on occasion or helping out with some branch activities. I think all in all, the marketing profession in banking is getting a lot more aware and knowledgeable of the digital marketing and the strategies that are out there. There's no shortage of training opportunities. You can go, uh, to Facebook Blueprint and Facebook will teach you everything that you need to know about Facebook ads, Instagram ads, Facebook analytics, running a page. But there's also a lot of other banking stuff that you need to do as well. So I would say once you get over a couple of billion in assets, that's when we start seeing opportunities for us as an agency at least on the digital side, not as great because they've got a very competent team that they've built. They've got somebody that's got Google Analytics certification or Google Ads certification. They've got a web developer on staff that understands HTML and Java and CSS. But underneath that, I think finding someone that you can bring in, not just as a vendor, but as a partner, and it certainly doesn't have to be us. There's a lot of great agencies out there that I'm friends with people that are in those agencies. But you want somebody that comes in that's not just going to be the technology vendor. You want them to understand your bank, your culture, your strategic objectives. You know, when we have conversations and we start talking, we're, we're talking about things like what's your ideal targeted persona, what's your customer profitability, what's your key objective, what's the onboarding experience like. Even though we don't do any of that within the website per se, We need to understand what that process is like, because if we're delivering people, I want to make sure that they've got things in place. And a lot of the people that are in this space that do it really well will know where their expertise starts and stops and when they need to make an introduction to say, you know what, this is a great time for me to introduce you to Jack because I don't do sales training. I do a little bit on the LinkedIn side and we talk about relationship. But if you want to do hardcore sales training, I'm going to point you to Jack over at St. Meyer and Hubbard, or I'm going to introduce you to somebody that does customer profitability, or I'm going to introduce you to a site that does online account applications or onboarding or any of those sorts of things. And making sure that you've got someone that's connected in the industry but also understands your big picture objectives. I think those are even more important questions to ask is, do you have the right partners? Because then you get into digital banking and fintechs and cores and third parties. Partnerships are so critically important, and that's one of the things that it really taught me growing up in banking. We were too small to do any of this stuff ourselves. I needed my core processor to have my back. I needed our debit card processor. I needed all of these people to make me look good.

And building that team is, is really at the heart of what I think makes a community bank successful, is that Well, and I think you make a really good point to bank marketers who need to make sure that they have an analytical approach. A lot of CEOs are ready, fire, aim kinds of people.

Yeah.

We need more of this. We go get 'em, tiger. And I remember when you started with us, you sat down here in my basement for 2 days and you worked with our team and you put us through some pretty rigorous exercises about the company that we wanted to be.

Yeah.

We asked you to come here to help us with our website. I think it's really important as a marketer. One of the things we talk about at the Sales and Marketing School is the marketing person getting to the C-suite. You want to get to the C-suite. It's not just taking an order to put an ad on LinkedIn. It is, what's the strategy? Where are we heading as an organization? Well, I want to ask you, speaking of heading, You do a lot of stuff on LinkedIn Live and podcasting, and you're so good at it. What are you seeing for community banks and what advice do you have for them around getting into podcasting and doing this on a regular basis for their bank?

So podcasting is on my list of I wish I did it and not did it better because I've not pushed a podcast out Um, that is an area that I would love to get into. I'd like to be able to take these live streams, be able to strip out the audio. Um, Madison, who's our community manager over at The LINC Banker, her and I have talked a little bit about after some of our mastermind sessions doing a little kind of an Oprah after the show recap and spinning that off as a little teaser podcast, because we talk about a ton of really great things on those mastermind calls I don't want to give it all away because that's part of the membership that the Link Bankers get. But to be able to put something out there that can still add value and help a banker with an idea or an aha or a moment, I would say first and foremost, listen to podcasts. You know, James Robert Lay's got a great one. Jim Maru's got a great one. JP Nichols has got a great one. Natalie Bartholomew, the Girl Banker. I'm not a girl, uh, and I'm not a banker anymore, so I can't be part of her community. But I see her information, her posts, her podcast, her guests. Even if you're not a girl banker, she's sharing a tremendous amount of stuff. And she's the marketing, um, you know, head kind of in charge of operations and whatnot for her bank, um, and does a great job. And it's building her brand. So I would say for bankers, just go out and just Go to Google and just do a search for bank podcasts, and you're going to get a ton of them. I did it just before the show, and the whole screen just lined up with podcasts, and most of those I've already subscribed to. And just start listening to some, because some of them are related more to marketing and strategy, some of them are more fintech. There's a lot going on in the world of fintech, and while some of that might be outside of a bank marketer's wheelhouse, understanding the influence of neobanks and alternative ways of connecting and engaging with customers and different transactional trends will spark thoughts and ideas of how you can position your bank to make sure that it's remaining relevant, which might be maybe a good segue into the Digital Banking School with the Graduate School of Banking. But I would say before you think about trying to do one, make sure that you're listening to them first and educating yourself can give you a sense of what it is that you wanna talk about and then If you want to have a podcast, make sure that it's something that's really focused on your audience, not just, hey, today we're going to talk about this product or we're going to talk about this service. Really get in the head of who your target audience is and what their concerns are and what they want to know, sometimes even beyond banking, because if you provide that value, you're going to endear them to you As a banker, as a professional, as a trusted source of information and a guide, not just somebody that, you know, hey, on today's podcast I'm going to tell you about another bank product. Nobody wants to listen to that. I hate to say it, but it's just the reality.

