A Comprehensive Guide on How to Develop a Banking App in 2021

According to Allied Market Research, the global mobile banking market is expected to reach $1,825 million by 2026. By 2030 the everyday banking experience could be entirely virtual. By then, 2 billion people will have digital bank accounts.

Emerging technologies like IoT, blockchain and AI have revolutionized the banking industry and created outstanding revenue generation opportunities.

Let’s talk about how to develop a banking app that’ll match your business goals and turn the industry upside down.

Benefits of Mobile Banking for Business

Banks that use technology’s advantages get a competitive edge. They create banking apps to:

• Boost service quality
• Increase customer base

Let’s look at the following lists of benefits that banks will get by becoming mobile-ready.

Expand Client Base and Increase Customer Loyalty

Banking apps are an effective way to bring new clients and broaden your customer base. Implementing in-app chat will enhance customer loyalty and prevent clients’ complaints.

Powerful Marketing Channel

Banking application is an additional marketing channel to magnet your customer and gives them a personalized experience.
You can send a promotional message about a deposit, credit service, new app features, and updates. Thus, you engage your clients to use your product.

Profit Investment Ratio

Mobile app development can be expensive, but the return on investment is relatively high. While traditional banks spend a lot of money on advertising, managing bank branches, and additional staff, companies that use banking apps for their business offer high-quality service with far less effort.

For example, the British bank Revolut provides service entirely online.

Beneficial Source of Information

The Banking app is an irreplaceable source of information that gives you hints to empower your business solutions.

You can track every user’s step — whether they’re purchasing online, traveling, or paying utility bills — to precisely analyze your clients’ wants to get from the app.

This analysis is crucial to analyze users’ behavior and generate new ideas for further app development. Moreover, there are a few more advantages:

• Provide a better customer experience
• Identify the weak spots in your business
• A better understanding of the client’s preferences and pain points

Essential Features for a Mobile Banking App

These are must-have features to make internet banking easier.

Account Management

It’s a must-have feature of all banking apps that consists of procedures and actions to modify accounts. This include:

• Balance check. Balance information should be instantly updated in the app to avoid the client’s complaints.
• Cards and bank accounts management. It’s a full life process of the cards that includes ordering new cards, opening accounts, etc.
• Money transfer. It lets users receive and send money quickly and control their expenses.
• Deposit Data. Opening deposit, deposit interest rate, time maturity, and so on.

Fast Payment Transactions

Speed and efficiency are the primary elements that users appreciate. The electronic funds transfer sends money from buyer to seller over the computerized network. The app just shows the results of the transactions.

Customer Support

Business is based on the relationship. It’s critical to provide 24/7 customer service to meet clients’ expectations. While using the banking app, they may face troubles or have questions.

You can build a live chat inside the app or create a chatbot. Chatbots are a huge time-saver, but they require in-depth knowledge. You should predict the client’s requests and give the correct answers.

Secure Authentication

E-banking service must not be limited to one signup option. Give the users two or more options to enter the app. The most popular are:

• Password
• Fingerprint
• Face ID

Fingerprint can be used to open the app, secure every transaction, manage passwords, etc.

Facial recognition is the latest trend for financial institutions. With Face ID, all the data will stay highly secured. No more worries that a third party may steal your money.

Steps to Build a Successful Banking App

Let’s now consider what steps you should go through to get a banking app done.

Step #1. Build and Test a Prototype

App prototyping turns your concept into a successful mobile app. You may identify trouble points, and implement the features that respond to client’s needs. Moreover, it’s much cheaper to create a test and fix a bug during prototyping.

With this information, you will make a banking experience enjoyable and increase the customer’s involvement.

Step #2. Application Security

Banking is an industry where security is paramount. Make customers feel that the system is secure and their assets are protected.

There are three basic methods to build a protected mobile banking app:

• Data encryption algorithms. It makes information unreadable by third-parties. It means that only the user can decrypt the data using the right encryption key.
• Code obfuscation. It makes the source code useless for the hackers but keeps its functionality.
• Protection from repackaging. It means that the app is secured from hacker attacks. Otherwise hackers could get a copy of the application, add malicious functionality, and then repack it again.

Step #3. Find the Development Team

There are a lot of great ideas that died just because of bad implementation. The best option is to find a dedicated development team. IT specialists with unique experience in the FinTech industry will bring the best solution for your business.

You can check the information and feedback about IT vendors on Clutch, GoodFirms.

Step #4. Present the App and Collect Feedback

The publishing of a banking app in the Apple App Store and Google Play is a laborious process. You should do many steps to get to the point where your app is actually on the Market. For example, in the App Store, you have to meet the App Store Review Guidelines. If the app doesn’t match, it will be rejected.

To make the most out of your banking application, you need to promote it. Show your clients all the benefits they can get using the app. What’s more, it’s essential to gather the users’ first feedback to know if your application works correctly and satisfies their needs.

Conclusion

Banking will become an everyday app for millions of consumers. Be sure that you present a user-friendly banking app with high-security standards and demands.