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Articles by Olivia Lui
To Achieve Meaningful Growth, Precision is the New Advantage
Last year, only 10% of banks achieved the typical 3% growth target for both customers and deposits. At the same time, the cost per checking acquisition soared to $559, more than twice that in 2018. And only 25% of deposit promotion balances yield new money—the rest is cannibalized from low rates in the back book. Why do banks struggle with efficient acquisition? Because they lack line of sight into what drives long-term customer value.
Activating Customer Engagement - Curinos
In today’s emerging age of generative AI, to acquire, retain and grow engaged relationships, banks need to rely on three core tenets: knowing the customer, engaging with them with precision, and delivering experiences seamlessly across all human and digital interactions. To help, Curinos has developed a composable data architecture to enable customer-level decisioning quickly.
Want Meaningful Customer Growth
With the relentless rise of digital providers, branch banks are capturing only about half of all new customers, and their average core customer growth is now less than 1% per year. To maintain and grow their share, these FIs are well advised to adopt a relationship activation engine to ensure more core customers choose them and stay with them. Acquisition is only the beginning.
In Gaining Primary Relationships, Bank Types Vary Considerably
In an increasingly competitive landscape, banks are rapidly designing value propositions and operating models to win primary customer relationships. But today’s banking environment is no longer one-size-fits-all. Curinos’ U.S. Shopper Study reveals that different types of banks are winning different types of customer segments. National and direct banks skew toward more affluent customers, while fintechs, perhaps not surprisingly, punch way above their weight with those living paycheck to paycheck.
Strategic Retail Planning - 5 Takeaways
From the Curinos webinar, “Harnessing the 4 Most Crucial Drivers of Growth in 2025,”presented on December 3, 2024, and featuring Curinos managing directors Peter Serene, Adam Stockton and Bob Warnock and SVPs Olivia Lui and Rich Martin.
Five Bank Profitability Challenges and the Strategies to Overcome Them
Some challenges belie the common wisdom. For example, while more and more people open their deposit accounts digitally, accounts opened in branches prove larger and stickier. Other challenges require temporary responses while longer-term solutions undergo refinement.
Greater Profitability In 2025 And Beyond
From “Greater Profitability in 2025 and Beyond: Ingredients for Success,” a Curinos webinar on August 22, 2024, presented in conjunction with Consumer Bankers Association and featuring Curinos executive vice president Pete Gilchrist and Curinos senior vice president Olivia Lui. Challenges 1. Compressed margins and slower non-interest revenue growth have led to suppressed returns. Virtually all industry indicators continue to display challenges for the banking industry in 2024.
CPAs Continue To Soar
Thanks to the unrelenting high-rate environment and the demand financial institutions are exhibiting for new relationships, the cost to acquire new-to-bank customers and members has shot up to $663 – a more than125% increase from pre-pandemic levels (see chart). Data from the Curinos’ Marketing Analyzer also show that for regional banks, the cost per acquisition is a staggering $868.
The Implications Of Higher For Longer
The FOMC held the Federal Funds target range flat at 5.25% to 5.5%. As previously communicated, the Fed has tapered quantitative tightening by $35B, lowering the redemption cap from $95 billion per month to $60 billion per month. The real news, however, was in the Summary of Economic Projections (SEP). In the previous SEP, 10 of the 19 FOMC participants expected three or more 25 bp rate cuts in 2024.
Targeting Affluent Consumers? You’re Not Alone
With the cost of acquisition rising and fee revenue falling, the payback period for consumer banking customers has extended from 18 months to four years. This has prompted many institutions to shift their acquisition efforts to affluent customers, those with annual incomes of more than $100k, whose payback comes quicker despite a higher initial investment. But the universe is small.
Harnessing The 4 Most Crucial Drivers Of Growth In 2025
As 2024 draws to a close, we’re bringing our experts together for a deep-dive on what’re likely to be the four most consequential and influential factors on banking performance in 2025: the direction of rates, changing customer behavior, personalization and accelerating AI, and regulatory changes and possible restructuring.
Digital Delivery, Analytics Are Transforming Financial Advice
The terms “advice” and “advisor” may evoke images of a client sitting with a financial consultant in a well-appointed conference room, walking through charts and graphs over a mahogany desk. They may conjure an advisor taking complete control of a client’s financial matters, thereby freeing the client of day-to-day decision making. Or perhaps the terms suggest that advisory services are for only the top 1%. To many people, “helps me plan for the future” may sound out of reach. But that’s changing.
New U.S. Shopper Survey: Digital Delivery Is Top Consumer Preference
The shift to digital continues unabated in consumer banking and with it, further disruption to the industry. That’s according to the latest Curinos U.S. Shopper Survey, which is fielded every year among consumers in the top 70 DMA markets who have recently chosen a new primary banking provider. Respondents report that their most important driver of convenience is “useful online/mobile,” a 42% increase in only three years.
The Changing Economics Of Mass-Market Banking
Old-fashioned consumer banking is facing some very modern challenges. A steep decline in overdraft fees, combined with higher rates of fraud and competition from new entrants, means that it is getting more expensive for financial institutions to provide basic banking services to the mass market. As a result, Curinos estimates that the revenue associated with providing a mass-market bank account will fall by 40% between 2021 and 2024.
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