Experience

WEBCAST

Webinar Recap: Getting to Customer-Centricity in Financial Services

61 min

Prophet recently hosted a webinar on customer-centricity in financial services – what it means today, what firms across the industry are doing to achieve it and how they measure success. We were joined by several senior leaders who graciously shared their insights and experiences:

  • Beth Wood, Chief Marketing Officer, Principal Financial Group
  • Andrea Schultz, Head of Workplace Retirement Marketing, Equitable
  • Kai Sakstrup, Chief Strategy Officer, US Bank

The questions and inputs from attendees made for a lively session, and we wanted to share some follow-on thoughts based on the big ideas that emerged during the discussion.

The State of Customer-Centricity in Financial Services

For years, customer-centricity has been a hot topic for banks, insurers, investment firms, credit agencies and other industry players. Tech-driven disruption, increased competition and rising consumer expectations have kept it near the top of the strategic agenda for marketing, sales and service executives, but indeed all types of business leaders and throughout the C-suite.

As we highlight in a recent report, the business case for customer-centricity – which is based on revenue growth, increased share of wallet, stronger loyalty and higher Net Promoter Scores (NPS) – remains as clear and compelling as ever. But many organizations still face longstanding challenges to achieve true customer-centricity. The most common barriers include:

  • Complex organizational structures
  • Post-M&A integration difficulties
  • Heterogeneous customers with diverse needs
  • Rigid legacy systems and fragmented data
  • Regulatory constraints

Collectively, these challenges lead many customers to feel as if they’re dealing with different companies when they engage with more than one business unit or product from the same organization. As Kai put it, “customers should not see our org chart.” But legacy operational models with siloed product lines and busines units make it challenging to offer seamlessly integrated customer experiences. Andrea commented that she was “jealous of FInTechs” because they don’t have to contend with all the outdated tech and can execute around a clear customer-centric vision.

Customer-Centricity in the Big Picture

Beth spoke on the need to “empathize with customers and to identify what each touchpoint really means to them.” This could emphasize tactical actions, such as data cleansing and harmonization to ensure all business units have access to complete and timely customer data.

There are unique elements of the customer experience – which Beth called the “visible edge of the brand” – that should be owned by business units. But it’s critical for marketing leaders to “build bridges and open doors and windows” between all parts of the organization so that experience is unified and as seamless as possible for individual consumers. After all, marketing leaders are often the most passionate advocates for satisfying customers.

Collaboration between business units is how customer experience and human-centered design can be truly embedded within and throughout the business, rather than being bolted on. Beth added that “customers are the avenue to scale transformative change.” Advanced technology can help operationalize such change, as well as promoting consistency in the customer experience, though it takes more than just the latest to be truly customer-centric. Indeed, chasing the newest tech can even distract some organizations from delivering what customers want. To become customer-centric, organizations need to align strategically on holistic transformation.

How to Drive Customer-Centric Transformation: Actions and Advice from Senior Financial Services Leaders

Seek Ongoing Feedback to Enhance Customer Knowledge
Success starts with deep knowledge and understanding of consumer needs and wants. While most companies would say they know their customers, the reality is that it’s much harder than it looks. And simply having lots of data doesn’t equate to customer knowledge.

Detailed journey mapping and segmentation exercises can help convert huge volumes of raw data into actionable insight. These efforts must also be supported by active and ongoing feedback mechanisms to track the effectiveness of every touchpoint.

Principal conducted a global study to learn what was going on in the hearts and minds of all of its consumers, across age and socioeconomic bands. “Do your homework on who you are, what you want to be, and then talk to your customers about what’s important to them,” added Beth.

Prioritize Diversity

The need for insight has only increased with the spotlight on diversity, as one participant question highlighted. Some consumers perceive that the financial services sector has historically focused on wealthy white males, a perception that true customer-centricity can powerfully counteract.

According to Kai, deep research on all customer segments helps prevent marketers from “assuming that we are the person that we’re serving, which can lead to bad outcomes.”

Champion the Promise Amongst the C-Suite
There was consensus among the panelists that buy-in and leadership from the top of the organization (including from product and business unit executives) are critical to realizing the promise of customer-centricity. Shifting the mentality of the organization involves getting more people thinking about the business from the perspective of the customer and talking about customer needs.

Marketers are often responsible to ensure that customers are represented in such discussions. Kai spoke of taking inspiration from senior-level advocacy and engaging “the people within the organization that actually do the work day to day.” Making customer-centric change sustainable requires incenting and rewarding the right behaviors. It also requires ensuring that the business case for change is clearly explained; you don’t want to imply that people have been doing things wrong.

Find the Right Talent

Talent is another key variable in the equation for success. All of our panelists are looking for more data science and analytics talent, as well as targeted expertise in engagement strategy, social media and other areas.

There is increasing interest in bringing in talent from other industries, with the goal of challenging conventional wisdom and energizing marketing teams. Fresh thinking is more valuable than knowing about financial services regulation, for instance. After all, new hires from consumer packaged goods and retail can always learn the industry. Our panelists agreed that such talent is critical to generating strong returns on their large-scale investments in technology and data.