No, they don't. And but, but to your point, uh, and we have a lot of bank marketers on here watching you today and listening to you and your expertise. I was on LinkedIn yesterday morning before I went out and played some golf and And I was watching a Comerica Bank LinkedIn Live program, not about a product, but a how-to. If you're in small business, what are some things you need to be thinking about? So I think we make a mistake in banking in saying, oh, these LinkedIn Live programs, this is just for consultants and et cetera. No, this is, this is great stuff that your customers demand and really do wanna see. Speaking of see, I see your LinkedIn Linked Banker t-shirt there. I remember a couple of years before you started this program, you had the confidence enough in me at dinner up at GSB one night to say, hey, here's what I'm thinking about, let's toss some ideas around. So I know this was a couple of years in the making, you've had it up and running for a year. Talk about the Linked Banker, it's a great concept.

So first off, I wanna give a big shout out to folks cuz I'm seeing in the chat thread over here, I see a number of Linked Bankers. Um, Mary, I had no idea that you were a Metallica fan, so— That's scaring me now. She's scaring me. It is, yes. So, uh, Mary, keep your fingers crossed for me that at 1 o'clock I will magically be the owner of 2 tickets, um, to either the 15th or the 17th of December out in San Francisco. So yes, there we go. Excellent. Good, good, good. She even threw the guitar emoji in there, so that's awesome. So 2 years prior to getting the Link Banker off the ground, I attended Social Media Marketing World out in San Diego with Social Media Examiner and Michael Stelzner. That's another podcast that I listen to. Doesn't have anything to do with banking, but it's all about social media and trends and what's going on in the world of social and digital. And Pat Flynn from Smart Passive Income and Will It Fly and a bunch of others, was the closing. And he talked about in his last session really building raving fans and how do you find your tribe and what were you really put on this earth to do? What's your expertise? What's your passion? And as I was sitting there in the audience, the light bulb went off in my head. I'm like, it's banking. It's banking and it's helping bankers figure out ways to do this. And the conversations that I had with bankers after banking schools and conferences Of somebody coming up and going, "Yeah, man, you nailed it. I I understand what a hashtag is now, or now I get why LinkedIn isn't just a resume farm." And they got really excited after they heard me speak, which was awesome. But then I would run into them at another event later in the year or the next year. I'd see them online, and it'd be crickets. There's nothing there. Nothing's going on. And the problem that I saw with that was they would go back to their organization and it wasn't that they didn't want to continue to do it, but they got sucked into that vortex of sameness that they were doing before they left and went to the conference. And we all experienced that. We go to a conference and we come back and maybe 20% of that we can actually implement and everything else stays in the book on the shelf and it's a great idea, but we just never have time for it. And the idea of the Linked Banker just popped into my head and I actually got on Wi-Fi on Delta when I was flying back to Michigan, and I reserved the domain name and bought it and did a mind map and a brainstorm. I'm like, I'm gonna do webinars and this and this and this and this, much like the mind mapping exercise we went through in your basement for St. Meyer and Hubbard. And the whole thought was, I'm going to build this community where bankers that really want to take the bull by the horns and say, I'm going to do this, I want to create a safe space for them to come do it with me. And with other bankers that want to do it together. And so we've got over 25 bankers now. We're just closing in. August will be our one-year anniversary. The team here at WSI, you know, was very gentle, but sometimes not. Like when the pandemic hit, they're like, boy, wouldn't it have been great to have had a community that everybody could have hopped into in like March or even April? And I was a huge sufferer of analysis paralysis. I wanted the best platform. I wanted the best this and this. Finally, I just said screw it. We're gonna pull the trigger, and I'll figure it out as I go along. And so we launched the Link Banker, and it's been it's been awesome. We do monthly mastermind sessions. We've got CEOs, marketing directors, commercial bankers, branch managers. I got to play matchmaker. With bankers, I think, if I'm not mistaken, we've got one of them that's on the show, put them together, and then we're able to create a job opportunity. But we're talking about stuff that helps bankers be that banker, connecting with their community, being relevant, sharing information, not coming across like a sales pitcher. It's just been, it's been awesome. And so we've got our own little version of Facebook on a community platform to chat back and forth. All of our sessions are recorded. So when you join the Linked Banker, you get all 12 months worth of stuff plus special sessions. You're in there, you're the October. I refer to that a lot and we'll sometimes send little snippets because the conversation was great and we still talk about it. But it's just this mastermind community. It's less than $50 a month. Lots of really great stuff that people get access to. And if you try it for a couple of months and it's just not your cup of tea, you're too busy for whatever reason, you can, you know, take off and we'll give you your money back. And so it's not like it's a forever thing either. So we just want it to be an environment that bankers that really say, you know what, I need to figure this digital thing out and I'm not getting it from my own organization. I want to be part of a group that also is there to support me and help me. Um, we've created that safe space, and I've got even bigger plans for, for the next 12 months. And I'm just so tickled that it's taken off and has gotten the reaction that it has.

