Podcast: Tech can help access client feedback, monitor engagement

Whitney McDonald 0:02
Hello and welcome to the buzz of bank automation news podcast. My name is Whitney McDonald and I’m the editor of bank automation News. Today is October 10 2023. Joining me to discuss why banks need to deliver better customer experience through digital offerings is Debbie Miglaw, head of digital solutions, Business Development at Broadridge. Financial Services. She has experience in financial services with product management and business development. Debbie, thanks for being here.

Debbie Miglaw 0:29
Well, great. Thanks, Whitney for inviting me to the podcast. I appreciate it. My name is Debbie Miglaw. And I head up our digital solutions business development team here at Broadridge, I’m in the customer communications group. My prior background has really been running the product organization for over 20 years. And prior to that I was in a couple different industries, one of which ironically, was in banking as well. So in the early days, I had supported some of the retail banking services as well as operational back office services. So that’s kind of my precursor to the lasta going into the 25 years here at Broadridge. So Broadridge Financial Solutions, were a global FinTech leader, we have over 6 billion in revenues. And we provide critical infrastructure around bank broker dealers, banks, asset management, wealth managers, public companies, and really, it’s to support everything from investing corporate governance and communications. So as one of the largest fintechs, we are supporting, specifically in the banking industry as well.

Whitney McDonald 1:34
Great. Well, thank you again, for joining us here on The Buzz. Let’s start with just setting the scene here, what our bank clients asking for today, when it does come to digital customer experience bank offerings that you’re hearing and trying to implement as well with your clients.

Debbie Miglaw 1:51
Yeah, so one of the things that we have found is when people talk about digital in the banking space, right, they often refer to the mobile apps, payments really has been a big piece of it. But what we’re really finding is that it’s a little bit more than that it is around journeys. It’s around engagement and personalization. Right? So that’s what we hear from our clients that it’s that connecting the entire experience from beginning of account opening to the servicing side to also the transactions, right, because transactions are a big part of the banking network itself. So from that perspective, it’s really around those components. Again, I would summarize journeys, engagement and personalization. And of course, there’s always the, if I’m gonna go digital, I want to turn off anything paper related or anything that is an extra cost, right that you have if you’re not doing a digital service.

Whitney McDonald 2:46
Now, when it comes to listening to customers, and what those needs are, how can banks be sure that they are taking in that information of what those needs are that they should be addressing? How can they look to data? How can they be sure that they’re using tech technology to their benefit in order to be sure that they are implementing those offerings?

Debbie Miglaw 3:08
Yes. So we tend to look at things like voice of customer surveys is obviously a key indicator, I think that’s no surprise to anyone. One of the other things that we look for is have they done any AV testing, because a lot of times you get insights from the customer. So while that’s maybe not listening in the traditional sense, you’re using technology to listen, the same would be true when we start looking at things like engagement results, right? So now you can actually start taking a look at the metrics that happen when you’re actually doing these services. Are people staying engaged? Do if they’re making, I’ll use the example of depositing checks right through a mobile app. Are they getting dropped it taking the images, like it’s not working well with their phone? So they’re there’s they’re falling out of it? Same as if you’re registering for an online service, right to get access to an account or something? Are they dropping out during the enrollment process. So I look at those as like technology methods to listening to your customer, because now you’re getting metrics about whether they’re actually successful products that you’ve put in front of them. And then of course, surveys is the most common like biggest way you can get feedback in general.

Whitney McDonald 4:20
Now looping in Broadridge, here, how does that technology all work to allow banks to accomplish this kind of where do you plug in? How does this kind of make this a one stop shop for seeing that data?

Debbie Miglaw 4:32
Broadridge really plays with the financial services market in general across the board. So when we look at banks, broker dealers, they have a variety of different businesses. Our technology helps support them. When you look at things like the wealth management services, we have a wealth platform. When you look at some of the services like the proxy and the post sale components that are kind of those pieces. We also have the customer communications business And in that place, we are creating all of the communications that go out. So think of the banking statements, think of tax documents, some of those things, as well as across the board when it becomes other things, credit card statements, loans, mortgages, etc. So all of those go out the door in either print or digital. And Broadridge provides these omni channel services that allow for us to distribute in digital channels. Right. So that’s the first piece I would say. What we also do is we look at how we support the transactional side. So how do we pull all this together and give views across the entire bank? So hopefully, that makes sense what I’m driving at?

Whitney McDonald 5:44
Yes, definitely. Now, on the integration component, if you were a bank that wanted to work with Broadridge, what does that look like to get all hooked up and leverage that omni channel approach?

Debbie Miglaw 5:56
The we look at it from a perspective of what are we trying to solution for so we really focused on, it’s not just a big bang, by an entire, you know, platform all along, we have in the in the communication space, the brokerage communications cloud, and that omni channel experience, we would take, let’s just start with the retail banking, for example, as one line of business, we would take an onboarding approach that would allow us to process all their communications, create the content. So think of your checking statements, for example, might even include the leasing and mortgage side of the business as well other business units, we would take those processes in, we would also manage the preferences. So what would you is Whitney, as a customer? What do you want to print? Do you want paper do you like? Or do you want digital? Do you want email? Do I SMS, what kind of channels so those preferences come together. And then we deliver those communications across the board. So being one of the largest printers in the US, we have, obviously the print and mail services that can take advantage of all the volumes right that the banks are producing today. And then equally, we have that digital platform that allows us to, you know, archive, the content, deliver emails present through mobile apps, websites, etc. So from that perspective, our clients are allowed to essentially focus on their core business, which is the banking and the financial services market, or even the wealth management space, and allow Broadridge to be their communication center of excellence.

