Experian

Finovate Alumni Website Traffic in August

By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on
Categories: Adobe, Andera, Betterment, Bill.com, Billeo, BillFloat, Bills.com, BillShrink, Boku, BrightScope, Budgettracker, Bundle, Cardlytics, CashEdge, CashStar, ChargeSmart, Check Point, CheckFree, Cortera, Credit Karma, Credit Sesame, Credit.com, DebtGoal, Discover, Equifax, eRollover, eToro, Experian, findabetterbank.com, Fiserv, Geezeo, Google, HR Block, Infosys, Intuit, Jack Henry, Kabbage, Kapitall, Kasasa, Leadfusion, LearnVest, Lending Club, Lendio, MasterCard, Metavante, Mint.com, MoneyAisle, Motley Fool CAPS, MyBankTracker, Offermatic, Online Resources, Outright.com, Pageonce, PayPal, Prosper, S1, Sears Credit Score, Seeking Alpha, Simple Tuition, smartcredit.com, SmartyPig, Standard Chartered Bank, Stocktwits, Striata, Sybase 365, TradeKing, TransUnion Interactive, Truaxis, TrustedID, VISA, Wall Street Survivor, Wesabe, Wikinvest, wipro, Yodlee, Zecco
Each month we survey the Web-traffic performance of Finovate alums using data from Web-analytics company Compete. 
Out of 268 alumni, 75 had more than 10,000 unique U.S. visitors in August 2011 and are included in the tables below. Of those, 41 (55%) had more visitors in August than July. Year-over-year, 45 (60%) had traffic increases.
Private Companies
  • Seeking Alpha — the most-trafficked in August with 2.5 million unique visitors — also had the highest increase in number of unique month-over-month visits with 300,000 more visits in August than in July.
  • Budgettracker.com saw the highest monthly growth percentage with more than 6.5 times the number of unique visitors in August compared to July.
  • Betterment had the highest percentage growth year-over-year, up 88x.
  • Cortera had the highest number of unique year-over-year visitors, growing by 1.5 million. 
August2011PrivateWebTraffic4.jpg
Source: Compete.com retrieved week of October 3, 2011
1) The previous month recorded was July 2011
2) Truaxis was formerly BillShrink
4) Kasasa is powered by BancVue
5) Checkingfinder.com is powered by BancVue

Public Companies

  • Fiserv had the highest month-over-month percent growth, with 50% more visitors.
  • CheckFree had the highest percentage growth year-over-year, with over 5 times the number of visitors.
  • S1 also had a high percentage growth year-over-year, doubling its visitors.
August2011PublicWebTraffic5.jpg
Source: Compete.com retrieved the week of October 3, 2011
1) The previous month recorded was July 2011.
_______________________________________________________
Notes:
1. We reviewed 268 Finovate alumni. Only those with at least 10,000 unique visitors in July are listed. 
3. NM = Not measurable
4. t= Tie
5. Compete estimates online visitors based on the activity of a panel of more than 2 million U.S. Internet users. It is only an estimate of traffic and may undercount at-work usage.

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BancVue Cracks the American Banker FinTech 100

By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on
Categories: ACI Worldwide, BancVue, Equifax, Experian, FIS, Fiserv, Infosys, Jack Henry, Online Resources

IMG_1080.JPGThe FinTech 100, a list of the top revenue-grossing fintech firms, was announced Wednesday at BAI Retail Delivery. 

Nine Finovate alumni made the cut, including BancVue, debuting at number 95. Pictured to the right are James Ladas and Gabe Krarcek from BancVue. 
Here are the Finovate alumni, listed according to rank:

2011 Rank: 1
2010 Rank: 3
Fiserv

2011 Rank: 2 
2010 Rank: 1
2011 Rank: 10
2010 Rank: 11
2011 Rank: 18
2010 Rank: 18
2011 Rank: 19
2010 Rank: 20
2011 Rank: 24
2010 Rank: 15
2011 Rank: 34
2010 Rank: 34
2011 Rank: 62
2010 Rank: 76
2011 Rank: 95
2010 Rank: NR
See the full list here. To learn how the rankings are calculated, see the American Banker article. 

