You are on page 1of 3

Marketing Financial Services: A Strategic Vision by James H. Donnelly,; Leonard L.

Berry;
Thomas W. Thompson
Review by: Carol A. Jordan
The Journal of Risk and Insurance, Vol. 52, No. 4 (Dec., 1985), pp. 758-759
Published by: American Risk and Insurance Association
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/252321 .
Accessed: 25/04/2014 02:03
Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at .
http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp
.
JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of
content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms
of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact support@jstor.org.
.
American Risk and Insurance Association is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access
to The Journal of Risk and Insurance.
http://www.jstor.org
This content downloaded from 27.147.208.126 on Fri, 25 Apr 2014 02:03:00 AM
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
BOOK REVIEWS
Sandra G. Gustavson
Book Review Editor
The University of Georgia
Marketing Financial Services: A Strategic Vision, By James H. Donnelly,
Jr., Leonard L. Berry and Thomas W. Thompson. (Dow Jones-Irwin, 1985),
256 pages.
Revievved
by
Carol A. Jordan, MBA, Ph.D. Candidate, The Univer-
sity of Georgia.
The authors have written a concise and thorough financial services mar-
keting book. They perceive banks, savings and loans, thrifts, credit unions
and insurance companies to be members of a dynamic new financial services
industry that is a result of deregulation and increased competition. Early in the
book, the authors incorporate a discussion of the causes and consequences of
deregulation to justify their assertion that tactical marketing, in which a firm
uses the best sales tools to capture its share of a known market for a traditional
product, will no longer be sufficient for financial institutions seeking to
maintain a competitive footing. They argue instead for the implementation of
strategic marketing, in which a firm addresses such issues as geographic
expansion, product extension, and the use of technology.
Later in the section called "The Planning Imperative," the authors stress
the importance of consciously changing the way the firm views itself in light
of the argument that consumers of financial services have radically changed
the ways they think of financial institutions. The authors explain that when
management sets about altering the focus of the firm, it should identify the
institution's strengths and weaknesses, its driving force and the strategic
alternatives available to it.
The authors do a good job of explaining the concept of and the steps to
market segmentation, in the marketing strategy and implementation sections.
First, they indicate that the firm must determine what the customer wants and
needs. Subsequent steps include dividing the firm's market into groups of
similar customers, positioning its product, deciding on a segmentation
strategy, and designing a marketing mix. The author's cornerstone marketing
concept, that of relationship banking, is well-developed in this section.
This content downloaded from 27.147.208.126 on Fri, 25 Apr 2014 02:03:00 AM
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
Book Reviews 759
Relationship banking, the idea of attracting, maintaining and enhancing client
relationships, makes sense in an industry where there are more and varied
institutions competing for quality customers.
Chapters 11 and 13 in the last section describe the people and skills
necessary to make the relationship banking concept viable. The argument is
made that it will become increasingly important for financial institutions to
find, motivate and keep employees with good communication and marketing
skills, as well as technical skills. The authors state that employees should also
have the ability to empathize with the customer, so that they are able to convey
the needs of the customer to the firm's management. In this way, the institu-
tion may be better equipped to maintain the customer and enhance the
customer-firm relationship. Personnel with these skills in the public relations
area will ensure that the institution is perceived as it wants to be. These final
chapters describe what the authors call the "age of people," in which
consumers in a high-technology society feel a need for a human touch in their
business transactions. It is in this part of the book that the authors tie together
all they have written about the new marketing focus and lead the reader to an
understanding of the results that can be achieved.
This book should prove useful in enabling managers in the financial
services industry to think practically about maintaining a competitive advan-
tage in their customer-oriented environment. It also is recommended to
students and teachers of insurance and finance, to help them visualize the
industry as it is today and to identify the skills that will be necessary to
function in this arena in the future. For any reader who still thinks of the
financial services industry as primarily one of depository institutions with
well-defined boundaries, the book facilitates the rethinking of that concept.
Risk and Insurance, Fifth Edition, By James L. Athearn and S. Travis
Pritchett. (West Publishing Company, 1984), 608 pages.
Reviewed by Billie Ann Brotman, Assistant Professor of Finance,
College of Charleston.
Risk and Insurance is in its fifth edition, and continues to offer a com-
prehensive, in-depth introduction to the fields of insurance and risk manage-
ment. James L. Athearn, the author of the 4th edition, now has a co-author, S.
Travis Pritchett.
This book is designed with the intention of answering not only the descrip-
tive question of what exists, but also why things are and why they are
important. A consumer application section appears at the end of each chapter,
and demonstrates how to apply what was learned. This section considers such
diverse issues as: identifying a firm's insurance problems, finding a superior
agent, claim filing, retirement planning, and shopping for a homeowner's
policy.
Discussion questions and case study problems follow every chapter. The
instructor's manual contains detailed answers for both the questions and
This content downloaded from 27.147.208.126 on Fri, 25 Apr 2014 02:03:00 AM
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions

You might also like