Shell Federal Recognized as National Community Credit Union of the Year

by Ron Daly

Way back in June of this year, we highlighted the efforts of Shell Federal Credit Union as a community credit union that was dedicated to reaching out to members and being active in their community. Back then, they'd been highlighted as "Business of the Year" by the Deer Park Chamber of Commerce. The awards keep on coming for Shell. It was only a few weeks ago that they were recognized by the Credit Union National Association as the Community Credit Union of the Year (click here to read the press release). From the release:

"In today's turbulent world, extending a helping hand in the community is a top priority at Shell FCU. The sole purpose of the credit union is to meet the financial needs of their members, provide free financial literacy and volunteer for a stronger community."

Shell FCU's accolades are well deserved. Their iLife program encourages members and non-members to come and participate in events that will benefit others in their community. Whether it's bicycle drives, cell phones for soliders or a basketball tournament, iLife is dedicated to boosting community spirit, community giving, and volunteerism. 

Shell is also celebrating a "great loan year" by offering a $15,000 store credit at Pasadena Honda to a lucky borrower in January. Pretty sweet prize, considering many lending institutions and banks are unable/unwilling to lend these days.

Congratulations, Shell FCU - you've earned it!

[This article originally ran on the DigitalMailer Blog]

In Defense of Email Follow-Up: I'm not the only one who's defending email!

by Ron Daly 

Last week, I reacted to an article from the Wall Street Journal about the impending death of email. I tried to give credit to Twitter, Facebook, etc. for the roll they've played in changing how we chatter at each other day-to-day. 

Kit Eaton at FastCompany.com put together a great story called "Why Twitter and Facebook Will Never Kill E-mail". This article points to some interesting findings from Nielsen and some facts about email that many overlook when they dismiss email as "on it's way out". 

For one, you can't send files directly via "tweet" - and, for all I know, you can't do that over Facebook, either. You can provide links and downloadable files that are hosted elsewhere, but these messages don't have the capacity to carry vital info. And who owns that info when you upload it? Rights issues are plaguing this new territory right now, and corporate/private communication can't be done in the blind - or worse, in an environment where security isn't prized. 

But maybe the best point brought up about email in this article is the idea of simplicity. Email is easy to learn and to use (for most). People have spent the past year squawking about Twitter being impossible to understand and arguing about its usefulness. Seems to me there might have been an hour-long window where the people who invented the first email systems were asking themselves "When will this ever be of any use to anyone?" Then they realized that email was sending messages in seconds when it formerly took days. 

While we're talking about email's long life, this Google Wave affair is interesting. Real time communication mixed with email mixed with...well, I'm not really sure. Jimmy, my Creative Media Directory, has been sniffing around for invites. Has anyone used it? Can we get some information on how it handles? Talk to us about it. 

Grasshoppers, Ants, and the CARD Act

by Ron Daly 

Remember the story of the grasshopper and the ant? The grasshopper sat back and didn't worry about winter until it was too late, the ant clambered to get more food to outlast the cold. In the end, the ant gets all his food and preparations in order, and winter never even comes and everyone's fine. 

Wait, that doesn't sound right. Wasn't the grasshopper supposed to be, quite literally, left out in the cold? Didn't all that preparation pay off for the ant who worked so hard to get it done? Maybe I'm thinking of the wrong story. Maybe I'm thinking of all the credit unions who worked to get their statements and documentation around HELOCs, Personal LOCs, and open-end credit adjusted to comply with the Credit CARD Act of 2009...and the CUs who somehow came out ahead by not trying to comply or waiting out the change to the bill. Doesn't sound fair? Few things are these days when it comes to regulation. 

In Defense of Email

by Ron Daly

I had this article dropped on my desk earlier this month - "Why Email No Longer Rules..." by Jessica E. Vascellaro at the Wall Street Journal. I sat on it for a while, trying to figure out what to say about it.

Long story short: Wrong. 

Now, I can't disagree with a few key points brought up by Ms. Vascellaro. These are: 

1. Twitter, Facebook, and Social Media are set to "profoundly rewrite the way we communicate" - I'd argue they already have. You don't have to do ALL your communicating through email, the way we had to in the 90s. We've got blogs, Facebook walls, Twitter feeds, Flickr streams, etc. 
2. Social media is a constant stream of information that, often, can't be squelched or silenced, and can cause "communication overload". Email can be guilty of this, too - if you let it.

But some of Ms. Vascellaro's observations left me scratching my head. For one, the statement about email being "better suited to the way we used to use the Internet", and how that doesn't cut it anymore. Why, exactly? Because we don't "log on" and "log off" and we're always patched in to our inboxes? I'd think that makes email MORE important. The first thing that happens when you get a smart phone after it's set up by your carrier, they enter your email accounts so you can read emails as they come. We're walking around with our inboxes in our pockets. That somehow makes email less important or less useful than Twitter? I don't buy it. 

The article goes on to say that Nielsen Co. put email users at 276.9 million people in the US, Europe, Australia and Brazil, whereas there are 301.5 million using social-networking and community sites. Not knowing which study was which (maybe one of our many marketing-focused readers can leave us a link in the comments?), I'm curious about what qualifies as a "community site". Is a blog one? How about a personal web page? Are they counting multiple addresses for single users? I'm not sure how they're qualifying accounts and users, but I do know this - there are few (if any) online services one can use without an anchor email addresses that the administrators of said service can send emails to for confirmation, announcements, complaints, etc. Like bank accounts, your social media accounts need your "permanent address", somewhere they can reach you when you need to be alerted to something. Email addresses are likely fitting into their place - as the "if all else fails" means of communication online. 

I mentioned earlier the thought of "squelching" social media. In the article, Vascellaro talks about how "more sophisticated" filtering systems are necessary and how certain sites like Facebook are letting you choose who you read when you log in, and who gets left out of your communication flow.

 How to you suss out who's worth listening to and who isn't? Twitter recently announced they'd be adding "lists" - ways of sorting your followers/followees so that you only have to read the posts of select users (side note - you can share these lists with other users, which I think is kind of neat). Want to know the easiest way to sort out what you want to read/don't want to read and who to contact or avoid? Put those people in your address book IN YOUR EMAIL ACCOUNT. Seems simple to me, but hey, I'm no "new media guy". 

Finally, there's the security issue. Yes, maybe your email account can be hacked. But there's a history of stronger and stronger security around email accounts as the need to transfer data has become greater and the kind of data being transferred via email has increased in size and importance. The same can't be said of Twitter, which is scaling but still behind the curve on security. Not that Twitter is completely unsecure or unaware of their security issues, but they've been slow to let people verify accounts that they use for business communication (a bitter pill for some of our associates - read here). Also, so many "companion sites and services" are being made for Twitter every day that passwords and usernames are being thrown around like confetti.

This article seems critical of Social Media in this respect, noting that personal information is flowing more freely these days. At best, personal info can be insightful or entertaining. But it can also be downright annoying ("Great, you had oatmeal for breakfast. Thanks.") or even compromising to your online security. Remember Sarah Palin's email breach last year? It all came down to a password that hackers found fairly easy to guess based on public information about her. All that loose information that people treat as "unimportant" can actually be used against you. 

The article gives a person a lot to think about, but I think it's overshooting when it says that email doesn't "rule" anymore. Email still has its place - the cornerstone of online communication, the best way to reach someone who you just can't get ahold of otherwise.