Competitive Advantages Of Santander Bank

Competitive advantages of Santander Bank

Introduction

The present work includes the sources of competitive advantages of the Santander Bank based on the competitive advantages for costs and differentiation. Banco Santander was born on May 15, 1857. It is a European company with more than a century old, which includes a network of financial entities with presence worldwide, mainly in Europe and Latin America. Its main markets are Spain, the United Kingdom, Poland and Portugal in the case of Europe and Brazil, USA, Mexico, Argentina and Chile in America.

Competitive advantages

Competitive advantages refer to advantages that companies whose characteristics are positioned in a place higher than the rest of their competitors, in general it would be any attribute that makes the company more competitive.

In Banco Santander we find two types of competitive advantages that would be cost advantages and quality advantages and after analyzing these we can see that Banco Santander gives more importance to the advantages in differentiation.

Competitive costs in costs.

Cost advantages occur when companies offer services/products similar to those in their competition at a lower cost. The types of competitive cost advantages that we find in Banco Santander are:

• Scales economies.
• The economies of scale refer to the power that companies have to produce more at least cost.

In this case Banco Santander opts for versatile workers who allow them to have a smaller template, that is, they intend to offer the maximum of services to customers saving everything possible on costs by having a minor template.

• Learning economies

Learning economies are based on cost reduction thanks to the repetition of work and worker’s experiences. In this case, this cost in cost does not favor the Santander Bank based on repetition because as we have said before when opting for versatile workers, it avoids repetition, the objective of this is to achieve greater flexibility of the workers and ensure that if necessary they helpIn other tasks other than yours more effectively, saving costs.

In relation to experience if we rely on the training and flexibility of workers Banco Santander saves on costs.

• Product design

This advantage favors Banco Santander since the entity has a product design that highlights among its competitors, especially when offering online services, since the design of its website offers a wide range of facilities so thatThe client comfortably finds the adapted service you need.

• Production techniques

Regarding production techniques in Banco Santander, the use of technology applied to organization management processes has a very important role since it reduces costs and makes the company more efficient.

• Use of capacity

The strong element of Banco Santander is the distribution of offices used in the most efficient way possible, to serve its clients in a totally personalized way according to their needs.

Competitive advantages in differentiation.

The competitive advantages in differentiation refer to those characteristics that the company has that do not have their competitors and that customers perceive it as something that makes them be above their competitors. Banco Santander has the following advantages in differentiation.

• Product characteristics and benefits:

Banco Santander tries to offer products and services adapted to the personal needs of customers, something that makes them unique to competition.

Some of the basic services it offers are: adapted financing, charges and payments with different institutions that separate them allow to offer global control through an electronic banking service, socially responsible investments, cards with broad controlled insurance coverage through the electronic banking service.

Through its website it offers an advanced online service in which customers can customize their payments, charges, personalized benefits according to what they need either individuals, institutions or companies.

In the services section of your website, they show all their available services, something that caught our attention was the initiative to create mortgages with fully personalized bonuses and especially the advantages of products and services it offers for the agriculture sector,betting on this sector since it is a sector that has great difficulties.

• Complementary services:

One of the characteristics that Santander Bank makes is the application with which you can make payments, purchases, financing, etc. A modern, innovative and safe form in the market. In addition, the bank offers a special service for SMEs, such as the development of a series of products and services tailored to these companies, a way to bring accounts to the company without efforts, in addition to providingadvice to manage business day to day.

It offers a nearby service through Santander Select (which consists of a manager), provision of unique services such as Mastercard card, Santandar Plú or Black, and other services such as Mutual Funds Santander Select, highlighting the impulse to the businessof insurance destined to cover approximately all customer risks.

It is noteworthy that the Santander Bank offers a financial branch through Facebook, which through specialized and executive personnel carried out exclusive advice to customers, in addition to providing solutions to the different problems posed by customers, this complementary service has servedthe entity to differentiate itself from many other financial entities with which it currently competes.

• Marketing intensity:

We can say that Banco Santander compared to the rest of its competitors stands out in this advantage since it has excellent marketing campaigns, we highlight the last campaign I launched in September “We want to help you”, three stories based on real events with the objective ofDemonstrate the good attention that customers receive, through their help, and proof of this are the Effie de Oro Awards received by previous campaigns.

One of the main strategies of the Santander Bank Marketing Plan is to identify where its customers are and how to send them the product with the aim of looking for new customers, therefore the entity invests in marketing satisfactorily obtaining great results.

Other marketing strategies to highlight are: the initiatives to launch popularity in their online banking that was to give 40 euros to each client that opened an Openback account, “return to school” campaigns and money gifts for domiciliations among many others.

The Santander Bank Digital Platform thanks to this advantage is shot in 2018 a deposit of 7.000 million euros.

It also publishes world repercussion events such as sports, in the case of football it is the entity in charge of advertising LaLiga and proof of this is LaLiga Santander and LaLigEight years.

• Technology incorporated in the manufacturing process:

Banco Santander has given importance to the investment of new technologies, a clear example is the application for smartphones through which it offers daily efforts such as:

1. Transfers and transfers
2. Operational with cards, to consult movements made
3. Closest ATM search.

Performed safely by the safe entrance of the Touch ID fingerprint, which allows all operations to be carried out safely. Currently the bank is immersed in the reinvention of the offices model, reinforced traditional branches, with technology leading models, such as the Work Café offices model, which groups in one place cafeteria, bank, cowork (shared officesBetween professionals and customers), it is an open space to all, in which you can attend events, hold meetings, connect to the Internet, and how not to carry out financial efforts.

• INPUT QUALITY
• Template qualification

Banco Santander stands out for the qualification of its employees and the importance of their formation, according to reports from the entity themselves provide more than 33 hours of training for each employee annually investing more than 100 million euros in the development of employees.

• Location

Regarding the Santander bank location, it is committed to international presence, something that favors the advantages in differentiation since it has 2.000 correspondent banks distributed throughout 152 countries in the world with an extensive distributed network as follows:

1. 16 Commercial Banks: Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Germany, Mexico, Peru, Poland, Portugal, Puerto Rico, Spain, Uruguay, USA, United Kingdom, China and Morocco.
2. 10 branches (wholesale banking service): Beijing, Frankfurt, Hong Kong, London, Milan, Nyc, Houston, Paris, Shanghai and Singapore.
3. 7 Representation Offices (International Private Banking Service): Bahamas, Geneva, Houston, Miami, NYC, San Diego and Seattle.

conclusion

After analyzing the sources of competitive advantages of Banco Santander we can see the great importance that the entity gives to the advantages in differentiation. We can emphasize that Banco Santander has a great commitment offering products and services adapted to their needs (individualization). We also see that this entity is constantly innovating both in products offered and in its organizational structure (Work Café). Another aspect that has caught our attention is the great marketing investment made by this bank, an example of this is LaLiga Santander or LaLiga Smartnank. We can also emphasize that it invests a lot in the training of its employees since a high degree of training is required in Banco Santander.