Track and Celebrate Incremental Progress

NPS and customer sentiment are among the top metrics for tracking customer-centricity. But it’s also important to track the small nuances of consumer behavior that can serve as leading indicators. Andrea believes the key is to know how customers feel about individual interactions and their willingness to go through them again. “Those are universal metrics that drive change, because everyone can understand them,” she said. Plus they provide more detail about what’s behind NPS.

Though firms should adopt an agile approach to upgrading elements of the customer experience, customer-centricity is more like a marathon than a sprint. “You want to say ‘within two quarters, we’re going to transform this business,’ but I think that’s the wrong approach,” said Kai. “You have to realize there’ll be milestones along the way and identify how to incrementally keep moving forward.”

Andrea agreed. “When it comes to customer-centricity, you have to play the long game, because the wins you’re going to see won’t show up on the balance sheet in a year.” That’s why leading marketers orient their customer-centric change efforts – including strategies, budgets, resources and their teams – around the target customer behaviors and business outcomes that matter most.

Final Thoughts

Our recent webinar, along with our ongoing client experience, shows the intense interest senior marketing leaders have in instilling customer-centricity in their organizations. Their passion will serve them well in advocating for richer and more personalized experiences and creating momentum for the long-term journey.

Watch the full replay here or get in touch with our financial services team at Prophet.

WEBCAST

Webinar Replay: Executing on Customer-Centricity in Financial Services

The secret to becoming genuinely customer centric? Start with holistic, human-centered cultural change.

61 min

Prophet’s financial services team leaders moderate a discussion with executives from Principal Financial Group, Equitable and US Bank on the ways financial services organizations can overcome barriers to growth by transforming their cultures to be more customer-centric.

Watch to learn: 

  • The skills, capabilities and processes needed to advance customer-centric transformation
  • The challenges leaders are facing as they change their cultures to operationalize customer-centricity
  • The top priorities of senior leaders advancing transformation agendas of their own

Panelists:

  • Beth Wood, Chief Marketing Officer, Principal Financial Group
  • Andrea Shultz, Head of Workplace Retirement Marketing, Equitable
  • Kai Sakstrup, Chief Strategy Offer, US Bank

REPORT

Executing on Customer-Centricity

Financial services execs tell us how they are transforming corporate culture, thinking bigger and acting bolder.

Download

How Financial Services Organizations Can Unlock Uncommon Growth

Non-traditional players – like fintechs, “super apps” and neobanks – have built their businesses around serving the whole customer. They use digital technology to open new sources of demand, and they find growth opportunities by constantly evaluating customer behaviors and designing solutions to fill the gaps.

Dealing with decades-old technology and product-centric org charts, traditional financial services organizations face higher barriers to achieving customer-centricity. To win and retain their customers, they’ll need to think and act like a disrupter by being hyper-focused on the 360-degree customer view.

Executing on Customer-Centricity is the latest research from Prophet’s Financial Services practice. It includes interviews with nearly 50 senior executives with customer-facing responsibilities across banking, insurance and financial services.  Our findings will help financial services organizations think bigger and act bolder, enabling them to achieve customer-centricity across the entire enterprise by transforming their cultures.

Read this report to gain deeper insights on:

  • The practice of customer-centricity – and how it pays off in share of wallet, higher loyalty, more referrals and stronger operational gains
  • The top five industry-specific challenges faced when it comes to achieving customer-centricity
  • The five actions legacy companies can take now to better orient themselves around their customers
  • A refreshed approach to transformation with culture as the keystone and Prophet’s Human-Centered Transformation Model as the guide

Download the report below.

Revolutionize
Experiences

RELATED SERVICE

Download Executing on Customer-Centricity

*Fill in all required fields

Thank you for your interest in Prophet’s research!

DOWNLOAD NOW!

BLOG

Pinduoduo’s Purpose-Led Agri-Tech Innovation: A Conversation with Xin Yi Lim

This tech company focuses on farmer productivity while reducing the environmental footprint of farming.

E-commerce continues to surge globally, in part accelerated by the COVID-19 pandemic, and in many ways, China leads the charge. While some Chinese companies, such as Alibaba and Meituan, have focused on building ecosystems and “super apps,” Pinduoduo’s approach differs. With origins in agriculture and social commerce, Pinduoduo has risen to the top through an innovative business model that is set on creating value for both the merchant and the consumer. In 2020, Pinduoduo was ranked third by GMV of China’s e-commerce platforms, with a total GMV of $242 billion USD.

Prophet’s Tom Zhang, a senior engagement manager, had the chance to sit down with Xin Yi Lim, Pinduoduo’s executive director of sustainability and agricultural impact, to discuss Pinduoduo’s investment in agri-tech, its view on the consumer-to-manufacturer (C2M) model and the company’s ongoing purpose-led innovation initiatives.

