You are probably tired of seeing statistics about millennials, but I will persist nonetheless because they set the stage for significant changes in the immediate future of consumer banking. Millennials:

In line with these trends, branch traffic is declining. Consumer visits to retail bank branches is expected to drop 36% between 2017 and 2022. What is a financial services business to do?

They know they must adapt which is why, over the past decade, they have focused on digitizing  customer engagement processes and enabling their customers with self-service mechanisms. Overall, these efforts have been very effective and have produced some great tools – like online and mobile banking platforms, SMS and email automation systems, self-service kiosks and others — that enhance convenience for customers and have become core components of an omnichannel customer engagement strategy.

However, in the financial services business, convenience is only one part of the equation. Those firms that most effectively establish trust and build long-term quality relationships with their customers reap the reward of customer loyalty, deeper share of wallet and high referral rates. A Deloitte study highlights that 84% of millennials seek financial advice demonstrating that the necessity for world-class investment advice is still in demand. So financial services firms are now looking for new ways to bring the human touch back in their customer engagement strategy.

Enter real-time video interaction services. Online video interactions have proven to be a perfect alternative for consumers to avoid the hassle of a branch visit but still benefit from a lifelike meeting experience from the comfort of their home. Video can also be leveraged to enhance the in-branch experience by speeding up the access to specific services from video-enabled kiosks or, in smaller branches, enabling access to resources usually only available in larger facilities. Video makes sense for any interaction that is more complex or where emotions run high.

According to our 2017 video banking survey, more than 80% of the banks are planning to offer video banking services and, according to another soon to be released similar report on the insurance market, more than 70% of insurance companies are also planning to deploy a video interaction channel. And, while financial services organizations lead the pack, this trend will play itself out in contact centers across industries — Dimension Data’s 2017 Global Customer Experience Benchmarking Report highlights that 46% of contact centers are planning to support video chat by the end of 2018.

Vidyo is at the forefront of this market evolution with 6 of the top 25 banks already using our video customer engagement solutions as well as dozens of smaller banks and credit unions. Through our partnership with Genesys, we are able to fully and seamlessly integrate the video channel in the contact center environment to deliver a comprehensive omnichannel experience.

Watch the Video:

This blog post is the first one of a series in which we will detail some of our customer case studies, the primary use cases for video interactions in the financial services industry and how Genesys and Vidyo collaborate to bring best-of-breed solutions to market.

Stay tuned…

To learn more about the features and benefits of Vidyo, visit the application listing on the Genesys AppFoundry.