Maybank Philippines: Powering consistent, customer-centric banking across channels

The Philippines digital banking market is growing fast, driven by young, mobile-first customers who have higher expectations from their banks. Customers no longer benchmark their banks against other banks but against every seamless digital experience in their daily lives. They expect their banks to be fast, simple, and secure, and want that  

For Maybank Philippines, a subsidiary of Malayan Banking Berhad, meeting those expectations meant rethinking how the bank communicates with customers entirely.  To learn how Maybank has been balancing the optimization of the digital banking experience without compromising safety and integrity, we sat down with Paolo M. Salcedo, Head of Virtual Banking at Maybank Philippines.  

A fragmented communication landscape

As digital adoption has deepened in the Philippines, the communication landscape has become more diversified. People no longer stick to just one app but hop between multiple digital channels and platforms.  What was once a single-channel approach evolved into a complex, multi-touchpoint journey, making it increasingly challenging for banks and financial institutions to maintain a consistent connection with their customers.

Our Messaging Trends Report shows that an average customer uses between 2 and 6 different channels to talk to brands. In fact, 97% of the traffic on our platform comes from customers using multiple channels.  

For banks, this diversification creates a fragmented landscape where a single-channel approach is no longer sufficient to deliver better experiences. “Banks are forced to juggle multiple communication touchpoints just to ensure full coverage of their customers.  This has increased the complexity of the communication channel,” says Paolo M. Salcedo.

However, adopting multiple communication channels is not enough if there is no sync between channels. When communication is spread across channels without proper coordination, important messages can easily be missed. 

For example, if a credit card reminder sent via SMS goes unnoticed, a customer may end up paying avoidable interest or late fees, turning a simple communication gap into a negative experience.

Adopting the right channel mix

The communication landscape of the Philippines is driven by multiple channels such as Messenger, Viber, WhatsApp, Telegram, and more, like its neighboring APAC countries. Although SMS continues to serve as the backbone for time-sensitive alerts and authentication for banks, where immediacy is essential, BFSI brands are now adding conversational channels in their messaging mix to create real-time experiences.  

“Gone are the days when institutions can only rely on SMS to reach out to customers. As the communication landscape is becoming fragmented with multiple communication apps, institutions must be able to quickly adapt and onboard these messaging types and apps”, says Paolo M. Salcedo. 

The platform combines familiarity with enhanced capabilities such as verified sender identity, read receipts, and rich media support, which add significant value to transactional banking communication. 

When selecting communication channels, banks weigh several factors; cost being an important one, especially given that millions of messages are sent daily. “Given that Maybank Philippines is an international bank, shifting to alternative communication channels such as Viber and email has kept the bank’s cost base manageable,” says Paolo M. Salcedo. 

Compliance without compromising experience

While digitalization brings greater flexibility and convenience to both banks and customers, it also increases the risk of data misuse and regulatory breaches. As custodians of vast amounts of sensitive personal and financial data, banking and financial institutions must place data governance, security, and privacy at the very core of their digital strategies.  

Today, customer data is increasingly used to deliver personalized, timely, and relevant campaigns that help banks stay connected and competitive. However, personalization in banking comes with strict regulatory boundaries around what data can be used, how it can be processed, who it can be shared with, and for what purpose.  

Delivering meaningful, tailored experiences while respecting strict compliance requirements remains one of the most complex challenges in banking communication. To address this, forward-thinking banking institutions such as Maybank are adopting smarter data practices. “Data science becomes important to ensure that messages are matched with the relevant customers. With the limited information that can be shared with third parties, segmentation at source and A/B testing becomes more important to support personalized communication”, says Paolo M. Salcedo. 

This approach enables banks to maintain regulatory compliance while still delivering relevant and engaging customer experiences.

Building a future-ready omnichannel ecosystem

Maybank Philippines continues to actively explore more effective and cost-efficient communication channels to elevate its customer engagement strategy. The bank also wants to enhance its omnichannel structure to enable intelligent orchestration, which provides a seamless experience for its customers. “Ideally, we would want to have alternative contact points “talk” to one another, where there is hand-off to the next channel if one channel fails,” says Paolo. 

At the same time, the bank is focused on adopting a more proactive and streamlined approach to onboarding new communication platforms. Channels such as Telegram and LINE are being considered part of their evolving omnichannel mix, helping the bank stay aligned with customer preferences and expand its reach in an increasingly fragmented digital landscape. 

In Maybank Philippines’ digital communication journey, Infobip has played a key role in enabling the bank’s shift to an omnichannel strategy by integrating channels like SMS, Viber, and Email. This collaboration has helped Maybank navigate the operational and technological complexities of managing multiple communication touchpoints. By unifying its messaging ecosystem, we have empowered Maybank to provide more consistent, reliable, and scalable customer communication across channels. 

Click here to know more about Maybank Philippines.