Whitney McDonald 7:24
Now with the clients that you work with, and I know that it’s probably different across the board, depending on who who’s asking for which offerings. But what are the digital offerings that are kind of driving the market? What are those ones that you’re seeing over and over again, that are gaining adoption?

Debbie Miglaw 7:42
From the banking perspective, not necessarily what we as Broadbridge provide the historically payments has been a driver, right? So banking goes with electronic payments, now we call them digital payments, that has taken off and things tend to follow suit. We’re starting to see things around preference management, and customer journey mapping, customer experience, those are things that we’re starting to see a lot of trends are driving. The other is, there’s obviously you haven’t asked the question yet. But there’s technology changes coming our way. Right? And I’m sure you’re gonna be interested in some of that. But we’re starting to see, from our clients perspective, how do enterprise views come together? So how do I actually find Whitney across retail across mortgage across well, and how do I speak to her? So we see that as trends, that’s certainly the area we have been investing in.

Whitney McDonald 8:38
Great. Maybe we could talk through an example, or two, when it comes to Broadridge clients and how things are piecing together? Who’s doing this? Well, where’s the digital demand stand? Talking through one of those client experiences or examples would be great.

Debbie Miglaw 8:54
Sure. So as I mentioned, the enterprise wide view comes into play quite a bit. And what we’ve been able to do is start looking at how that experience is intended to be. So we had performed some research, I’ll give you a specific example, in the wealth space, but in particular, we did research that said investors receiving tons of communication, we know that because we’re creating that content and delivering it on behalf of our clients. And the bank side of it is also producing this content. So how do you bring those together? So we first have launched our wealth and focus platform that from a product perspective is allowing us to consolidate communications around well. So instead of you just receiving a quarterly statement, for example, now have that statement created in a digital experience through a microsite technology, we’re able to bring in all the other activities. So now I can tell you not only what happened in the last quarter, what’s coming up proxy events, shareholder meetings, other regulatory content. So now you get a snapshot of what’s happening with your entire wealth, wealth portfolio. Do we then look at the expansion that next iteration is? How do you do that to create that same view, where now I can tell you about what’s happening with your credit cards with your mortgage with your auto lease your retail banking, right? All of those components coming together. So imagine if you Whitney suddenly received a communication that you thought was, hey, just your normal banking statement. But it’s now your entire enterprise. So let’s just say ABC bank is now communicating with you about five lines of business, and they know you and but then maybe they know you only have three lines of business. So now they when they market to you, they can actually upsell and not make it sound like they don’t know which services you’re using, because I’m sure you’ve received marketing men, you know, information where they’re trying to sell you on something, you’re like, well, I already am a customer. So why are you sending me this? These are the kinds of things that we’re looking to bring together as products offerings to the banks where they can take advantage of that. And that then drives down the cost. That is also based on research that not only we have done on our own, but we have other third parties that really talk about digital engagement increases based on a better digital experience. And so as we launched the first version that I mentioned, the wealth and focus platform, we did go and get feedback from the customers on those initial components. And the actual investors are saying up to 88% and higher are saying that that’s their preferred communication. It’s personalized, it’s contextual, it’s relevant, and it tells him the entire story. Plus, it’s digital. So hopefully, I’ve shared with you an example or two that that you can leverage from there.

Whitney McDonald 11:38
You started to allude to where technology is headed, kind of, we’re seeing so much. On the on the digital front. Right now we’re seeing so much innovation, where are these digital offerings headed? You talk through some of the investments that you’re making right now? What do you have your eye on when it comes to new innovation in this space?

Debbie Miglaw 11:59
Well, definitely the example I said about the multi lines of business, that holistic enterprise view, saying that for sure. A financial digest is another way to kind of look at that and making sure it’s relevant. The general industry, I would say around banking, certainly, your audience knows artificial intelligence, chatbots, digital assistants, you know, open banking, cryptocurrency all have those are really relevant technology and trends. And everybody’s trying to figure out what’s the best use of them in the right place. Broadridge is definitely looking at a lot of those things in terms of our overall entire first the wealth platform, but also some of the other components we do for the, for the rest of the banking, financial technologies. So cryptocurrency is definitely in there artificial intelligence machine learning all of those components. Were definitely in a API first approach, right? So it’s like digital first or API first and like about the same, right, so API, open interface is definitely a component, everything modularized. So I think a lot of companies, especially in the FinTech space, trying to support the banks, in a good way, are trying to do the same thing so that banks can operate openly with different providers, right. So there’s not going to be one provider for every bank, there’s many, many providers that they use. And so how do we actually make that interoperability, something that they can leverage as they go forward? So a lot of trends in in those spaces?

Whitney McDonald 13:29
Great, um, anything that we missed that we didn’t touch on?

Debbie Miglaw 13:35
I would say the only thing maybe is some of the, you know, it’s kind of new, is hyper personalized banking is kind of a newer term, right? That people are coining, we look at that wealth and focus product as something that is in that sense, it’s hyper personalized, it is truly this unique microsite sharing content across everything that’s there. There’s also it’s not necessarily maybe an offering, but cybersecurity comes up a lot. And, you know, a lot of the data that that we pay attention to research data that’s out there and available to everyone is that fintechs are helping banks with cybersecurity, right. And we believe progress helps play a role in that as well.

Whitney McDonald 14:20
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