By Jon Capetz, Customer Success Adoption Director, Genesys
The COVID-19 pandemic fundamentally changed the way customers interact with their banks. With customers still needing assistance in the absence of in-person services, whether that be with card services, mortgages and loans, savings and investments, or other services, banks had to act quickly to provide assistance while being entirely remote for long periods.
Digital banking is on the rise. Research has found that 14 million Brits opened a digital-only banking account in 2021, three times more than 2019, pre-pandemic. As services have undergone transformation and digital channels have become the standard, customers and banks have had to adapt to new ways of communicating.
Many consumers still want regular interactions with their banks, but how they want to engage has changed. Banking clients have a much higher expectation for instantaneous and on-demand responses. Resulting in a growing number of banking clientele turning to chat, text, messaging apps or email instead of initiating a phone call or visiting their local branches because it’s more convenient.
Many clients will also expect the conversations to continue from one channel to the next. For example, when a client applies for a mortgage, they will likely start with an online enqkeyuiry, then proceed to a phone call and a follow-up email. Rather than starting each stage from scratch, clients expect the bank’s customer experience team to have insight into what has been discussed or agreed to beforehand and know what the immediate next steps should be.
While omnichannel and digital services aren’t new to banks, many institutions have struggled with the rapid changes and the scale of demand on these services during the pandemic. In many cases, this has resulted in siloed user experiences across voice and digital interactions because of ad hoc implementations. Larger financial institutions have also had the additional challenge of providing a consumer experience that’s consistent across all business lines and geographic locations, meaning a comprehensive digital and global strategy is even more vital.
Despite calls from clients for digital-first services, there remains hesitancy within the banking industry when it comes to building a robust digital banking strategy. This is often because of concerns around security and misconceptions of high risk and effort with low reward. However, if banks want to strengthen relationships and loyalty within the communities they serve, they must adapt to these demands and provide a customer experience that is meaningful and personalised.
As such, there are three key considerations when implementing a cloud-based digital banking strategy to maximise success:
Deploy with a customer-first mindset
When rolling out a digital strategy, simply adding new channels is a flawed approach, it requires a different way of thinking. New digital deployments can often fail when the design derives from a business’ internal goals and doesn’t take into account that customers’ want a consistent experience across channels that drives a meaningful outcome.
Using customer-centric design techniques places the user at the heart of transformation, allowing banks to remain focused on achieving outcomes that align with expectations for seamless and consistent experiences across channels.
By adopting cloud technology, banks can initiate a digital engagement solution that re-envisions the experience and needs of clients and employees throughout their journeys, getting rid of point solutions for a platform that scales.
Enhance experiences in the cloud
Once banks have identified which digital engagement methods clients prefer, the next step is making sure they can cope with that level of demand. The pandemic has heightened expectations on banks, with clients becoming accustomed to digital channels with features like quick pay, quick deposits and self-service trading that can be accessed anywhere, at any time of day. The demand for these features and further digital capabilities will continue to grow, and banks need to make sure they’re equipped to respond.
Leveraging cloud technology allows banks to scale services in line with demand, while enhancing agility and speed. This ensures customer issues can be resolved in a timely manner when needed. At the same time, this gives banks the ability to respond faster to the evolving needs of their clients by delivering a consistent experience across channels as they meet their expectations for convenience and accessibility.
Through defining which digital engagement methods matter most to customers and bringing capabilities up to speed with demand, the base of a digital strategy can be formed. Then it can be expanded and built upon. Banks can then begin to craft experiences that are personalised to the client.
Anticipate customer needs with predictive AI
Once customers’ preferred routes have been established, enabling predictive engagement using artificial intelligence (AI) is the next step in building an exhaustive digital strategy.
Customers want to know the businesses they interact with can learn and adjust faster to what’s happening across engagement channels, such as voice, digital and CRM platforms to truly capture and understand their past and present activities across all touchpoints. AI- based predictive routing uses predictive capabilities to understand intent, route to the next best step in the journey and allowing agents to respond with the insights needed to drive to meaningful outcomes.
By offering a truly personalised experience, banks can ensure clients feel heard and understood, and that their issues are met with empathy. Through this, banks can really begin to build relationships with the communities they serve and maintain loyalty by establishing themselves as businesses that understand and care about their clients’ needs and concerns.
A necessary investment to cope with changed expectations
While adding new digital capabilities to an organisation can seem daunting, it’s a vital investment if banks wish to maintain long-lasting relationships with their clients. Cloud solutions are a key enabler for banks to transform and experiment with digital innovations. It offers the flexibility and agility for banks to build new services and applications, which makes it more adaptable to meeting changing customer demands.
Customers want banks to not only be always available when a problem occurs, but to also have solutions at the ready. Expectations are higher than ever; by establishing a comprehensive digital banking strategy, banks can ensure they’re meeting client needs time and time again.
