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8 Key Ways to Improve Customer Service in
Banks
by Ron Gagnon
12 minute read
FEATURED On-Demand Webinar
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Credit Unions
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Customer experience is a key — if not the key — competitive differentiator not only for the
financial services industry, but across all industries. The numbers prove it:
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84% percent of businesses that focus on enhancing the customer experience report an
increase in revenue; another 92% report increased customer loyalty
A 1-point improvement in Forrester’s CX Index score can yield $19 billion more
assets under management for the average multichannel brokerage
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Businesses that prioritize the customer experience achieve an average 20% increase in
employee engagement
In today’s technology-driven world, there is no shortage of opportunities for banks and credit
unions to innovate and improve the customer experience, starting with customer service. You
see, customer service is a vital component of a quality customer experience because it directly
impacts how your customers engage with your organization. Customer service failures, such as
an unpleasant interaction with a live service representative or a failure to address a customer’s
pressing need, can easily become a black mark on a customer’s impression of your bank and sour
the entire customer experience. To that end, it’s imperative that you not only look for ways to
improve customer service in banks but to completely exceed customer service expectations.
Let’s get started.
1. Promote Financial Literacy Through Customer Education
According to a recent study from the Raddon Research Institute, financially literate customers
are more profitable because “they are credit-driven and have a higher usage of depository
products.” That said, most Americans overestimate their financial literacy and are aware of
surprisingly few financial literary resources, which means banks are perfectly positioned to step
in and educate customers on financial literacy and profit from increased patronage in the process.
There are any number of ways to structure your financial literacy program, from online
educational materials made available through your mobile banking application (more on the
subject of mobile banking apps later) to in-house financial advisors who can walk customers
through different scenarios, such as buying their first home or saving for retirement, at branch
locations. Community banks and credit unions have found great success hosting educational
workshops and fairs, getting involved in community outreach, and partnering with local schools
and colleges to develop financial literacy curriculum for classrooms. This last item not only
empowers younger generations to make smarter financial decisions but also comes with the
added benefit of enabling banks to engage with prospective future customers. Even in our
technology-driven society, customers still value face-to-face interaction, so it’s imperative to
capitalize on every opportunity to engage with customers through human channels.
Developing a financial literacy program is an excellent way to improve customer service in
banks; the American Bankers Association and the National Financial Educators Council provide
excellent primers to help you get started. If developing your own program seems too tall an
order, there are plenty of pre-existing programs you can recommend to customers.
2. Become a Trusted Advisor to Small Business Customers
The 2008 economic recession has, perhaps, made some small business customers more wary of
banks — after all, small businesses felt the effects of the recession more severely than large
firms, with as many as 170,000 small businesses shuttering between 2008 and 2010, alone.
Over 10 years later, those small businesses that were able to survive the financial crisis are still
reeling from employee layoffs, slashed spending, and stalled plans for expansion. According to
figures from the U.S. Small Business Administration, “The amount of small business loan
originations plummeted by more than half during the crisis and has seen only a very limited
recovery post-crisis, leaving small business loan originations down 40 percent from pre-crisis
levels.”
We mention all of this to acknowledge that the way small businesses interact with banks has
changed substantially. Gone are the days when a small business owner would confidently walk
into their local bank in search of a loan; the small business owner of today is savvier, knows that
they must be discerning, and expects to be courted by banks rather than the other way around.
In order to earn small business owners’ trust and loyalty, your bank must transition from lender
to financial advisor by offering holistic services designed to help small businesses grow. For
example, you could:
Offer holistic
services designed to help small businesses grow.
The goal is to partner with small businesses in such a way that you’re not just a lender, but a
trusted advisor that plays a key role in their long-term growth. It’s also imperative that you
continue to deepen existing small business relationships to protect this segment from moving to
fintech and other digital competitors, such as Amazon or Facebook. In order to do so, you’ll need
to consider how small business banking interactions need to change in order to fully leverage the
possibilities of new technology.
3. Make Contextual Data a Core Component of Your Customer Service Strategy
With fintech firms such as Stripe, SoFi, and Avant edging in on their market share, legacy
financial institutions must evolve or die — and that means embracing the strategies that made
these startups successful in the first place. One thing that fintech firms do exceptionally well —
which should prompt traditional banks and credit unions to take notice — is leverage contextual
data. Contextual data refers to any information that provides valuable context to a person or
event.
Contextual data can be used to identify behavioral patterns and causal relationships, which banks
can then use to inform and enrich the customer experience. In fact, contextual data can be used to
improve customer service in the banking industry by enabling financial institutions to develop
custom products and services tailored to the needs of each individual customer. For example,
when faced with the challenge of collecting money from clients, Finnish-based small business
digital banking startup Holvi responded by developing an electronic invoicing system that
enables customers to “create professional-looking digital invoices that fill out payment details
automatically and sends alerts to your phone when it gets paid, keeping you in the know at all
times.”
Your most valuable source of contextual data is your customer base. You can use customer
relationship management (CRM) technology to collect information on just about anything and
everything customer-related, including:
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Geographic location
Major milestones (e.g. graduating from college, getting married)
Purchasing preferences
Spending habits
Customer service history
Social media activity
And more
Learn How Hitachi Solutions Can Make Your Customer Data Work for You
Each piece of information you gather can be used to create a detailed profile that provides a 360degree view of the customer. These profiles can then be stored within a central repository in your
CRM, so employees can easily access them to make more informed decisions when fielding
customer service requests, developing targeted marketing campaigns, upselling and cross-selling
products, and so on (more on this later).
4. Develop a Truly Omnichannel Customer Experience
Although it would be easy to assume that, given how attached people are to their mobile devices,
banking is on a trajectory to becoming entirely digital — but the numbers say otherwise.
