Never mind the channels, here’s the b******s

Apologies but it’s that time of year where my nerve endings jangle with tension as I get into another crappy debate about multichannel strategies.

“We’ve got our contact centre, then there’s our internet banking division and now we have to integrate these mobile thingymyjigs.  These channels are never-ending, wail, wail, sniff, sniff.”

Don’t you guys get it?

Mobile is NOT a channel.

Internet banking is NOT a channel.

Nothing is a channel.

Things have changed so wake up and smell the coffee.

Our planet is populated by people who have digital personas tightly integrated into their physical lives.

We walk the street texting, talking, surfing and interacting.

We geolocate our address and are smart navigated to our destination via our maps app.

We check what’s on TV whilst reading newspapers on digitised screens.

We transact with each other person-to-person face-to-face end-to-end.

In the very near future, every single person on the planet will be connected this way and, in the very near future, they will think differently.

In fact, we already do.

Just read Susan Greenfield’s book on identity in the 21^st century or Nicholas Carr’s book “The Shallows” on how the internet is changing the way we think.

This is why we don’t think: “I’m on my mobile channel and I shall switch to my internet channel later”.

We don’t think: “now I’m doing digital stuff and, shortly, I’ll do some physical stuff”.

My digital stuff is my physical stuff.

It’s all tightly coupled into mine and everyone else’s life.

This is why we have to stop thinking of channels and multichannels.

It’s a fundamental flaw in bank thinking.

There are no channels.

Just everyday lives that are highly digitised for the 21^st century.

‘Nuff said, rant over.

Back to the Sex Pistols …