Creating unique experiences while leaving customers in control

By Rikke Sternberg, Corporate Journalist, SAS Nordics

Jesper Nielsen, Head of Personal Banking and member of the Executive Board at Danske Bank Group, shares insight on how Danske Bank is banking on customer insights.In this interview, Jesper Nielsen gives insight on how Danske Bank has increased its grasp on customers’ uniqueness and how it plans to continue refining its customer experiences.

On Danske Guide: “Danske Guide, our web bank messaging service, is an increasingly important channel to us. It has a high trust score with customers, 4.11 on a 5 scale, and it gives us great opportunity to work with customer satisfaction. Through Danske Guide, we have asked selected customers to test Beta versions of our new netbank, and have found that people are very interested in giving their feedback - they think it is fun to involve themselves in creating the best tools for their online banking experience”.

On Fraud: “We have focused heavily on tackling fraud. As customers are using more time and spending more money online, their risk of financial fraud is increasing. We wanted to increase their security as customers while at the same time making it easy for them to intervene by freezing credit cards if they suspected abuse. In the future, we may make it so that if you let us track your card by GPS, we can warn you if the card is not in your possession. “

On peer group comparisons: “In the future, if customers allow, we can help them make more intelligent financial decisions, based on comparisons with peer groups. Say for example that your household spends 20% more on electricity and heat than other people in your peer group, we might point that out and invite you to discuss relevant home improvements that would give you a financial gain in the long run.”

On fiscally responsible, fast consumer loans: “Consumers have many options for financing purchases today and sometimes forget that their credit card is perhaps the best option. As banks, we are legally obligated to be advisors so we will advise against a purchase if your economic situation does not support it. However, when it is financially responsible, we need to be ready to give a good experience. I believe that a lot of this will happen through an increased collaboration with retail outlets. In Finland, we have a chat function embedded in the website of the travel agency Matka-Vekka, which allows potential travellers to discuss financing opportunities, rules about credit card uses in different countries and so on. This is just one example of how we try to be more relevant and create the right offer at the right time.”

On securing informed consent on data use: “It is very important that customers know what they are consenting to do.  Customers need to remain in control of their data and their actions. What we do is try to make it more visible what they can achieve by giving this insight, and how we will use it, so that customers can give an informed consent for our data usage. It is also crucial that customers are able to see exactly what we know about them, and that they can change their permissions if they do not want us to track them on specific parameters. The customer needs to feel in and be in control.”