Xin Yi Lim

Pinduoduo

Executive Director of Sustainability and Agricultural Impact

As Pinduoduo’s executive director of sustainability and agricultural impact, Xin Yi Lim is responsible for Pinduoduo’s international corporate strategy efforts and innovation in sustainability and agri-tech. Before joining Pinduoduo in late 2018, she worked for Singapore’s sovereign wealth fund, GIC, in both its Singapore and New York offices as a technology and media analyst in the Public Equities division. Xin Yi holds a bachelor’s degree from the University of Oxford and a master’s degree from Harvard University.

Can you tell us a bit more about your background? What brought you to Pinduoduo, and what is your current role there?

I’ve spent most of my working life in investment, covering technology, the internet and media. As a financial analyst and an outsider, I was familiar with Chinese e-commerce but very much interested in learning more.

I joined Pinduoduo in late 2018. I’m part of the broader strategy and investment team, but my title is quite unusual – executive director of sustainability and agricultural impact. It’s very hard to find anybody else who has those two things in one title, which speaks to how Pinduoduo sees agriculture. For us, it’s where we can have a huge impact in the social sphere, via poverty alleviation and job creation, and in the environmental sphere as well.

What is Pinduoduo’s ambition behind its continued focus on agriculture, even as the company has expanded into numerous other categories?

In the beginning, there was Pinduoduo and there was also Pinhaohuo (拼好货), which was focused solely on agricultural goods. We merged the two in 2016, and as a result, agriculture remained deeply rooted in our DNA. Even as we grew into selling other categories of goods, agriculture stayed at the forefront as a sector where we could have a large-scale impact and accelerate change.

As a technology company, we’re constantly thinking about how we can disseminate agricultural technologies to improve farmer productivity while reducing the environmental footprint of farming. By leveraging these technologies, customers can get the same product, or perhaps even one that is more nutritious, while reducing the environmental impact. Broadly, that’s how Pinduoduo thinks about agriculture, technology and sustainability.

As a platform, where can Pinduoduo have the biggest impact in the agricultural value chain?

The way agricultural products make their way to market – the distribution channel – has not yet been transformed as it has for other categories. We estimate only about 7% to 8% of the total dollar value of agricultural products transacted in a year is happening online.

That caught our attention because we know shifting online can unlock a lot of efficiencies in the supply chain. Through the Pinduoduo model, we are able to bring the produce directly from farmers to customers, cutting down on any unnecessary intermediaries in between. And by doing this, the farmer can earn more while the consumer can save more. It becomes a win-win for the producers and the consumers.

“As a technology company, we’re constantly thinking about how we can disseminate agricultural technologies to improve farmer productivity while reducing the environmental footprint of farming.”

The knock-on effect is also more prevalent now that the farmers are more plugged into the economy. This is because they have a direct sense of what their target consumers like. They can understand how consumers respond to certain pricing or packaging if there is stronger demand for large oranges versus small oranges or how demand changes throughout the year. We want to empower farmers so that they’re not just price-takers in the traditional distribution model, but instead, can be more actively involved in producing what consumers actually want. This is where we can add value and how we bring the C2M model to life.

Can you elaborate on how Pinduoduo incorporates the C2M model in its overall strategy?

In China, there is a very strong manufacturing base on the supply side. However, the Original Equipment Manufacturers (OEMs) often lack the expertise and insights to create distinctive brand identities and value propositions that connect with their consumers. Thus, we are coming up with new ways to enable domestic producers to leverage their own IP, understand consumer needs and create products and brands that resonate with the market.

Our New Brands Initiative, launched in late 2018, is one way we are bringing this to life. We have dedicated vertical specialists who work with manufacturers from each category, sharing emerging market and consumer trends with the goal of turning manufacturers from OEMs to Original Brand Manufacturers (OBMs). Based on these category trends as well as their own merchant data we provide via the platform, merchants are able to adjust their offerings accordingly and consider how to upgrade their marketing. That’s also where brand building begins. Brands can’t be everything to everyone, so by providing insights and narrowing the focus, C2M can help manufacturers develop their own value propositions and their own brands.

China has the benefit of having one of the highest levels of penetration of e-commerce. This speeds everything up, from product development to pricing to SKU assortment, by allowing manufacturers to get feedback in real-time.

Can you give a few examples of some of the initiatives Pinduoduo is undertaking in terms of innovation?

Pinduoduo is training a new generation of agri-entrepreneurs. In the past five years, we’ve trained one hundred thousand “new farmers,” a younger, more educated generation that is migrating back to their hometowns, and we’re committed to training one hundred thousand more. These are the ones who are managing the storefront, packaging, customer service and distribution and at the same time, they are also mobilizing the rest of their rural communities to join them in the digital economy. We bring business expertise via online and offline classes and then partner with institutions such as China Agricultural University to teach agricultural knowledge. Through these agri-entrepreneurs, we’re hoping to start improving the branding of agricultural goods in China, which is very undeveloped.

