Today I was reading a guest article on Bank Systems & Technology from Gary Greenwald, Citi’s managing director of digital money services, on the subject of banks tackling mobile payments and other digital initiatives. He was commenting on Citi’s effort around creating a new business called “Citi Enterprise Payments” and how he was tasked with understanding the trends and challenges their organization would face with employing digital technology tools for mobile payments.
He made some great comments on how banks are being forced to combat issues that software companies are used to addressing – not financial institution IT departments. During yesterday’s financial services webinar, “Guiding Principles for Mobile Payment Readiness” we had a great Q&A session and some offline questions from attendees around this very matter. Some banks are unsure if they should be competing in the mobile payments space, and if so, how can they do it successfully with the resources they have? Tackling regulatory compliance issues, mobile security and user experience design, may not be in a financial institution’s wheelhouse. Then throw in the need for “Big Data” and customer segmentation to create real-time offers, and I can picture their heads spinning. Check out our SlideShare presentation below to see what we talked about.
As we learned in our webinar poll banks know that user experience is a top requirement for banking customers. They are also committing a significant amount of their 2013 budgets to expanding mobile service offerings, and investing in recruiting IT talent to support these platforms. Banks know the digital-related opportunities are there, but what about the external factors they can’t control?
As Greenwald described it, the bank payments ecosystem has become the “wild west” with diverse industries coming together to drive payments. Yet banks are challenged with developing a scalable solution while digital technologies and standards still in flux. As another resource for information, I would encourage you to download our white paper, “Mobile Payments – Six Success Factors to Remain Competitive”. This white paper shares our SME’s real-world payment experiences as they’ve supported organizations facing this digital technology challenge. Armed with information, banks can forge ahead – even in an evolving market. Greenwald couldn’t have said it better, when he says:
“…the market is moving quickly, with many new entrants — and many non-banks. This is not a time for complacency, particularly for banks. So buckle in for a wild ride.”
