Business Value Creation Through Branch 2.0

Many business thought leaders are exploring strategies to leverage their branch assets to increase revenues and improve the branch office customer experience by mitigating branch office constraints. These thought leaders are collectively thinking in terms of Branch 2.0, which from a real estate and staffing point of view is a smaller footprint but rich in information technology (IT). Branch 2.0 offers a solution to the business challenges of staff skill levels, right here, right now customer transaction requirements, broad lack of loyalty thanks to increased competition and using the large branch office footprint to up- and cross-sell customers while gaining new ones. The communications industry is driving new value in branch offices with Branch 2.0, which leverages communications and IT to remove the above branch office constraints and improve corporate performance. The combination of business and communication technology trends is creating the next generation branch office. The Branch Office 2.0 concept and its associated business value are developed in white paper available for download at http://lippisreport.com/2008/08/business-value-creation-through-branch-20/ which contains industry recommendations so that business and IT leaders may exploit it for corporate advantage. We use retail and financial services as examples, but Branch 2.0 may be applied to any branch or store facility in any geographic theater.