Delta recently sent me a link inviting me to recap my “travel year,” and it turned out to be surprisingly effective. Banks can learn from this.

Here’s the meat of the email I received.

I was initially skeptical when I got the note, but I was curious to see what “my video” might look like, so I clicked through. You can see the 1:15 by clicking on the above graphic. It showed me how many miles I flew, who I gave a gift to, where I went on with free tickets, how many countries I went to, and how many times I was upgraded. It generated some fond memories (how can Paris not?) and made me value my relationship with Delta. While the video was obviously canned, there was nevertheless some relatively heavy lifting to generate the text that flashed across the screen.

What does this have to do with banking? Three lessons seem worthwhile:

1.Think about how you can generate positive feelings in your customers. What was good in their financial year that you can highlight?

2.What data can you pull together in an automated way that will be useful, thought provoking, or nice?

3.If an airline, part of an industry not known for generating warm and fuzzies, can do this, why can’t banks?

Please excuse me as I go plan my next trip.