Firms that are looking for the blueprint on how to create an informative and focused product video should look no further than Prudential’s new HD Lifetime 6 Plus video. Available on the firm’s publicly accessible Retirement Red Zone page, the HD Lifetime 6 Plus video explains the inner-workings of the HD benefit rider that targets investors in the “Red Zone”, or critical years immediately before and following retirement. Firms have long been utilizing web demos to highlight new product releases; however, Prudential’s new video offers a wealth of basic product information on a visually enticing platform, without getting too complicated. The result is a video that is useful to both advisors and clients alike.

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As we discussed in last week’s Credit Card Monitor, every issuer that we track recently added the ability for customers to order their card agreements through the card website. Although this is a mandated feature, our research showed there are good ways and bad ways of doing this.

In this short video, I explain why American Express demonstrates best practices in providing access to customer agreements. Continue Reading »

In January we published our annual Monitor Awards, which take a broad look at the state of the industry in several key areas, selecting categories for evaluation based on their importance to investors. This year we added a new category, Navigation, to our monitor awards. Navigation is a key determinant of any site’s overall usability. To reflect this in our Monitor Awards report, the new category recognizes retail firms with well-organized content and an advanced main menu system.

In our review, we found that the top winner in our new navigational category best incorporated the following features:

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For nearly a year and half, most Wachovia customers have been waiting patiently to see when and how the merger with Wells Fargo would affect them. For some customers, this process has been too slow, as seen in the comments sections of the Wells Fargo – Wachovia Blog. That said, it appears that there’s finally a light at the end of the tunnel.

Last week, Wachovia removed all its branded credit cards on the public site, and replaced them with Wells Fargo cards. As for existing card customers, on April 10, 2010, all Wachovia credit card accounts will officially be integrated into Wells Fargo, and aside from a site outage from April 9-11, service should be uninterrupted, as card numbers and rates will stay the same. It’s currently unclear if Wells Fargo will mail clients newly branded cards after the conversion, but clients can still use their old cards in the interim.  Continue Reading »

Retirement Income Journal Article Written By Ben Pousty, Senior Analyst - Annuity Monitor

Published in the February 24th Issue of RIJ

With variable annuity sales down, firms are intensifying online product marketing campaigns to reach more prospective investors.  No annuity product was hit harder during the financial crisis than variable annuities. Many variable annuity contracts saw significant drops in value, in many cases 30% or more, due to the products’ heavy exposure to the financial markets. For an investment that supposedly offers a guaranteed retirement income stream, variable annuities had been exposed as flawed and ultimately risky investment vehicles.

Despite the firms’ best efforts to evolve variable products to fit the new financial landscape, variable annuity sales remained flat throughout 2009 and were down significantly in contrast to 2008. In response to the lackluster sales numbers, firms have intensified their online marketing campaigns to the public, placing additional promotional muscle behind high-profile variable annuity product launches. Continue Reading »

Following several months of new product releases, tools, and web promotions, the pace slowed across the industry this February. A few firms revamped their sites this month, and as the athletes took to the slopes in Vancouver, one firm promoted its 2010 Winter Olympics sponsorship online.

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