All Eyes On Bank of America's Virtual Assistant
- Date:October 11, 2018
- Author(s):
- Emmett Higdon
- Report Details: 3 pages, 1 graphics
- Research Topic(s):
- Digital Strategy & Experience
- Digital Banking
- PAID CONTENT
Overview
Bank of America first announced its ambitious plans for a mobile banking virtual assistant in the fall of 2016. Dubbed “Erica,” the bank’s assistant ultimately took more than two years of development to reach customers. Erica went live in selected markets in early 2018 and was launched to all 25 million Bank of America mobile banking customers in May. Within the first two months, more than a million customers had tried Erica. Through the end of August, 3 million customers had posed more than 8 million questions to the bank’s new chatbot.
As the largest U.S. bank to launch a mobile digital assistant to its customers, Bank of America has competitors watching its moves closely to see if such investments resonate with a broad set of banking consumers. Just more than 10% of the bank’s customers have tried Erica to date — impressive adoption for a brand new interaction model. However, unlike with traditional mobile banking tasks, such as bill payment or mobile check deposit, Erica’s success should not be thought of only in terms of adoption.
How banks position digital assistant functionality will help determine whether customers come to rely on it as an indispensable tool for helping manage their accounts — as they have with mobile banking. Or will it be seen as just another delivery method for information they already access in other ways?
Learn More About This Report & Javelin
Related content
Six Alert Flaws That Banks Can Fix Today
Alerts enable banks to initiate meaningful digital conversations and entice customers to log in to learn, seek advice, and act. But a Javelin Strategy & Research analysis of eight ...
Open Banking: A Vision for Customer-Driven Data Management
For better or worse, the regulatory side of the house is driving open banking. A data management experience built by lawyers is guaranteed to fail with customers. As data sharing a...
Why Banks Need a Mobile Homepage Makeover to Drive Satisfaction and Engagement
A homepage that makes an app easier to understand and navigate is critical to mobile banking success. Search and virtual assistants will one day provide concierge-like navigation a...
Make informed decisions in a digital financial world