Mobile banking is an important way to attract new customers and retain existing ones. This is one of the outcomes of “Customer Loyalty in Retail Banking: Global Edition 2013,” an annual survey by Bain & Company.
Regardless of bank model, frequent mobile users consistently report higher Net Promoter Score (NPS) than non-users. The greatest gap in NPS between the two groups occurs in China, Japan and Thailand, while the narrowest gap is found in Belgium, France and The Netherlands.
Mobile banking is still continuing to grow across the globe, among all age groups and income levels. More than half of customers’ interactions on average took place through online or mobile channels, ranging from 75% in Norway to 38% in Mexico. Still, there is a room for growth. Globally, fewer than half of respondents in developing countries and just over one-third of those in developed countries used smartphones or tablets for their banking. The cross-country variation ranges from 60% in China to 17% in Belgium. In South Korea, where 56% of customers engage in mobile banking, Hana Bank has embraced mobile to the maximum extent – it allows using a mobile phone number to get cash from ATM.
Younger customers are the most active user group, especially in Australia, the US, India and Sweden. US survey finds, for instance, that older customers care more about branch location and quality of branch staff, while younger customers place greater value on mobile device interactions.
What may be surprising, China, Chile, South Korea and India have already leapfrogged in mobility some theoretically more advanced countries, like Belgium, Japan and Canada. However, we need to keep in mind, that within any given country, there is a wide dispersion in mobile banking uptake. For example, Citibank in India has a higher mobile penetration than Comdirect in Germany and Fineco in Italy, even if one could guess that direct banks will find its audience more mobile friendly. In the US, Chase leads among traditional banks, which may be also due to its advertising campaign showcasing mobile banking platform.
Looking at the Bain & Company data it seems obvious, that mobile banking is now one of the deciding factors to increase loyalty and be able to attract new customers from younger generations.
