As part of the task I had to research banking in different ways, gathering information on what people think of different banks, what they like/dislike, what could be improved, and what people are using banks for the most etc. Keeping in mind that my target audience is people aged 16-25 I conducted some research to see what I could find out about banking. This type of research is called competitor analysis and will be very useful when it comes to designing my own banking brand.
I began by going online and looked at Trust Pilot to see what people said about different banks. Trust Pilot is one of the most trustworthy review sites and it is where most people go to share their feedback on what they think of different stores and companies. Some of the banks I researched on here were Ulster Bank, Danske Bank, and Nationwide.
Ulster Bank - I went on to TrustPilot.com, which is a popular website for customer feedback and reviews, and searched up Ulster Bank to see what people thought about it. As you can see the overwhelming majority gave it only a 1 star review, with 86% doing so. Some issues people had included trouble with the online help and support, especially the AI system CORA. People think it that it would be better to talk to a real person when trying to get help and support. Other people had trouble getting through on the phone which isn’t great for a bank. Other people thought that once you got through the original setting up process it is very simple and easy to use.
Danske Bank - On TrustPilot.com, Danske Bank got much better reviews that Ulster Bank, with an average rating of 4.5 stars. People said that the staff were very friendly and helpful, in person and on the phone. People said that Danske Bank were especially helpful when using advisors them for important decisions like purchasing a house or taking out loans. They also commented that the app wasn’t anything special but done the job. Overall customers thought that the customer service was great. One review did mention that they were quite manipulative with International students, and can try to be a bit shady with them.
Nationwide - Nationwide did not receive good feedback on TrustPilot.com, with 75% of people giving them a 1 star review. People said in their reviews that the staff were very disrespectful, condescending, and there wasn’t any benefits of being a loyal customer. People also said that their online help and support services were very slow getting back to them, some saying that they took weeks. Some people also mentioned that it seemed like the staff were poorly trained.
I then went round Belfast city centre with Matthew and Ryan to observe different banks. What we were looking for specifically was where they put logos and names, how busy they were, whether there was many 16-25 year olds, and what the architecture was like. What we found was that all the banks had their name on the front of the bank, and also the sign of the bank name was usually the colour that the bank uses in it’s brand. This was important to us as with there being many banks in the area, it is key that they try to stand out from the rest. The architecture was all pretty similar with some looking more traditional and some being more modern. One that stood out to us was how modern the inside of Danske Bank was, which we thought would appear to a younger generation as it felt very modern and up to date with todays trends.
We then wanted to gather information in a more personal and emotional way and we done this by asking people questions about their banks and also creating a survey and sending it round to our class mates, friends and family. Some of the questions that we asked included some basic questions like what bank do they use, whether they preferred using online banking or physical banking, what they struggled the most with and what they would improve with their bank. Also completing other peoples questionnaire in my class was really insightful as it got me thinking about what I thought about my own bank and what I would change. We created a Google Docs form for the online survey and you can view it here:
Questionnaire for Banking (16-25 Year Olds)
The results showed that most people were with Ulster bank and Danske bank. This was expected as I knew prior that a lot of people use these banks. This was also useful as we now know what the main traditional banks are. The in-person interviews showed that most people who go into the bank branches are of an older demographic (40+), and that they go in because they either don’t know how to work the online banking, or find that they get more sense of trust when they go in and talk to someone face to face. Something to consider is that there is also a big rise in people using digitally owned banks such as Monzo and Revolut. I done some research on these two companies and found some surprising statistics about it’s growing popularity.