Online customer magazines leave more lasting impressions

The purpose of a customer magazine is to communicate with readers at eye level. But once the customer magazine is published online, great content is not the only thing to consider.

Usability has an important impact when it comes to starting dialogues with customers, just as readers expect the content to be dynamic. In Sydbank, the fourth largest bank in Denmark, the web-based possibilities of providing more than just static copies of print documents to customers are brought into focus. Palle Laulund, Head of Communication in Sydbank, explains why:

“What the users see online leaves an impression of the company. It’s our ambition to show that we lean over backwards, and to fulfill that the solution from Zmags is a great match. Using Zmags, we reach out to the target audience in an inspiring and user-friendly way.”

Online customer magazine as portals

Online media offers possibilities that print does not. First of all, there are more possibilities when it comes to interactivity and the expanded ways to communicate directly with readers. But it is not the plan to let interactive publications substitute for the printed versions of the customer magazine, Sydbank p.t. “Quite the contrary,” Palle Laulund states:

“Print and online are two widely different media. We see the online version of Sydbank p.t as a portal, where the readers get inspired and can quickly find additional information by clicking a link. In addition, interactivity is important to us; for example, when a reader sends a link to an article about investment advices to a friend. That behavior allows us to touch more readers and thus potential customers.”

Sydbank has no plans regarding rebuilding their strategy for the printed version of the customer magazine. The Zmags version adds another channel to reach out to the readers.

Fulfills future needs

In the beginning, Sydbank used Zmags to produce the customer magazine, Sydbank p.t, that is published quarterly. Since then, Sydbank Investering and a number of financial reports are included in their portfolio of interactive publications. In larger organizations like Sydbank, the need to distribute interactive publications typically expands gradually. Zmags’ ICM solution, which provides the opportunity to manage various types of collateral for continuous optimization, fulfills the needs for Sydbank – for the start-up phase as well as for future projects.

”In fact, some of the things that are not visible to the readers are among the best working parts in Zmags’ tools. The administration of our interactive publications is simple, and we got going pretty fast from a good and thorough education that first of all settled in our needs as a company,” Palle Laulund says.

A useful part of Zmags’ ICM solution is the set of analytics tools that enables Sydbank to see to what extent readers find their content relevant. From case to case, Sydbank logs in and reads off statistics, giving the company a clearer understanding of the target audience and what kind of content they like.

Ready for more interactive reading experiences

Having used Zmags for about one year, Sydbank now feels fully comfortable with the ICM solution. The company has upgraded various collaterals from PDF to Zmags, making the publications much more inviting and aligned with the way readers expect to get their content delivered.

Sydbank has plans about producing even more dynamic collateral. The objective is to include more interactive content inside the publications that leave an even stronger impression of the bank among the target audience.

About Sydbank:

Sydbank is the fourth largest bank in Denmark with more than 100 departments in Denmark and Germany and a subsidiary in Switzerland. The bank has approximately 375,000 customers and around 146,000 stockholders. Sydbank has around 2,500 employees.

Sydbank has a decentralized organization and is known for being energetic and competent to transact business.

Besides departments for business and private customers, the 17 Danish regions have their own investment centers with private banking counseling.