According to Reuters, 60% of Americans would still prefer to open a new checking account at a
bank branch rather than through digital channels; perhaps even more encouraging is that
Accenture reports that 86% of consumers intend to visit physical branch locations in the future,
and desire face-to-face human interaction.
Americans still desire
face-to-face human interaction.
That isn’t to say, of course, that banks should prioritize improving branch locations over
developing a digital strategy, but rather that it’s vital to blend traditional and digital components
in order to create an omnichannel customer experience. To get an idea of the touchpoints
involved in this type of experience, and how it improves customer service in banking, here’s how
it works:

Meet Alexis
As you can see, Alexis engaged with at least a dozen different touchpoints — some traditional,
some digital — over the course of her customer journey. And although her story is fictional, it
isn’t outside the realm of possibility: A survey of nearly 5,000 retail banking customers
revealed 22 unique touchpoints. It’s imperative not only that you capitalize on as many of these
touchpoints as possible to create a truly omnichannel experience, but also that you deliver
exceptional customer experience every step of the way.
5. Provide Customers With Self-Service Opportunities
Customers: They’re doing it for themselves. Consumer self-service has become a booming trend
across all industries, with 74% of customers reporting that they’ve used a self-service support
portal in the past; another 81% reported that they’ve attempted to resolve issues on their own
before contacting a live service representative.
Customers are doing
it for themselves.
Despite it being a clear competitive differentiator, the financial services industry has been slower
than others to implement self-service capabilities and best practices. As a result, many
institutions are missing out on valuable opportunities to reduce call center volume, provide 24/7
support, and improve overall customer service in banking. How, then, can your organization take
advantage of this growing trend?
The answer to that question lies in your mobile banking app. In a world in which everyone seems
practically glued to their smartphone, the benefits of mobile banking aren’t lost on banks and
credit unions. In fact, you’d be hard-pressed to find an institution that hasn’t developed its own
branded mobile functionality. But just because mobile banking has become ubiquitous doesn’t
mean that all banks are leveraging their applications as effectively as possible.
There are a few things you can do to take your mobile banking experience to the next level and
turn your app into a one-stop self-service shop:
A few things you
can do to take your mobile banking experience to the next level.
6. Set Your Employees up for Success
As prevalent as self-service has become, there will always be a place for live service
representatives and a value for human interaction. Therefore, it’s in your best interest to ensure
that each interaction is as positive as possible and contributes to an exceptional customer
experience by equipping your frontline staff with the tools they need to succeed.
First and foremost, it’s imperative that you invest in comprehensive training. If that seems like
an obvious piece of advice, that’s because it is — but it’s still worth mentioning because banking
industry training techniques are rapidly evolving. From virtual simulations to gamification,
technology sits at the forefront of employee training and ongoing education.
From there, the next step is to build an internal knowledge base that employees can refer to when
they encounter questions they don’t know the answers to. This knowledge base should serve as a
centralized repository for everything from policies and procedures to relevant industry
regulations and should be well-organized and easy to navigate to prevent customers from waiting
on answers any longer than is necessary. Be sure to regularly update your knowledge base so that
it includes only the most accurate and relevant material.
The final key to empowering your employees (and one of the most valuable ways to improve
customer service in banks) is to invest in the latest front-end and back-office banking
technology. From a CRM solution that uses data-driven insights to provide a 360-degree view of
the customer to security systems that leverage predictive analytics for fraud prevention and
protection, a strong solutions ecosystem can be a real asset to your staff. Most importantly, be
sure to integrate these systems so they have access to the same data, and so your service
representatives don’t have to jump from one system to another when they field customer
requests.
7. Solicit Customer Feedback Whenever Possible
No one knows your customers better than your customers, themselves. After all, the information
stored inside your bank’s CRM can tell you all about who a customer is, and predictive analytics
can make an educated guess about what they might do — but technology, no matter how
innovative, can’t tell you what’s going on inside a customer’s head. It only makes sense, then, to
tap into the invaluable resource that is your customer base by asking them for regular feedback;
in doing so, you can gain insight into whether their needs are being sufficiently met, what
products or services they’re interested in, what their goals for the future are, how their
experience can be improved, and more.
There are any number of ways to solicit customer feedback, but the most practical approach is to
establish check-ins across all touchpoints. For example, if a customer were to contact your
bank’s call center with a service request, the representative responsible for processing that
request might close out the call by asking whether the customer had any additional questions and
whether they were satisfied with the service they received. Or, you might program a pop-up
featuring a brief (think two to three questions) customer service survey to appear on your website
after a customer has completed a transaction. Each piece of data you’re able to collect adds to the
rich tapestry that is your customer base and can help your organization make more informed
decisions that enhance the customer experience.
8. Be Flexible and Open to Change
The financial services landscape is in a constant state of flux, with new trends emerging every
day. In order to ensure that your organization delivers the best customer experience possible, you
need to keep your finger on the pulse of the industry and remain flexible to change — that means
constantly looking for ways to improve, keeping your solution ecosystem integrated and current,
and embracing digital transformation. By listening to your customers, keeping an open mind, and
making smart investments, you can guarantee exceptional customer service at your bank.
Speaking of smart investments, partnering with Hitachi Solutions is one of the smartest you can
make. In addition to providing intelligent solutions built on the Microsoft platform and data
science expertise, we have the acumen to help you empower employees, optimize operations,
transform your products, and reimagine the customer experience. And with decades of
experience working with organizations in the financial services industry, we’re well-equipped to
help you rise to any challenge.
For more information on how to improve customer service in banks or about what Hitachi
Solutions has to offer, contact us today.
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