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Finovate Alumni at BAI Retail Delivery Conference

By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on
Categories: ACI Worldwide, Adobe, Arroweye Solutions, BillShrink, Cardlytics, CashEdge, ClairMail, Dynamics, Equifax, Experian, FIS, Fiserv, FreeMonee, Guardian Analytics, Ideon FS, Kony Solutions, Lodo Software, MasterCard, mFoundry, Mitek, oFlows, On Deck Capital, PayPal, ProfitStars, Q2ebanking, SafetyPay, Sybase 365, Truaxis, VISA, Yodlee

BAIIMG2.jpg

The BAI Retail Delivery conference begins tomorrow with 29 Finovate alumni participating in sessions and/or exhibiting on the trade show floor.
Session Speakers
  • Tuesday, Global Game-Changer Session
    Speaker: Jim Taschetta from FreeMonee
  • Wednesday, Technology for Business Summit 
    Speaker: Mitch Jacobs from On Deck Capital
  • Wednesday, Technology for Business Summit Session 
    Speaker: David Eads from Kony Solutions
  • Thursday, Technology for Business Summit Session
    Speaker: Eric Connors from Yodlee
  • Thursday, Marketing & Product Management Summit Session 
    Speaker: Rod Witmond from Cardlytics
Exhibitors 
BAI Mobile Link
Mobile Link Panel Discussions
Solutions Theatre
Jim Bruene and I (julie@netbanker.com) will be in attendance and will update the blog and Twitter with new developments throughout the event. 

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Experian Gives You The Power to Protect Your Identity

By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on
Categories: Experian

Experian.jpg

This afternoon, Experian demonstrated myID.com, a tool that helps you protect your identity:
“A part of Experian, it monitors all facets of your identity, including personal privacy, financial information, your reputation and your safety. myID.com quickly alerts you to risks to your identity so you can take action and minimize the potential for damage. Unlike most identity theft software, myID.com helps you manage your entire identity, on social networks, on people page sites and offline through our financial monitoring system. 
myID.com helps consumers stay private and safe, and prevents identity theft by continuously scanning for personal information on public websites and databases. myID.com also provides real-time alerts if your private information becomes public, and investigates possible situations where your identity has been stolen. With myID.com, you can rest assured that your privacy, safety, finances and reputation are secure.”
Product Launched: 2011
HQ Location: Irvine, CA 
Company Founded: 1999 
Product Being Demoed: myid.com 
Website: experian.com
Presenting Hue Rhodes (VP Business Development) & Conor Swanson (Business Analyst Expert for myID)

IMG_0782.JPG
IMG_0784.JPG

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Finovate Alumni Website Traffic in July

By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on
Categories: Adobe, Andera, BancVue, Betterment, Bill.com, Billeo, BillFloat, Bills.com, BillShrink, Blippy, Boku, BrightScope, Bundle, Cardlytics, CashEdge, ChargeSmart, Check Point, Cortera, Credit Karma, Credit Sesame, Credit.com, DebtGoal, Discover, eRollover, eToro, Expensify, Experian, FIS, Fiserv, Infosys, Intuit, Jack Henry, Kapitall, Kasasa, Leadfusion, Lending Club, Lendio, Metavante, Mint.com, MoneyAisle, MyBankTracker, Online Resources, Outright.com, PayPal, Prosper, S1, Seeking Alpha, Simple Tuition, smartcredit.com, SmartyPig, Standard Chartered Bank, Sybase 365, TransUnion Interactive, TrustedID, Wesabe, Wikinvest, wipro, Yodlee, Zecco
Each month we survey the Web-traffic performance of Finovate alums using data from Web-analytics company Compete. 
Out of 255 alumni, 59 (23%) had more than 10,000 unique U.S. visitors in July 2011 (see tables below). Of those, 19 (32%) had more visitors than in the previous month and 25 (42%) were flat. Year-over-year, 26 (44%) had an increase, 10 (17%) were flat, and 23 (39%) were down. 

Private Companies
Notable successes:
  • Seeking Alpha had the most traffic in July with more than 2 million unique visitors.
  • eToro saw the highest monthly growth percentage with 3 times the number of unique visitors in July compared to June.
  • Bundle had the highest increase in number of unique month-over-month visits, with 450,000 more visitors in July than in June.
  • eRollover had the highest percent year-over-year traffic increase, with 260,000 more visitors from last July. 
JulyWebTrafficPrivate6.jpg
Source: Compete.com retrieved week of August 15, 2011
1. The previous month recorded was May 2011
2. Sears Credit Score is powered by CreditKarma.com
3. Kasasa is powered by BancVue
Public Companies
Notable successes:
  • PayPal had the highest number of U.S. visitors in July, with more than 30 million visitors.
  • Jack Henry & Associates saw the highest monthly growth with twice as many visitors in July than June.
  • Wipro Technologies had the highest year-over-year growth, with 3 times as many visitors this year compared to last year.
  • FIS Global and Online Resources also doubled their traffic compared to last year. 
JulyWebTrafficPublic4.jpg
Source: Compete.com retrieved the week of August 15, 2011
1. The previous month recorded was May 2011.
_______________________________________________________
Notes:
1. We reviewed 255 Finovate alumni. Only those with at least 10,000 unique visitors in July are listed. 
3. NM = Not measurable
4. Compete estimates online visitors based on the activity of a panel of more than 2 million U.S. Internet users. It is only an estimate of traffic and may undercount at-work usage.

