revolutionizing financial health

Seventy percent of Americans struggle with financial health.¹

Nearly half of all Baby Boomers lack retirement savings and 70% feel uncertain about their financial security.² Sixty percent of Gen Xers are experiencing negative mental health effects due to money concerns and 62% lack an emergency fund.³ Gen Zers are “very or extremely worried” about not having enough money and would like personalized advice to get their savings goals on track.

This is where your financial institution comes in.

When you invest in financial health tools, you’ll not only be helping millions of Americans achieve financial stability and security, but you’ll also increase accountholder loyalty and ultimately drive growth for your organization.

On average, 54% of consumers turn to banks and credit unions to address financial tasks like trimming spending, tracking savings, and prioritizing bills, compared to 31% using offline methods and 16% using third-party apps and websites – indicating that banks and credit unions play a crucial role in supporting individuals’ financial well-being.⁴ By offering accessible and user-friendly tools and resources, you can empower Americans to improve their financial health and address the challenges they face.

The good news is that you don’t need to go it alone. You can successfully compete against the biggest financial institutions – who are currently placing a premium on financial health – while helping your accountholders improve their financial health, using technology available in and through the Banno Digital Platform™.

unpacking financial fragmentation

To find a solution, you first have to unpack the problem: financial fragmentation. Americans live financially fragmented lives.

The average consumer has up to 30 financial accounts, with Millennial households averaging 35 – 40 financial relationships.⁵ This fragmentation makes it difficult for people to understand their full financial picture and make informed decisions to improve their financial positions.

Financial fragmentation simultaneously blocks your visibility into your accountholders’ financial lives.

Without this data, you can’t provide targeted and relevant recommendations that would deepen accountholder relationships or identify competition and gather information that would help you make better business decisions.

So, what can you do?

External account aggregation is available within the digital experience. This enables accountholders to safely consolidate financial data from several institutions and relationships into a single, easy-to-access location: your digital banking platform.

reintegrating through aggregation

Banno and Finicity have integrated to offer external aggregation, providing a seamless experience for accountholders through secure APIs and Finicity’s deep relationships across the financial landscape. 

This technology was previously underutilized by the financial services industry – primarily due to pricing models that penalized financial institutions for promoting aggregation by charging per aggregated account. But Banno and Finicity have pioneered a new cost structure: a low, per-user charge that empowers you to encourage the use of external aggregation, no matter how many accounts are aggregated.

With these integration tools already in place, it’s fast and easy to enable external aggregation for your accountholders. This means you can regain your position at the center of your accountholders’ financial lives and gain actionable data for your short- and long-term strategies.

embedding fintech and building custom functionality

When it comes to digital tools and services that supplement your accountholders’ financial health, there’s an accelerating fintech marketplace offering a wide range of options.

To be successful in getting your accountholders to use these tools, it’s not enough to relegate them to a tab or deep in a menu. It’s essential to embed these tools within your main digital banking experience.

Making Personal Financial Management (PFM) Part of the Main Digital Experience

Javelin research has found that consumers won’t hunt for financial fitness features, especially if it’s unclear that such features even exist.⁶ That likely comes as no surprise to industry long-timers, who’ve watched PFM features struggle to gain mass adoption. To increase the likelihood of adoption, consider:

• Automatically categorizing spending
• Building aggregation into the homepage experience
• Empowering accountholders to receive actionable alerts to avoid fees
• Displaying dynamic credit scores
• Adding a library of financial education materials to the signed-in experience
• Making your financial health plugins front and center

Take Advantage of Industry Disruption

As fintech giant Intuit discontinues its PFM app Mint, 3.6 million consumers are left hunting for a new solution⁷ – giving banks and credit unions an opportunity to fill the gap. 

Eight in 10 adults trust local institutions over other financial services entities,⁸ and yet competing PFM apps have seen surges in new sign-ups since Intuit’s announcement. Given that many of these competitors directly compete with banks and credit unions for loans, credit products, and even high-rate savings accounts, now is the time to bolster your in-app financial health offerings.

how Jack Henry™ can help

Using the Banno Digital Toolkit™, you can roll out innovative and timely financial health features through strategically embedded fintech partnerships – or you can build custom functionality in-house.

The plugin framework available at jackhenry.dev, in combination with the publicly available API documentation, puts the power in your hands. Implementation timelines are as quick – or as relaxed – as you need them to be. Your developers, or those at a chosen third-party fintech, can build integrations and perform testing in a live Banno environment without needing Jack Henry’s permission to get started.

You’ll discover many popular third-party fintechs focused on financial health have already built plugins for the Banno Digital Platform, including those focused on credit scoring, direct deposit, savings round-up, wealth management and investments, and gamification of financial health. If you want to build something customized or work with a fintech who hasn’t built their integration yet, developers can self-enroll to gain credentials to the jackhenry.dev development environment anytime.

next steps

Take full advantage of the financial health tools available within the Banno Digital Platform, the additional flexibility and optionality that the Banno Digital Toolkit provides and invest time with your senior leadership team to develop a comprehensive financial health strategy.

You’ll discover that you can regain your position at the center of your accountholders’ financial universe, as you ultimately gain share of mind and share of wallet.

invest in financial health

Learn more about the financial health solutions available within the Banno Digital Platform by booking a demo or contacting our digital experience team.

For more information about Jack Henry, visit jackhenry.com.

sources

¹ Financial Health Pulse: 2023 U.S. Trends Report. Financial Health Network. Accessed January 9, 2024.
² Lauren Ashcraft. Each Generation Has Distinct Financial Goals for 2024 – And They Should Inform Banks’ Targeted Marketing Strategies. Insider Intelligence. Accessed January 10, 2024.
³ Ashcraft.
⁴ Lea Nonninger. The Future of Financial Fitness Depends on Mobile-First Experiences. Javelin. Accessed January 10, 2024.
⁵ Ron Shevlin. Americans’ Shadow Financial Lives: Why Banks Don’t Know Jack (Or Jill). Forbes. Accessed January 1, 2024.
⁶ Javelin.
⁷ A Popular Budgeting App Is Going Away. Banks Can Step Up and Fill the Gap. ABA Bank Marketing. Accessed January 10, 2024.
⁸ 2021 FDIC National Survey of Unbanked and Underbanked Households. FDIC. Accessed January 10, 2024.