Widget-based banking and brand erosion

In the view of some, banking widgets offer a new means by which bank applications will become more versatile and easier to use. Waterfield Technologies and Worklight have teamed up to create some consumer banking widgets that could be dropped into Windows Vista Sidebar, Mac OS X Dashboard, Facebook, iGoogle, Twitter, Apple iPhone and other channels.

ZDNet discusses the rise of such functionality with John Marino, president of Waterfield. He's seeing interest mainly from retailers right now, who want to push the buying experience closer to the customer. He also has plans to push the technology to regional banks.

But what about the big consumer banks that dominate web-based banking right now? Is this a threat? Well, it could be. Anytime you have a financial technology getting between the bank and the customers, you have to ponder whether it will damage the brand. Right now, big banks are vulnerable. My sense is that banks ought to be figuring out ways they can push their own widgets out to maintain their brand investment--not only basic banking for consumers, but also small business-oriented apps. 

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