WhatsApp banking: How to build an end-to-end customer journey

The increased popularity of messaging apps, such as WhatsApp, over the last few years has influenced change for many businesses across industries.

The banking and finance sector has been one of the most adaptive industries to these changes in communication and technology. It has undergone its own form of digital transformation with the introduction of conversational banking.

Conversational banking allows financial providers to give customers fast and easy access to online support services while adding a human touch to every interaction.

What’s more, benefit from marketing and sales use cases as they play a key role in creating these conversational experiences. That’s why, together with WhatsApp, we can support the entire banking customer journey from Infobip’s communication platform.  

Here we highlight the benefits of using WhatsApp Business Platform powered by Infobip for banking communication and share tried-and-true use cases to get you started.

Here are some of the key advantages Infobip and WhatsApp offer to create a great banking experience.

Our omnichannel platform allows you to take full advantage of the massive reach WhatsApp has. We give you the ability to scale your messages as your business grows and together with WhatsApp, your business can communicate with customers anywhere in the world. A growing number of consumers have turned to WhatsApp as a primary communication channel, reaching 2 billion users. In fact, 68% of customers think that WhatsApp is the best channel to use to interact with businesses.

Infobip’s global reach and local insights ensure that we are always aware of local compliancy measures. In combination with WhatsApp’s end-to-end encryption, businesses and customers can trust that their messages are compliant and safe in any region over a robust and reliable platform.

Additionally, give your customers peace of mind when interacting with you by using branded and verified sender features on WhatsApp. It provides customers with a sense of security that they are interacting with a verified account and can share private banking information comfortably.

Using instant messaging with rich media and chatbot automation eliminates the need for lengthy calls to your contact center – and frequently asked questions taking up your agents’ time. A WhatsApp chatbot built on our chatbot building platform /answersmakes it easy for customers to resolve queries on their own – resulting in less wasted time, resources, and money.

Banks can also increase their ROI on ad spend by advertising through the high-reach chat app. Businesses can launch ads that click to WhatsApp on Facebook and Instagram and nurture a lead in one conversation. No need to spend more on non-targeted advertisements and finding new leads.

Integrating a WhatsApp chatbot helps more than just your bottom line. It also makes your support agents more efficient by ensuring that only complex or urgent issues reach their attention. Connecting your chatbot to a cloud contact center solution enables seamless transfers to agents – giving them a full view of conversation history and context. This reduces repetition for customers and provides an uninterrupted experience.

Provide a smooth onboarding experience over customers’ favorite chat app so they don’t have to visit a local branch to get started. Use rich media features to send documents, educational videos and other onboarding tools and improve the overall experience.

We want to see your banking institution succeed. That’s why we offer CX consulting to guide you through creating the perfect conversational journey with our solutions and WhatsApp. Our consultants understand your business needs, customer needs and consider your brand image and tone of voice to design a journey that will leave the best impression on your customers.

Now that you know the benefits of using WhatsApp powered by Infobip for banking – the next question is how can you apply WhatsApp interactions to each stage of the customer journey?

Here are the most popular use cases that banks and financial institutions can use to reap the benefits of WhatsApp from discovery to retention.

Make their first engagement with you friction-free.

Use QR codes on social media ads to allow potential users to message you directly over WhatsApp. Instead of making their way to a branch or waiting in line to open an account, new leads can send a WhatsApp message to receive more information or send their photo ID to start their registration. This will lead to faster and simpler acquisition, giving customers seamless experiences and banks a better conversion rate.

Be available for potential customers in their research phase. With a WhatsApp chatbot, you can provide information to FAQs and product or service inquiries 24 hours a day. Customers can get access to the chatbot through Facebook or Instagram ads that click to WhatsApp.

Boost engagement during onboarding.

Before any meaningful interactions can take place, you must get your customers to opt-in to your WhatsApp messages. Creating opt-in flows allows you to understand what kind of interactions are relevant to your customers and allows you to send promotions and relevant information that they expect. This helps banks create a friction-free experience and removes the risk of sending spam-like messages.

If a potential customer has reached out over WhatsApp, but hasn’t yet opened an account, send a promotional message in the same chat to incentivize them to become a customer. A time sensitive offer is a great way to restart the conversation and get them to act quickly to move onto onboarding.

Congratulations, your lead has converted to a customer! It’s now time to send them a welcome message on WhatsApp with options to get them started. This is the perfect opportunity to engage and get them to explore your banking services.

