ATMs Beat Other Marketing Methods: News from Wincor World

By marketing to customers through the point of greatest interaction with the bank -- the ATM -- Pireaus Bank, Athens has had an unheard of 35 percent response rate to its offers, attendees at Wincor World heard in Paderborn, Germany.

By contrast, Gavrii George, senior officer with Pireaus said, "The average response rate from direct mail is one percent to three percent."

Over the course of this decade, use of the ATM by the banks customers had grown to account for 45 percent of all their dealings with the bank, George said. "This raised the obvious question, 'Why shouldn't we use it as a marketing tool?" George told some of the 7,000 delegates attending the annual user conference of Wincor Nixdorf, a leading global provider of ATMs and related services.

Pireaus is expanding its use of personalized marketing offers on ATM screens outside Greece to the other countries in which it operates: Cyprus, Albania; Romania, and Egypt.

"Once the customer swipes their card, we know who they are so it makes the ATM a very effective marketing tool," George said.

However he cautioned listeners not to overdo their ATM marketing: "It's not comparable to web marketing where the customer can spend hours browsing around, so whatever you want to say you must be brief. You do not want to delay their transaction or make them think that their money is at stake. This is very important."