Andhra Bank has been in the business for over 85 years now. From being perceived as a regional bank with presence mostly in the south especially Andhra Pradesh, it has come a long way to be recognised as a technology-savvy bank with a pan-India presence. It is now undergoing a rebranding exercise with Dolphin as its mascot.
Leveraging on this new initiative, the bank is planning to roll out an aggressive campaign from the first quarter of this fiscal. Says RS Reddy, chairman & managing director: ?Having a mascot for the bank is a new idea. Many banks have tried rebranding by changing the logo and things like that, but this is a new experiment.? A beginning has been made, but lots more need to be done to achieve the desired objective, he said.
?We are in the process of finalising a signature tune for the bank, too. Some documentaries have already been prepared linking the mascot with the bank. The idea is to use Dolphin in all our campaigns and advertisements to promote the bank and its products. All the existing products would be reviewed and relaunched wherever necessary and even new products would be launched keeping in mind the mascot,? he said.
Right now, the bank is using outdoor advertising for the branding exercise. In the coming months, it would go to the visual media for promotion. As the bank focuses on the branding exercise, it is also equipping itself with technology and new services and products to take on competition.
About three months ago, the bank had put in place a real-time offsite surveillance system, which is more like a dynamic monetary system. The system would send out signals if things do not happen as per the norms. For instance, if debits in a profit and loss account happens more than the set threshold limit at the branch level, it would be flagged immediately and get sorted on a real-time basis. The system is still at the evolutionary stage. ?We need to improvise on it. We will have to set threshold limits for every segment of a banking transaction at every level like debits in a P&L account, deposits, etc,? Reddy said, adding that the bank?s core banking solution has enabled the setting up of the system.
This would be of good use as it would bring in a lot of transparency and also improve the productivity of every employee. ?Andhra Bank has changed over the years, but the basic values are still intact. It has been in the neighbourhood all these years, but unfortunately, people were not completely aware of products and services offered by the bank. Today, the bank has upgraded its product and services line-up as also the human resource to offer customers an experience of banking with a foreign bank or a private sector bank. We have a plethora of products and our branches are completely networked. We offer services like internet banking, RTGS, NEFT, online trading of shares and even mobile alerts. In fact, about 10 lakh customers of the bank have been registered for the mobile alert services,? he added.
The bank has set an ambitious target of achieving a total business level of Rs 1.5 lakh crore by December 2010 as against Rs 1.18 lakh crore achieved by December 2009. While the focus is on improving the performance numbers, emphasis is also given to improving the skill sets and productivity of the employees as lot of cross selling of products happens at the branch level. ?I want to institutionalise whatever that has happened in the bank in terms of products, processes, systems so that if there is a change in the leadership it does not hamper the growth of the bank,? Reddy added.