The explosion of customer communication channels was intended to cut costs and increase efficiency. However, with cracks appearing in some systems and technology improving to allow face-to-face contact, banks may have to reverse their position on self-service. By Chris Skinner.
It may seem a long time ago, but it is less than 20 years since retail bank customers could only communicate with their bank by visiting a branch or putting pen to paper. Now, consumers can communicate with banks through myriad communication methods. The issue is how to keep up with it all and working out which methods of communication might be winners 20 years from now.
In the last five years in particular, layers of communication channels have been added to banking at a frenetic pace, including e-mail, instant messaging, text messaging and wireless messaging. The result has been a four-fold increase in channels of communication over the last five years, causing banks a major challenge in adapting ageing technology infrastructures to allow customers to use their preferred channels.
Banks have been quick to deploy many of these technologies and channels because they place the onus on the customer to input the data and serve themselves. The aim is to cut costs and improve service, but the reality is different. For example, e-mails to US Banks grew from 420 million in 2001 to over 2.6 billion by 2003. Sounds great, until you realise the cost of responding to these messages is considerable.
Consequently, some research suggests over 85% of e-mails to banks go unanswered. How is that for customer service?
Bearing in mind the difficulties in keeping up with the rapid innovations in communications today, the issue for most banks will then be how to handle further innovations tomorrow. For example, there are already signs that the next revolution in communications will be high-quality, low-cost video connections.
At this point, customers will want a comprehensive branch experience online, with personal service and a human connection. Banks will need to make a customer’s virtual experience as good as their physical experience.
Video communication also raises the question as to what will happen to our current technologies. If we can communicate intuitively via video and voice online, would we still want to type? If not, then bang goes e-mail, instant messaging and text messaging, and hello to voicemails, videomails, talk and conversation.
And if consumers stop typing, banks will find that the self-service data entry that has offered such great potential for cost savings disappears and we all have to return to human relationship techniques in a virtual world. Now there’s something to talk about.
Chris Skinner is founder of Shaping Tomorrow and chief executive of Balatro Ltd. Find out more at www.ShapingTomorrow.com or e-mail Chris at chris.skinner@shapingtomorrow.com
