Navigating banks: Why Omni channel?

This is the world of 'Omni Channel': the smooth integration of customer experience across connected devices and platforms. In banking terms it means augmenting channels (branch, ATMS, phone, web, app, email, SMS) with the tech-platforms to seamlessly serve customers: making transactions quicker, easier and convenient.

An Omni Channel customer journey is:

Providing customers with consistent information, access tools and functionality regardless of touch point, channel or device,

Allowing customers to perform a variety of banking transactions across channels - so that transactions may begin in one channel and end in another, and

Helping present customers with the right information at the right moment in time based on context and their preferences.

To understand the concept, imagine a cricket crazy family glued to their TV, watching the Pakistan vs India World Cup fixture on a Sunday afternoon via their Digital HD Box. When their teenage son calls and expects to be picked up from the bus station, the father takes out his tablet and carries on watching the game using the android application for the Digital HD Box service provider at the parking of the bus station. As the bus is delayed, his tablet runs out of battery. This time, he quickly switches to his smartphone to watch the final overs through his Digital HD Box mobile app.

Now imagine, a mother who is interrupted by a weekend work call whilst she is searching on Daraz or Ali Express for a Valentine's present for her husband. She can log onto those applications on her smartphone the next morning and begin from where she had left - ready to purchase without having to find the intended gift again.

Journey in Practice

It all starts by approaching the end state with an Omni Channel mindset. Especially, considering how getting customers to interact with more channels and technologies can impact the experience and the bottom line. Beyond mindset, there are three hard drivers of Omni Channel experience: (i) platform flexibility, (ii) process simplification / optimization and (iii) robust architecture. The ultimate aim is to build customer trust at every step of the journey by providing a consistent, continuous, innovative and secure transaction experience.

Banks need to benchmark the retail industry from where the term, Omni Channel was initially coined. An example, which cannot be ignored when mentioning the retail industry and Omni Channel customer journey, is Amazon and their Amazon Go stores...