By Jatin Bhasin, Chief Product Officer, axio (formerly Capital Float)
The answer to whether customer experience is important is of course yes, obviously. However, the truth isn’t reflective of this. While 87% of companies said in a 2022 survey that they provide excellent CX, only 11% of customers say they had an exceptional product experience. This shows a sizable gap between what companies think and what the customer expects.
Solving for customer experience is typically associated with reducing the number of steps in the journey. However, it varies from industry to industry. For example, in FinTech, while reducing friction is hygiene, being transparent and secure to gain trust is even more important. Examples of these include showing interest rates and fees up front in lending products, displaying the most important terms of a policy while buying insurance, providing two-factor authentication in case of payments, etc.
Key Principles for FinTech CPOs to Foster a Culture of Customer-Centrism
Creating memorable customer experiences forms the baseline for sustainable growth for financial institutions. It not only triggers the first purchase but also promotes repeat buying and even positive word-of-mouth. For a CPO to foster a customer-centric approach, the CPO must strategically harmonise product innovation, collaboration and development, keeping the customer at the fore. For this, they must:
• Stay on top of the ever-changing customer needs.
• Collect and understand feedback on experience gaps.
• Spur the evolution of products and services iteratively to offer personalised experiences through customised offerings.
A CPO must always know that a product must be viable for the company, feasible for the product to be built and most important, desirable for the customers. To achieve this, one should focus on the following.
Customer Segmentation
Extensive customer personas are the foundation of building customer-centricity. Gathering data points on personas relevant to your business is very important. These personas are often defined as templates rather than unique to the company’s targeting methods and offerings.
Accurate segmentation offers a 360-degree view of the customer base and also helps decide upon what to cross-sell and upsell. Within a large set of customers, every customer is different. Creating a bespoke product for every cohort is the key.
Let data and analytics guide actions, from top-level decision-making to ground-level implementation teams that are the “first responders” for customer experience within product or service design and development. Advanced analytics, predictive insights and risk assessment are key ingredients to serve delight seamlessly to your customers every single time.
Prioritise Customers at Every Step
Knowing what the customer wants should determine business decisions and subsequently, product development. While there is a philosophy on ‘customers don’t know what they want’, creating a hypothesis on what is in the best interest of the customer can add focus to the product-building efforts.
It’s easy to slip into ‘only’ focussing on business outcomes, for example creating fresh revenue streams or reducing cost. Metrics like revenue and profits should be monitored as an outcome and not an input metric. By this, I don’t mean that revenue and profits aren’t important; in fact, these are the most important for a business run. However, if Product doesn’t offer what customers want, then the pursuit of those business outcomes will be in vain irrespective.
Finally, build a team-oriented towards customer satisfaction and embed customer empathy within the operations. Make CX a measurable part of performance review and incentivise employees who facilitate superior services.
Continuous improvement
With the increase in the digital footprint of Indian consumers, the best part is that financial institutions have a wealth of data on user behaviour, transactions, social shopping and more. Companies just need to use the data effectively. Whichever approach an organisation takes, customer experience needs to be the primary driver of product design and development.
Building a cycle of feedback > design > product to continually keep the customer at the centre is the cornerstone for a distinct experience in the long term. Proactive communication, intuitive technology integration and redefining development as co-creation rather than an isolated activity help deliver exceptional, personalised experiences.
Leverage the incremental stages of product development or MVP paradigms to test the waters. Beta-test novel ideas with select customers, gather feedback and decide according to the reports. Delivering superior experiences does not require going all out from the start. Starting small and gauging the impact is cost-effective and efficient for consistently improving FinTech offerings.
