By Deepak Mittal
In this digital world, rather than a customer chasing his or her bank, the bank is taking care of his needs with customized services. Consider these two scenarios:
A bank branch in the 1990s:- Long queues, noisy atmosphere, customers running from one counter to the other to get the required services, and feeling a sigh of relief when they come out of the branch.
Cut to 2017:- An SMS on your mobile phone notifies that salary has been credited to your account. You receive another notification from the bank that your mutual fund auto-debit is due in the next 3 days, therefore, you need to maintain an account balance for the same. As you apply for a personal-loan by clicking a button on the app (rather than being at the mercy of branch manager), it assesses your eligibility by tracking past income, expenses, income tax filing, and credit score patterns.
If you are not sure about the best investment or insurance options for yourself, you may again leave this to your banking application which mines your profile to come up with the best solution.
This means that the consumer may not only have access to all the basic banking services but gets entirely customized experience on his fingertips.
This is the power of digital transformation.
We live in the digital world, with more and more customers asking for a superior customer experience.
According to Forrester, 72% of businesses say that improving customer experience is their top priority.Providing a superior customer experience involves many aspects such as experience design, personalization, omni-channel experience, and data analytics.
Some of the leading technologies that help to provide a superior customer experience include backend technology Grails for rapid application development, front-end technology AngularJS, Cloud, Big Data, Microservices led architecture, and DevOps for delivery pipeline automation.
Many Indian BFSI players have started embarking on the Digital Transformation journey. One of the leading mutual fund houses in India was facing challenges with a large number of investors and distributors which led to problems of concurrency and a poor customer experience.
They developed a comprehensive technology roadmap and a bespoke digital transformation strategy. They could overcome all challenges with UX led distributor and investor portals for both web and mobile.
Let us understand how digital transformation is enabling better customer experience:
Engages end customers at all the points during their banking journey-Unlike traditional banking services which are availed by customers on an ad-hoc basis, digital banking enables banks to remain connected with customers for all their needs.
Be it a quick fund transfer through a digital wallet, investment advisory, loan application, cross-selling the products of other associates, or financial literacy, banks can do it from a single platform.
Moreover, the digital technologies enable a bank to have a more proactive approach and reach out to customers rather than a traditional reactive approach.
Provides multi-channel experience- Customers have the option to access banking services through their smartphones, desktops, ATM, merchant Point of Sales (PoS), and even social media. They can switch seamlessly across these devices and platforms.
Customers get all the banking services within the digital ecosystem, without actually having to visit a brick-and-mortar branch, that too on the device of their choice.
Collates and uses third-party data- Banks collaborate with many third parties such as insurers, mutual funds, real estate developers, automobile sellers, and even regulators.
With digital solutions, they are now in a better position to link customer’s financial association with these entities more effectively.
For example, when a customer buys home from a well-known builder who may already have a tie-up with the bank, the bank can send loan eligibility notification to its customer after assessing the financial viability of the project, past record of the builder, price trends in the real estate industry, credit score of buyer etc.
This assessment saves a lot of hassle for the customer who would have otherwise required a lot of documentation for the same job.
Evolves all the time- Digital technologies allow customers to share their feedback and experience with the bank in real time basis.
So, rather than going through a long process to speak to a customer care executive, customers may simply share his feedback via the app or social media.
Given that social media is an open and collaborative platform, we can expect one such feedback to lead towards responses from other users too.
Thus making the exercise a source to get genuine consumer feedback. Given the involvement of consumers, we may even say that they co-create banking solutions along with their respective banks.
Given the market requirements and increasing competition, digital transformation becomes imperative for banks to meet changing customer needs.
(The author is CEO of Noida-based tech firm – TO THE NEW. Views are personal.)
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