How Do We Get More Customers?
in Banks & Financial Services

The short answer

More originations and deposits is an outcome. The decision is which route you can afford to repeat without lifting cost of funds or efficiency ratio. Banks and financial services firms carry a specific bind here — the branch network is simultaneously the deposit moat and the cost problem — and the relationship knowledge sits in six people close to retirement. Until that is priced, efficiency ratio will keep moving for reasons nobody can attribute, and the debate about CAC by channel will stay a matter of opinion.

Almost every bank can name several ways to grow the commercial book and few can say which one improves net interest margin after payback. That is the actual constraint: not a shortage of tactics, but no evidence on which route moves origination per banker or lowers cost of funds at scale.

The productive framing is route economics. For each plausible route — branch, relationship managers, referral agreements, digital lead channels, treasury services partnerships — what does it cost to originate one commercial relationship, how many months of spread does it take to recover that cost, and can volume increase without deposit beta rising or efficiency ratio worsening.

Most routes fail the third test. They produce results only while the six people close to retirement still control the relationships, and the flow stops once those relationships are no longer available to the bank.

How to tell this is actually your problem

These three together are the signature. One on its own usually points somewhere else.

✓ Origination per banker stays flat or declines even as marketing spend rises.
✓ Efficiency ratio and cost of funds are tracked only at the total-bank level with no route-level breakdown.
✓ Every available channel receives some budget yet none receives enough volume for a conclusive test of margin contribution or payback period.

The move that usually makes it worse. Running several origination routes at low volume simultaneously, which produces no conclusive result on efficiency ratio or net interest margin for any route and raises total cost of funds more than testing one route at full scale.

Who this is for — and who it is not

It is for you if you run or finance a bank and growth depends on one person's relationships. It is the situation where the numbers are available but nobody has put them in an order that produces a decision.

It is not for you if Percision is the wrong tool if you already know the answer and only need execution capacity, or if the business is pre-revenue — then the constraint is evidence about the market, not analysis of your own figures. Percision is not a lawyer, tax advisor, auditor, licensed appraiser, clinical or regulatory filer, or an AI implementation shop. It does not do HR casework, creative-only brand work, or impersonate a named consulting firm. It is a strategy analysis engine — not a template library. Also wrong if you need facilitation, politics, or someone to sit with a lender or buyer. Those are human jobs.

Percision is not a lawyer, tax advisor, auditor, licensed appraiser, clinical or regulatory filer, or an AI implementation shop. It does not do HR casework, creative-only brand work, or impersonate a named consulting firm. It is a strategy analysis engine — not a template library.

What this looks like when the analysis is actually run

Below is an excerpt from a real run of this analysis on a bank. It is a sample profile rather than a customer, and it is unedited engine output — this is the format you get, on your own numbers.

The subject is Harborline Financial Group, a sample company profile used for testing rather than a customer — $3.1B commercial lending book, $410M of deposits.

This is one move out of a full analysis. Read a complete report — every page, no email required.

What the engine does with this question

This question routes to Go-to-Market & Commercial Strategy, one of 29 engagements the platform runs. For banks and financial services firms it works through efficiency ratio, cost of funds, origination per banker and deposit concentration, then produces the sequence rather than a list of options — which move first, what it funds, and the observation that would say the sequence is wrong.

You watch the analysis get built before paying anything. Read a complete report here if you would rather see the depth first.

Questions people ask about this

Which acquisition channel is best?

The one where your buyer already is and where you can pay back the acquisition cost within a period you can finance. That is business-specific, and the general answer is worth very little.

How many channels should I run?

One that works, then a second. Running four at a quarter of the necessary budget reliably produces four inconclusive results and the belief that nothing works.

How long before a channel proves itself?

Your sales cycle plus one payback period, with enough volume to distinguish the result from noise. Setting that number in advance is what stops the decision being made by whoever is most persuasive.

Is this different in banks & financial services than in other industries?

Materially, yes. The branch network is simultaneously the deposit moat and the cost problem — and the relationship knowledge sits in six people close to retirement — which changes both the diagnosis and the order of the fixes. The metrics that decide it here are efficiency ratio, cost of funds, origination per banker, and an answer built on industry-general benchmarks will usually point at the wrong one first.

What data do I need before this analysis is worth running for a bank?

Less than most people expect. Your last twelve months of revenue and cost split the way you already split it, plus whatever you hold on efficiency ratio and cost of funds. The analysis is explicit about what it is assuming where your data stops, which is more useful than waiting for numbers you may never have.

When is Percision the wrong tool?

Percision is the wrong tool if you already know the answer and only need execution capacity, or if the business is pre-revenue — then the constraint is evidence about the market, not analysis of your own figures. Percision is not a lawyer, tax advisor, auditor, licensed appraiser, clinical or regulatory filer, or an AI implementation shop. It does not do HR casework, creative-only brand work, or impersonate a named consulting firm. It is a strategy analysis engine — not a template library. Also wrong if you need facilitation, politics, or someone to sit with a lender or buyer. Those are human jobs.

Does Percision replace a lawyer, tax advisor, auditor, or AI implementation team?

Percision is not a lawyer, tax advisor, auditor, licensed appraiser, clinical or regulatory filer, or an AI implementation shop. It does not do HR casework, creative-only brand work, or impersonate a named consulting firm. It is a strategy analysis engine — not a template library.