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Banks and FIs

Helping banks and NBFCs understand customer insights, assess micro markets, benchmark products and services and identify improvement areas

NBFCs Private banks PSU Banks

What We Do

Customer journey mapping
Customer needs assessment
Voice of customers
Digital banking journey mapping
Customer share of wallet study
Customer NPS diagnostic
Brand NPS diagnostic
Employee NPS diagnostic
Ad effectiveness monitoring
Campaign evaluation
Micro-market mapping & opportunity analysis
Competitor benchmarking
Branch economics
Customer persona identification
Eye tracking study
Process benchmarking
Concept testing and evaluation
Interest rate benchmarking
Real estate cost benchmarking
Channel economics benchmarking
Channel tracking
Sales channel NPS diagnostic
Offering NPS diagnostics

Customer journey mapping

What are the main touch points in customer journey across different product categories?
How does the customer journey originate (digitally, own sales team, agent, etc.)?
How is the experience with the customer support across different banks / FIs?
What was the level of dependence on the bank / FI personnel across different touch points?
What are the specific pain points and areas for improvement at different touch points?
What is the level of satisfaction on different touch points during the journey?

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Customer needs assessment

What are the key financial products (loans, credit cards, insurance, etc.) required by customers?
What are the key purchase criteria across different product categories?
What are the product offerings customers are aware of and currently using?
What is the frequency of usage and use cases across product categories?
Are there any product offerings not available to customers? If yes, why?
What are some of the unmet needs across existing products and reasons thereof?
What are the digital products currently being used?

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Voice of customers

Which banks / FIs are customers most satisfied with across product categories and why?
How has their experience been with different offerings across different product categories?
What are the reasons for preference of a particular bank / FI over others?
How do customers rate the sales and service experience?
What are the improvement areas across product categories?
What is the level of stickiness across product categories?
What are the triggers that would make customers shift to another bank / FI?
What are the key elements to provide a comprehensive user experience?

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Digital banking journey mapping

What are the main touch points in customer journey across different product categories? How is the user experience and ease of navigation?
What is the degree of adoption of digital at different touch points?
What are the KPC for adopting digital as compared to traditional options?
Which products / categories do they prefer purchasing online and why?
How does the digital banking journey differ from the traditional journey?
What are the specific pain points and areas for improvement?
What is the level of satisfaction on different touch points during the digital journey?

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Customer share of wallet study

Which banks / FIs are customers associated with across product categories?
What is the value of financial products used (loan amount, monthly credit card bill, etc.) across banks?
What is the share of wallet of the competitor banks / FIs across product categories?
How can banks / FIs capture higher share of customer’s wallet?
How can banks / FIs retain current share of wallet?
What is the level of stickiness across product categories?
What are the triggers that would make customers shift to another bank / FI?

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Customer NPS diagnostic

How likely is the customer to promote respective bank / FI?
How does the NPS vary across regions and products and how does it compare with key competitors?
What are the key reasons for a customer to be a promoter / detractor?
What are the improvement areas across product categories?
What is the level of stickiness across product categories?
What are the triggers that would make customers shift to another bank / FI?
What are the relative strengths and weaknesses that have the highest impact on NPS?

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Brand NPS diagnostic

How strong is the brand proposition in the minds of customers?
Is the brand proposition consistent across regions and products / services?
What is the level of unaided and aided recall?
What are the top 3 words most associated with the brand?
How likely are customers to recommend/ advocate the brand to others?
Does the brand have a customer pull or distributor push across products / services?
Are customers willing to pay higher fee, commission, etc. for brands?

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Employee NPS diagnostic

How satisfied are the employees with the bank / FI across different parameters?
What are the areas of strength which employees would like the bank / FI to continue and build on?
What are the key improvement areas?
How satisfied are the employees with their career path in the bank / FI?
How likely are the employees willing to recommend the bank / FI to others?

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Ad effectiveness monitoring

What is the advertising reach across modes and customer segments?
How does the advertising reach compare with competition? What is the customer recall?
What is the frequency of advertising vis-à-vis competition?
What is the Click-Through Rate (CTR) of digital advertising for various products and customer segments? How does it compare with benchmarks?
What is the propensity to induce enquiry and trial?
What is the ROI on advertising overall, and on specific campaigns?
What is the impact on the overall brand?