Our long-term goal is to bring in more upstream, purpose-led innovation. We’re in year two of hosting the Smart Agriculture Competition. We bring together global technology teams with backgrounds in AI, machine learning and plant science to compete against traditional, premium horticulture teams. We then put these teams in a smart greenhouse that they control remotely using IoT, monitoring the plants and making precise adjustments whenever needed. In last year’s competition, the AI teams produced three times as many strawberries and generated 76% higher ROI compared to the traditional teams. Not only was it very impressive to the farmers, but some of the technology experts also went on to work with the farmers after the competition. The Smart Agriculture Competition creates an opportunity to test the teams’ technologies on a bigger scale. At the same time, the farmers benefit from the efficiencies and see the real-world impact.

Pinduoduo has referred to itself as a “Costco+Disney” concept. Can you elaborate on what this means and how it guides Pinduoduo’s innovation and strategy?

The Costco+Disney concept ties in with Pinduoduo’s slogan: More Savings, More Fun (多实惠，多乐趣). The Costco part, “more savings,” comes from our early insight that we could get more value for money by aggregating demand. The Disney part, “more fun,” speaks to people’s desire for a social shopping experience.

We designed Pinduoduo to be very interactive. The app offers a social connection that helps users discover things more easily compared to the traditional e-commerce model, which is very individualistic. The “team purchase” model is a big part of the social element. Livestreaming serves as another interactive element, which helps build trust between consumers and merchants. It allows them to see how things are made, how it looks, which helps consumers feel closer to the producers, creating trust.

Revolutionize
Experiences

RELATED SERVICE

FINAL THOUGHTS

We don’t want shopping to feel like a chore. We want it to be a fun part of your daily routine. Within the e-commerce industry, we’ve achieved one of the highest engagement rates in terms of monthly active users and daily active users. By emphasizing more savings and more fun, we’ve found a way for users to engage willingly and regularly.

Learn how your organization could drive innovation through a purpose-driven approach. Contact us today!

CONNECT WITH US

BLOG

How To Respond to New Customer Expectations Around Data and Experience

People feel vulnerable. Build trust by finding new ways to show them you’re protecting their data.

The most lasting change of the pandemic is likely the “digital load shift,” as people rapidly adopted new tech habits that experts once thought would take years to establish.

These behaviors have radically changed the way people experience the world. They’re buying houses they’ve never physically stepped inside, working with people they’ve never met in real life and investing in stocks recommended by their social-media community.

Even as COVID-19 vaccination rates, this digital load shift is here to stay, and with it are increasing privacy concerns and higher expectations for what a “good” experience feels like. Better-informed consumers are demanding more from the devices, networks and brands they use. For financial-services companies during their own digital transformations, this presents a valuable opportunity to re-assess priorities across their own digital roadmaps.

A Growing Sense of Vulnerability

It’s not entirely accurate to link consumers’ growing wariness to the pandemic. Certainly, the 2018 Facebook/Cambridge Analytics scandal rattled trust in Big Tech. And the mistrust doesn’t stop there. “The Social Dilemma,” a Netflix documentary detailing the ways companies like Google and Facebook manipulate consumers, was one of the most popular releases last year Google, at least for the moment, has an edge in the battle for trust, with 66% of people saying they generally trust it, versus just 38% for Facebook).

As companies try and move past the pandemic, they must address these suspicions. If businesses want people to share data, they need to offer more in return, including greater customer control over the data, transparency in how it is used, and greater value for data exchanged.

It’s not likely people will cut back on their digital life. American adults now spend 16-plus hours per day with digital media, up 25% from pre-pandemic levels. But they’re smarter, with 54% saying COVID-19 has made them more aware of the personal data they share.

While they are alert to high-profile breaches, 50% say they are still willing to share – as long as they get a fair value in return. The majority – 56% – want more control and better information about how that information will be used. Google Pay, for example, has released a control center for users to control their data for personalization, payments profile and transactions and activities.

Linking Digital Experiences

Winning with these skeptical consumers will become more difficult as the load shift from analog to digital channels accelerates.

“They’ll increasingly expect experiences that link and mutually enforce each other across all other channels.”

Consumer preferences and behavior have leapfrogged by years and 75% of consumers say they’ll continue using the digital channels they’ve started to use during the pandemic. This spans across age groups and channels. About 44% of consumers say the pandemic has led them to use their banking apps more. Some 71% of consumers aged 55 and older prefer an internet chat/video insurance claim process to replace the traditional in-office approach. Two-thirds of consumers prefer to book and reschedule appointments online rather than over the phone.

Forward-looking firms know these changes are here to stay and are actively solving for the new future state, rather than trying to play catch up to the 2019 status quo. About 86% of financial services executives plan to increase their AI-related investments through 2025. One-third of banks plan to increase spending on digital channels over the next year.

Emerging as a category leader takes exceptional strategic innovation and a digital roadmap that can adapt to unforeseen market changes.

