Case Study

Speed, simplicity and new functions, here are BPER Banca's new digital channels

Reply and BPER Banca are tackling the process of transforming the bank's digital channels by renewing the mobile banking app and the internet banking platform.

#Mobile Banking
#Digital Platform
#Digital Engagement

The challenge

To offer a new user experience to the bank's digital services and to modernise the underlying technologies, from renewing the functionalities available to customers, to integrating innovative and valuable functionalities for the customer.

Scenario

The evolution of digital services

BPER Banca, the third largest Italian banking company in terms of territorial coverage, has started transforming its digital platforms as part of the plan for evolving their digital channels. From this initiative, “SMART MOBILE” - the new mobile banking app, and “SMART WEB” - the new internet banking platform were created to offer faster, easier and more intuitive interactions with BPER Banca customers through all points of contact.

BPER Banca's strategy is to improve the quality and variety of the services offered, encouraging the adoption of digital solutions through innovative interactions shared on all bank channels. In this context, the SMART MOBILE and SMART WEB platforms represent an important step to ensure a consistent and personalised experience for the customer, putting their needs at the centre and prioritising attentive listening.

Solution

A modern, scalable and user-centric ecosystem

The renewal initiative saw Reply support BPER Banca in constructing a new multi-channel platform, based on the most modern and innovative technological paradigms with a “cloud native” architecture. The design of the new ecosystem has allowed BPER Banca to evolve its offer on digital channels, maintaining high performance and a high degree of scalability to support important transformation initiatives, deriving from the group's new business plan.

The new ecosystem was also created as a direct communication channel to support the customer and anticipate their needs. Thanks to the direct integration of direct channels with the Salesforce Marketing Cloud platform, it will be increasingly easier to reach the bank's customers, offering “tailor-made” content for different categories of users, taking advantage of the advanced data analysis capabilities offered by the platform. The technological evolution of the IT ecosystem therefore helps BPER to optimise its campaigns and to create new personalised customer paths, making the experience even more engaging and effective.

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How did we do it

New user-friendly and innovative features

The important results obtained for the SMART MOBILE and SMART WEB platforms also derives from the solid UX/UI design principles that have been adopted, with the aim of achieving a concrete digital evolution based on ease and speed of navigation, a completely renewed graphic style consistent with the group guidelines, with better usability, that would meet the first accessibility criteria for the blind and visually impaired. This approach has made it possible not only to improve and modernise the existing basic operations, but also to introduce new functionalities with strong added value, both for the entire new multi-channel platform and for BPER Banca's customers, including:

New types of bank transfer and revocation functionality
.

Payment and
revocation F24
.

QR Code scanning through
OCR on F24, CBILL and other
types of bulletins

Self-request and
loan sale
.

Innovation in the main
sales processes
.

Re-design of the support
and tutorial section
.

As far as SMART WEB is concerned, the focus on the innovation component as the main driver has made it possible to optimise the user experience through the developments related to card payment management (blocking, PIN display...); the extension and management of the main payment methods for small/medium-sized enterprises (Riba, salary entry, separate transfers...); and evolved consulting contracts and management of remote finance orders.

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The success of the project

A 360-degree collaboration

Fundamental to the success of the project was the collaboration between BPER Banca and the Reply Group, which worked very closely together, with an agile methodology, developing innovative solutions in a very short time. Considering the breadth of the perimeter, several Reply companies were involved, each of which contributed their own skills to achieving such an important goal: Iriscube Reply, oversaw the implementation of digital solutions, e*finance consulting Reply and Bitmama Reply undertook the analysis and design activities, and Concept Reply did the test and quality assurance activities for the solutions.

The results

Quality and innovation in just a few months

Listening to customers = better UX

The numerous moments of listening to customers, both during the design phase and during the “beta test”, have made it possible to create a completely new experience for nearly 2 million customers served on the bank's digital channels who, in 12 months, have rewarded BPER Banca with a constant increase in store ratings from 2.2 to 4.6/5.

300+ redesigned features

There were 300+ redesigned functionalities, including the renewed operations and new functions that were introduced for the first time for BPER Banca customers, such as the payment of F24, new types of bank transfers, a completely redesigned support and tutorial section, and much more.

"Record" times

In just over six months from the start of the project to the release of the first version of the new app, followed by the progressive roll-out to the main public stores for all the bank's customers. Subsequently, before the merger with Banca Carige, the new internet banking was activated.

100+ professionals involved

A great team of professionals with many specialised skills combined, reflecting the commitment and strong will of BPER Banca in the transformation of its digital offer.

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The BPER Banca Group was founded in 1992 on the initiative of BPER Banca. The basic objective is to create a reality in which each Bank can take advantage of the synergies of a large Group, while maintaining operational autonomy and territorial roots. Seriousness, transparency and professionalism are the basic values that inspire the BPER Group's “way of doing banking”, with the desire to promote small household savings and business resources in every context, conceiving the exercise of credit as an instrument for the development and promotion of the territory. The BPER Banca Group is now a strong entity of five commercial banks, all autonomous and well established in the various territories to which they belong. In addition to credit institutions, the Group also includes numerous product companies (managed savings, personal credit, leasing and factoring) and capital companies. The BPER Banca Group can also count on a solid network of partnerships and investments, some of them controlling, in foreign financial institutions. These relationships allow, through special “Italian desks”, to provide effective operational support to all companies engaged in internationalisation processes.