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PayPal and Cortera Take Charge in May’s Web Traffic

By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on
Categories: Adobe, Andera, BancVue, Betterment, Bill.com, Billeo, BillFloat, Bills.com, BillShrink, Blippy, Boku, BrightScope, Bundle, Cardlytics, CashEdge, ChargeSmart, Check Point, CheckingFinder, Cortera, Credit Karma, Credit Sesame, Credit.com, DebtGoal, Discover, eRollover, eToro, Expensify, Experian, Fidelity National Information Services, Fiserv, HelloWallet, Infosys, Intuit, Jack Henry, Kapitall, Leadfusion, Lending Club, Lendio, Metavante, Mint.com, MoneyAisle, MyBankTracker, Online Resources, Outright.com, PayPal, Prosper, S1, SecondMarket, Seeking Alpha, Simple Tuition, smartcredit.com, SmartyPig, Standard Chartered Bank, Sybase 365, TransUnion Interactive, TrustedID, Wesabe, Wikinvest, wipro, Yodlee, Zecco

Each month we survey the Web-traffic performance of our alums, using data from Web-analytics company Compete to review the sites they operate. 

Out of 255 alumni, 62 (24%) had more than 10,000 unique U.S. visitors in May 2011 (see tables below). Of the 62 reviewed, 25 (40%) had fewer visitors than in the previous month and 28 (45%) saw a decline year-over-year.

Private Companies
The 44 private companies are as follows:

Notable successes:

  • Cortera saw the highest number of unique U.S. visitors in May, with almost 2 million hits.
  • HelloWallet experienced the greatest month-over-month growth, with more than four times as many visitors.
  • Betterment saw its traffic increase an impressive 38 times from May of last year.

Private Finovate Alumni With More Than 10,000 Unique Visitors in May 2011

Thumbnail image for Thumbnail image for Thumbnail image for Thumbnail image for May2011PrivateWebTraffic.jpg





Source: Compete.com retrieved June 29, 2011

Public Companies
The 18 public companies are as follows:

Notable successes:

  • PayPal experienced the highest number of U.S. visitors in May, with over 32 million visitors.
  • TransUnion Interactive saw the highest month-over-month growth with more than two times the number of visitors in May than in April.
  • Sybase 365 experienced the highest year-over-year growth, with its traffic up almost 80% from last year.

Public Finovate Alumni With More Than 10,000 Unique Visitors in May 2011 

May2011PublicWebTraffic.jpg

Source: Compete.com retrieved June 29, 2011

_____________________________________________________________________________

Notes:

1. We reviewed 255 unique sites. Data was unavailable or irrelevant for 201 sites because: 

  • They had been acquired.
  • They were no longer available online.
  • They were not covered by Compete for various reasons (including some that were not U.S. domestic companies).
  • The number of unique visits was too small to be considered accurate.
  • They were subdomains of larger websites.

2. Numbers have been rounded to three significant digits.

3. The charts include companies that did not have measurable traffic in May 2011, indicated by “N/A.”

4. Compete draws its information from the online activity of a panel of more than 2 million U.S. Internet users. It is only an estimate of traffic, and may undercount at-work usage.

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Free “Ad-Supported” Credit Scores from Credit.com, Credit Karma, and Quicken Loans

By Jim Bruene Posted on
Categories: Credit Karma, Credit Reports & ID Theft Protection, Credit.com, Experian, Quicken Loans, TransUnion

image In August 1997, QSpace (now owned by Experian) was first to bring credit report data to the Web. The cost was $12 per report (see note 1), a price that has changed little over the ensuing 10 years.

Three years later, in October 2000, WorthKnowing.com introduced the concept of ad-supported (i.e., free) credit scores (see Online Banking Report, #66, article reprinted here). But the company failed to make it through the dot-com crash and ceased operations (note 2). Both QSpace and WorthKnowing earned OBR Best of the Web awards for their innovations.

It took seven years for the concept to reemerge, but now two Bay Area rivals are offering free credit bureau info in exchange for permission to present credit and other product offers. And just as I was about to finish this post yesterday, Quicken Loans introduced Quizzle, a personal finance/credit portal that also offers free credit bureau info (yesterday's post here).

