Banks Turn Mobile Banking Into Consumer’s Financial Tool of Choice

With the pandemic now endemic, are contactless digital tools and behaviors that got us through that episode sunsetting so we can return to how it was before?

In a word, no.

There are numerous examples, but the use of online banking and mobile banking apps that rose dramatically in the first two years of the crisis have now become a permanent part of how we bank.

“The magic word is ‘habit,’” as NCR Digital Banking President Doug Brown told PYMNTS. “If we make it a habitual behavior, then it becomes permanent. COVID really drove habitual use of mobile banking and the app.”

He compared the stickiness of the typical banking app to sexier adaptations like Big Tech digital wallets. “When Apple Pay was introduced, big fanfare, big splash. We all got excited, went and used it once, and then we stopped using it. It was like ‘that was cool, but then I couldn’t use it at the next merchant or the gas pump,’ and so we stopped.”

Mobile banking, on the other hand, was how we did banking during lockdowns, and as is often the case, people tried it and liked it.

None of this is to say that mobile banking’s expansion is done. Far from it. Millions of consumers, especially older demographics like baby boomers and seniors, have shown intent without following though.

On that count Brown said, “Intent does not always translate to action. That’s what I think we’re really trying to do in a digital-first world, especially leading with a mobile banking app that’s with them all the time.”

Get Your Copy: Digital-First Banking Tracker®

Avoiding Digital ‘Fatal Distractions’

Discussing the latest Digital-First Banking Tracker®, a PYMNTS and NCR collaboration, Brown noted standout findings, particularly the fact that 70% of consumers surveyed view their increased use of digital banking as permanent, and no longer tied to pandemic use cases.

To keep mobile banking apps part of the daily flow of consumer’s lives, they need to offer more than just checking your balance.

“We want to help with financial wellness to help remind people that these are the good things to do, but not make it so punitive and such a drag that you’ll lose interest, and you’ll break the habit,” he said. “We’ll go back to the mobile banking app, helping remind people with insights and nudges toward positive behavior.”

This can take the form of simple prompts — “do you want to round up that payment” and “do you want to pay down your loan” and so on — that encourage and even gamify financial wellness to make the bank app experience fiscal fun, not financial chore.

But concepts like intent and habit are potent elements of this and it’s up to banks and credit unions to present digital tools that people want to make part of their daily lives.

However, he added that “There’s always going to be this endless proliferation of ‘fatal distractions’ I’ll call them. But when we go back to the statistic about 70% actively engaged, I’ll pair that with another stat I got on PYMNTS.com: over 60% of people are living paycheck to paycheck. That tells you you’ve got to help guide and coach that audience more than ever.”

Change and Change Again

How banks, credit unions and other financial institutions are making this work is partnering with the NCRs of the world who have dedicated untold resources to creating app experiences.

As mobile banking becomes another app on the smartphone, engagement must be deftly handled lest those “fatal distractions” start getting in the way of more important things.

“Sometimes people have this perception of, ‘something new, it must be better’ without really understanding that it may not be,” Brown said.

This could put the onus on banks to “have the cachet and attraction so that people don’t lose interest and get distracted.”

That gets into enabling real-time payments, immediate fund transfer and all those capabilities, which NCR emphasizes with its clients as are others in the space who grasp what’s at stake. As we move past the pandemic, some customers may want a more blended banking experience.

Brown said “We could have that banker come out in front with a tablet and help that person do things in a facilitated manner. Digital doesn’t mean you’re just doing it by yourself alone at home. It can also be a digitized, immersive experience. It’s what [we] talk about as a connected commerce digital first paradigm.”

That means catering to the diehard paper check writer and the digital-only mobile banking customer how they want, when they want.

“It comes down to [the fact that] they really trust their bank and their credit union more than any other entity out there,” Brown said. “The reason is that trust equity has been established because not only have you been good stewards with managing their money, but managing their data and managing their privacy.”