Perspectives: Customer Engagement

While the trajectory of ‘digitization’ in financial services is encouraging, there is still significant demand from customers to expand and evolve their digital experience.

Amidst a boom in insurance business, Asian consumers remain largely underinsured.

One of the largest and fastest growing wealth segments, the Asian mass affluent, is projected to hold $43.3 trillion in assets by 2020, yet only 20% of all wealth in Asia is tapped by the wealth management industry.

The Indian life insurance market is the fifth largest in the world.  Although the per capita premium remains lower than in other emerging markets, the size and growth of India’s working class remains one of the largest globally, presenting enormous opportunity for life insurance companies to expand into and within the Indian market.

In the world of financial advisory, growth strategies often focus squarely on the end client; after all, growth is achieved through new client acquisition or new asset acquisition from existing clients.  While this logic is not incorrect, it fails to acknowledge the intricacies of third party distribution. 

While firms have found tremendous success in using these loyalty metrics to successfully grow customer relationships, they are lagging indicators and provide little help in providing immediate insight into whether or not improvements and initiatives are moving the needle. 

Credit has seen its fair share of ups and downs, from being the crux of financial services, to commoditization and mass distribution, to now being re-engineered. In the realm of Wholesale Credit, a revolution is underway.

Now that Business As Usual is unusual, leaders are forced to re-imagine business models and build ‘winning strategies’ - to not only survive the pandemic but also emerge as successful change-makers, shaping an altered business reality.

Cities are at a standstill, but they are bound to get moving again. Urban mobility will never be the same, and contactless payments will shape the new normal. Trends are shifting, preferences are being broken, and opportunities abound!

Before the Covid-19 inducted recession, the wealth tech sector was already experiencing a slowdown - both in the number of new startups and total capital raised. Now more than ever, investors and operators must be bold in re-inventing their Firm's long-term value proposition.

The COVID-19 pandemic has re-shaped the landscape for marketers. They are not only forced to cut budgets to save costs, but also face the challenge of keeping up with new emerging customer behaviors. These unprecedented changes call for a broader shift in marketing tactics and investments to successfully navigate the current transformed landscape.

Innovation has been in vogue for over a decade but the need to be innovative has never been felt as strongly as today. As businesses are learning to thrive under the lasting effects of the pandemic, they need to reinvent products, services and customer experiences to satiate emerging patterns of demand. To truly capitalize on the opportunity, business leaders need to look beyond internal capabilities and embrace a networked model of innovation to drive positive impact.

Strategic direction is evolving rapidly during COVID-19. Businesses are struggling with ways to respond to the pandemic and have numerous challenges facing them including potentially significant revenue shifts, interaction changes and resource limitations.
Fortunately, organizations can analyze readily available data by using both business and data intelligence to better serve their customers.

The pandemic has created unprecedented challenges for the insurance industry. Experiences of the world’s biggest economies (U.S. & China) offer valuable lessons as to where the industry can improve and change in order to better handle similar events in future and build sustainable risk management systems.

We are on the cusp of a revolution within financial services that will have far-reaching ramifications for the +1 billion unbanked, current models of financial intermediation across entities and borders, and ultimately the very nature of how end-consumers understand financial health. As this understanding held by customers evolves, so too must the operations, services, and visions of providers.

We are on the cusp of a revolution within financial services that will have far-reaching ramifications for the +1 billion unbanked, current models of financial intermediation across entities and borders, and ultimately the very nature of how end-consumers understand financial health. As this understanding held by customers evolves, so too must the operations, services, and visions of providers.

Digital Transformation is about developing new capabilities and leveraging new channels to design and deliver a better client experience.

Competition is an important facet of business world, and the process of seeking growth is a continuous one. One should never stop trying to win new customers or retain existing ones. After all, competitors are always trying to win your customers over, especially in mature markets.

Getting the Basics Right

The rising aspirations of consumers combined with the limited access to, and opaque nature of traditional financing solutions, has given rise to innovative products for underserved segments. BNPL is one such solution that offers short-term financing to users with the ability to pay in definite installments with low to no interest rates.

The payments industry has been experiencing explosive growth across Latin America over the past few years: cash usage has decreased ~20% as consumers pivoted towards payment products that are well integrated into the financial ecosystem.

As younger generations start to play for competition and skill development, there is a rise in payment flows, volumes, and subsequent opportunities arising out of the same. Financial institutions are not only presented with the opportunity to monetize on gamers but also target younger Gen Z and Millennial consumers to upsell and cross-sell their existing products.

Organizations are now recognizing the limitations in their workforce programs, so are making a concerted effort to develop a contingent workforce strategy, consolidate their master vendors/staffing agencies, and extract maximum benefits from the program.

Healthcare organizations must harness the momentum of platforms, embracing unified solutions that may still be evolving. Benefits extend beyond cost savings, paving the way for establishing long-term relationships with vendors. Simultaneously

For several years, it has been said that “data is the new oil” and arguably, the most valuable strategic asset for a business. Whilst getting value out of data might be less straight-forward, it is true that data needs to be refined to make it valuable.

In the current environment, streamlining the bottom line is no longer enough for US insurers. To find the next wave of growth, insurers must rethink lead generation, agent interactions, and the way they service customers.

The economic climate is becoming increasingly uncertain with cautionary signals of recession, along with inflationary pressure, fluctuating currencies, and uncontrollable impact of geopolitical events. Firms need to proactively take this opportunity to refocus their future investments on high value, high potential business lines.