News

Study: How customers see the branch (and what they want from it)

April 17, 2014

Overall, consumers are visiting bank branches less often than they used to (in a survey, 46 percent said they visit a branch more than once a month, down from 51 percent in 2012), but young adults, smartphone and tablet owners — particularly those who are mobile banking users — are actually likely to visit branches frequently.

This consistent engagement at the branch enables financial institutions to strengthen customer relationships and make a wider variety of services more attractive to their customers, according to the most recent Insight Report from the Mercator Advisory Group Customer Monitor Survey Series.

The report highlights consumers' relationships with their primary financial institutions; bank branch use compared to other banking channels (e.g., ATM, online banking, mobile banking); consumers' rising interest in self-service technologies within the branch to facilitate transactions; and reliance on the branch to resolve issues or speak with product specialists.

"The bank branch is far from dead even though branch visits may be declining," said Karen Augustine, manager of primary data services at Mercator Advisory Group and author of the report. "The branch is a powerful sales tool that is key for cross-selling financial products and services and strengthening the customer relationship."

Highlights of the report include:

• year-over-year trending in number and types of FIs used by consumers, and the institutions they consider to be their primary FI;
• shifts in communication methods with FIs and satisfaction with those methods;
• preferred type of branch;
• new account openings by type of account and experience opening account;
• reasons for branch use, frequency of visits, and interaction with branch staff;
• Interest in being made aware of relevant new financial products and services and preferred methods of learning about them; and
• trends in use of and interest in in-branch videoconferencing with product specialists — or teller-assisted videoconferencing — for conducting transactions.

One of 24 exhibits in the 37-page report:

Findings were based on responses from a sample of 3,001 U.S. adults with banking relationships, collected in the annual online banking and channels survey in November 2013.