Sponsored by Smart Communications
Clear communication is essential for successful customer onboarding in any industry, but even more so in the financial services sector. Particularly in the new “pandemic digital age”, customer expectations are ever-changing; with accelerated digital transformation and more people working remotely, customer interactions are increasingly moving online or via mobile. Optimising processes and keeping up with the latest technology is key in industry 4.0 and smart, cloud-based approaches are how savvy financial services companies pave the way for meaningful, two-way customer engagement.
This shift towards smarter solutions is critical, as legacy tools such as paper-based or PDF forms have become so off-putting to customers as to be obsolete. In fact, a benchmark study conducted by Smart Communications (the world’s only pure cloud provider of a customer conversation management platform) found that almost 60% of consumers are likely to abandon an interaction if a company has an inefficient process for collecting information – with 86% stating that they prefer digital interactions over other forms of communications.
In addition to reducing abandonment rates, digital solutions can also improve data quality and accuracy. Deriving intelligent insights from previous interactions enables enterprises to enhance customer conversations and improve effectiveness over time. Customers now expect simplified processes at every step, even across multiple platforms.
Organisations must deliver communications that are scalable, personalised, contextual and compliant across preferred channels to improve the customer experience and to deepen loyalty. This is especially important for multi-stage processes, where all necessary stakeholders should be able to collaborate in a centralised, secure, online location. Technology that unifies communications and breaks down internal silos reduces costs, increases transparency and simplifies compliance in regulated environments.
User experiences can be negatively impacted if consumers initiate an interaction on one channel and are unable to continue it across others. Consequently, organisations must ensure they manage communications across multiple channels such as SMS, WhatsApp and push notifications.
The key to providing a solution that meets all these customer expectations is to make sure that any technology is built to integrate with other critical data sources that are used across the organisation to drive customer experience. Customer communications platforms should be able to facilitate integrations with third-party systems and use advanced analytics that improve customer conversations.
Smart Communications offers a cloud solution that delivers personalised, omni-channel conversations across the entire customer experience, all backed by rigorous certifications for data privacy. Its trademarked Conversation Cloud platform enables seamless collection of customer information by providing an intelligent, conversational user experience instead of static, forms-based processes.
Interactive communication can be carried out via the customers’ preferred channels, including web, email, SMS, mobile and voice assistants. Businesses can connect and use their existing content repositories and data to ensure the relevance and accuracy of communications, as well as giving designers the tools to optimise processes and time-to-market for new products and services. The Conversation Cloud platform facilitates negotiations by speeding up the drafting process with documentation that can be created from pre-approved templates, as well as highlighting changes and edits in a document to allow for rapid review and instant online approval.
The financial services industry is becoming increasingly digital, so organisations cannot afford to fall behind.
To learn why all 15 of the world’s largest investment banks use Smart Communications to manage client interactions, download the free white paper below.
