If you've ever opened the built-in "Wallet" app on your iPhone, you're no doubt at least passingly familiar with how convenient digital wallets can be. With a few taps of your finger, digital representations of all of your credit and debit cards are available and can be instantly used to make contactless purchases and other digital payments.
But what you might not realize is that this doesn't just benefit members--it also offers major advantages to the credit unions that offer them, too.
Offer Digital Wallets and Other Digital Services at YOUR Credit Union!
The Art of the Mutually Beneficial Situation
A major reason why digital wallets benefit both credit unions and their members has to do with how they enable a practically unmatched level of personalization for both parties. Using a standard debit card for online purchases is convenient, yes--but there isn't much in the way of data attached to that transaction information. From the point of view of a credit union, they might know what someone purchased and when, but they don't have the ability to dive much deeper than that in terms of the larger behavior.
With digital wallets, on the other hand, they do. Not only is it more convenient than a debit card (it's more akin to something offered by Apple or even PayPal than a traditional financial institution), but it collects more data with each transaction as well. That insight can then be used to offer more personalized experiences to credit union members based not on general trends or hunches, but on actionable, accurate intelligence.
In addition to housing transaction data, a digital wallet can also give credit unions a peak into the preferences of members by way of chatbot interactions, for example. Artificial intelligence can be deployed to help make more accurate predictions about not only what services a member needs today, but the ones that might interest them tomorrow.
All of this is a great way for credit unions to learn more about their members than ever. In that way, digital wallets directly improve the organization's ability to establish a meaningful relationship with those people. This helps to further separate them from their larger competitors in the minds of the people they're trying to serve.
From the point of view of the members, they get exactly what they want: a more personalized experience that speaks to who they are rather than to a general audience. It's also one that becomes more convenient and pleasing to engage with every day.
It truly is a "win-win" situation in every sense of the term, and it's one that wouldn't have been possible--even as recently as a decade ago--were it not for the advancements that concepts like digital wallets and digital payments have brought with them.
Taking Digital Convenience to the Next Level
At FLEX, we understand that one of the key competitive advantages that credit unions have involves not just creating a more personal experience for their members, but a far more convenient one as well. People want more options regarding where, when, and how they handle the financial aspect of their lives. If you want to separate yourself from those larger financial institutions positively, options like digital wallets are how you do it.
We've also recently written an eBook about Digital Account Services that expands on this and similar ideas that will allow you to leverage technology to create the best possible situation for everyone involved. To find out more, click the button below to read the guide.
