Increasing competition and changing customer behavior in the German financial services sector

Master's Thesis from the year 2006 in the subject Business economics - Investment and Finance, grade: 1,0, University of Applied Sciences Ludwigshafen (MBA-Studiengang International Management Consulting, International Management Consulting (IMC)), language: English, abstract: Inhaltsangabe:Abstract:§Within the last few years, dramatic changes took and still take place in the retail banking business. On the supply-side competition for cooperative banks is increasing due to various reasons. New competitors with different business models have entered the market. There is no doubt that they pose a serious threat to cooperative universal banks (which were the focus of this dissertation) and whose market share is declining constantly. Furthermore, non-banks and near-banks have to be considered in this respect, too, as these entities' business models are increasingly targeting customers of universal banks.§On the demand side, changing customer behavior has accelerated transformation processes in recent years. An increased willingness to change suppliers can be noticed as consumers are placing more and more importance on price. A strong price awareness is changing market conditions in many business sectors in Germany. Decreasing customer loyalty forces universal banks to push sales activities and to intensify their personal relationship with the customer.§The main objectives of this dissertation are the following:§Work out a strategy within today s typical structure as a universal bank. Identify key success factors and evaluate this strategy for its chances for success.§Derive the consequences for the future business model of a cooperative bank. Determine the change steps necessary to strengthen the competitiveness.§Furthermore, the prerequisites of such a change process will have to be worked out.§An inductive approach was chosen to achieve the aims of this thesis (Gill & Johnson). Firstly, an in-depth analysis of existing literature was carried out in order to gain an overview on current developments such as a) customer behaviour, and b) the competitive situation of the financial services sector. The results were to produce not only an explanation for current trends but also allow the prediction of future trends over the course of the next years. The environment in which cooperative banks are operating was described in detail. This approach provides a good basis to identify the relevant factors and to work out the necessary consequences for cooperative banks. §In order to examine possible conclusions, interviews with 12 experts in the field were conducted. The target groups were CEOs of cooperative banks and representatives of cooperative bank associations. It is those people who are confronted with new challenges by the market on a daily basis and hence forced to develop an adequate response on behalf of their bank or their member banks.§The interviews were conducted freely, allowing for open and direct questions. The author prepared them by designing a rough sketch for the conversation beforehand. Some alternative methods were not to be applied: he amount of data to be gathered was deliberately limited to a doable number of oral interviews. It would have been of course be possible to obtain more data by using written interviews or questionnaires or holding workshops. This method is likely to have widened the breadth of views and opinions. §However, the author felt to gain more useful results by focusing on personal, in-depth interviews with key business leaders and experts. Moreover, in large surveys respondents often fail to overcome their inhibitions to talk about business strategy. This effect can be reduced in personal one-to-one interviews as confidentiality can be guaranteed, hence more openness. This method follows the principle of concentration to gain information developed by Ch. Niedereichholz and should yield sufficient...