Capital One, for example, uses cloud and artificial intelligence to connect customer experience across all touchpoints. Prospect and customer feedback is gathered across channels and stages of the journey and is synthesized using natural language processing to optimize the experience. As the first U.S. bank to operate completely on the cloud, Capital One uses cloud data systems to maintain a unified customer view across all channels.

As financial services companies transition from analog to digital experiences, they must follow consumer preferences closely to innovate more quickly. It’s more than having the right technology to deliver those experiences – it’s cohesively linking those experiences across channels.

Three Ways to Strengthen Digital Trust and Reinforce Omnichannel Experiences

1) Create an “opt-in” strategy

Include methods for asking for “opt-in,” centralizing how prospects and customers can manage their data within the ecosystem.

2) Perform qualitative research to understand the importance of data control in experiences.

Audit prospect and customer touchpoints that request data. Is it clear how data will be used? Is the value exchange meaningful and easy to understand?

3) Define existing and new opportunities for points of convergence.

To develop mutually reinforcing and cohesive multichannel experiences, companies must prioritize opportunities. Which experiences are most desirable to our customers? Are they viable for our industry? Are they feasible for our business? Leaders must adapt their transformation roadmaps to make sure both experience design and technology builds toward this convergence.

Drive
Customer
Demand

RELATED SERVICE

FINAL THOUGHTS

As people journey into increasing levels of digital sophistication, striving to protect their privacy and financial data isn’t enough. Financial services companies will have to continually demonstrate how they are adopting new technology to serve customers better. Developing a distinctive, durable quid-pro-quo for this data exchange is the next frontier for financial services. To achieve uncommon growth, these companies can’t just keep up with the latest in technology. They’ll have to lead.

To learn more about the latest market and consumer trends impacting your business – reach out to Prophet.

CONNECT WITH US

BLOG

Three Ways Financial Services Companies Can Dial-Up Empathy

In the last 15 months, the world has vaulted years ahead in digital acceptance. As consumers gain tech experience, their standards get higher. They’ve developed the ability to tune out fake empathy and cringe at personalization efforts that are either lame or creepy.

Yet empathy counts more than it ever has before. During the pandemic, unemployment because of a harsh reality, many individuals lost or were separated from loved ones, several were forced to postpone milestone moments and no one was able to participate in the communities that made them feel the happiest and safe.  Brands and companies that build true connections are those that understand that context is everything. Personalization is only relevant and timely when it relates to what prospects and customers are going through at that moment.

Financial services companies have a clear advantage compared to other industries, with more data-driven insights that reveal specific struggles. While not every family’s finances have been impacted, 51% of consumers added to their credit card debt during the pandemic. Additionally, Pew Research reports 27% of consumers are worried about the cost of healthcare.

Catch Up With Missed Milestones

Financial services companies can improve personalization efforts by helping people catch up with milestones. The weddings, graduation ceremonies and retirement parties that were put on hold due to COVID-19 left emotional holes. Consumers are still coming to terms with the impact of that disruption. And as vaccination rates rise and cases drop, people are looking to reclaim those “lost” moments.

Weddings are a happy example. The Knot predicts this year will be the biggest wedding year ever, increasing by 20 to 25%. And many couples who got hitched during the pandemic will celebrate with a long-delayed bash.

Moving house – always a significant financial transition – has also taken on outsize proportions, with millions of millennials struggling to find affordable homes. They are trying to navigate a real-estate reality that’s markedly different, not just because of the pandemic. Housing prices are soaring, up 23.6% – a record increase. And after two decades of declining home construction, experts say America needs an additional 5.5 million units.

It’s a market more confusing than their parents ever faced­. Instead of buying dream houses or starter homes that make them feel financially comfortable, they’re often stuck. They need content that helps them make the best choices and financial partners that understand their frustrations and disappointments.

Consumers also need support for events that aren’t happening. The birthrate has been falling for some time, but experts believe COVID-19 caused a further 8.6% decline. Again, this loss is felt more keenly among millennial women.

But baby boomers and Gen Xers are taking some emotional lumps, too. About 40% of retirement savers say the pandemic has shaken their confidence in their financial plans, and 32% in their 50s plan to delay retirement as a result.

Even more disruptive? Nearly 2 million older Americans have been forced out of work into a retirement they aren’t quite ready for.

To handle these curveballs, people need new planning tools, focused content and a tone that recognizes new challenges. Even automated content needs to be more human, sensing what consumers crave at each touchpoint.

Understanding The Pandemic’s Lasting Economic Impacts on Women

The pandemic fundamentally altered life for many women in deep and profound ways. Not only did women lose more jobs than men, but one in four employed women have considered leaving the workforce or downshifting their careers, according to Lean In. The pandemic also pushed women to take on multiple roles including juggling more family responsibilities. Lean In says moms are 1.5 times more likely to be spending three or more hours a day on housework and childcare.

And while many companies just spouted generic “We’re here for you” messaging, some built genuine relationships. For instance, fintechs like Betterment and Ellevest are personalizing marketing and content messaging to emphasize what female customers can do for themselves in light of COVID career setbacks and how they can help other women directly impacted by the pandemic.

