According to a recent Mercator Advisory Group report, many financial institutions are seeking ways to gain 360-degree views of member needs and behaviors. The ultimate goal of doing so is to better engage with members by having increased awareness of members' needs and expectations. To achieve this 360-view and ultimately provide superior service and boost member interaction, credit unions should leverage an omnichannel digital banking solution.
Better view of your members
The disparity among separate digital banking solutions hinders a credit union's ability to gain a complete view of its members. Many credit unions have separate technology solutions for online retail banking and business banking, as well as a separate mobile banking solution. Oftentimes, credit unions implement one vendor's solution for personal finance management and another for bill pay.
When it comes to payments, some may use one vendor for person-to-person payments and another for loan payments. This heavily fragmented approach, albeit functional, makes it virtually impossible to achieve a holistic view of members' overall interaction with the credit union. To overcome this, investing in a single digital banking solution is key. A single platform allows for greater access to reliable, useful data. Credit unions are then able to make intelligent decisions, such as where technology investments should be made based on usage trends.
Improved support and interaction
Since it allows for 360-views of members, a single platform also provides for better member support and interaction. Consumers tend to use a mix of banking channels. When operating through disparate channels, call center representatives will likely not have access to the member's full activity history. This becomes problematic and can potentially impact member service.
In an omnichannel environment, all activity from all channels, including online, mobile and tablet, is made available through one back-end system. As a result, credit unions have a complete view of the member and can provide superior support.
Increased security
In the wake of recent and highly-publicized data breaches, security is understandably a major concern for consumers. A single digital banking platform with deeper insight into a member's activity enables credit unions to better track fraudulent activity. By leveraging multi-factor authentication and fraud analytics, credit unions are able to not only identify member behavior, but also track a member's preferred device, common feature utilization and location.
If different systems are used for different banking channels, it becomes very difficult for a credit union to examine a member's activity across platforms, forcing the credit union to investigate disparate systems for fraud. Meanwhile, the member remains at risk.
Alternatively, a single platform is capable of tracking and consolidating user behavior regardless of device or channel used. In turn, credit unions are able to better protect members from fraudulent activity.
Relevant marketing offers
Leveraging an omnichannel solution also equips credit unions with the ability to better market relevant products and services to members in the best way to meet their expectations. Based on a member's behavior, credit unions can tag content, linking similar products and services. When a member clicks on an offer that is tagged under a certain product category, similar product offers will be made viewable.
Member demographics can be leveraged to customize product and service offers. For instance, a credit union can customize the version of a retirement product that a millenial member sees, making the product more relevant to them.
Stephen Bohanon is founder and chief strategy and sales officer of Alkami Technology Inc. He can be reached at 877-725-5264 or [email protected].
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