Ask the Right Questions and Get the Most from Your Digital Banking RFP

Q2 receives hundreds of requests for proposals (RFPs) per year, and we’ve seen important areas overlooked by financial institutions (FIs) entering a digital banking evaluation that they should consider. Five areas stand out, and we’ll discuss them and provide questions to ask about each in the weeks to come.

This first blog focuses on what to consider when inquiring about omnichannel banking.

Omnichannel banking
Digital banking among consumers and businesses is not only the preferred way to bank these days but its use is accelerating.

Consumers and businesses that turned to digital at the height of the pandemic now expect more as they perceive a range of capabilities and ways it can make their lives and operations even better. As part of their expectations, they also want to continue to bank anywhere, at any time using most – if not all – products and services.

The point is pretty clear: Customers expect great experiences and on their terms, and speed, simplicity, and efficiency in a digital banking platform help produce them. Q2 – like a growing body of digital banking experts – advocates that a single platform is best suited to deliver on these requirements today and moving ahead.

Five Questions to Ask
When developing your RFP, here are five questions to consider asking a prospective digital banking vendor about its omnichannel approach and capabilities:

1. Does your company provide a single platform approach to digital banking?
2. Does your platform allow consumer and/or commercial banking?
3. Is there a consistent user experience across segments served?
4. Does the platform allow both consumer and commercial banking from mobile phones and tablets?
5. Does the platform have a single admin console for all account holder segments?

Tied to these questions, find out if the vendor offers:

• A single user interface and experience across user types.
• One set of login credentials across all consumer and commercial banking tools.
• An admin console able to do more without adding complexity for account holders and staff.

Omnichannel isn’t enough, though: Look for a platform that can quickly adapt.
Amid greater digital banking adoption, there is another tantamount reason to ask the right questions of vendors about their omnichannel capabilities. As Forbes recently reported, “Newly built digital-first banks often target conventional banking products with more cleanly designed experiences.” Forbes goes on to persuasively state that the growing target for alternative banks and other fintechs is the small business account holder.

Equally concerning, other recent reporting indicates the loss of consumer account holders to tech-savvy competitors providing banking services and products. CapGemini, for one, has said that “Super FinTechs” could even “replace mid-size banks (community banks and credit unions), which are struggling to compete.”

What once could be described as a nibbling away of consumers and small businesses by fintechs and others is now a significant challenge to community and regional FIs. Therefore, an RFP should determine if a digital banking vendor has the ability to meet the challenge through its SDK and other innovation approaches – even including selective partnering with fintechs to help an FI.

There’s a lot riding on a thorough RFP. It’s more critical than ever to ask the right questions and to receive salient responses that show a deep understanding of current and future market conditions and challenges and how to effectively address them.
Besides the five questions listed in this blog, there are many more that should be asked about omnichannel banking and the single platform. These questions are provided in  Your Digital Banking RFP Evaluation Guide and Checklist.

The next blog in the series will look at what to ask in an RFP about Onboarding.