Well, every time I, uh, I talk to my friend Ken Bostwick, who I, I do work with at Lakeland—

that's awesome—

client of ours, uh, sickeningly he says, now before we talk about what we're going to discuss, let me tell you what Eric did. And it's just sickening.

Terrible.

And it's so good. You know, I've been on the program. I'm a LinkBanker person. It is absolutely fantastic. So I'm glad you did it. It's a time when we need to network with each other and we need to share with each other. Sure, we're competitors in some ways, but we can learn from each other. And learning from you is great. And speaking from learning, one of the things that you referred to is the Digital Banking School. We're both real advocates of banking education, and I know Byron Earnhardt is on here, and he's terrific, and his school down in Tennessee is fabulous. So education is really important. We're real fans of GSB, and GSB has several specialty schools. And one of them is the Digital Banking School, Eric. When's the next one, and what's that all about?

Well, we haven't scheduled the next one, but in 20— so give you a backstory on that. 2019, um, good friend of mine from Market Insights, Joe Sullivan, uh, had a conversation with Kirby and then shared the conversation with me, and then I pulled in JP Nichols. So it's kind of like the Three Amigos here, and then we bring to Kirby and we said, we're seeing a lot of banking events Talking about digital banking, they'll have a breakout session, but there's really nothing that really dives deep into that. So we started the genesis of the Digital Banking School, and to my knowledge, I don't think there's really any other formal school program like that. Some of them talk about it, which is great, but we ended up developing the Digital Banking School. It's delivered over 8 sessions. It talks about fintech compliance, cybersecurity culture, which is a huge deal. One of the things that that most people think about digital banking, it's all ones and zeros and whether you're a Jack Henry or a Fiserv. It's got more to do with culture and the people that are resistant to change and fearful of doing things electronically and letting go of what you've done for the last 20, 30, 40, or maybe even culturally 100+ years and learning new skills and tactics and bringing on different people. But it's been a really, really amazing journey. We've gone through 4 school programs, over 200 banker— individual bankers delivered entirely virtually. Bankers can have people sit around the board table or join remotely. So 2020, we kicked it off. Uh, uh, '21, we had 2 sessions in March and May, and we're still trying to figure out, okay, is fall when we need to redo it again? Because we don't want to oversaturate it, but but we also understand this is a real need for a lot of bankers to figure out. 'Cause in most people's minds, when we talk to them, they think of a digital banking initiative as I've gotta spin off a completely different entity like Redneck Bank, for example, and be a completely different brand and completely separate. When in reality, your business model probably is gonna benefit more from figuring out how you can digitize some of your traditional stuff And gain the best of both worlds because a community banker can still do that personal touch, come to the office, we're here to see you, sit down for a cup of coffee now that we can get together. But if you can layer on that digital element that some of the neobanks are presenting, you've got a one-up on them and starting to figure out how we can do that either ourselves or identify strategic partners to do that. And what are the risks? What are the challenges? What are the pushbacks? Because being inside of that banker box and doing the same thing we've always done is a very comfortable place for a lot of bankers. And we got to break that in order to get outside of what we've always done. And sometimes that can happen, sometimes that can't. But it's been, it's been a really fun experience and I've met a ton of great bankers. As a result of it, and I've learned a boatload from the other presenters that have been part of the program.

Well, and you talk about oversaturation, and that certainly can be true. The challenge, of course, is that if we don't continue to do this, digital banking moves so fast.

Yeah.

New things that you could be left out if you're not kept informed.

Yep.

Eric is a coordinator of the Digital Banking School. I'm the coordinator of the Sales and Marketing School. Eric is one of our instructors at the Sales and Marketing School. He'll be teaching digital marketing at that school. We have Amber Farley, who's joining us this year for the first time. Amazing, amazing in branding.

I can't wait to see her again.

Oh, it's great. Alicia Webb is gonna— is the vice chairwoman of Village Bank up in Minnesota. She's gonna talk about how to get CMOs to the CEO level that executive table. Tom Hershberger, our good friend, talks about ROI. I'm going to talk about sales. Uh, we've, we've got some really, really excellent instructors. October 4th through the 8th, there are only a few seats left. And one of the neat things— I don't know how this works at Digital Banking School, but at Sales and Marketing School, we only have 50 people maximum. We really keep it intimate.

