How Titan Bank is growing its customer base – MD Udensi

Adaeze Udensi, managing director of Nigeria’s Titan Trust Bank, spoke with Global Finance’s and editorial director Joseph Giarraputo about the outlook for Nigeria’s economy and how the economic trends affected Titan Trust Bank’s strategy and performance, and how the bank is updating its digital platform and services to retain its competitive edge.

Titan received its license in 2019. Last year, it acquired Union Bank.

Pluboard has transcribed the interview – which was published as a promoted content – for our readers.

What is the outlook for Nigeria’s economy, and how has the economic strategy affected the Titan Trust bank’s strategy and performance?

There is global inflation, and Nigeria is not exempted from that. Inflation in Nigeria continues to trend upward, it’s been tough, and when it gets tough, you have to think or put on your thinking cap and think strategically, and that’s what we have done, just like the strategy with which we entered the market, we proceed with the gaps in the trade space, and we decided to take it.

Titan Trust Bank has rapidly increased its customer base since it was formed in 2019. What is driving the bank’s successful customer strategy and how will this growth be sustained?

I think for us is about listening to your customer and understanding what the customer’s pinpoint is, also understanding no two clients has the same problem, no two transactions are the same, and so there is no one element product meant for everybody, so we are constantly listening to our customers and then we tell you the truth, we tell you what we can do, and we tell you what we cannot do. We believe that it is best to underpromise and over-deliver than promise you that we are going to be everything and then disappoint you. We found our clients tend to prefer bankers that tell them the truth and at least know what challenges they are going to face upfront, and then we proffer you a solution that will work. So it is not just enough to say this is the problem; we will tell you this is the solution, and this is how we are going to do it and we are going to work with you from the beginning to the end.

Secondly, we don’t get into any transaction that we don’t see the end from the beginning, so we need to see how we are going to come out of it at the time we are going into it, and so we are able to draw that map for the client. The client now knows that you understand their transaction and you understand their business. There are businesses that are cyclical, and so if you expect to see the same type of turnover that you will see in a certain season and another season, then that will be most unfair to the business. So, you need to understand the circle of business and know that at this time, they are stocking up, they are not doing a lot of selling so they are doing a lot of importing; you work with the client in that same manner. 

Then we have got what we call our trusted advisors, and their work is to listen to the customer and make sure that you try your best to address the customer’s problems. So not all problems are possibly addressed because you cannot be everything to everybody, but you are going to continue to make sure as much as possible at any point in time a client knows I can count on Titans Trust bank.

They will tell me the truth, they will direct me, they will guide me, they will tell me what to do, and even when they have problems with their other banks and they will say “hey can I run this by you’’, and they talk to us and I will be able to tell you, and my colleagues are able to tell you to do it this way, go that route, this is the reason why your bank is doing this, this is what you need to do to resolve this.

And so that gives our clients a sense of “I am there for you, and we have got your back and we are going to be with you all through’’ so we keep getting referrals. 

We also have what we call the power of five, so for every new client we get, we ask you to introduce us to five of your friends or competitors; they don’t need to be your friends. These are five people who give you sleepless nights in this sector, and we go after them, and when we get those five, and even if we are able to get two of them, we ask them to refer us to another five, and so the power of five has continued to help us to grow. 

So, we keep stretching and stretching and stretching, and when we come into an ecosystem, we try to take the entire value chain. We take the client; we take your suppliers; we take your staff. We offer them retail loans; we fund your suppliers, so we bridge their funding gap. And so, by the time we take the entire value chain, we are also growing our customers base, and for each group, there is a product service for them that has continued to help us to thrive, so the referral has been very good, and we continue to push it, and that has helped us a lot.

The power of five is very interesting.

Yea.

Is Nigeria’s banking industry embracing digital transformation and how is Titan Trust Bank building its digital platform in its products and services to retain its competitive bridge from other banks?

Digitally, we are ready. I am sure if you just search us on the internet, you will see that through this digital transformation has been going on in the last couple of months. Titan Trust Bank came out as a bank that stood out in solving the customer’s problems and serving the general public. You will hear the customers on Twitter; they were everywhere talking about Titan Trust Bank and that no matter how tough it is, go there and you will get served. 

Their ATMs are running, it doesn’t shut down, it doesn’t break down. Banks have gotten customers so upset that they want to destroy things, but in Titan Trust Bank we have never had such an incident because whether you are a that again helped to grow our customer base. People were trooping in here, opening accounts, moving their businesses to us and I took a meeting today with a very big client in one of the banks, and the only reason he moved to us is the fact we seem to be one of few that are technologically resilient and ready for today and his bank not been up to it. 

The bank is a good bank, strong bank, but probably not up to date or prefers to be or what the Central Bank wants to achieve today in Nigeria. So we are set, we are ready, we are good, and you can join for the benefit of the doubt.

This is very interesting, thank you for joining us, and I hope we will have you back again.

Thank you very much.