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BBVA: 
Bank of the Future

PROJECT

CLIENT

BBVA

SERVICE

  • Strategy

INDUSTRY

  • Financial Services

The global banking giant approached Continuum with a lofty challenge: envision the bank of the future.

With over 50 million customers in 31 countries, BBVA is one of the globe’s largest banking systems.

Challenge

Retail banks once built trust with customers by guaranteeing stability through their massive physical infrastructures. A fixed and unchanging bank was a safe one. While this perception of confidence is still important, it is no longer the primary factor driving customer behavior. Bank customers assume a new level of control, as mobile technologies continue to transform how people manage and spend their money. Like all retailers, banks must adapt to individual customers’ needs and expectations. This requires the redistribution of services that were once centralized at a single branch or location across a complex, customer-centric ecosystem.

With over 50 million customers in 31 countries, BBVA is one of the globe’s largest banking systems. Recognizing the shift in customer behaviors and the influence of new technologies, the global banking giant proposed a lofty mission for Continuum: envision the bank of the future. This would drive BBVA’s technology roadmap, branch evolution, and the adaptation of service models for the next banking era.

    Awards

    • Core77 Design Award—Service—2013

    RESEARCH & INSIGHTS

    My Money vs. My Life

    In contextual research across four continents, Continuum’s team found that people approach personal finances from two distinct modalities. The first, “My Money,” describes the transactional manner in which people handle everyday monetary exchanges like withdrawing cash from an ATM or paying a bill online. The second, “My Life” represents the more complex and emotional mindset people adopt when making milestone financial decisions like buying a home or paying for college. Our understanding of these two modalities informed the design of every aspect of the new retail banking model—from digital interfaces to physical spaces.

    RESEARCH & INSIGHTS

    Prototyping to Learn

    Our service designers built full-scale prototypes of new banking concepts to assess and refine each aspect of the BBVA customer experience. This included constructing full-scale, foam-core models of the physical spaces where BBVA engages customers, both inside and outside the branch, as well as fully functioning representations of digital interfaces. The team used role-playing to fine-tune customer interactions with employees and digital tools.

    RESEARCH & INSIGHTS

    Organizational Change

    Over the course of several years, Continuum worked across the bank’s silos and geographies to forge the organizational change required to bring this new retail banking model to life. The team socialized the concept within the organization by creating an immersive, real-world banking branch of the future, which simulated how the customer-centric bank experience would feel in the year 2020. To ensure successful implementation of the concept globally, the team collaborated with BBVA’s business units to make the necessary changes to the bank’s retail spaces, digital channels, service protocols, product development, and brand.

    RESEARCH & INSIGHTS

    Meet Lola, Sister of Siri

    Lola is an avatar-based banking assistant designed to help BBVA’s online customers navigate the bank’s digital ecosystem and support their financial decision-making. Named after a BBVA sales associate known for her especially helpful nature, Lola was developed in collaboration SRI International—the folks who brought you Apple’s Siri—and is smarter than your average virtual assistant. She offers vocal guidance through a wide selection of graphics and menus, helping customers to configure their online banking profile to suit their lives and banking needs.

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    Solution

    BBVA’s Customer-Centric Bank model empowers customers with the freedom to bank the way they want. Adaptable to markets across the globe, the new service model combines virtual experiences with hands-on, human interactions. Wherever they are in the world, BBVA customers can manage day-to-day finances easily and efficiently. When it comes to long-term planning decisions, customers receive one-on-one, personalized guidance.

    Results

    Today, localized branches of the Customer-Centric Bank model operate in nine locations—six in Madrid, Spain, and three in Santiago, Chile. These branches demonstrate the flexibility of the new retail banking platform, which is localized to serve both established and emerging market contexts. In BBVA’s 2014 annual report, the company described itself as “a global financial group with a customer-centric approach.” Indeed, the banking giant has positioned itself as a leader in the inevitable migration of retail banking from the brick-and-mortar branch to a complex, online financial ecosystem. BBVA’s vision anticipates a banking future where the need for physical branches diminishes, and reimagines the bank branch as a place to teach and guide customers through this transition.

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