Charismatic officer at the helm of Seylan’s Sales Division
Mark Taylor
By revolutionising the sales strategy to meet customer needs, the Sales Division of the Seylan Bank has come to dominate the consumer banking landscape with innovative ideas under the able leadership of Mark Taylor, Senior Manager Sales of the Seylan Bank who assumed duties at the sales division of the bank, a couple of years back.
In an interview with the Business Times, Mr. Taylor said that he is quite sanguine about promoting sales hitherto not practiced in the bank. With unblinking self-confidence and with several proposals under his belt he implemented them meticulously during the past few years which saw a significant increase in garnering market share of the banking industry.
“Direct sales approach is a new concept of the Seylan Bank during the past three years. Other competitors too have joined the same bandwagon and fight for the same piece of pie during the past few years.”
He said gone are the days when most customers walked into a bank to negotiate a deal. Things have changed so rapidly that banks today have to approach customers to clinch a deal. The centerpiece of his strategy is to cater to the needs of customers according to their choice preferences. Mr. Taylor joined the Seylan Bank with the idea of infusing new ideas to its sales network team that consist of around 200 sales personnel who focus mainly on consumer product range that include credit cards, personal loans, housing loans, travel cards and tele- sales business unit modules and other consumer products including leasing portfolios. He is of the opinion that the bank has not nurtured its existing customer portfolio during the past few years which has a higher potential being one of the oldest banks during the past three decades. “Our idea is to sell more products to our existing customers whom we know well so that their chances of leaving us are very slim. We want to bundle up our products and sell it to corporate customers and we are one of the fastest growing sales units in the country.” Meanwhile the entire Seylan Bank Sales division that includes personnel loans unit, the cards unit, the housing loans unit and the Sales Administration unit has moved into a new location at Dharmapala Mawatha, Colombo 7 for the convenience of its customers.