Innovations in Spend Management: Insights and Actionability are Key to Supporting Customers
This article is part of a VB Lab Insights series paid for by Capital One.
In the digital world, spending is easier than ever. With tools like digital wallets and other online payment options, you can buy gifts from a favorite online retailer, pay a utility bill, or secure last-minute concert tickets en route. to the location, all with a few quick clicks on your smartphone or laptop. . It’s clear that the sea change in the e-commerce landscape over the past decade has succeeded in eliminating friction in the online shopping experience.
But, with great power comes great responsibility. Shopping online has become incredibly convenient, but it also means it’s becoming increasingly complex for consumers to keep tabs on their finances. Who has your card number? Which number is stored where? Which purchases are recurring and when? While removing complexity at checkout, we inadvertently added it elsewhere.
Historically, in the financial services industry, consumers had to rely on monthly statements to get an overall picture of their one-time purchases and recurring expenses, which made sense when every purchase was an in-person scan. But now, consumers make dozens of transactions every month (in multiple ways), and that once-a-month, line-by-line view of transactions is no longer enough to support how we spend.
Consumers demand more from their financial institutions. They seek out their financial institutions to proactively help them surface and take action on the most relevant insights and information about their financial accounts – before, during, and after every purchase.
Focus on the full consumer spending lifecycle
At Capital One, we strive to provide our clients with a truly personalized, comprehensive and contextually relevant view of their finances. Building on a multi-year technology transformation and advancements in cloud data, we’re launching large-scale tools driven by artificial intelligence and machine learning to make it easier for customers to facilitate and customize their risk management routines. expenses.
As the industry continues to innovate in spend management, there are three main areas that should be kept in mind in product development:
1. Proactively surface the right information and ensure transparency
The first step in helping customers better understand their finances is to surface proactive insights and insights relevant to their accounts. This information, such as an increase in recurring charges or a potential fraud alert — help illustrate a more transparent and real-time view of their accounts. At the same time, it’s equally important to provide customers with the ability to independently explore their finances in a simple, easy-to-understand user interface. Here, customers can explore their own spending trends, such as recurring or upcoming charges for bills and subscriptions, monthly changes in recurring charges, and more. At Capital One, these account management tools are provided as enhancements to our mobile app and website, allowing customers to leverage a familiar resource in new and differentiated ways.
2. Make financial information and tasks actionable
Along with proactive information, customers have clear and easily accessible ways to take action. Say, for example, you’ve signed up for a free trial of a new streaming service. Capital One may detect that you have signed up for a free trial and proactively offer to notify you before the trial ends so that you can cancel your membership before it becomes a paid membership. This high-leverage actionability puts control back in the hands of customers, in turn unleashing trust, control, and easy-to-use customer experiences.
3. Keeping the customer first
Ensuring customers are able to make sense of the massive amount of data that exists is critical. At Capital One, we keep the customer at the heart of what we build, ensuring customers have access to the right information at the right time, which ultimately helps them save time and money.
Expense management features are increasingly sought after by consumers, especially given the impact of inflation and other economic issues that make it all the more important to keep tabs on your finances. With instant or near real-time access to spending information, consumers can make more informed decisions about their money and financial goals. We’re excited to be launching even more of these features for Capital One customers this year.
The bottom line
The way we spend online is changing and consumers deserve advanced tools to help them better manage it. Whether these tools help you spend more easily, make it easier for you to understand your spending history and trends, or allow you to take steps to improve your finances, it’s an exciting time to explore the value that new tools and technologies can bring. Everyone deserves a personalized experience, complete with valuable insights and actionability, that meets their specific banking needs.
And it can – and should be – within reach.
Dan Van Winkle is Vice President for Spend Experiences at Capital One.
VB Lab Insights content is created in conjunction with a company that pays for publication or has a business relationship with VentureBeat, and they are always clearly marked. For more information, contact [email protected]
Innovations in Spend Management: Insights and Actionability are Key to Supporting Customers
