There are some hard-earned lessons of 2020 that are going to be impacting some of the trends that we will be seeing in 2021. The first is that with the massive convergence of new users into digital channels, the use of data and the bank’s ability, to not only use it for understanding who their customers are but where their customers are going, is going to be an area that will require new investment and focus on advanced data analytics.

Predictive analytics is going to be a new critical tool that banks of all sizes must begin to use if they are going to continue competing effectively in this new digital era. Attached to this is going to be user experience and customer journey whether it is rethinking and reconfiguring the way branches are laid out to the digital user experience if banks this year are going to take that next step and really begin to provide customized and personalized hyper-segmented user experiences to individuals those banks that do will continue to move forward and advance in terms of their competitive positions and those who do not will be at a distinct disadvantage.

Additionally, we are also going to be looking at the modernization of infrastructure and the use of cloud computing to continue providing flexibility and agility to banking infrastructure as well as modernizing a legacy core infrastructure. It will be critical for banks in the next months to really modernize and prepare themselves not just for this coming year but for the years that are going to follow.

The digital age has really landed in the banking industry after all the adoption that was done in 2020 to survive the issues of the pandemic. Customers do not judge banks digital experience against other banks. They judge their digital experience against the last great digital experience that they had whether it was in Netflix or Amazon or any other of the digital applications that exists.

Banks must begin to enhance their offering as it comes to their digital experience to their customers, or they are going to be at a very distinct disadvantage. It will be critical the reskilling and the upskilling of their workforce for them to become participants in this transformation effort. This is not something that is going to be done by one individual or a small group of individuals. Everyone in the financial institution is going to have to participate and provide their input and insights and getting their teams to be able to do that. It will require the continuation of the evolution of the culture of these financial institutions to become more innovative and more agile.

A few of the trends in the online and mobile banking will be the following:

• Implement a simplified experience to getting online using One Time Passcode, Security Alerts and Biometric Authentication.
• Include a faster enrolment reducing the time and help customers bank on the go in a faster way.
• Enable the customers activating the accounts and the cards online anytime and anywhere focusing on a contactless process.

This year is going to be critical for the banking industry and competitors are going to really be resetting their competitive position. The trends above are what we should expect that financial institutions across the board are going to be facing including new challenges and opportunities as we move forward.