Dominic Larivée, VP of Marketing Planning and Execution at Desjardins, discusses the challenges of building and maintaining customer relationships, the advantages and limitations of digital banking, and the importance of human engagement, in an interview for the Qorus-Avanade report titled Balancing human and digital: Are banks losing touch with customers?
What are your roles and responsibilities in the bank?
Desjardins is today the largest credit union in Canada, with over 4.4 million members and 7 million clients. We cover every possible financial need, from everyday banking to loans and mortgages, business and institutional services, savings and investments, property and casualty insurance, and life and health insurance.
My role, as VP, Marketing Planning and Execution, focuses on our members and their personal financial needs. My group oversees a better understanding of our membership base, the products they seek, their expectations, the identification of short and medium-term marketing priorities and then defining all the relevant strategies and initiatives to answer our goals and to support our business lines.
We are focused on increasing our membership base, but also in developing our business relationship with our members, making sure that they always choose Desjardins when it comes to a new financial product or service, and then, of course, retaining these members throughout their entire lifecycle. So, we cover all the stages of life, from 0 to 99+. We bring to market all the initiatives that will support Desjardins’ growth and we relentlessly work on diagnostics, positioning and customer journeys pertaining to what triggers major financial needs, whether it’s buying a house, having children, getting through a separation or a divorce, or retirement planning.