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Educated Investor: Educated Investor University - Call Archives

Call Archives

  • September 17th, 2007 at 2pm CDT and September 18th, 2007 at 2pm CDT
  • August 27th, 2007 at 2pm CDT and August 29th, 2007 at 2pm CDT
  • August 6th, 2007 at 2pm CDT and August 8th, 2007 at 2pm CDT
  • July 16th, 2007 at 2pm CDT and July 18th, 2007 at 11am CDT

September 17th and September 18th , 2007

ACTION ITEMS

  • PI to send notes by end of week
  • Schedule 5 th call in October to discuss final pricing
  • Kristi to schedule volunteer one-on-one calls
  • PI to draft document regarding how to set fair criterion on how to decide who the 3-4 key partner will be to launch the products in Q4 2007

ATTENDEES - September 17 th at 2 PM

  • Rob Givens – Mazuma Credit Union
  • Matt Kojis – North Island Credit Union
  • Brett Everhart – North Island Credit Union
  • Larry Scott – Randolph -Brooks Federal Credit Union
  • Gary Sawyer – Sawyer Consulting Services
  • Stephanie Mollinelli – TEG Federal Credit union
  • Lon Neofotist – XtraCash
  • Rob Poyner – Third Degree Advertising

ATTENDEES – September 18 at 2 PM

  • Diane Nazarchyk – Alabama Telco Credit Union
  • Becky Nilsen – Desert Schools Financial Services
  • Melanie Hoffner – Du-Trac Community Credit Union
  • Michael Lee – The Golden 1 Credit Union

ATTENDEES – Precision Information

  • Joe Saari
  • Ellen Smith
  • Tammy Douglass
  • Mike Marcoe
  • Steve Royko
  • Ed Harris
  • Kristi Wenger

NOTES

  1. Ellen and Tammy welcomed the group and a quick roll call was taken
  2. Ellen gave a quick recap of the previous pilot call and the action items we have completed since the third pilot call.
    1. Key features
    2. Member/SEG input
    3. Clarification of positioning and pricing
    4. Action items
  3. Steve Royko gave feedback on the survey, pricing, packaging, and current features. Steve said that the purpose of the survey was to validate the findings from the calls. Generally, the response was agreement with the questions asked.
    1. Regarding Ala Carte vs. Bundling for volume discounts, the group agreed strongly that this was important, but that more specific information would be helpful.
    2. Regarding pricing based on a flat fee vs. a fee based on usage, flat fee was preferred, but again, more specific information would be helpful.
  4. The following people volunteered for another call to discuss pricing and the products in more detail:
    1. Stephanie Mollinelli
    2. Matt Kojis
    3. Rob Givens
    4. Michael Lee
    5. Diane Nazarchyk
    6. Becky Nilsen
  5. Joe and the group discussed how to fairly choose the 3 or 4 institutions for the Beta launch in a live environment later this year.

QUESTIONS

  1. Does the group want a predictable pricing model? The group liked the predictable model for budgeting, but prefers a flat-fee. Diane said that she preferred the flat fee because of budgeting and the fact that here the costs would not get away from you.
  2. Do discounts for length make sense? The group felt that yes it does.
  3. Is the 100% guarantee without a charge for cancellation important? The group said yes that it was. Rob said that he has a problem with automatic renewal for long terms. The group liked Joe's idea of a 1 year renewal period regardless of the original length of the contract.
  4. Is the pricing structure easy to follow? And, are the prices reasonable? The group felt that yes the pricing is easy to follow and understand. The pricing seems reasonable as well.
  5. Could it be a turn-off if the pricing and discount information is too complicated? Yes. It might make sense to bundle all of them together and have one price for the bundle. It would also make it easier for the salespeople.
  6. Is it fair to set criteria regarding which groups will be allowed to beta-test the tools? Yes.
  7. Are there email ‘blast' capabilities with these products? The group said that this would be a great feature as long as it could include the option for someone to unsubscribe.

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August 27th and August 29th, 2007

ACTION ITEMS

  • PI will send out notes by end of week
  • Kristi will schedule volunteers for follow up calls
  • Ellen will send company profiles and group will correct and update
  • Volunteers to help PI on how to get feedback from members (Mike Lee, Diane Nazarchyk, Larry Scott, Becky Nilsen, Melanie Hoffner, Suzanne Oliver and Sonya McDonald)