These enormous problems will shape family life for years to come. Companies that tailor valuable content, compassionate messaging and thoughtful timing can achieve relevance. Those that don’t risk getting dismissed or, worse, alienating a key customer base.

Three Ways Financial Services Companies Can Dial-Up Empathy

1) Give existing marketing messaging a compassion check-up.

How should personalization strategy change given the effects of the pandemic on life events? Which use-cases should take priority? How can marketing and content be more empathetic to new realities?

2) Identify changes in customer needs across the journey.

Using consumer interviews and behavioral insights, identify how customer needs have shifted because of the pandemic’s wide-sweeping effects and how that impacts their customer journey. How might products and services need to adapt to best meet these needs?

3) Develop personalized experiences around life events that are more likely to occur post-pandemic.

From the brand’s perspective, prioritize the most relevant life events that relate to the customer journey and develop personalized touchpoints for them.

Revolutionize
Experiences

RELATED SERVICE

FINAL THOUGHTS

As the world continues to open back up, consumers’ financial needs are evolving. It’s time for financial services companies to think even more carefully about how those changing needs best align with their digital transformation priorities. It requires an empathic ear to hear how customer priorities are shifting and an agile mindset to adapt quickly. Life has changed in fundamental ways for so many, creating an opportunity to build brand relevance in this post-COVID-19 environment.

To learn more about the latest market and consumer trends impacting your business, reach out to Prophet.

CONNECT WITH US

WEBCAST

Webinar Replay: The Insurance Customer of the Future

We take an in-depth look at sweeping demographic and psychographic changes shaping the insurance landscape.

59 min

Prophet’s financial services team leaders moderate a discussion with executives from MetLife, Thrivent and Shift Technology on the way customer behaviors are shifting and these shifts are impacting their transformation priorities.

Watch to learn:

  • The key findings about insurance customer behavior shifts – and predictions for their shift over the next decade
  • The ways financial services organizations – from a global insurance provider to an AI-native InsureTech company – are helping build better experiences for their customers
  • The top priorities of senior leaders advancing transformation agendas of their own

Panelists:

  • Michelle Froah, SVP Global Marketing Strategy & Sciences, MetLife
  • Rohit Mull, Chief Marketing Officer, Thrivent
  • Benjamin Braunschvig, Global Head of Partnerships, Shift Technology

REPORT

High-Concept Thinking: 6 Ways To Create Striking Innovations

A high concept creates clarity about an idea, making sure it’s developed and delivered as originally intended.

Download

How To Find (and Keep) Your Competitive Edge in Innovation

Innovation is the cornerstone of business growth today. Figuring out the right formula results in big ideas and opens the door to new business opportunities. ‘High-concept’ thinking is what’s separating successful innovators from the rest of the field. A high concept creates clarity about an innovative idea and ensures the idea is developed and delivered as originally intended.

In this report, our Experience & Innovation practice outlines how to take your innovation strategy to the next level with high-concept thinking.

Read this report to learn: 

  • The definition and key traits of high-concept thinking
  • How high-concept thinking can help re-center how your company thinks about innovation
  • The six critical ways high concepts are used for innovation
  • Examples of successful high concepts in practice

Download the full report below.

Download High-Concept Thinking For Box Office Innovation

*Fill in all required fields

Thank you for your interest in Prophet’s research!

DOWNLOAD NOW!

BLOG

Five Winnovation Factors to Drive Innovation Excellence in Asia

Look for new ideas that are high concept, more familiar than strange, and end-to-end human.

As we step off the Coronacoaster and onto (what we hope is) a new Roaring 2020s joyride, it’s critical that businesses innovate in ways that leverage how echoes of the pandemic will remain endemic in the future.

As always, the winners have been the most innovative in responding to changing market dynamics and consumer needs – putting momentum behind ideas that create the most sales energy, scaling production when the time is right, demonstrating cultural resilience in sometimes plummeting conditions and showing agility through the loop-de-loops of competition.

Innovation Changes Our Lives

The history of humankind is the history of innovation. Where would we be without fire? Or the light bulb, now the universal icon of innovation? Or the internet? We don’t want to reinvent the wheel, but it would be nice to spin out the next Uber. Or perhaps, an upgrade from the past – like switching from paper money to credit cards to QR code payments.

Innovation is Hard

There are oodles of stats on the subject, and the numbers aren’t pretty – about 90% of innovations fail soon after launch. But when you take a closer look, it seems many of these failures suffer from self-inflicted wounds. Far too often, failed innovations are simply failing to answer enough basic questions: What is it? Who is it for? When is it for? Where is it for? How is it different? Why should I buy it?

Technology Moves Fast, Human Needs Change Slowly

As we think about better ways to innovate, we need to be careful to avoid the speed trap between the evolution of human needs and a revolution of solutions.

Innovators need to be out in front of the public, or else they aren’t innovating. But innovators also need to create an intelligible bridging story if the innovations they’re pimping are way out there.

