This guest post was written by Daniel Thomas, a 25-year strategy and product development veteran of the financial services industry. He is a principal consultant with Mindful Insights LLC.

Back in April, we showed you the list of the 30 most popular iPad apps from U.S. banks and other financial services companies listed on iTunes. The list featured the usual big names, but one surprise was #14, Texas Dow Employees Credit Union (TDECU), a 132,000 member, 19-branch, $1.6B credit union headquartered in Lake Jackson, TX.

The app, UniFI, available on iPad, iPhone and Android platforms, was developed by startup FI-Mobile. The full-featured offering includes:

• All the banking functions offered in online banking
• Linkage to Facebook and Twitter
• Branch locations
• Rates
• Advertising capabilities
• Analytics

FI Mobile says it can launch the app in three weeks for FIs that already have a mobile banking application, and seven weeks if they have to develop a native app.

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Features
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Clicking on Mobile Banking from the home screen launches the WAP service developed by Q2ebanking (note 1).

Both the Locations screen and the Check Our Rates page fetch real-time content from tables that the bank or credit union maintain in FI Mobile's advanced-content management system (admin tool). 

TDECU has an active social network presence, so Facebook and Twitter integration facilitates more frequent views and comments.

The app also includes contact information, rates, and access to TDECU credit cards through gotomycard.com.

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Results
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According to Brad Clutter, Online Banking Product Manager at TDECU, in the first two months after the app's launch in March, mobile subscribers grew 50% (their target was 10%) and the number of mobile transactions (balance inquiries, transfers, etc.) grew 30% compared to their existing WAP-only, mobile-banking program. He said, "We have been blown away by the results we've seen, and they have more than justified the cost."

Thanks to FI Mobile's analytics, TDECU can now see that their app is being used by members in all 50 states and in 16 different countries. They know that 84% are returning users and use of Android devices outnumbers Apple iOS nearly 2-to-1.

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Note:
1. UniFI is vendor agnostic and will launch the mobile banking program developed by any vendor. And if you don't have one, FI Mobile will develop one.