Big Data to Adapt to the ‘Always On’ Generation

Banks and other companies that are saddled with outdated legacy systems and siloed IT infrastructures often struggle to be agile and responsive in supporting today’s “always-on” customers, especially millennials, aka Generation Y.

For instance, millennials (the 105 million people in the US born between 1980 and 2005) have the highest social networking penetration of any generation as well as the highest Facebook and Twitter usage rates, according to eMarketer.

Meanwhile, 92.3% of millennials used mobile phones in 2012, 63.2% of whom used the mobile web and only slightly fewer used smartphones.

Predictive analytics offer banks and other companies a big boost by helping them better identify and evaluate behaviors by millennials and other digital customers in different types of channels.

These types of insights can enable marketers, product managers, and other decision makers to tailor the customer experience for target segments more effectively. This can lead to improved customer satisfaction, greater loyalty, and enhanced customer lifetime value.

For example, millennials are most likely to conduct research online (and do so for extended periods of time), according to a study by Acquity Group.

Banks, retailers, and other companies can use these types of insights along with other behavioral, transactional, and other information about target customers to customize websites for specific visitors based on what’s known about their needs, interests, and preferences.

Increasingly banks are competing with PayPal and other providers for millennial financial services customers.

While 92% of millennials use a bank, nearly half (45%) have also used external services such as prepaid cards, check cashing, and payday loans, a recent Think Finance survey finds.

Bankers can draw upon these and other insights they have about these customers who are struggling under the weight of student loans and underemployment to promote comparable services to them when they visit a bank’s homepage or mobile website.

Applying analytics against behavioral information and customer feedback can also help inform business leaders about what millennials value most in customer service – and how best to tailor customer support offerings for them.

For instance, millennials value efficiency and speed over service, according to a recent study.

Combining these insights with behavioral information about the types of channels that high-value customers prefer to use for support, bankers and executives from other types of companies can craft the types of speedy customer support (e.g., chat, intuitive interactive voice response) that millennials prefer to use.

It’s also important to recognize that not all millennials are the same. That means that marketers and other decision makers must recognize the distinct differences in their preferences and needs to tailor the right messaging, support, and content for the different types of younger consumers (e.g., mothers, environmentally-conscious people).

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