Providing customers with educational videos is a great way to take advantage of WhatsApp’s rich media features and ensure a successful onboarding experience. Videos can help avoid lengthy calls and explanations about mortgage rates, different kinds of loans, credit cards and accounts. If the customer needs more information, they can easily be transferred to a live agent.

Create full-funnel conversational flows to promote new products and services to customers. Based on their age, demographic, behaviors and other data you have collected in People CDP you can determine which credit cards, loans, lines of credit and other services you can offer them.

Sending these promotional messages will help you better engage with your customers and offers banks opportunities to cross sell and upsell their services on WhatsApp.

Banking processes can be stressful for customers. Ease any complicated processes by addressing a variety of situations over one channel.

Make card delivery or pick-up seamless. Keep active engagement by informing customers about the status of their card delivery on WhatsApp, and use call-to-action buttons to keep them connected in case they have any questions or concerns.

Using call-to-action buttons you can guide customers through an easy activation process for bank cards. WhatsApp is a secure channel to send verification codes over, offering your customers a safe and fast activation process.

WhatsApp media message templates enable you to share invoices, e-policies, and e-receipts – without any friction. Make it easy for customers to pay their outstanding balance, sign documents, and complete processes in a fast and secure way, all within the WhatsApp chat.

Use recent customer activity to offer them pre-approval offers for loans, lines of credit, or credit cards. Sending a WhatsApp message about what pre-approved loans they are eligible for can help you upsell your services and result in more active customer engagement.

Help your customers quickly find the nearest branch or ATM with rich media functionalities, such as maps. A customer can send a message to your WhatsApp chatbot to get information on where the nearest branch locations are relative to their location.

Give your customers reliable and responsive support from anywhere.

Notify customers in real-time of any transactional updates that happen on their account. These automated alerts keep your customers informed and give them peace of mind that they can track their own accounts and notify support if they notice transactions they did not make.

Create a self-service AI chatbot on WhatsApp that can help your customers resolve miscellaneous queries at their fingertips. Reduce long waiting queues and boost engagement by instantly interacting with customers.

Chatbots can offer more than just FAQ responses. See how a WhatsApp chatbot can quickly resolve security issues and offer customers real-time support in a crisis situations:

When a customer has a more complex issue that cannot be resolved with the self-service or AI chatbot, easily have them transferred over to a live agent, within the same conversation. The agents will have a full view of the chat history and avoid the need for customers to repeat themselves.

Additionally, if customers call your support line, they can be greeted with a welcome message prompting them to use WhatsApp to speak with a live agent. Having live agents available over WhatsApp removes the need for customers to switch channels or devices to get quality service. Issues are resolved faster, and engagement is more efficient than ever.

Satisfy customers with continuous engagement.

Retain customers by offering them an easy way to deal with insurance renewals. Simply send a personalized message when their contract is about to expire asking if they are interested in renewing their insurance with you. When they reply confirming, they can be transferred to an agent who will complete the processes. Don’t let your customers forget to renew contracts and engage with them before they have to contact you.

After engaging with customers on WhatsApp, send a satisfaction survey to get real-time feedback. Sending surveys is a great way to learn more about how to optimize and improve your WhatsApp service so that you can continue to offer quality customer care. The best part – customers don’t have to leave the WhatsApp chat to complete it.

Turn engagement into an opportunity to show customers that you appreciate them by sending loyalty offers over WhatsApp. Remind customers to use their loyalty points to pay for credit card bills or to notify them of a loyalty status upgrade that gets them a better interest rate on insurance. These offers keep your relationship with your customers thriving and offering them over WhatsApp makes the engagement experience easier, faster and smoother than ever before.

As a WhatsApp Business solution provider and trusted Meta partner, Infobip provides banking institutions with the tools and guidance they need to create a solid communication strategy.

With our SaaS solutions and CX consulting, banks can maximize their use of WhatsApp by:

Utilizing the world’s most popular chat app allows banks to connect with customers in a personal, trusted, and familiar way. Banks and financial institutions that offered their services via WhatsApp with Infobip were able to increase efficiency, reduce costs, and continue to improve customer satisfaction – all on a single platform.

We’ve helped these financial institutions maximize WhatsApp’s potential:

Expand your digital services with banking use cases – from customer support, sales and marketing, to improve engagement, increase retention and upsell products throughout the entire customer journey. Our platform enables you to scale as you grow and add use cases with the help of our CX consultants. Let us help you reach your full digital potential on WhatsApp.