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Campaign evaluation

Are the campaign objectives and spend mix aligned with the overall business goals?
Are the key messages of the campaign being received and understood by customers?
What is the reach / Click-Through Rate (CTR) of the campaign, and what is the cost per customer reach out?
What is the cost per enquiry/ lead/ trial?
What is the actual commercial value (new customer acquisition, business volume, revenues, cost save through channel migration, etc.) of the campaign?
What is the actual ROI of the campaign?

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Micro-market mapping & opportunity analysis

What is the nature of opportunity in each micro-market (retail, commercial, etc.)? What are the typical customer requirements of this micro market?
Who are the key competitors and what are the attributes of their offerings in each micro-market?
What is our market share (points of presence/ sales capacity, number of customers, business volumes/revenues)?
How do our existing offerings compare to those of the market leader?
What are the key gaps in our product focus/ sales strategy/ distribution strategy across micro markets?
What is the potential business upside/ risk across micro-markets?

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Competitor benchmarking

What does the competitive landscape look like in each product category?
What are the differentiating features of the successful products/ services from the competition (product offerings, TAT, service levels, sales capacity, pricing, etc.)?
How do our existing offerings compare to those of the competition?
In which customer segments are we strong vis-à-vis competition?
Where does the bank / FI win against competitors and where does it lag competitors?
What is the potential value upside in the target market?

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Branch economics

What are the major drivers of revenue and costs for a branch?
What are the key costs that can be controlled?
What is the break-even point for the branch and how can branch level profitability be improved?
What is the mix of products available in each branch?
How standardized are the branch operations across geographies?
Which processes can be centralized or decentralized to make the working more efficient and keep branches viable?

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Customer persona identification

What are the key purchase criteria and usage preferences of various customers?
How do customers evaluate alternative options and select the product and service provider?
What is the level of research undertaken before buying a product / service? What factors influence the customers’ decision?
What are the key behavioral attributes of customers?
How open is the customer to try new experiences?
How do these vary by key demographic parameters – age, gender, income, occupation, etc.?
What are the key 4-5 personas which emerge, and how is the bank/ FI competitively positioned in each of them?

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Eye tracking study

What aspects of the website portal/ mobile app catch customers’ attention?
What is a typical journey of a customer on the portal/ mobile app?
How much time do customers send on average on each page?
How do customers navigate from one page to another?
How do the size, placement, layout, colors of widgets/ tools capture the attention of the user?
What are the blind spots for customers on the portal/ mobile app and why?
How do customers locate/ search for the product or service they were looking for? What tools are effective in helping them locate the product/ service they wanted?

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Process benchmarking

How do the key metrics of our business processes (turnaround time, first-time right, NPS, etc.) compare with competitors?
What are the areas of process improvements based on a time and motion study?
What is the hands-on-time and wait time for each step of the process?
What steps of the process can be eliminated or automated?
What are the customer experience and efficiency gains for customers?

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Concept testing and evaluation

How can we get customer feedback on proposed new product launches?
What is the ideal methodology for testing new product concepts? What should be the sampling plan?
How can we get insights on customer preferences on the features and overall product concept pre-launch?
What should be key message and tonality while advertising the new product launch?
What is the optimal beta launch design for a proposed product?

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Interest rate benchmarking

How do the current interest rates on deposits compare with competition? What amount/ tenor buckets are we competitive in?
What is the actual loan pricing in the market? What factors are taken into consideration while determining the interest rate?
How does the interest rate vary with ticket size, risk profile, relationship value, etc.?
How relevant are non-price factors such as brand, service levels, etc. for customers?

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Real estate cost benchmarking

What is the current real estate usage by location, purpose, etc.? How does it compare with competition, e.g. how do our branch formats and sizes compare with competitors?
What should be the optimal usage of real estate?
What is the rent per sq. ft., refurbishment/ fit out costs and how do they compare with the prevalent market rates?
What are the levers to optimize the total real estate cost?

