Nontraditional digital banking alternatives continue to gain market share on retail banks. Options such as Apple, Venmo, and Amazon are embedded in consumers’ day-to-day lives, and they find the experience exceptionally easy. And these innovative simple-to-use banking tools have heightened customer expectations to meet their needs instantly. Therefore, retail banks must create an exceptional customer experience to stay relevant, compete and grow. The CX doesn’t just mean “look and feel” but the entire journey.
Let’s explore the top 5 factors to creating exceptional banking CX.
1. Knowledgeable Bankers
Banks often have an extensive portfolio of products, which challenges bankers to have in-depth knowledge of each offer. And these expansive product offerings can leave bankers unaware of which products best fit a customer’s unique need, so they may recommend the product with which they are most familiar. Plus, today’s customer is looking to their bank for insight and assistance in their financial journey. Accordingly, bankers should possess up-to-date customer data and product data to serve as power advisors to guide customers to financial wellness.
“Digital guides allowed a new employee to succeed day one. This is huge for maintaining retention and reducing training costs.”
Large Midwest Financial Institution
On average, a banker can master only 6 products and will sell those products even when they are not the right one for the customer because they, the banker, only had great knowledge on those accounts. Adding technology to help with knowledge for all products empowers bankers to offer customers the absolute best products for them.
2. Scalable Systems
The pandemic escalated consumers’ use of digital banking tools. In response, most banks have accelerated their digital transformation and enhanced their digital offerings at some level. However, banks need scalable systems that seamlessly run across all channels, whether in a branch, online, mobile, kiosk, or contact center, to compete today effectively. Banks must transition to cloud systems to deliver the consistent, high-quality experience that customers demand.
3. Ability to Collect the Right Customer Information
Every time a banker communicates with a customer, they have the opportunity to garner more information about the customer and build a 360-customer view. Whether online or in the branch, each customer interaction should be considered a chance to gather additional details on customers’ current circumstances and financial goals. Consequently, bankers need engagement tools that enable them to capture customer data during every engagement and transition a conversation from one mode to another without missing a beat.
4. Personalized Experience
Staff at local bank branches have made it their business to know their customers – and it has been their differentiator. Yet, as digital interactions increase, the importance of online personalization throughout the customer journey grows. The likes of Netflix and Amazon have set expectations for all online experiences to be highly personalized. Likewise, customers expect their banks to understand their unique needs, circumstances, financial habits, and hopes. Hence, banks should personalize all communication and content to each customer, and every offer should be customized and reflect recent customer engagements.
5. Empathetic, Caring, Conversations
Customers today want to feel cared for, heard, and have their problems solved. Thus, banks must reimagine the banking experience. While technology is vital, banks must not implement it at the expense of losing the human touch, as it is essential to creating customer connections and building loyalty. To attain that humanization, bankers must engage in meaningful, compassionate conversations that show customers they care about their needs, desires, and financial well-being. As the saying goes, nobody cares how much you know until they know you care.
Learn how Ignite Sales can power your exceptional retail banking customer experience so you can sell more, build relationships and drive business growth.
Ignite Sales is the leader in digital customer engagement, using artificial intelligence for engaging analytics to facilitate growth, deeper product penetration and increase satisfaction levels of bankers and customers.
