The Best Way To Increase Digital Deposits

Consumers have come to expect the ability to do banking – and a wide range of other activities – online. These expectations are only likely to grow with the Covid-19 pandemic.

While some banks have offered online services for some time, many others may be rethinking their strategy as they consider options that might help them grow market share beyond their traditional or geographically limited service areas. After all, digital banking has the potential to draw deposits and service loans from a broader pool of potential customers. As banks of all sizes contend with margin compression and increased competition, one of the easiest and most expeditious ways to cut costs is through the use of technology.

As banks work to increase deposits in an increasingly digital world, they have the opportunity to take different, sometimes divergent, approaches to connecting with audiences and compelling them to become customers. Two key strategies are:

• Establishing a digital branch – a digital version of an existing branch
• Launching an entirely new digital bank, with an entirely different look and feel from the existing brand

There is no right approach as long as banks are meeting customers’ digital needs. Each bank should pursue an approach that incorporates their brand, their core strategies and their target audiences. But small community banks don’t have to be hampered by the lack of big budgets or deep pockets when providing excellent experiences to their customers and fuel consistent growth, though. By leveraging truly optimized digital capabilities, community banks can grow faster and at a low cost.

Extending the Brand Name
There’s great value in brand loyalty. Many community banks have long-standing positive relationships; strong brand awareness and loyalty are firmly established within the communities they serve. When doubling down on offering online services, leveraging its existing brand name can help the bank establish immediate awareness and preference for its services.

Leveraging the existing brand name can be a less-costly undertaking, since new logos, branding platforms, key messages and marketing collateral don’t need to be established.

The potential downside? When reaching into new markets, an existing brand name may not have enough awareness to compete against the large, national, online brands. Fortunately, the online landscape offers even very small community banks the opportunity to build a very large footprint. To do that, some are launching new brands designed to reach an entirely new target audience.

Launching a New Online Brand
Reaching a new audience is one of the biggest benefits for banks that launch a new online brand. It also creates an opportunity to shift the bank’s image if the existing brand has not been strong or does not convey the modern, nimble image that tends to appeal to younger audiences.

The drawbacks, though, include the costs of creating a new brand, both in terms of time and money with no certainty or guarantee that the new brand will gain traction in the market. In addition, launching a new brand relinquishes any opportunity to leverage any existing brand equity. Operational planning and related costs may also be higher, given the likelihood that some positions and services will be duplicated between physical and online branches.

Still, community banks should carefully consider both options in light of their unique positioning, strategies and goals. While both approaches represent some level of risk, they also provide specific benefits that can be capitalized on to grow market share and revenue. We’ve worked with banks in both camps that have seen incredible growth and gained operational efficiencies well beyond their goals.

No matter the approach, when it comes to digital banking, it’s imperative to have clear objectives, buy-in from all stakeholders, focused resources to make it happen, and partners that can provide guidance and best-practices along the way.