Summary

Island Federal Credit Union, established in 1955, is a not-for-profit, full-service credit union. Over the years, it has grown to become one of the top-performing credit unions in New York State, managing assets totaling $1.5B and serving over 50,000 members. They partnered with Digital Onboarding to reduce attrition among Cash Back checking account holders by improving early engagement. Through a personalized, multi-channel campaign—including emails, texts, and self-service microsites—new members were guided to adopt key account services like direct deposit and mobile banking. The result? A 25% reduction in attrition, a 20% increase in digital banking enrollment, and a 14% boost in online banking adoption.

Misson

Island Federal Credit Union recognized the strategic importance that checking accounts played winning household relationships, and they were on a mission to minimize the attrition rate for their Cash Back checking account holders. Island Federal’s Cash Back checking account has no monthly fee, no minimum balance requirement, and comes with uChoose Rewards® that lets members earn 1 point for every $2 they spend on their debit cards. Despite these attractive offers, the credit union faced challenges with checking account holder attrition and needed a better way to engage new account holders from the start.

Goal:

• Reduce the attrition rate of Cash Back checking account holders by 10% (based on comparisons between 2022–2023 and 2017–2021).

Approach

To strengthen early engagement, Island Federal leveraged Digital Onboarding to reduce attrition of their checking account holders. They educated its front-line staff and leveraged Digital Onboarding’s engagement platform to ensure Cash Back checking account openers understood the value of the rewards program and other account benefits.

Island Federal Credit Union also used the platform to automatically deliver personalized, multi-channel messages after members opened new checking accounts. The team used self-service platform widgets to deliver messages that guided members to personalized microsites, making it easy for them to adopt key account services.

Campaign tactics

• 9 personalized email and SMS text messages during the first 40 days following checking account opening