The Treasury Management Customer Relations Role
In many banks, Treasury Management (TM) efforts are heavily focused on acquiring net-new business. Sales teams pursue prospects, onboard customers, and then quickly move to the next opportunity. But as institutions grow and the Treasury Management book of business expands, cracks begin to form in customer satisfaction. Services get misconfigured. Follow-ups fall through the cracks. The customer’s internal users struggle with training. Slowly, the glow of a new relationship fades into frustration.
Enter the Treasury Management Customer Relations Role, a key position designed to ensure the long-term success of TM customers and to protect the bank’s reputation, revenues, and relationships.
Why Create This Role?
This position is typically found in larger or fast-growing environments where the return on investment is crystal clear. When implemented properly, customer satisfaction (CSAT) scores increase significantly, often justifying the annual cost of the position many times over. This role doesn't focus on chasing new business; instead, it ensures that existing relationships thrive and expand over time.
In fact, Customer Relations professionals are often just as knowledgeable, if not more so, than Treasury Management Officers (TMOs) when it comes to the bank’s TM offerings. But their mission is different. Rather than focusing on net-new sales, their job is to deliver flawless onboarding experiences, consistent customer support, and deep engagement throughout the customer lifecycle.
What’s In a Name?
Titles vary depending on organizational culture and structure, but two common options include:
Treasury Management Customer Relations Specialist
Treasury Management Customer Success Manager
Regardless of the title, the mission remains the same: deliver value by making the customer’s experience seamless, professional, and productive.
Key Responsibilities
The role spans a wide range of responsibilities, all aimed at deepening customer relationships and minimizing churn.
- Partner with the TMO to help manage the ongoing needs of assigned customers, acting as a second point of contact and internal advocate.
- Oversee onboarding from start to finish. This includes creating onboarding tickets, verifying each implementation step, and ensuring the timeline stays on track.
- Lead Onboarding Kick-Off Meetings, where expectations are clearly set, timelines are reviewed, and the customer is introduced to their support team.
- Hold regular update meetings, either quarterly or monthly depending on the customer’s revenue and deposit volume. Before each meeting, the Customer Relations Specialist ensures all service tickets and implementation items are up to date, so nothing is overlooked.
- Support the bank’s risk management efforts by ensuring that customer configurations, access controls, and usage patterns are in line with policy.
- Monitor training progress for each customer’s internal users. If users haven’t completed training, the Customer Relations Specialist follows up and provides encouragement or additional resources.
- Routinely audit customer setups, ensuring services like the Online Portal, Positive Pay, and Remote Deposit Capture are configured correctly and functioning as intended.
- Identify cross-sell opportunities based on the customer’s existing service mix, transaction volumes, or new business activities. The goal is to uncover unmet needs and propose solutions, not through cold outreach, but through relationship depth.
- Collaborate with the TMO to prepare proposals and presentations for new services, ensuring the message is relevant, timely, and aligned with the customer’s goals.
A Strategic Investment
Too often, we see banks focus all their energy on winning new customers but fail to fully support them after the deal closes. The Customer Relations Role changes that. It bridges the gap between Sales and Support, ensuring that each customer receives the attention and expertise they deserve, not just during the first 90 days, but for years to come.
When customer expectations are rising and technology is advancing rapidly, having a dedicated Customer Relations function is no longer a luxury. It’s a strategic necessity.
Recent Blog Postings
Stop Giving It Away: Reclaiming Treasury Management Fee Income
One of the most common challenges community banks face is the widespread practice of waiving treasury management (TM) fees. On the surface, it can seem like a gesture of goodwill to business customers. It often leads to significant lost revenue and unintended cultural damage inside the bank. Read more on the blog...
Turn On the Value: Leveraging Your Account Analysis System
At banks who are just starting out developing their Treasury Management departments, the Account Analysis System (AAS) sits dormant, effectively cutting off a major source of insight - and revenue. Leveraging your Account Analysis System can solve this. Read more on the blog...
Thank You Members
Thank you to all our members for your continued support of our newsletter. Your engagement keeps us motivated to deliver the best in community bank treasury management content. If you're a guest, consider a paid Launch Pad newsletter membership to have exclusive insights and updates sent direcly to you, ensuring you never miss out on the latest in treasury management strategies and trends.
In this month's paid membership section directly from the TMClarity Framework, we go deep on The Digital Sales Role in Treasury Management. If you are a paid Launch Pad member, login using the links in the box below.
