To say Dime Community Bank has been around a long time would be an understatement. When they opened their first branch in 1864, Abraham Lincoln was President of the United States. The Brooklyn Bridge wouldn't be built for another six years, and it would be another 20 years (a score, if you will) before Coney Island saw its first roller coaster.

At the time, a recent wave of European immigration had transformed pre-roller coaster Brooklyn — which was its own city then — into the third-largest city in the country. It was this struggling immigrant community that inspired the founding of Dime Community Bank all those years ago. And service to the community remains at the heart of the bank's mission today.

"Dime has always been about community and taking care of those less fortunate," states Joseph Raitano, Vice President of Digital at Dime Community Bank. "There were no banks that would take care of the immigrant community back in 1864. So William Grandy founded Dime to help immigrants open bank accounts. You were able to open up an account with just a dime."

Over the years, Dime has grown from two operating branches in Brooklyn to 28, but throughout this growth, the bank's commitment to serving customers with individual attention and respect has gone undiluted. "It's personal," states Lee Guilder, Digital Marketing Manager. "The cliché is that you're not just a number, you're a person, and we know who you are — and here that's very true."

As customers' needs have evolved over time, the bank has adapted its strategy — and its technology — to ensure it can continue to reach people when and where they're looking for financial help.

"Customer service, customer experience, and technology — we understand that it's all about convenience today," explains Raitano. "I think that the mind frame of a lot of different banks is that new technology is a nice-to-have. But Dime understands how important it is to have a strong digital strategy, and the right technology to support it."

Dime uses Yext to update and maintain important brand information across the entire Knowledge Network — approximately 175 digital services globally, including Google, Amazon Alexa, Apple, Bing, Facebook, Yahoo, and Yelp. Dime also uses Yext to manage and respond to online customer reviews, and to provide a convenient and intuitive search experience on its own website.

"The communities we serve are getting a lot more accustomed to asking the Alexas and Siris of the world various questions — whether it be personal, like 'how much is in my checking account?' or 'can I transfer money between one account to another?' all the way up," explains Raitano. "It's all about convenience. Knowing that we have partners like Yext makes it that much easier to keep up with the technology that our community is looking for."

"Dime is fortunate to have an outstanding leadership team that understands the importance of technology and the value it brings to our customers from a convenience standpoint," he continues. "Under the leadership of our CEO Kenneth Mahon, President Stuart Lubow, CTO Michael Fegan, and CMO Steven Miley, these individuals allow my digital marketing team at Dime to be a leader within the banking space, and as innovative as possible with bank products and services."

"Partnering with Yext has allowed the digital marketing team to not only easily update location information for the branch network, but to also garner valuable data on the customer network, and deeper demographic data as a result," explains Steve Miley, Senior Vice President, Strategic Marketing. "This becomes informative data that we can analyze as we continue to refine our customer experience at Dime. To that end, we have been able to better connect with not only our customers through an enhanced experience, but also have seen a vast improvement of the overall user experience on a greater scale."

When the COVID-19 coronavirus outbreak struck New York City, the team at Dime was able to use Yext to quickly provide customers with new information as the situation evolved. "We have 28 locations," says Guilder. "And when COVID-19 first started in March — and even into the beginning of April — the hours of the branches were changing constantly. Whether one branch was open or closed, or if there was some enhanced cleaning within the branch, the hours were changing on a daily basis — even throughout the day. So people were searching for that quite often. Yext allowed us to make those updates as they happened."

"Yext Answers also allows us to see exactly what people are searching, and how they are searching," adds Raitano. "And we were one of the first banks in the New York area to successfully put together a COVID page, and a Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) response page."

"We noticed the people who were searching for information on our website were getting the answers that they wanted," he continues. "And then they were submitting questions to our SBA page — personal questions unique to their situation. So they were searching on our website, getting the answers that they needed, and then submitting applications for PPP loans. Yext Answers helped us get a step ahead of everything that was happening. Our community was in a super vulnerable position and everyone needed answers to their questions. And we were able to get them those answers."

Using the Yext platform, Dime Community Bank has experienced a 34% year-over-year increase in listing impressions and a 21% year-over-year increase in listing clicks (January 2020 through April 2020, as compared to the same period the year prior).

4-star and 5-star reviews are up 26% year-over-year, and the brand's average rating of new reviews is up 38% (January 2020 through April 2020, as compared to the same period the year prior).

Within four months of launching Yext Answers, Dime saw a 312% increase in search volume on its website, and five months after launch, the brand's website had a 35% click-through rate for site search results. During the COVID-19 pandemic, Dime was able to react quickly to government intervention, by adding entities for SBA and PPP resources. Since doing so, "ppp loan application" has been the most commonly searched query on its website.