Here are the players:

  • image Credit Karma: This San Francisco-based startup, with backing from Prosper's Chris Larsen, is delivering an actual credit score computed by TransUnion, one of the three major U.S. credit bureaus. It does not precisely match the commonly used FICO score from Fair Isaac. And the scale is different, with a top score of 900 instead of 850. The credit score service is still in closed beta, but we'll see if we can get some invites from the company. Credit Karma will be presenting at our FINOVATE Startup conference April 29 in San Francisco, if you want to meet the team behind this new service.
  • image Credit.com: Another San Francisco company, but one that dates back to 1995, recently launched a similar system, called the Credit Report Card. Credit.com CEO, Adam Levine, presented his other company, Identity Theft 911, at our inaugural FINOVATE conference last fall in NYC (video here). Credit.com provides a full evaluation of your actual TransUnion credit report and assigns letter grades to five different components of the overall score (see third screenshot below). The score is shown on a chart at the top that appears to top out at 850. The report is extremely well done. Like Credit Karma, the company earns fees from targeted offers. In our case, we were given a choice of applying for two Citibank cards.   
  • image Quizzle powered by Quicken Loans: Quizzle's business model is completely different because it's run by a financial institution instead of a lead generation site. The idea here is to get customers and prospective customers to use Quizzle frequently so that when the time comes for a new mortgage, the user remembers to apply at Quicken Loans. See yesterday's post for a complete overview.

Credit Karma homepage (15 Feb. 2008)

Credit Karma homepage

Credit.com Credit Report Card homepage (15 Feb 2008)

Credit.com credit report card

Credit.com Credit Report Card (top portion, detailed analysis of each section not shown)

 image

Note:

1. QSpace charged $12 for the first credit report, then $5 each to reorder. Data was from Experian (see Online Banking Report #28).

2. TransUnion now owns the WorthKnowing domain name.

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Experian Upsells ChildSecure, Credit Monitoring for Your Kids

By Jim Bruene Posted on
Categories: Credit Reports & ID Theft Protection, Email Samples, Experian

 

Coincidently, the same day I received my first alert from Experian's FreeCreditReport credit-monitoring service (see yesterday's post here), the company revamped its website's account-management area. The thing you notice right away is the focus on upselling subscribers to the new ChildSecure family plan (see first screenshot below).  

The cost is an extra $6.95/mo, which seems like a good value, considering that you can cover all your kids with a single fee. But the total monthly fee on my plan rises to an eye-popping $18.95/mo or $227 annually. That's a significant investment and hard to justify unless you've previously been burned by fraud (for more on the price/value equation, see our Online Banking Report on the subject published in August).  

Screenshots (24 Oct. 2007)
Logging in yesterday, I was greeted with this popup in front of the grayed-out main page.

They also sell it in a huge banner across the top of the main page and a tab for the ChildSecure option.

Finally, here's the page you see after clicking on ChildSecure tab.

Here's the email sent yesterday announcing the website redesign:

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Credit Monitoring Needs More Integration with Online Banking

By Jim Bruene Posted on
Categories: Alerts & Messaging, C-SAM Inc., Credit Reports & ID Theft Protection, Email Samples, Experian

Today I received my first alert (see screenshot below) since subscribing to Experian's credit-monitoring service about 4 weeks ago. While I appreciate the heads up, the user experience is not at all what I want.

Here are the problems: 

1. Cries wolf. All the alert tells me is that there was a "key change" posted to my file. Is it a routine credit inquiry (which I was expecting) or did someone just open an account at Best Buy in my name? The only way to find out is to log in to my FreeCreditReport account, which took three minutes since I couldn't remember the username/password. Please provide more info in the alert so I can better gauge the severity of the situation.

2. Not phish proof: While Experian does use my first and last name in the salutation, thereby improving believability, additional personalization is needed to help users know it's genuine, especially when the company's log-in process requires input of a social security number confirmation after login. 

3. Not enough trust: I've worked with Experian for more than a decade so I know and trust them. However, the average Joe/Jo doesn't really know whether FreeCreditReport is a trustworthy company or not. Credit monitoring alerts are too easy to miss if they don't come from a recognizable and trusted name. It would be much better if they came from the user's financial institution or card issuer, someone with whom they do business on a monthly basis, so the emails don't end up in some spam filter.

4. Not integrated with online banking: I really don't want to remember yet another username and password, nor do I want to spend five minutes of my day logging into another website to verify there are no criminals using my credit files. Credit monitoring and credit scores should be integrated into online banking so I can keep track while doing my normal banking.

