According to a 2020 Deloitte report “Retail Banking in the Age of COVID-19”, banks will need to focus on developing more digital solutions that enhance the consumer journey to stay competitive over the next 1-3 years. Advanced solutions can help banks upgrade their existing legacy technology systems to realise value almost immediately. A true differentiator for banks will be their ability to use effective price and product personalisation. Doing so successfully can significantly increase customer satisfaction and retention while helping banks meet their business targets, regardless of changes in the market.
Earnix is a provider of mission-critical systems for global insurers and banks. Through Earnix, customers can provide prices and personalised products that are smarter, faster, safer and in full alignment with corporate business goals and objectives.
As the Head of Global Banking at Earnix, Be’eri Mart is responsible for accelerating value-delivery, market expansion, and growth for the company’s offerings for banks. Mart has over 20 years of experience in delivering better customer experience for banks. Before joining Earnix, Mart was the General Manager of the Fraud Line of Business at NICE Actimize. Prior to this role, he led the development, go-to-market, and sales for NICE’s Real-Time Authentication Solutions.
Discussing the three main components to improve customer satisfaction, Mart analyses how digitisation, personalisation and risk management must be used by fintechs:
Breaking the inertia of digital adoption
Covid-19 has catalysed a digital transformation in the banking sector as individuals and businesses turned to digital solutions and moved away from traditional ways of banking. The above-referenced Deloitte report indicates that “financial institutions are rapidly adjusting to serving customers almost entirely digitally, with leading players proactively investing in expanding the functionality and efficiency of their digital platforms in the short- and long-term.”
Going digital can be a complex and challenging process for banks. However, providing banking products and services over digital platforms can create an easier and better customer experience, presenting an opportunity for banks to achieve their business objectives in a manner that is smarter, faster and safer. Through an agile, automated, artificial intelligence (AI)-driven solution, banks can better assess risk and offer highly personalised products and prices through digital channels. This in turn serves as a proof point for consumers and businesses that banks are attuned to their needs and can offer a seamless customer experience digitally.
Digitalisation presents banks with an opportunity to adopt systems that operationalise data to deliver banking product offerings instantaneously. Banks with digital capabilities can leverage technology to enhance the delivery of the right product, at the right time, through all customer touchpoints. The key to being at the “top of the market” is personalisation – a bank’s ability to offer a product that the consumer needs at the time when they need it and at the price they can afford.
Power of Personalisation
Digitalisation has heightened consumer expectations for hyper-personalisation. However, legacy technology traditionally used to determine prices and products falls short on two fronts when it comes to personalisation: operationalising data to generate prices and products accordingly in an automated manner and delivering and adjust products and prices proactively in real-time.
Banks that use analytical solutions and automation capabilities can boost their business. A bank’s ability to personalise products is measured by the level of granularity in its market segmentation. The more granular the market segmentation, the more personalised offer for a product and price. This is in part enabled by sophisticated machine learning (ML) algorithms – the only way a bank can define granular segmentation automatically and continuously. Once implemented within an end-to-end solution, these capabilities altogether position banks to generate tailored products and prices that reflect their customers’ needs and financial circumstances, thus gaining a competitive advantage and differentiation in the industry.
Being attuned to a dynamic market and reflecting changes in product offerings increases customer satisfaction and retention and is key to banks remaining competitive in the market even after the pandemic. Analytical modelling tools, sophisticated algorithms, and machine learning capabilities that deliver competitively priced and highly personalised financial products to every customer are no longer aspirational. It’s a requirement.
Dynamically Managing Risk
Incorporating advanced analytics and ML in a digital world where personalisation drives competitiveness levels enhances a bank’s ability to manage risk, regulatory, compliance and governance processes among others.
These systems can run “what-if” simulations, perform real-time monitoring, and determine the right price terms for each banking customer within a matter of minutes. Advanced analytics solutions can analyse large data sets, assess and manage risk while ensuring governance and compliance over the entire pricing process. Therefore, banks are well-positioned to better meet customers’ needs as well as their business objectives, without compromising their business operations and adherence to regulatory standards.
Providing personalised offers through digital channels is the optimal solution for both banks and their customers, whether they are consumers, small or large businesses. The immediate value lies in providing products informed by the customers’ needs instantaneously. Banks need to harness the power of advanced technology solutions that can deliver personalised products and fully manage risk through digital platforms, to gain a competitive advantage and stay relevant in the future.
