Case Study
Fifth-Third Bank
Industry: Financial Services
Size: $9B
The Business Problem
It’s projected that ~$65T will move between generations, a concept known as Intergenerational wealth transfer. As a regional bank seeking to scale, Fifth-Third (5/3) Bank saw an opportunity to capitalize on this macroeconomic trend by acquiring and retaining high wealth customers.
Through in-depth analysis of the market and future wealth inheritors, 5/3 developed Legacy Link, a new venture designed to help high wealth customers and their heirs navigate intergenerational wealth transfer through its “next generation” estate planning and wealth management SaaS platform.
What We Did
5/3 Bank engaged Three Five Two to help them pioneer the new venture, as well as design and develop the new platform. Over the course of 18 months, Three Five Two worked with wealth management stakeholders, as well as in-house and third party technology and marketing teams to build the new digital business.
5/3 Bank engaged Three Five Two to help them pioneer the new venture, as well as design and develop the new platform. Over the course of 18 months, Three Five Two worked with wealth management stakeholders, as well as in-house and third party technology and marketing teams to build the new digital business.
The shared teams developed a product roadmap and go-to-market strategy to seed the market pre-launch. This included working with traditional channels like local brand financial advisors, as well as new-to-world digital engagement strategy via remote advisors and self-planning tools.
Marketing a new-to-world product is vastly different than how a traditional brand might market, position and sell their current business. 5/3 had never launched a new business or a digital product into market. Their traditional in-house marketing teams had never built a user base from zero, and internal marketing practices were not designed to scale quickly. We introduced growth and traction marketing as new concepts to the organization, and trained internal teams on how to develop and launch new products without the support of the parent brand.
What Happened
The product development and initial launch of Legacy Link were successful, driving several million dollars in new revenue over Legacy Link’s first two years. However, leadership changes and organizational readiness ultimately sunset the initiative, despite having found product-market fit and early user adoption.
Legacy Link served as a massive learning moment for Three FIve Two and how we engage with our partners. The biggest learning was that our stakeholder had to have alignment and ownership of the business, technology and marketing; without complete ownership and/or alignment there is a high risk of failure. After working with 5/3 Bank, Three FIve Two incorporated organizational readiness into our assessment of the right work. In hindsight, despite developing a successful product and profitable business, we failed at creating a successful organization.
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The 352 team did an outstanding job with a complex project, even winning approval on design direction in a single meeting — which is unheard of in a company our size. In addition to timely delivery and exceeding expectations, the team did an amazing job at describing the reasoning for the design and sharing facts to support the approach. They won new fans at Fifth Third every day of the project.”Daniela Demaria, SVP & Managing Director, Private Bank Strategy and Solutions, Fifth Third Bank
Services
- Problem Refinement
- New Venture Design
- Customer Discovery
- Capability Building
- Primary Research
- Go-to-Market Strategy
- Growth Marketing
- Digital Product Design and Development