5. Doesn't tell me what to do: In this particular case, I knew about the inquiry, but what if I didn't recognize it. The website doesn't provide any info on what to do if I did not authorize the inquiry, which could be the first sign of serious identity takeover (see screenshot below).

For more information, see our recent Online Banking Report on Credit Monitoring Services here.

Email alert from Experian's FreeCreditReport service (24 Oct. 2007)

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Automobile Title Insurance has Fee Income Potential

By Jim Bruene Posted on
Categories: Experian, Fee Income, First American, Loans & Credit

When it comes to generating incremental fee income, it's difficult to find new ideas. One you may not have considered is automobile title insurance.

Although we've purchased two used cars on eBay, we'd never heard of title insurance for autos until we read about it in the Wall Street Journal today. For a one-time fee of $50 to $60, consumers can buy insurance that protects them against fraudulent titles, including instances where a salvaged auto has had its title wiped clean by registering the vehicle in a state with more liberal salvage rules.

Firstam_titleguard_logoAccording to First American Corporation, which markets a $49.95 policy in a joint venture with Experian Automotive, 20% of salvaged autos end up with clean titles. The product is called TitleGuard Vehicle Title Insurance and is sold through a stand-alone website <autotitleguard.com> and through resellers such as Credit Union Direct Lending and Escrow.com.

Financial institution opportunities
There are two ways financial institutions could use title insurance:

  1. Education: In your auto-loans area, explain the ways that car titles can be manipulated with links to outside informational sources.
  2. Resell title insurance: Title insurance is most needed when purchasing vehicles from unknown private parties. Even if you don't finance such transactions, you could earn commissions on customers referred to third parties for title insurance.
  3. Bundle title insurance with loans: If you offer financing for private transactions, you could bundle title insurance with your loan to help differentiate your product and help justify premium pricing. The title insurance could be mandatory or optional and either way could be priced as a fee-based add-on or included in the regular loan-origination fee.

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Credit Report Marketers are Faster than Google!

By Jim Bruene Posted on
Categories: Credit Reports & ID Theft Protection, Equifax, Experian, Search Engine Marketing, TransUnion

In thousands of searches using Google and other search engines, I’ve succeeded in stumping them a few times, receiving no results on my search expression.

Vantagescore_googleHowever, today I saw something I’d never witnessed before. A Google search for "VantageScore," the new joint credit score from Experian, TransUnion, and Equifax (NetBanker March 14) returned the following (click on the inset for a closeup):

  • Zero mentions of the term
  • Two ads placed against a search term that returned zero documents (click on inset for closeup).

But I guess it had to happen: savvy credit report marketers are moving faster than Google’s spider to lay claim to a new term.

—JB

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New Credit Score Creates More FUD

By Jim Bruene Posted on
Categories: Credit Reports & ID Theft Protection, Equifax, Experian, TransUnion

Vantagescore_logoFUD (fear, uncertainty, and doubt) is a strong motivator, especially when it has something to do with your personal financial situation.

As much as financial institutions strive to maintain the perception of safety and soundness, they often benefit from the concerns and resulting risk-averse behavior of their customers.

Case in point: credit reports and identity theft protection. Sure, it’s relatively simple to request a credit report every six months to make sure the credit bureaus have accurate info on file under your name. The problem with this approach: it takes time, you must pass rigorous authentication tests each time, you have to remember to do it proactively, and once you successfully access your report, you have to figure out what it all means.

One of the more confusing aspects of the credit report world is the various credit scores available. Each of the three major credit bureaus offer a proprietary score, but the most common one, used by 75% of mortgage originators, is from Fair Isaac, whose FICO score is almost a household word.

Vantagescore_homepageThe new VantageScore is designed to simplify the confusing credit score landscape. Released today, it’s a joint effort from the three major credit bureaus, Experian, TransUnion, and Equifax, who worked together to create a single score incorporating information in all three databases. The new product will be marketed by a separate entity, VantageScore Solutions LLC, <vantagescore.com> a joint venture from the three companies (click on inset for a closer look).

Rather than the 800-point scale in use today, the VantageScore will use a more common academic letter-grade scale as follows:

900-990 A
801-900 B
701-800 C
601-700 D
501-600 F

Analysis
While it should help bring more clarity to the credit score in the long term, the immediate effect is more confusion with a new name, additional marketing campaigns, and a new grading scale. This should be good for financial institutions that can use the raised awareness and heightened concerns to sell their own credit-monitoring services, which can be a solid source of monthly fee revenue.

We’ll be taking a close look at the market during the next six weeks as we research and author an update to our 2002 analysis of the credit report-monitoring opportunity (refer to Online Banking Report #83/84).

—JB

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