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The credit union member experience must go beyond offering great rates and low fees in order to attract and retain customers. Unlike big banks, credit unions thrive on trust, community, and personal relationships. When members feel valued and supported, they’re more likely to stay loyal, refer friends and family, and deepen their financial investments through your institution. But what does it take to curate a member experience that pays?
In this article, we’ll explore key strategies that can help you improve your credit union member experience. This will ultimately drive higher satisfaction, boost trust and loyalty, and ensure the long-term success of your institution. It’s time to cash in!
The competitive landscape of financial services means that credit unions must provide an exceptional member experience to be successful. Nowadays, anyone can go to a big bank to receive basic financial services—at a great price. While most credit unions can’t compete on a scale with the likes of these nationwide household names, they can provide something unique and special: a customer experience that’s personal, professional, and local.
Certainly, it’s the special relationship between a community member and their hometown banking institution that makes credit unions stand out. In order to make the most out of your business, you must capitalize on that natural differentiation and leverage member expectations to curate an experience that will keep them coming back for more.
Generalized customer experience strategies can only provide so much help to credit unions—because member experience is just different.
For example, there are common pain points that your customers face that look different from other industries. While some prefer a restaurant experience with consistently cheery wait staff, credit union members often prefer autonomous touchpoints. In fact, 46% of people only use digital channels for their banking activities. That’s nearly half!
However, 67% of consumers will invest more in services after a personal meeting. So then it’s a matter of balancing convenience and self-service in the smaller things and a human touch in the bigger things. And that’s where credit unions can shine.
So how do you go about creating a memorable and valuable credit union customer experience for your institution? Let’s take a look at four key strategies that have helped credit unions stay on track with their customers and exceed expectations.
Your credit union is not a big bank. Thankfully, that means you don’t have to act like one. Major corporations will often take minor steps to make customers feel like they’re more than a drop in the ocean of their massive audience. However, most of the time, everyone is perfectly aware of how robotic and industrial their organization is.
Credit unions, on the other hand, can provide truly personalized service. This is the heart of member loyalty—your customers are also your neighbors. And this is a huge advantage to your business.
Here are a few quick ways to add personalization to your credit union member experience:
You can create opportunities for meaningful engagement by simply showing up for your members wherever you can. This transforms one-time interactions into long-term relationships that keep members coming back year after year.
In today’s fast-paced, tech-driven world, credit union members expect seamless digital and omnichannel touchpoints that make banking easy, accessible, and efficient. While customers may have chosen your credit union for its smaller scale, they still expect the same big-budget accessibility as they'd find in a big bank. Thankfully, modern technology facilitates seamless interfacing at just about any level—it’s just a matter of investing in and implementing the services that will yield the best return on your investment (ROI).
You can also facilitate more tech-savvy options, such as integration with mobile wallets like Apple Pay or peer-to-peer payments like Venmo and PayPal. These features provide members with confidence and control over their finances—while bridging the gap between digital convenience and human connection. When done right, this enhances loyalty and satisfaction and, ultimately, your bottom line.
This is where the rubber meets the road in terms of credit union member experience. At the end of the day, a friendly face and convenient features can only carry your institution so far. Make your services so good that they sell themselves. Then customers will know they can truly trust you with their financial future—which is to say, their livelihood.
There are countless ways to improve your credit union’s services, and most of them revolve around the idea of simply banking well. When it comes to your locations, ensure that the customer experience is smooth, positive, and productive. Reduce wait times and facilitate speedy appointment scheduling where possible. Create loan application and approval processes that make sense, keep things straightforward, and facilitate communication. Again, leverage the power of self-service options without losing the appeal of the human touch.
In sum, make every member experience as positive as possible. Additionally, do your best to turn problems and negative interactions around. This can go even further for reinforcing your brand identity and inspiring confidence.
One final strategy that can take your credit union member experience to the next level is to make customers feel more empowered in their financial journey. This starts with a strong customer service department and staff members who are prepared to address and resolve any issues as they arise. Depending on your organization, you might even schedule regular check-ins with members to anticipate and meet their needs.
Furthermore, providing member education can accomplish much for your brand. Financial literacy programs establish you as an expert in your field and also help members learn more about how money works. This can even inspire more business, as education often leads to the discovery of additional services, and therefore more conversions.
There are also fun ways to involve members and the community itself. Create rewards programs and promote member-exclusive perks. These make you stand out from the rest of the banking world. Encourage community involvement and engagement to connect more with your local area. You can even offer referral incentives to attract new members from customers’ friends and families. The sky’s the limit!
Now that we’ve examined powerful strategies for improving your credit union member experience, the next step is determining if your initiatives are actually working. How can you tell if you’re getting the ROI you expected? Here are a few thoughts on how to determine—and capitalize on—success.
There are a number of key performance indicators (KPIs) that can readily demonstrate the state of your credit union’s member experience:
By regularly tracking and comparing these KPIs, you can determine when your initiatives are successfully improving your member experience, as well as what might need refining.
Speaking of refinements, it’s also important to understand that not every initiative you undertake will actually work—or be worth the ROI. Furthermore, as time goes on, member expectations will change and evolve alongside technological progress. Ultimately, you need to be flexible, aware, and innovative to stay competitive in terms of credit union member experience.
One smart way of staying abreast of the latest changes is to test and refine new strategies before rolling them out across every location. Use pilot programs, A/B testing, or phased rollouts to assess the effectiveness before doing a full-scale launch. You can also dedicate resources to ensure your digital platforms are regularly refreshed and updated. This can help you keep them modernized and functional during shifting industry trends.
Lastly, it’s important to invest in staff training. Not only can employees use what they’ve learned to keep customers happy, but they also represent a great asset in themselves as engaged, contributing members of your team. Empowering them to stay updated on new tools, technologies, and strategies keeps your credit union running like a well-oiled machine.
Ultimately, the best way to assess member satisfaction and get new ideas for initiatives is to simply ask. And members are likely already leaving you nuggets of data unprompted—in interactions, online reviews, and digital comments. By tapping into member feedback, you can leverage this valuable information and utilize it for future success.
Here’s how you can get started:
The good news? You can get help with all three of these strategies with CustomerOptix’s CX On Demand platform. It’s designed for small business owners and executives to take advantage of big-business tools at a flexible, scalable level. Learn more and get started today.
Creating an exceptional credit union member experience isn’t just a competitive advantage—it’s essential for the long-term success of your establishment. By focusing on personalization, top-tier service, and financial empowerment, you can cultivate stronger relationships, increase member satisfaction, and drive loyalty. Just remember that a great member experience isn’t built overnight. It requires continuous evaluation, adaptation, and innovation to keep up with evolving expectations.
In the end, the work is always worth it when you see the results: a stronger, more engaged membership base that trusts your institution with their financial future—and guaranteed growth and success for years to come. Now is the time to invest in your credit union’s member experience and cash in on the inherent benefits of community banking.
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