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Channel economics benchmarking

What is the cost-to-serve of key processes such as customer acquisition, servicing, cross-sell/up-sell, etc.?
How do these vary across channels – branches, customer care, self-service kiosks, ATMs, internet/ mobile app, etc.?
How do these compare with key competitors?
What are customer preferences for key processes across channels?
What are the key improvement levers and potential upside?
How has COVID impacted customer choice of channels and overall cost-to-serve for banks and financial institutions?

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Channel tracking

What is the role of various channels (physical and digital) in the product lifecycle? How do these vary with customer segment/ demography? How have these changed over time?
What are the key differences in the channel strategy vis-à-vis competitors?
How does the extent of digital adoption vary across customer segments? What are the key drivers of digital adoption?
How does the customer acquisition cost and cost-to-serve vary across channels and customer segments?
What is the customer feedback and net promoter score (NPS) for our products? How does this vary across customer segments and products?
What are the key customer pain points in various channels?

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Sales channel NPS diagnostic

How likely are the sales channel partners to promote respective bank / FI?
How does the NPS vary across regions and channels and how does it compare with key competitors?
What are the key reasons for a sales partner to be a promoter / detractor?
What are the improvement areas across product categories and channels?
What is the level of stickiness across product categories and channels?
What are the triggers that would make channel partners shift to another bank / FI?
What are the relative strengths and weaknesses that have the highest impact on NPS?

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Offering NPS diagnostics

How likely is the customer to promote respective bank / FI?
How does the NPS vary across regions and products and how does it compare with key competitors?
What are the key reasons for a customer to be a promoter / detractor?
What are the improvement areas across product categories?
What is the level of stickiness across product categories?
What are the triggers that would make customers shift to another bank / FI?
What are the relative strengths and weaknesses that have the highest impact on NPS?

Let's talk market research firms in mumbai

Connect with our Banks and FIs Experts

Madhur Singhal

Mentor

Aryaman Tandon

Mentor

Hitesh Gossain

CEO, Network

Amar Choudhary

CEO, Intelligence & Insights

Aditya Thakur

Growth Leader, Operations

Related Case Studies

Concept validation for new product launch by digital lender

Objective

A growing digital lender wanted to launch a new product and hence liked to test the customer behaviour towards both its upcoming and existing products
Client also wanted to identify the most useful media for the marketing of its products

Methodology

Conducted survey (N = 500) with customers belong five metros and have some experience in taking unsecured loans
Identified customer behaviour towards their existing loans, their media consumption behaviour, and usage of different online services
Presented various concepts related to the upcoming and existing product offerings and tested their likeliness towards them
Deep-dived the validation with in-depth interviews (N = 100) with different customer segments based on their demography, past credit behaviour, and likeliness towards offerings
Understood customer behaviour towards different the selection of loan products for different personal and business needs and verified the strengths and weaknesses of different product offerings of the client

Impact / Outcome

The client validated and tested the upcoming product across different major cities and looked forward towards marketing and advertising strategy through different media platforms.

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Customer journey with digital gold loan player

Objective

Client wanted to evaluate an online gold loans player for a potential investment and identify differentiation in the customer journey of the digital lender with traditional player

Methodology

Conducted customer survey (N = 400+) of loan consumers across 8 major cities to understand customer behavior and experience with the gold loan lender and its competitors
Conducted in-depth Interviews with industry experts and customers (N = 65) to map customer borrowing needs with different loan products based on loan amount, urgency, collateral capacity, and repayment options
Identified key selection criteria, differentiating loan product features (interest rate, processing fee, documentation, loan TAT), and loan application process
Assessed the impact of technology on lender selection, loan TAT, and on loan process – origination to repayment by the customers

Impact / Outcome

Enabled the client to understand the overall gold loans market, operations of various market players, and impact of digitalization over changing customers preference and needs.

