Offering small and medium business clients access to videoconferences with business bankers under the Business Connect programme has paid off for St George, according to Phillip Godkin, general manager of business banking.Godkin said that, prior to the launch of the service, new clients signed up for an average of 1.5 products but that has now risen to an average of 4.5 products per new client.Godkin, speaking at the FST Media Technology & Innovation conference in Sydney yesterday, said technology facilitated relationships but business bankers remained the "secret sauce" in terms of boosting business.Alan Shields, managing director of RFi Advisory, said that the unanswered question was whether small business was truly happy dealing with a banker through a videoconference, or would still prefer to visit another bank with a business banker on the premises. A Telstra survey last year found that one in three Australians would like to interact with their financial service provider via videoconference - suggesting two thirds were less enthused.Shields acknowledged, however, that in-bank videoconferencing had allowed banks to spread their specialist resources across branches, and that the benefits would be even greater if that was available using client's own technology at a time and venue of their choosing.All four major banks along with St George currently offer videoconferencing services - but the focus to date has been on offering video conferencing from within bank branches. Godkin said yesterday that St George was running a pilot of a service which would allow customers to use "video anywhere." Shields said that such a service could particularly benefit regional or rural customers who could be several hours' drive from a physical branch. He added that the rollout of the national broadband network would also enable banks to develop richer content for video distribution.