ATTENDEES

  • August 27 at 2 PM CDT
  • Diane Nazarchyk - Alabama Telco
  • Lisa Renner - Credit Union Holding Company
  • Rob Givens - Mazuma CU
  • Don Clark - Mountain America CU
  • Nathan Anderson - Mountain America CU
  • Carl Windom - National Credit Union Administration
  • Larry Scott - Randolph-Brooks Services Group
  • Gary Sawyer - Sawyer Consulting Services
  • Stephanie Hahn - TEG Federal Credit Union
  • Stephanie Mollinelli - TEG Federal Credit Union
  • Michael Lee - The Golden 1 Credit Union
  • Lon Neofotist- Xtra Cash, LLC
  • Davida Carter-Vystar Investment Services
  • Rob Poynor - Third Degree Advertising
  • August 29 at 2 PM CDT
  • Scott Jenner - Addison Avenue Federal Credit Union
  • Becky Nilsen - Desert Schools Financial Services
  • Melanie Hoffner - Du-Trac Community Credit Union
  • Suzanne Oliver - Mountain America Credit Union
  • Sonya McDonald - Randolph-Brooks Federal Credit Union
  • Jane Boutelle - Boutelle and Associates
  • Charles Hopper - Desert Schools Federal Credit Union

Precision Information - Joe Saari, Ellen Smith, Tammy Douglass, Ed Harris, Mike Marcoe, Kristi Wenger

NOTES

  1. Ellen gave a welcome and greetings from the Educated Investor team and did a quick roll call of the attendees
  2. Tammy gave a recap from the previous pilot calls and action items we have completed since the second pilot call
  3. Ellen asked that those who have not sent in their features ranking survey to do so as soon as possible
  4. Survey Results
    1. The following were ranked most important
      1. Tracking web usage
      2. Contextual links
      3. Branding and co-branding
    2. The following were ranked less important
      1. Branded calculators
      2. Discounts on software
      3. Ability to choose tools vs. saving money
  5. Joe demonstrated the Educated Investor University and showed the features and some of the administrative features that we have incorporated thus far, using the daily quiz questions as an example.
  6. The group discussed reporting statistics to Excel and the purpose of the statistics. The group would like to know who is using the product and what information they are interested in.
  7. Ellen and Joe asked for volunteers to discuss how to get feedback from members. The following people volunteered:
    1. Mike Lee
    2. Diane Nazarchyk
    3. Larry Scott
    4. Becky Nilsen
    5. Melanie Hoffner
    6. Suzanne Oliver
    7. Sonya McDonald (added later)

PRECISION INFORMATION QUESTIONS

  1. Does the format seem easy to understand? Yes.
  2. Would it be helpful to be able to pull reports for a specific period of time? Yes, especially being able to set a date-range.
  3. Would an email with a monthly report be helpful? Yes.
  4. Would it be helpful to be able to add individual credit union's products to the template? Yes.
  5. Should leads generated be sent to a central location for distribution? Yes.
  6. Regarding the recording of views/clicks: What is wanted on web usage? Monthly? Ability to set custom start/end dated when pulling and that it is clear what dates are included/excluded.
  7. Does it add value to have an emailed monthly report? Yes.
  8. Do you need to know the IT addresses and types of web-browsers that are being used to access your site? No. Nathan wants to know how many people click and also want contact information form the CU.
  9. Is it helpful to automatically calculate the percentages in reports? Carl and Nathan both thought that it was.
  10. Are our admin panel screens easy to understand? Yes.
  11. Do you like having a home page with general administrative stats and that can be drilled down from there? Yes. It was decided to discuss further off line.
  12. For the Quiz Questions, is the administrative content page intuitive? Yes.
  13. Does it make sense to have a default lead form? (Whatever system the form is on is the one that will track responses and we can do the tracking for the CU if we use a default form.) Nathan felt that the important thing is that leads go to a central location, such as marketing, within the CU for dispersal of leads and follow-up.

QUESTIONS FROM PILOT PARTNERS

  1. In regards to the articles, are they compliant or does the credit union need to clear them? It depends on the broker-dealer. Our content has been approved by roughly 50 broker dealers thus far. All of the articles have been submitted and have received a non-objection letter from the NASD. We plan to link these letter to each article in PDF form to make it easy on the credit union.
  2. Regarding Quiz Questions, how often do the questions repeat? There are 400 quiz questions. Therefore, it would be just over 1 full year before a question repeats if you are using all of the questions.
  3. How could we pull SEG reports? We don't know, yet. Joe will explore.
  4. Can we receive a copy of the features ranking? Yes, it will be on the web site.

