Mumbai, March 28: ICICI Bank has seen a spurt in growth as more and more customers are opting for multiple products — a practice called cross-selling. The bank had introduced cross-selling around two years ago to increase business by tapping existing customers.

Chanda Kochhar, executive director heading retail operations, told The Telegraph that even as the bank is now adding nearly 1.2 lakh credit card customers every month, nearly half of them are from its existing clientele. Around 25 per cent of the housing loans disbursed are also to its existing customers. Home loans and credit cards account for Rs 14,345 crore and Rs 2,119 crore, respectively, of the bank’s retail finance portfolio in April-December.

ICICI Bank’s success comes on the heels of a recent survey by leading CRM applications provider Siebel Systems which stated that 87 per cent of all Indian banks made no attempt to cross/up sell related banking products during customer interaction.

Cross-selling has assumed a critical importance in ICICI Bank’s retail credit strategy. Bank officials said this has been achieved as the bank has been successful in ramping up its customer base over the past few years from a little over 3 million to 10 million at present. “For cross-selling to work, huge numbers are needed,” another bank official added.

Kochhar said the bank has been referring its customer database to even offer customised solutions. In credit cards, the bank has used this data to its advantage by offering customers a credit limit that best suites them, she added. “Even if a customer has a salary account with us, we can use the data to offer him a card that carries a credit limit based on his income,” she added.

Retail credit outstanding is estimated to represent close to 5 per cent of the country’s gross domestic product.