Be Mindful of How Cultural Context Comes into Play

Across cultures, whether or not innovative ideas translate is also being put to the test. In Asia, for instance, we have seen countless big ideas that have been massively successful in the west, such as Amazon, Uber or Groupon, fail miserably, getting replaced and outpaced by local competitors after struggling to adapt to the local culture and consumers. In contrast, Starbucks, Walmart, and Airbnb have reimagined themselves vigorously and relentlessly.

“Winnovation factors work even better when accompanied by the other innovation frameworks, exercises and approaches we have up our (rolled up) sleeves.”

The 5 Winnovation Factors

Prophet works with enlightened innovators of all shapes and sizes across a spectrum of categories and markets. We’ve distilled what we’ve learned from our work (and what we’ve observed to work in the marketplace) into five winnovation factors.

The fab five should NOT be thought of as a super-strict checklist, but instead, be thought of as guidance towards creating winning innovations. They work individually and collectively to raise an organization’s innovation game to a higher probability of success. They do it all from informing answers to basic buyer questions to inspiring disruptive ideas that surf pop-culture tsunamis.

  •  High Concept
  •  New Platform Development
  •  Multiple Needgasms
  •  80:20 Familiar:Strange
  •  Human End-to-End

High Concept

Innovation should be rooted in an intuitive High Concept that helps people understand what innovation is all about…in an engaging way. High Concepts are often expressed through name and/or design elements.

Facebook (2004) turned the page to a new chapter of social media, with its concept of becoming a “Book of Your Life.” WeChat (2011), prior to reaching super-app status, first gained traction as a messaging platform connecting people. Its Chinese name, 微信, also reflects its concept clearly – “micro message.”

The High Concept definition says it all: A simple and often striking idea or premise, as of a story or film, that lends itself to easy promotion and marketing. What could be better than striking ideas and easy marketing? High-concept thinking is a powerful concept for innovation.

New Platform Development

Changing the NPD game from new product development to new platform development means treating innovation as a living system that spans (and spawns) multiple products and/or services.

Oreo (1912) kept its cookie dynasty from crumbling over the years by flexing a dynamic platform system that innovates with a defined set of variables – ranging from the dimensions of the outer sandwich to the amount and flavor of the cream filling. Pop Mart (2010) thought inside the box to turn a simple toy into endless opportunities for surprise, by selling its trademark dolls in “blind boxes” and collaborating with artists and brands to constantly create new collectibles.

Whenever you innovate something new to the world, treat it as a platform that can be leveraged in a variety of ways for future growth from the get-go.

Multiple Needgasms

Many contemporary innovations are one-upping their unique selling proposition ancestors. Increasingly, new innovations are purpose-built to (over) deliver against multiple needs to elicit mind-blowing experiences from the jump.

Beverage company Genki Forest (元气森林) (2016) quenches Chinese consumers’ thirst for healthy drinks that still taste delicious. Their sparkling water boasts 0 sugar, 0 fat, and 0 calories, comes in a wide range of flavors and is topped off with sleekly designed packaging.

‘Multi’ is the new ‘uni’…‘and’ is the new ‘or’.

80:20 Familiar:Strange

Most consumers want a twist on the known in their innovations. If something is too familiar, there isn’t much reason to buy it. If something is too strange, mass consumers will reject it as something only good for freaks.

Take the salted egg yolk, a traditional staple across many Asian cuisines. In recent years, the flavor has hatched a number of new products that consumers are crazy about, from IRVINS Salted Egg Potato Chips (2015) to McDonald’s Salted Egg Yolk Loaded Fries (2019).

The innovation advice on the 80:20 factor should feel strangely familiar. If an innovation is highly familiar, add some strangeness. If an innovation is strange, make it feel more familiar.

Human End-to-End

Innovations are no longer thought about simply as isolated goods. Instead, they’re increasingly thought of as end-to-end systems in time and space. The best of these systems recognizes the human front and center in the ‘end to end.’

Apple (1976) pips most lifestyle tech companies to the post with a well-designed alpha and omega innovation experience play. There’s an appealing unboxing ritual when you buy a new product, and the company will often take your old product off your hands (literally) and apply its value against the price of this year’s model. One of China’s leading electric car manufacturers, NIO (2015), powers its community through its NIO Life sub-brand. The online platform enables car owners to chat with one another, sign up for exclusive events, and use NIO credits to buy everything from suitcases to cereal, shifting the car ownership experience to one that is all-encompassing and owner-centric.

When it comes to the end-to-end in your innovation…just do it.

Revolutionize
Experiences

RELATED SERVICE

FINAL THOUGHTS

The More Winnovation Factors, The Better Likelihood of Success

There you have it, now you know the winnovation factors. So, it’s time to start using them. Remember, they aren’t Pokemon (1998) – you haven’t ‘gotta catch ‘em all.’ But in general, the more winnovation factors you have in innovation the more likely it is to be successful.

Prophet applies winnovation factors across a wide range of categories, including products, services and new business models. They’re proven to make a difference in incremental product improvements and breakthrough category disruptions. They make a difference in innovation that lives in the physical world and innovation that lives in the digital world…and in innovation that lives in the hybrid phygital world.