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August 6th and August 8th, 2007

Notes and Action Items from the August 6th and August 8th, 2007 Educated Investor Member Education / SEG Development Pilot Group

ACTION ITEMS

  • Notes from both August 6, 2007 and August 8, 2007 calls to be sent out by end of week
  • Ellen to follow up regarding completion of company profiles
  • Ellen to send list of key features to the group by the end of this week so they can rank them in order of importance
  • Ellen to follow up with volunteers (Rob Givens, Nathan Anderson, Matt Kojis, Scott Jenner, Joe Day, and Becky Nilsen) regarding implementing these key features into our tools

ATTENDEES

  • August 6th at 2pm CDT
  • Mazuma CU - Rob Givens
  • Mountain America - Don Clark
  • Mountain America - Nathan Anderson
  • National Credit Union Administration - Carl Windom
  • North Island Credit Union - Matt Kojis
  • North Island Credit Union - Brett Everhart
  • Sawyer Consulting - Gary Sawyer
  • Schneider Sales Management - Paul Robert
  • XtraCash - Lon Neofotist
  • August 8th at 2pm CDT
  • Addison Avenue - Scott Jenner
  • CUNA - Joe Day
  • CUNA- Susan Tiffany
  • Desert Schools Financial Services- Becky Nilsen
  • Du-Trac Community CU - Melanie Hoffner
  • Ent Federal Credit Union - Jim Moore
  • LIMRA International - Lynn Ferris
  • TEG Federal Credit Union - Stephanie Hahn
  • TEG Federal Credit Union - Stephanie Mollinelli

Precision Information — Joe Saari, Ellen Smith, Tammy Douglass, Ed Harris, Jeff Bail, Mike Marcoe, Kristi Wenger

NOTES

  1. Ellen did a quick welcome and greeting from the Educated Investor team and called the roll
  2. Tammy reviewed the pilot call process, background of the company, what we expect and what we plan to provide
  3. Joe and the group discussed the following goals for the pilot process:
    1. Generate sales and service opportunities
    2. Build new, stronger member/stakeholder relations
    3. Explore how technology can be used to serve the underserved
  4. Ellen and Tammy demonstrated and the group discussed key features of the Educated Investor family of products.
    1. Tammy pointed out that all of our products are customizable and interactive and that the customer can self-refer
    2. There was a wide-ranging discussion of when the member should be asked to set up an account, security issues, and what should be tracked. Joe said that they do not have to use their email address, and an account could be set up with just a user name, or there could be two levels (one a visitor, one for account registrants).
  5. The group discussed the survey results
  6. Rob Givens, Nathan Anderson, Matt Kojis, Scott Jenner, Joe Day, and Becky Nilsen volunteered for one-on-one calls to discuss features of the products in more depth.

PRECISION INFORMATION QUESTIONS

  • Regarding MoneyCoach:
    • Is it important to be able to choose the financial goals available to your members? Rob: Yes, as long as there is text behind it. Becky: Present topics good. Should we add auto-buying? Melanie: Yes and also college planning.
  • Regarding setting up accounts in the Money Coach:
    • Why do it? This allows a member to sign out and come back and pick up where they left off. Does the account prompt have to be when they are leaving the web site? No, and could be done at more than one point. Also, there are 5 fields available that the CU can choose and track. Examples: age, gender, and income. Becky: Most important factor is that they feel secure and that the information will not be passed along. Regarding where to put it, give people a choice either at first or later.
  • Regarding the Educated Investor Challenge:
    • Would it make sense to link to the section where the information is covered, even if the member got it correct? Yes. Matt and Don both felt that they should because they may have guessed, as did Melanie and Jim. Where do the questions come from? Our database. Rob asked if the correct number of questions can be tracked. Yes, but we need a cookie or log-in to give a prize to the member that had the most right answers in a month.
    • Would credit unions want to choose the channel from which the questions come from and also be able to customize here? Yes, Stephanie M. thought that they would.
    • Do you want to have a programmer set up the categories or be able to choose from a list and do it yourself? Stephanie and Melanie want to do it themselves.
  • Regarding the Financial Well-Being Test:
    • Would the group want there to be a link to material based on the score? Yes, but there should be a menu of options. You shouldn't presume that the member would be interested in a particular subject based upon their score. Nathan noted that this might work well with other topics, too, like insurance.
    • If the test shows that someone is stressed, do you want to be able to offer a referral? Yes. MoneyCoach could be the interface.
  • Regarding the Learning Center:
    • Would a contextual link to setting up an appointment to an advisor add value? Becky: Another opportunity is always a good thing and also the ability to track where it came from.

QUESTIONS FROM PILOT PARTNERS

  • What is the timing for deliverables? This week we are working on what features will be used and then can set the timing. Joe would like Version 1.0 by the end of September.
  • When will we have the pricing structure: We will start discussing the pricing during the next pilot call. It will be finalized by the end of September, but it will depend on the features and package set up. If anyone would be open to discussing the pricing sooner in a one-on-one call we would be open to that.
  • Can people read the content without creating an account? People may want to sample before they decide. We haven't decided, yet. The advantage to requiring log-in is that you can tell who is reading what. Maybe we need to ask the pilot partners to rank the importance of this feature. Overall, we are looking for a feature list and would like each pilot partner to rank the feature's importance to them. Ellen will be sending this list out to the group.

