How Banks Can Provide a Great Digital and Client Experience

What Are Digital Experiences?

A digital experience is a correspondence between a customer and an organization conducted exclusively through digital technologies. This type of technology enables companies to expand their capabilities beyond the digitizing paper processes to offer services only available on the Internet and other emerging technologies.

Digital experiences have two components: digital technology and the interactions between a single user and an organization. The clients, employees and partners receive digital experiences from websites, mobile apps and smart devices. Essentially, the purpose of digital experiences is to leverage digital technology to enhance customer experiences while better addressing their needs. In addition, digital experiences provide a reliable and transparent experience for clients as they go through each stage of their customer journey.

What Are Client Experiences?

Client experience (CX) is the culmination of interactions between a client and an organization (company or bank) during their relationship with the brand or organization. It accounts for every interaction, regardless of the length of time or the outcome. So even if it's a customer service call, a response to an ad or an in-person branch visit, every point of contact and correspondence is a part of the client experience.

Client experience's main focal point is the customers' feelings about their interactions with the bank. As a result, it covers every phase of the customer journey, including the pre-customer stage, the sales and marketing experiences, product satisfaction and post-purchase customer service. Customer experience differs from customer service because it encompasses all factors of the customer journey instead of one.

Options or Impacts of Providing a Great Digital and Client Experience

The significant shift to online shopping during the Covid Pandemic demonstrates that consumers are increasingly seeking a personalized digital customer experience (DCX). As a result, the distinction between online and offline is now gone. Therefore, companies must combine the offline and online customer experience to excel in the current marketplace. This CX strategy is called the omnichannel approach.

An effective omnichannel customer engagement strategy can significantly impact a bank's customer metrics. For example, a recent V12 study revealed companies with robust omnichannel customer engagement strategies had an average 89% customer retention rate. In contrast, companies with weak omnichannel strategies had an average 33% retention rate.

An excellent example of a US retailer with a great omnichannel strategy is Target. In the second quarter of 2020, Target had a sales increase of 24.3% and digital sales of 195%. The big-box retailer found that multi-channel consumers outspend store-only consumers 4 to 1 and 10 times more than digital-only customers. So, creating a sound omnichannel client engagement strategy for your bank should be a significant priority in your quest to provide the most outstanding digital customer experience.

What Bankers Need to Know About Providing Great Digital and Client Experiences

The most crucial objective in providing the best digital client experience is delivering a consistent and cohesive experience that pleases your customers and keeps them engaged, meaning their experience should be at the same level of excellence in every channel.

Organizations must facilitate exceptional digital user interaction across all devices since customers are intolerant of poor web experiences. In fact, Software Advice.com researchers found that 90% of consumers give up after one or more substandard web experiences with a brand. This  research illustrates is why banks should constantly monitor the usability and the accessibility of  their digital assets on mobile, web and app channels.

Consistency across all channels is another pivotal factor in ensuring great digital customer experiences. On any given day, clients may interact with banks via mobile phone, desktop and on-site.  A way to win their trust and loyalty is providing them with a seamless CX across all channels.