Problem:
How might we give credit unions a way to share, aggregate and evaluate reviews of our common vendors to help with new vendor selection and ongoing vendor renewals?
Solution:
CUCrowdSpeak is the independent word on credit union vendors. This means credit union professionals can save time and feel confident about credible research and evaluation of products and services for credit unions. Unlike other vendor review sources, CUCrowdSpeak is driven by credit unions, for credit unions—without the influence of advertising or endorsements.
Test Results:
In a survey of 184 credit union professionals, when asked if a similar service for credit union vendors would be of interest (Appendix A):
- 73% were very to extremely interested in the idea
- 51% were very to extremely likely and post a review
- 86% would use the service at least once a quarter
- 68% were very to extremely likely to recommend the service to someone they know
- 42% really need this service because nothing similar exists
- 31 credit unions agreed to test a prototype of the service
184 people replied to the initial survey:
167 positive comments had reoccurring themes such as: honest feedback, real reviews, on demand responses, single source of information, convenient, trusted source, collaboration, credit union oriented, saves time, a list of available vendors with readily available contact information, one for several uses, the need for fewer Listservs
145 dislikes or concerns also had reoccurring themes such as: difficultly of getting reviews, cost, false or inaccurate ratings and reviews, time consuming, only bad experiences will be posted, how will it be policed, posts should be anonymous, posts shouldn’t be anonymous, vendors should have restricted access, potential harm to vendors from negative ratings