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July 16th and July 18th, 2007

Notes and Action Items from Educated Investor Member Education / SEG Development Pilot Group Calls on July 16th and July 18th, 2007.

ACTION ITEMS

  • Kristi to schedule times to talk to Rob Givens, Sonya McDonald, Carl Windom, Stephanie Mollinelli, Jim Moore, Brett Everhart, possibly Victoria Selfridge, and possibly Monica (from CFE) for feedback and more in-depth demos.
  • Mike to provide the PPT presentation. Download it from http://www.educatedinvestor.com/downloads/Pilot_group_call_1.ppt
  • Joe to follow up with Jim Hanson on content issues.
  • Mike to send notes and action items to members.
  • Ellen to get bios from those who haven’t sent them.
  • Send out a survey of related products/services/tools that group members may be familiar with.
  • PI team will follow up with all participants to confirm which date in August they would like to participate in. The calls will be August 6th at 2pm CDT and August 8th at 2pm CDT

OPPORTUNITIES

  • Explore opportunities to find the type of niche we should fit our member education products into.
  • Explore ways to modify the program to fit the group’s needs.

KEY TOPICS

  • Agenda is also in Powerpoint form.
  • Greetings and introductions
  • Clarification and overview of the pilot partner process
  • Background on the member education suite of products
  • Group question and answer
  • Clarification of action items and dates for the second call

NOTES

  • Present on the July 16 call: Becky Nilsen, Nathan Anderson, Matthew Clark, Don Clark, Suzanne Oliver, Diane Nazarchyk, Susan Barnes, Mark Dennis, Lisa Renner, Sonya McDonald, Gary Sawyer, Scott Jenner, Rob Givens, Carl Windom, Lon Neofotist,, Regina Carey (present later), and Brett Everhart (present later).
  • Present on the July 18 call: Becky Humphrey, Brett Everhart, Jim Moore, Ty Richardson, Stephanie Hahn, Stephanie Mollinelli, Kathy Fogarty, Joe Day, Jim Hanson, Bob Grieb, and Lynn Ferris.
  • Purpose of call was to give a flavor of what to expect over the next few months.
  • Ed and JB from the Madison office assisted members with signing in online.
  • Joe explained the purpose of this pilot group.
  • Joe, Ellen, and Tammy introduced the members of the pilot group, using the online bios that JB posted.
  • Ellen clarified our expectations of pilot group participants, along with the benefits they will receive.
  • Joe gave a background on PI.
  • The CU market has done a strong job of promoting financial education. Since the deregulation of the 1980s, the number of products has proliferated. Also, responsibility for retirement has shifted to individuals. However, there is now a strong need to provide financial literacy. Joe and Ellen also discussed the state of financial education today.
  • Joe discussed the financial literacy quiz that we gave to 2200 credit union employees.
  • Joe took the group through our Educated Investor University, noting how Desert Schools and Mountain America credit unions have used it successfully to educate their employees.
  • We covered the suite of products from our pilot homepage.
    • Daily Quiz Engine
    • Featured Article Service
    • Challenge
    • Personal Financial Well-Being Test
    • Calculators
    • MoneyCoach
    • Learning Centers
    • Reference Library
  • Joe showed how non-programmers can choose templates and publish branded versions of the tools listed above.
  • There are two questions PI wants to ask of the group:
    • What products/services/tools, if any, do you use?
    • What niche should we help fit?
  • We are looking for two to three volunteers from the 7/16 call for feedback and a more in-depth demo. Rob Givens, Sonya McDonald, and Carl Windom answered. From the 7/18 call, Stephanie Mollinelli, Jim Moore, Brett Everhart, possibly Victoria Selfridge, and possibly Monica (from CFE).
  • The next Pilot Group calls with be August 6th and August 8th.
  • Rob mentioned Moneystyle.net, from Ohio Consumer Credit Counseling Service. Very competitively priced, suitable for credit unions.

QUESTIONS

  • Rob Givens to Desert Schools and MTN America: Do you have a perspective on return visits or participation with your website? Joe specified that SAFE Credit Union and some non-credit union clients may have information on this. If you would like more information Joe can follow up with you directly.
  • Brett Everhart from North Island CU asked: Is the material adaptable? Yes, it can be adapted as needed. It is best that we consult individually with the pilot members to determine how the material can be adapted.
  • Brett Everhart from North Island CU asked: Is the material NASD compliant? Much of it is, and much of it is being used with companies that demonstrate NASD compliance.
  • Jim Moore from Ent FCU asked: Are the applications hosted on PI’s server or the members’ servers? Generally it runs off of PI’s server. The material is pulled from or hosted by PI’s server.

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