The winnovation factors work. And the winnovation factors work even better when accompanied by the other innovation frameworks, exercises and approaches we have up our (rolled up) sleeves.

Want to learn more about how to increase your organization’s innovation capacity? Click to download ‘Innovation in a Post Pandemic World: The Critical Traits of a Truly Enlightened Company’

If you’re looking for an innovation partner to raise your game, we’d love to talk. Get in touch today!

CONNECT WITH US

REPORT

Winnovation Factors: Five Criteria for Innovation Excellence

Working with intensely nimble companies, we’ve distilled five essential factors for innovation.

Transform from innovation laggard to innovation leader

The pandemic disrupted business operations in ways leaders could not have possibly imagined. Forward-looking companies used this as a catalyst for innovation, to digitize services, fast-track disruptive products, or access new markets – but there were many who fell short. The appetite for innovation is far from slowing and the urgency for businesses to continue to flex their innovation muscle has never been greater. To avoid the risk of slipping behind, ill-prepared for the next crisis, companies need to be putting innovation front and center now to ensure they seize the seeds of opportunity and prosper in a post-pandemic world.

Prophet works with high-performing, innovation-driven companies of all shapes and sizes across a spectrum of categories and markets. There’s a lot other companies can learn from their approaches and attributes. We’ve distilled what we’ve discovered from our work into a set of five essential factors that are present, either in part or in full, at those nimble companies reaping the benefits of innovation-driven success.

Want to unleash innovation-driven growth and build resilience for your business? Read the five criteria for innovation excellence here.

Prophet’s Experience & Innovation practice can help you to underpin a superior approach to innovation to help you realize your ambitions, get in touch. 

Revolutionize
Experiences

RELATED SERVICE

BLOG

How Transformation Can Help Insurers Win With Rapidly Evolving Customers

Insurance brands must find new partners, focus on value-added services and transform their business model.

Insurance customers’ needs are rapidly changing, but the industry is not. With insurtech companies – like Hippo, Root and Lemonade – overwhelming the market, longstanding insurance leaders can’t shake organizational norms and industry standards, preventing them from connecting with digitally native consumers ahead of new disruptors.

We often hear our insurance clients ask us, “How can I best prepare for the future needs of our customers?”

Insurers are ready to mobilize their transformation efforts to become more customer-centric businesses, but they often implement new technologies or point solutions without a clearly defined digital strategy to guide their efforts. Without a holistic understanding of digital transformation (which goes well beyond technology implementation), insurance companies miss the mark with their customers. They struggle to find the true sweet spot between consumer privacy and personalization – while providing the right level of transparency and autonomy. Not to mention, customer expectations are changing each day making it extremely difficult for legacy insurers to keep up with their demands.

“Without a holistic understanding of digital transformation insurance companies miss the mark with their customers.”

Prophet’s new research report, The Insurance Customer of the Future, was written to highlight the most pertinent market trends set to impact the insurance industry in the next decade and explains how these trends are changing the relationship between customers and their insurance providers.

We centered the research around “Jamie,” an insurance customer living in 2030. By understanding and anticipating the generational trends and technological possibilities that will shape Jamie’s environment, insurers can make the right transformation moves to win Jamie’s – and her peers – business in the future.

But it won’t be easy to become the kind of insurance company Jamie wants to choose. While battling new entrants and advancements in technology, insurers need to keep their ever-evolving customers’ needs, values and expectations at the center of their transformation agenda.

Here’s how insurers need to transform their businesses over the next decade:

  1. Go beyond personalization
  2. Find partners to build holistic ecosystems
  3. Transform business models to serve next-generation customers
  4. Double down on capital-light, value-added services
  5. Reimagine the mind, body and soul of the organization

Revolutionize
Experiences

RELATED SERVICE

FINAL THOUGHTS

Plain and simple: the insurance industry is ripe for disruption. Insurers will either be disrupted by insurtech or be the disruptors. By prioritizing these five core areas as a part of their transformation agendas, insurers will cater to their future customers and achieve the disruptive growth they crave. The report gives insurance leaders the research, insights and ‘action items’ needed to capture the future market and create a new standard for customer experience within the industry. Read the report today.

Are you looking for a partner to usher you along your customer-centric transformation journey? Prophet can help. Reach out to our financial services team today.

CONNECT WITH US

PODCAST

Art of the Brand

42 min

In the Art of the Possible podcast, Peter Dixon discusses how his journey from an engineer to Chief Creative Officer helped him discover the importance of branding through art. By using the art of the possible, companies can create meaningful customer experiences.

Listen here to learn how brands can use the art of the possible to create meaningful customer experiences.

Reimagine
Brands

RELATED SERVICE

Your network connection is offline.

caret-downcloseexternal-iconfacebook-logohamburgerinstagramlinkedinpauseplaythreads-icontwitterwechat-qrcodesina-weibowechatxing