Is it possible to make ‘boring’ banking a social media conversation starter? Yes, it is! And the 2015 Digital Banking trends and predictions report covers the biggest trends that the banking industry should follow to stay in the top-of-the-mind recall for consumers. This article covers an in-depth description of The Financial Brand Report to help you prioritise and plan your actions in 2015.

The coming months will see changes in banking trends that will impact the financial services industry. A crowdsourcing article has unveiled that the #1 expectation for 2015 will be customer analytics that will have a huge impact on industries all around the globe. This report will let you have a bird’s eye view of the different trends and predictions on digital technologies in the year ahead.

According to Jim Marous, co-publisher of the financial brand and publisher of the Digital Banking Report, many of the concerned parties, that is banks and credit unions, have already adjusted strategies to reflect the observations of the said report. Unfortunately, for those that haven’t yet adopted the trends to spur their growth in 2015, they will need to follow a steep digital curve in order to stay in touch with this increasingly competitive environment.

These are the top ten trends covered in the report:

1. Increased Use of customer analytics
   The crowdsourcing panel agreed that understanding customers would be an advantage to provide them with services and products related to their wants. Thus, companies await the power of this technology to help them gain insightful improvements in services offered and to upgrade customer values.
2. Expedited Deployment of Digital Delivery
   With the overwhelming effect that the Internet of Things have on banking and other industries, digital technology will affect distribution – from product, placement, price and promotion, which are the 4 P’s of marketing. It will also affect marketing communication and the entire customer experience.
3. Mobile Design
   As mobile banking is grabbing lots of eyeballs and is set to gain increasing popularity in the years to come, the mobile versions of banking apps have to look simple, attractive, time saving and entertaining, among others, in order to meet customer demand.
4. Increased Digital Selling
   The key to success in 2015 will be the thrust on adopting new banking tactics via digital platforms. Thus, being able to adopt a multitude of channels available through the Internet of Things will be valuable for the banking industry. Since financial services players have adopted old school methods so far, they will be prompted to change.
5. Acceptance of mobile payments
   A crowdsourcing article shows that 2015 will be the year when mobile payment will gain currency, thus it is vital for banking industries to adopt this trend.
6. Security and Authentication
   Due to increasing number of threats online, countering malware and hackers has become a priority for software creators, thus we are seeing more and more devices being released with biometric security such as fingerprints and face recognition programs, which are fast replacing passwords.
7. Industry Consolidation
   During the next 12 months, it will be a challenge to consolidate costs and digital technologies. Financial institutions will find it challenging to combat competitors in a tough economic environment. Accordingly, industry consolidation may be expected as companies come together to counter economic challenges and serve customers more effectively.
8. Enhanced Customer Incentives
   We are living in a connected world which has big expectations from content creators, and where consumers expect reinvention on a regular basis from the diverse platforms which feed them. Thus, this poses challenges for the banking industry to adopt an instant gratification and easily accessible approach by providing more and more customer incentives to come onto their platforms.
9. Investing in the future known as innovation
   The pioneers of innovation such as Facebook, Apple and Google have left us to our own devices to understand the focus point of 2015 – which is INNOVATION.
10. Digital Disruptors impacting branch banking
    Due to the technology impact on consumers, by 2020, traditional branch banking will be replaced by digital players. In order for it to go smoothly, organisations will have a new approach to integrate it into their daily business. Some firms have already acquired new technology start-ups to improve agility and reduce risks.

Source: Finacialbrand
Image Source: Etma_infosys Finacle