Yeah.

We are live. It's going to be at the Fluno Center in Madison. And you're gonna buy me dinner when I see you. I, I'm really looking forward to seeing you. It's been way too long since we—

Yes, and, and I'm bringing cash because the last time Jack and I had dinner in Madison, neither one of us had cash. I had to leave my iPhone as collateral to prove that I would come back. I had to go back to the Fluno to get cash, um, to, to be able to pay for our dinner. So We'll either go back to that same spot because it was kind of a cool vibe, but they didn't take credit cards, or we'll find someplace else. But I'm really excited to be back in Madison. I love Madtown, and, uh, I went there as a banker and graduated from that program in 2003. And it's always great to be back teaching there as well because it gives me another excuse to get back into, into the Madison environment. So looking forward to seeing you there.

Well, me too, Eric. Just absolutely terrific to chat with you today. One final thing I always ask everybody, you mentioned a few of them. Who are you following? Who do you read books? And if you're reading books, who are you reading? Give us—

Yeah, so organizationally speaking, we're actually going through the process of implementing EOS, the Entrepreneurial Organization System, WSI Corporate. Embraced that about 4 years ago and introduced it into our Top Gun section, which is part of the Top Guns community, which I'm in as a performer within the WSI ecosystem. So EOS, I've actually known one bank that's actually implemented EOS within their organization, and it's about developing processes. So that's one of the things, but the other book that I'm actually reading is Building Your Brand Story by Donald Miller. And in that, it talks a lot about how do you put your customer as the hero of the story and you are simply the guide to help them get there. And when you think about the type of material that a bank is typically posting or sharing, a lot of it is, hey, we're hiring, or hey, look at us, we just made a donation, or hey, here's what we're doing. Instead of how do we put the customer as the hero and make it feel like they are the, the one that we're actually— and at the end of the day, that's what we're trying to do as bankers. But I don't know if the story is really being painted that way and communicated, and then that's the way that it's being interpreted. So I think we're missing the boat there. And we're actually doing a web project right now with, uh, with a community bank, and one of the folks at the bank is actually reading that book. So we've had some really interesting brand story. Hey, does this really put the customer as the hero, or are we putting ourselves as the hero? Let's take a step back and rethink the message, rethink the imagery, rethink the, the tone of our material. That's a really good one. Doesn't have to be just a marketer. I think that's a really good strategic, uh, element. Um, and of course, you— I mentioned James Robert Lay, Amber, Ben Pankinen over at Social Assurance does some great stuff, and he does a lot of live videos and other sorts of, uh, uh, information sharing. So I mean, there's, uh, there's a ton of people that I follow, and I'm excited to get back on the, the conference circuit so I can see some of those people in real, in real life and shake some hands and give out some hugs. So it'll be really cool.

Yeah, airplanes aren't gonna— are, are missed in, in the Hubbard family for sure.

So I, I have my I'm off to Maryland for their banking school, and I've not been on an airplane since February of last year when I went to Nebraska. So I hope I remember how to do it.

Yeah, it's a, it's a new world, and you're, uh, banking is very, very, uh, very fortunate that you're in it. So my good friend, thank you for doing this program. I really, really appreciate it, and I'm looking forward to seeing you in October.

Cool, sounds good. Excellent. Well, thanks for having me on the show. I love your Jack Rants. And I know you joke about being an old guy that doesn't get technology, but you fake it really, really well. So kudos to you and keep up the great work, man.

Well, thanks. There's a way to reach Eric Cook, and really appreciate it. Thanks again, Eric. Go get your Metallica tickets. Good luck.

Yep. See you later. All right.

So this was a little longer Jack Rantz Live, but I think Eric and I could have gone a long, long time, and I think the people that were in the room and still are in the room really got a lot of benefit out of the practical help that Eric provided. He mentioned— he was kind to mention Jack Rants, our private LinkedIn group, and we sure hope that you will be very, very open to joining the group. This is my latest rant. We called it CEC. And CAC basically stands for cadence, accountability, and commitment. And it's an interesting article about a story that when a bank executive called me. So if you're interested in joining the hashtag rant pack, get me a message on LinkedIn, connect with me for sure, and I'll get you a link to this free and very much growing community of bankers who really enjoy kind of an irreverent look at marketing and sales. So that's it, everybody. It was a great, great program. Join us October or August 11th. August 11th is our next Jack Grant's Live where we'll have my good friend Larry Levine on. And we really, really look forward to that. Thanks to Eric Cook for his time and sharing his talents. And thank you for, uh, for joining us today. Until next time, this is Jack Rantz Live, and we'll see you.