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NPS study for NBFC player across various loan products

Objective

An emerging Non-Banking Financial Company (NBFC) wanted to understand its perception amongst customers and Direct Selling Agents (DSAs) vs other competing NBFCs along with
Client wanted to evaluate the reasons for stickiness and detraction
Client also wanted feedback on efficacy and efficiency of lead generation and customer service channels

Methodology

Conducted consumer survey (N = 500) across 25 cities (mix of metro, tier 1 & 2 cities) for different customer segments (based on gender, age groups, income, etc) and across key loan products (Personal loan, Business loan and Micro finance)
Calculated NPS across different customer segments to understand reasons for difference in customer satisfaction across different segments
Conducted in-depth interviews (N = 20) with customers to understand key reasons for stickiness and propensity to switch to other banks / NBFCs and reasons thereof
Conducted in-depth interviews (N = 30) with DSAs to understand their preferences, reasons to push loans to certain banks / NBFCs and NPS
Used proprietary NPS framework to identify key action items detailing specific improvement points along with identifying relative strengths and weaknesses

Impact / Outcome

Client developed clarity on perception, preferences and feedback as compared to its competitors with action points on how to improve NPS.

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Opportunity analysis in supply chain financing

Objective

Client wanted to assess the opportunity in providing credit to the supply chain participants in the maintenance, repair, and operations (MRO) product market
They wanted to identify the operating leverage in the same and the usage of technology by the channel partners

Methodology

Conducted in-depth interviews (N = 100) with various distribution channel partner (MRO products) including authorized dealers, distributors, retailers, and agents
Identified the channel partner behavior of the various MRO products – technology usage, margins, credit usage, and credit partners involved in the system
Conducted in-depth interviews (N = 20) with credit managers and branch managers of various banks, NBFCs, and digital lenders
Identified and benchmarked various products available to the channel partners fulfilling their supply chain financing need
Mapped loan products available with the credit usage and identified gaps in the system due to which MRO channel partners looks for local money lenders

Impact / Outcome

Devised potential opportunity for the client suggesting starting with supply chain financing although they can face difficulty in getting cash credit from banks.

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Understanding small HFC customer experience and behavior

Objective

Evaluate customer experience with the HFC across the loan cycle and identify areas of improvement; develop understanding of customer thought-process, preferences, and perceived quality of delivered services.

Methodology

Visited two major business regions, one each in north and south India and conducted in-depth interviews (N = 120) with both existing and churned out customers, who have taken individual home loans for construction, reconstruction, purchase, and who have taken loan against property
Conducted in-depth interviews (N = 40) with Direct Selling Agents (DSAs) to identify product and process level differentiation with the competitors – selection and acceptance ratio, loan TAT, and post disbursal services and challenges
Visited competitors’ branches (N = 14) in both the geographies to understand about their channel preferences, loan product features, and assessed underwriting process and deviation taken by them
Created customer journey from need generation to channel identification and loan application process and marked challenges faced by the customers at different phases of the journey
Identified gaps in the loan process and service levels by segmentizing all the challenges faced by the customers both pre and post disbursement of the loan

Impact / Outcome

Suggested areas of improvement recommended across both the geographies and approved for implementation by the management team.

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Channel preference in housing finance

Objective

The client wanted to understand the various sourcing channels used by the housing finance sector and identify the preferred channels. They also wanted to understand the customer behavior and experience with different channels

Methodology

Visited branches (N = 50) of ~10 banks and housing finance companies across 9 cities in India and conducted in-depth interviews with the branch and relationship managers (N = 80) to understand different channels used by them to generate leads
Deep-dived into the difference in preference of various channels with the changes in city type, customer demography, loan ticket size, and loan type
Conducted in-depth interviews with Direct Selling Agents (DSAs), builders, and customers (N = 100) for home loan finance and loan against property
Conducted loan customer survey (N = 500) across 12 cities (mix of metro, tier-1, and tier-2 cities) belonging to different demographics, who have taken either individual home loans or loans against property from major scheduled commercial banks or housing finance companies
Combed through demographic data from surveys to create customer personas to identify their preferred channel choice and key selection criteria and identify the variation across public sector banks, private banks, and large HFCs

Impact / Outcome

Enabled the client to understand the different channels (RE brokers, DSAs, direct), while making them understand the reasons for such preferences in terms of channel margins, customer experiences, and relationship with the branch / HFC

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