Picture this scenario. You purchase a clothing item from an ecommerce site. The product arrives in three days. The size doesn’t fit, so you want to return it. A typical process you follow is to initiate a return on the ecommerce website. And on most ecommerce websites, you can track the pick-up status from the time your request is approved until the moment the package is picked up.
Think about a similar scenario in a financial institution, say, a bank. You have a query about extending the credit limit for your credit card. You either call the toll free number, reach out to your personal banker, or go to the bank. But how is the quality of customer experience with a bank, as compared with that on an ecommerce site?
Customers today are comparing the quality of support they receive from other businesses with the quality of support they receive from banks. As a result, customer experience has become imminent for financial institutions across the world.
Here are some statistics—from the Forrester Banking Experience Report—that bring out the impact of positive customer experience on banking customers. Around 77% of the 110,000 customers surveyed indicated that they will stay with the financial institution if they feel valued. Furthermore, 89% of the customers indicated that they will be willing to advocate the institution if they feel respected.
Great customer experience in financial institutions is now about how much they know their customers, and how well they are able to customize their offerings, as opposed to how much they are able to sell what they have. For example, a digital-only bank in New Zealand, instead of offering a free checking account or savings account to woo a customer, allows its customers to create buckets - like travel, rent, and so on - into which they can slot their money. That way, when they have a wishlist or a financial goal, they know how far they are from it. What the bank did here was to help their customers improve their financial situation, rather than merely selling a product to them.
What more does good customer experience comprise?
Customer experience largely boils down to three key components:
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How banks handle customer service issues has a direct impact on its overall CX Index Score
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Feeling appreciated, valued, and respected take precedence and these are tactics financial institutions can adopt to build a loyal customer base
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Bankers need to move beyond just communicating factual information, to helping customers identify ways to improve their financial situation
So, how can financial institutions create an above par customer experience across multiple touchpoints? By signing up for a CRM for Finance.