1. Learn Your Audience Through Buyer Personas

A Buyer Persona is a composite sketch of your ideal customer. Personas are made up of trends, patterns, and feedback from your actual customers. Using research, data, or simply your own observations, you can create your own Buyer Persona to answer the questions:

Who is my target audience?
What is their occupation and income level?
What problem can I help them solve?

You may have more than one Buyer Persona for different products and services. For example, business banking has a different target audience than personal banking. There are many free templates online you can use to help you create Buyer Personas for your financial institution. This process will help you create better digital experiences for products, services, and customer support.

Once you’ve created your Buyer Personas, the next step is to map the customer journey. This encompasses the interactions a customer has with your brand and its products and services. For example, landing on your website while researching mortgage loans or visiting your table at a community event.

Mapping the customer journey will help you understand where frustration is occurring. For example, is your website’s load speed too slow to support online account opening or loan applications? This could deter prospects who otherwise would open a new account or apply for a loan from you.

2. Optimize for User-friendliness on Mobile

If your bank or credit union doesn’t offer a mobile banking app, you’re losing out on customers who prefer the self-service approach over traditional banking.

Like online banking, mobile banking gives customers convenient access to current account balances, recent transactions, funds transfer, statements, and more–with additional features such as mobile check deposit–but available 24/7 from any mobile device–no desktop or laptop computer needed. Are your customer eStatements mobile-friendly?

If your financial institution already has a mobile app, you can track how customers interact with the app so you can continue to improve and develop it. For example, you might want to improve the content, offer in-app perks and rewards, or add features such as easy checking account opening on mobile. The easier and more helpful your mobile banking app is, the more you can keep your customers engaged.

3. Integrate an Omni-Channel Approach

An omni-channel approach to marketing means taking a holistic approach to the customer experience across platforms and touch points. In retail, for example, the most successful brands offer customers the choice between browsing and purchasing online, in-store, or some combination thereof. Whether online or in-person, digital or traditional advertising, the goal is to give customers a streamlined, consistent, and unified brand experience.

So, what does the omni-channel approach look like in practice?

Self-service options, including 24/7 chatbots
Educational content on your website and in the mobile app
Personalized recommendations for financial solutions
Budgeting and goal-setting tools to help people manage their money
Online and in-app account opening and loan application

While creating a good omni-channel experience for your customers requires some effort, it can pay off with customer loyalty, increased revenue, and better data analytics to support your marketing efforts.

4. Provide Comprehensive Customer Support

What does your customer service experience look like? It’s not enough to have customer service agents available during business hours. Providing comprehensive customer support means a combination of live human support. AI chat helps customers get answers to their questions at any time of day or night, or at least be able to handle some less urgent requests. Your mobile banking app should also feature in-app customer support, including the option to talk to a live agent during certain hours.

Ultimately, the goal with comprehensive customer support is to avoid the feeling that people are receiving less valuable service from digital banking. They should have access to real financial experts and advisors, which can be accomplished via video conference and other telecom strategies.

5. Adapt Your Digital Banking Strategy for the Future

The best practices for a positive digital user experience are always evolving. Reviewing your digital banking strategy should be part of your annual plan, along with keeping an eye on new developments as they enter the market. You can also leverage customer feedback to integrate new ideas and improvements.

Most importantly, keep your data privacy and security regulations up to code. Offer special value-adds such as fraud alerts via text and app notifications. Let users know how you are protecting their sensitive financial information through your digital platforms. This article gives you seven ideas for educating your customers about mobile banking safety.

Improve Your Bank’s Customer Experience

Need help improving the customer banking experience across digital channels? PrintMail Solutions has its own digital marketing division, BankBound, that provides a range of services for banks, credit unions, wealth management companies, mortgage lenders, and more. For personalized recommendations for your FI, contact us to start a conversation!

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