As an industry we have talked so much about branch transformation and the branch of the future. And what we’ve come to realize is that this is not really the most useful way to think about it.
Today, the challenge is less about, how do I update my branch? Instead, FIs should be thinking, how do I deliver the right experience to my consumers when and where they want it? It’s a very strategic question that moves past the branch or the smartphone and focuses on the sum of a consumer’s engagement with an FI — regardless of their interaction method. We’re helping our customers shift the way they think about the entire consumer journey and drive “experience-driven banking,” as opposed to “banking transformation.” So it’s more about building and enabling consumer-focused ecosystems that will support transactions and data flow among every single touchpoint and channel in their network, whether physical or digital.
The ideal partner for FIs on this journey is someone with the capability and insight to orchestrate solutions above all the channels and silos, a sort of “experience architect” who can identify emerging opportunities and execute innovative strategies in a more holistic way. I think that’s one of Diebold Nixdorf’s biggest differentiators in the marketplace: We have the ability to act as experience architects for our clients, because our expertise is very targeted, and our teams are incredibly knowledgeable about the challenges and opportunities in the financial industry. We can partner strategically with our customers to build customized solutions that fit their current-state and future-state needs.
Initiating the Shift
I’m a big believer in small changes that happen rapidly. You don’t need to pull out your entire middleware infrastructure to create omnichannel solutions. You don’t need to renovate your entire branch network with fancy technological bells and whistles. You can make quick changes or enhancements, see what works, and add to it. Think of how software companies work today. They create an app, make it available, and the first version has some kinks. But every two weeks there’s an upgrade (pushed out automatically, mind you), and finally you have a solution that works really well.
When we talk to bankers around the world, and ask them about how they’re investing, they’re often focusing more on digital investments rather than branch investments. While the reality is that the majority of their new deposit and loan accounts still originate in their branches. And the accounts opened in branches are generally more profitable than those opened through digital channels. This is where that experience architect can help guide an FI from outside of that internal perspective, and bring different teams within the organization together to build collaborative solutions.
Solution-Based, Not Department-Based
So for bankers, it’s saying, OK, we’ve looked at the numbers, we have an opportunity to increase wallet share among millennials with an income of more than $100,000 per year. Our research suggests this group would like to do these five things at our bank. Let’s take our investment dollars to improve how we deliver those five things – that could include integration of capabilities into the mobile app, improving the experience at the ATM, adding new service concepts at the branch, improving data mining capabilities … the list goes on. But the point is, it shouldn’t matter which team in the bank is getting the investment, it should be more about delivering the right experience for the FI’s target consumers.
Through the experience-driven approach, we’re trying to move FIs to an environment where they can provide more services and interactions through existing or new touchpoints … And, perhaps even more importantly, enable FIs to take more advantage of the data they’re getting from their consumers to provide more individual experiences.
Source: Raja Bose, Diebold Nixdorf
