By Jon Buss, Managing Director & EVP, EMEA – Yext

With the COVID vaccine rollout underway, we’ve seen far more optimism this year. But while there’s a lot of talk of a “return to normal,” life post-coronavirus will be anything but business as usual. Even as businesses continue to reopen around the world, the shifts in digital consumer behaviour we saw over the past year will likely be here to stay. The global pandemic has accelerated digital transformation to unprecedented levels, and gone are the days of being digital first as a marker of innovation. In fact, these days that means you’re likely just surviving. To make sure you are actually thriving this year, and beyond, businesses must be at their digital best.

In particular, “digital nimbleness”, which is the speed and ease with which businesses can make updates to their online information, has now become a major key to success.

Nimbleness = Survival

We saw it throughout 2020; nimbleness became the key to survival. Whether it meant pivoting to offer click and collect, hiring more delivery people, putting up a three-sided tent in a restaurant’s car park, or quantifying the impact to clients with a data hub, the nimble survived, and even thrived, under additional strain, while others fell behind. This certainly hasn’t changed in 2021. The pandemic is still making things unpredictable, so businesses will have to continue to make strategic adjustments on the fly. But how can a business measure if it’s being nimble enough?

One key metric of digital agility is the number of “facts” a business has updated online over the course of the last few months. In this instance, a fact is any piece of public facing information — such as store closures, services offered, products available or hours of operation — that is essential to creating a positive customer experience. Businesses need to be able to make seamless updates when things are disrupted, and that’s certainly something we’ve seen over the past year.

For instance, last April Yext launched a Search Insights Report, detailing a large increase in updates in the Yext Platform. But the surprising bit is that the number of facts updated haven’t reduced since. Despite the rush of updates in 2020 as the series of lockdowns began, there still remains a higher level of information being updated on sites, with 33% more updates to business facts.

While reacting quickly to crisis continues to be crucial for survival, it’s also important that businesses listen to their customers and change operations accordingly. Brands who are able to show strong indications of better data cleansing will be those who are at their digital best. 

Nimbleness in Financial Services

Financial Services businesses have been working to strengthen their digital capabilities over the years, and have continued to make consistent updates. Online banking was nothing new for some, but there is always a crop of users who need assistance as they make changes in the way they manage their money, acquire mortgages, and the like.

Most understood the digital hurdles of changing hours and managing closures. Many boosted their online discoverability. Some even took the opportunity to make themselves more digitally friendly and reduce support costs in one fell swoop. But many businesses still remain unprepared to answer their users’ questions in a comfortable and cost-effective manner, failing to meet their needs in a rapidly shifting digital environment. 

Updating the information on your site and communicating it effectively is crucial. A survey with over 2,000 consumers, conducted by Yext, found that 69% of consumers are willing to swap banks over incorrect information online. For years challenger and digital-first banks have been forcing traditional banking services to innovate and update their offerings. This has been accelerated as bank branches faced restrictions to the way they operate over the course of the various lockdowns, many have been needing to change their online information and boost their digital resources.

Consumers search for more than just a single business’ services when searching online. The role of search in determining whether a customer will sign up to a particular service cannot be underestimated. In what was the toughest time for consumers and businesses in living memory, financial services must now ensure that the customer’s first step of the banking journey, an online search, provides the right information every time.

They need to be prepared to answer the questions at every customer’s fingertips: what measures are in place in light of COVID-19, which services are available online and what the latest rates are. As well as advice from friends and family, these are all things that consumers will turn to websites and search engines to answer. Banks, lenders, and insurance providers now have the opportunity to accelerate their digital transformation, and better meet the needs of their customers online.