It’s been three years since our last report on improving your bank’s visibility on the PC desktop (Grabbing Desktop Mindshare, OBR 85). Back then, Google and eBay had just launched toolbars and we were advising banks to improve their desktop positioning through buttons, bars, and various browser plug-ins.

While there’s been less progress than we anticipated, several new services this year demonstrate the potential:

• Southwest Airlines Ding service embodies much of what we envisioned
• Billeo’s toolbar raised the bar (pun intended), in the bill payment arena
• Apple’s widgets in its new OS X

If you are looking for inspiration, check out Yahoo’s Konfabulator, a program that lets Windows  and Mac users add spiffy utilities to their PC desktop, such as a calendar or system performance monitor.

There are several widgets of interest to bankers. Two savings meters (see above and right) allow users to track progress towards savings goals. This would be a good way to support and add value to your deposit accounts.

—JB