
If you are in Finance, you would have read at least one of the many predictions articles that poured from all directions on the internet in the past month. This is not trying to be yet another one but focus on the CX angle of one of them.
Most of the FinTech forecasts herald the advent -or victorious prevalence depending on the knowledge level of the author- of a few technology trends: blockchain, chat bots, robo-advisory and AI, PSD2 and data analytics in 2017.
“Cross Sales” or “Life Assistance”
Transactions already tell banks what your family looks like, and what you need in terms of next, extra or better financial and non-financial services. Buying a size 12 plimsole in M&S can only mean you have a 5-7 year old to raise. All the bank has to work out is “when and how” not “if,” they should tell us about their “goHenry” equivalent card and the junior ISA.
Making regular payments to a care agency can only mean you have an elderly relative. All that banks need to decide is “when and how” not “if”, they should engage us about the pension top-up product or even a burial service insurance.
Put into perspective, the mere fact that comparison sites, financial advisors, insurance brokers and the likes have developed as a parallel industry to banking, is a sign that banks have spectacularly failed at their job if we agree their job is to not only to store and move money, but offer the consumer all the information and actions connected to their money as services.
The beauty of it is that “doing the right thing by the consumer” by giving them the experience they deserve through attaching meaning and intelligence to their data, is that it’s a win-win – as much a moral imperative as a means to drive business and banks are in a uniquely insightful position to do so.
Lastly, and to me most importantly, making use of data is good Emotional Banking™ practice. Customers instinctively feel that there is great intrinsic power and opportunity in transactional knowledge and, if employed for the good, they will not perceive it in a creepy “I know what you did last summer” fashion. They simply know they have offered slices of their lives in information and that feels intimate, it is arguably why they develop Irrational Bank Loyalty ™ towards their financial services provider.
Giving away so much of our data is emotionally connecting in a way banks need to be courageous enough to explore to become beloved brands. It puts them at the forefront of helping consumers achieve a better financial standing by helping them save and spend more intelligently and that can very well be addictively important.
Consumers attach so much of their identity to their financial success –this article in the Economist wonders which came first happiness or money- that it follows they would be delighted with their bank contributing to it. Not to mention utterly surprised if they did.
An ad for a savings account on the side bar of a current-account-only-customer’s incomprehensible transaction list, may have been what passed for cross-sales, customer insight and marketing in most banks until now, but keeping in mind it will from hereon be “anyone’s game” with the arrival of PSD2, challengers and big brands who will build smartly, it simply won’t cut the proverbial P&L mustard anymore.
Blockchain and AI may well need a few more years before making a difference but my transactional data and yours is already in our banks, they now know what it means, so all they need to do in order to make 2017 the year they really became relevant to their customers, is be willing to help us act on it to become a smarter consumers and convince us they’re a brand worth banking on.