How to act on banking customer data

How can businesses truly understand their customers? This is a struggle for every industry: banks included. By utilizing a multifaceted strategy, banks can understand their customers and in turn act on that data. This is a topic the opening keynote at the Bank Customer Experience Summit, held from Sept. 12 to 13 in Charlotte, North Carolina, explored.

Erin Cohee, VP of digital customer experience at OneUnited Bank, discussed in detail how her bank used a variety of tactics to understand customers.

She began by discussing how banks that optimize customer experience grow at three times the rate of ones that do not.

However, 50% of customers will go to a competitor after one unsatisfactory experience.

"The stakes are high but margins are slim. But one wrong move from competitors and we have an opportunity," Cohee said. "New financial accounts are opening at twice the usual rate. They're not closing original accounts, just adding more."

However in the meantime, customers are not getting the advice they need from banks. Only 20% say they are receiving advice from their banks.

The same principle applies to digital channels as well. "64% of customers are saying that mobile app didn't allow them to solve an inquiry fast if at all," Cohee said.

However, this creates another opportunity. If a bank does reach out to help a customer, even if the advice isn't helpful, the customer is more likely to be loyal to the bank, Cohee said.

"We need to proactively understand customer's needs."

However, that raises a question; how can banks take customer data and turn it into actionable insights? A big issue is what Cohee calls "spaghetti architecture."

"73% of bank leaders are struggling to transfer customer data into actionable insights. Data isn't being fed into CRM. Data resides in systems but not in CRM," Cohee said.

Luckily banks can deal with this issue through data integration in cloud based services. However, many banks are hesistent due to the time required and cost.

But with the birth of AI, Cohee said, banks need to get their "house in order" when it comes to data so that tools such as chatbots can deliver the right information.

How can banks use this data to deliver a successful customer journey? Cohee said there are several keys to make that successful:

• Have cross-functional teams.
• Provide simple personalization (like putting names on communication).
• Send only relevant messages.
• Minimize jargon in client communication.
• Send surveys often (including finding out what they like).

Another major tactic is to proactively serve customers through tools such as emails about market news like FDIC insurance with failed banks, Russian hackers and money management tips.

But this can also take a personalized tone. For OneUnited Bank, they took a look at customers who had suddenly stopped using their cards. From there, they pulled all interaction data and put it into a cloud document. From there, they were able to ascertain the issues and reach out to those customers using proactive communication to handle those issues.

This can take a variety of forms such as emails or even making a call, which keeps "digital human," Cohee said.

"We reach out to customers who we believe might have an issue," Cohee said.

It is important, however, to keep empathy in these communications. Cohee recommends that bankers act on scripts, especially during stressful interactions like overdrafts.

This same principle plays out with employee training. Banks need to understand their employees' processes to see ways they can help them and make processes easier, such as ensuring that tasks can be done in fewer clicks.

Lastly, Cohee talked about how generative AI can utilize customer data to meet customers' needs. For example, a chatbot can learn if a customer has an issue, it can answer questions based on data, such as whether it is a new client or failed to set up their account.

They can also deliver responses based on customer preferences, such as if they prefer short or long answers to questions.

However, Cohee pointed out that algorithmic discrimination can be a problem, especially with fraud. At times, it can even deliver offensive answers to people.

In the future, Cohee said that OneUnited is looking at "not using technology to give exact responses, but rather suggest responses which agents can send if they are appropriate."

In conclusion, if your bank stands out when it comes to delivering actionable insights, they have a chance to capture those 50% of customers who switch banks after a single bad interaction.