Mobile Banking Use Fueled by Enhanced Financial Management Tools, Improved Demos and Advancing Virtual Assistant Skills
Wilmington, Del., September 13, 2023 – Keynova Group, the principal competitive intelligence source for digital financial services firms, today announced the results of the Q3 2023 edition of its semi-annual Mobile Banker Scorecard. For the fifth consecutive time, U.S. Bank earned top honors for its mobile banking capabilities and customer experience, ranking No. 1 for Overall Score in an evaluation of the country’s 17 leading mobile banking offerings and placing first for Mobile App banking as well.
The Q3 2023 Mobile Banker Scorecard reveals a rise in personal financial management (PFM) tools for mobile, the growing importance of demonstrating banks’ mobile apps to prospective customers with informative self-directed tours or videos, and advancements in intelligent virtual assistant skills.
“Banks’ mobile apps can outshine both fintechs and other financial institutions by offering a one-stop financial hub for deposit and credit accounts, including wide-ranging payments, support, and updated PFM tools," said Susan Foulds, managing director, Keynova Group. “Consumers don’t switch banks lightly. Simulated tours of mobile apps that showcase customer journeys for various banking and payment activities, including virtual assistants and financial management resources, is crucial to winning new customers.”
Key Findings:
Increasing Growth in Mobile Financial Management Tools
As good credit and sound money management becomes more critical amid rising interest rates, mobile banking apps are well positioned to become a centralized hub of activity for banking customers—especially apps that enable aggregation of transactions from external accounts. Banks continue to integrate next generation PFM options including spending reports and cash flow monitors, budgeting and saving goals tools, and credit management resources. Today 65% of Scorecard banks offer PFM tools with spending reports, and most of those also include personalized expense categories, enabling customers to assign categories to transactions—a key element for relevant and actionable information. Just 30% of Scorecard banks (BMO, M&T Bank, Regions, Truist, and U.S. Bank) offer more comprehensive spend reports and cash flow analysis including imported transactions from external accounts via aggregation APIs.
Mobile Bank Tours and Demos Key to Acquiring New Customers
Digital banking is a key consideration when customers are shopping for a new bank; financial institutions that illustrate their mobile services on their websites with thorough tours of banking and payment activities or simulated test drives stand to attract more customers going forward. App stores only show limited previews and screenshots and do not provide adequate customer experience insights or activity flows for prospective banking customers. Today, 70% of Scorecard banks offer a demo or tour that depicts actual app screens, and in some cases, full user experience workflows such as test drive simulators, guided tours, tutorials or video shorts on various mobile banking topics. Demos that specifically show how to use mobile check deposit – a critical mobile bank service – are offered at 76% of banks’ desktop websites. TD Bank, U.S. Bank and Wells Fargo stand out by providing comprehensive views of mobile banking actions, services and support.
Virtual Assistants Will Continue to Strengthen the Mobile Experience
Although still nascent, virtual assistants (VAs) with developing skills are poised to change the narrative for banking. Currently, Bank of America and U.S. Bank are the only two banks that offer two-way conversational VAs, which can streamline banking activities and increase user accessibility. One-third of the banks’ VAs filter transactions such as Zelle payments and 18% facilitate transaction disputes. Predictive and proactive notifications via VAs and alerts notifying customers to the risk of an overdraft, duplicate transactions or recurring fees are progressing as well and are now available from one-third of reviewed banks—Bank of America, Huntington, M&T Bank, PNC, Truist, and U.S. Bank. This represents a 3x increase in the past two years since the Q3 2021 Mobile Banker Scorecard. However, only the VAs offered by Bank of America and U.S. Bank proactively alert customers to these types of transactions.
About the Q3 2023 Mobile Banker Scorecard
Keynova Group’s semi-annual, fact-based Mobile Banker Scorecard, offered for more than two decades, evaluates digital user capabilities, customer experience elements, and best practices to identify evolving trends and insights that drive mobile strategy in banking. The evaluation encompasses the mobile apps and websites of Bank of America, BMO, Capital One, Chase, Citibank, Citizens Bank, Fifth Third Bank, Huntington Bank, KeyBank, M&T Bank, PNC, Regions Bank, TD Bank, Truist, USAA, U.S. Bank, and Wells Fargo. For more information please visit: https://www.keynovagroup.com/scorecards/#banking
About Keynova Group
Keynova Group is the leading competitive intelligence firm providing trusted benchmarking insights and analysis of consumer and small business digital financial services, including banking, credit card, home lending, and insurance. Keynova Group’s Scorecards have served as the go-to source for leading financial services firms to obtain reliable competitive intelligence and actionable insights since 1999. The firm’s proven methodology and highly detailed results help its clients maximize the value of their digital channels to deliver a premier experience to customers and prospects.
For more information:
Meggan Manson
Young & Associates, for Keynova Group
301-371-6995
megganm@yapr.com