Walk the talk, Mr .client..

State Bank of India has beenwith us for a long time, as a symbol .. of old generation banking, whatever the word means..

For me it symbolises Heirarchy and hence narrow sightedness.... lack of customer orientation and simply obscurantist....ICICI and their onslaught couldnt make them competitive until recently, and then they entrusted ad agencies to advertise them..

Advertise? SBI? what the hell?

It is true.. and the ads have come out well.. so simple.. humane.. touching us some where.....

To put it simply.. marvellous ads..... just clean bowled me ...

So here am i walking into an SBI show room (banks these days are showrooms, not banks any more) with doubts about home loans and how i can avail one, and expecting surprises.. lovely smiles, welltrained ,polite staff guiding me (in private banks this guidance some times is an irritation.. that is a seperate issue altogether) and leading you to the pinnacle of customer ecstacy...

Alas! it seemed that the guys whom i was facing, hadnt seen their new ads..

They didnt even knew , it was obvious, that their bank was now trying (in vain?) to compete with the ICICI's and HDFC's..

They all lived in the past.. some behaved like cannibals who hadnt seen human beings for quite some time..

A lady under the "may i help you?" , shouted at my doubts about home loans and floating rates...

Excuse me mam.. i said in utter disappointment.... i am your customer, if i go to ICICI, they treat customers royally..

Then why dont you go to ICICI? ...she thundered... did some one invited you?

I felt sorry for the agency(ies) making ads for SBI... a case of talk the talk and no walk the talk from the clients side.

Yes mam, your ads did......i said as i walked out.

Didnt they??

************************************************************************************

Foot note: Promises are like babies: easy to make, hard to deliver.....