Why fintechs stand to win more customers with BPOs that nurture agents

It’s a strange time to be an ambitious fintech.

Brick-and-mortar institutions are racing to update their legacy practices to keep up with their customers’ demands.

Meanwhile newer fintechs face a different, arguably tougher (but way more exciting) challenge: redefining customer expectations.

Think about the change we’ve already seen. Comprehensive banking services through the convenience of your phone. Genuinely empathetic customer service interactions on any channel that suits you. Shorter—and maybe even enjoyable—holding queues.

But as the CX bar raises ever higher, so are any deficiencies magnified. There’s very little room left to hide, and it’s never been easier for customers to switch services. It’s exciting, unforgiving and uncharted territory.

That’s why ambitious fintechs need more from their BPO partner. To accelerate your fledgling reputation you need a battle-proven brand of CX facilitated by a specialized and advanced BPO partner—that’s more of a relationship-based growth driver than a transactional cost center.

And crucially, that comes down to individual agents. Every interaction with a service agent is an opportunity to elevate experiences for your customers. Your customer service teams are the front-line ambassadors for the big CX promises your brand makes.

So when it comes to BPO, it’s vital to pick an outsourcer that explicitly connects agent experience and development to growth-centric CX strategies.

Traditional BPO call centers rarely create value. Typically, agents sift through as many calls or chats as possible without much care for service or quality—resolution is the main priority.

This myopia often leads to high employee turnover and churn. And it’s no wonder why—it’s demoralizing to get stuck on a treadmill of endless, impersonal transactions. It’s ironic but it’s true—focusing too hard on resolution is actively counterproductive to revenue and retention.

Conversely, the right BPO partner incentivizes agents beyond fulfilling basic call-handling metrics. And that process starts before an agent gets anywhere near a customer.

Growth-oriented BPOs develop screening and recruitment processes that filter out the wrong candidates and select the best talent for your specific requirements.

These BPOs also optimize training to protect less experienced agents from bad actors and empower them to address nuanced issues—like payment resolution and complex policy clarification—with confidence and competence.

And once you select the right candidates, and give them the right training, something great happens: They feel self-assured.

Assurance is powerful. With assurance comes agency—well-trained and advanced agents aren’t reliant on scripts to reel off cookie-cutter answers.

They’re individual and independent architects of unique, better customer experiences, harnessing empathetic, productive interactions in service of your brand’s reputation and wider goals.

They operate with a degree of humanity and authenticity that can’t be forged and makes your customers feel heard. And when your BPO realizes this potential, it’s vital to capture what’s working and learn from what isn’t.

Quality assurance teams should monitor performance to ensure agents handle customers in line with your business objectives. Agents receive continuous coaching and feedback to hone their craft.

The right BPO fintech partner goes beyond training agents in financial regulations. They imbue them with purpose—and purposeful organizations are unstoppable.

Transactional BPO doesn’t leave much room for continual process improvement—not when the focus is solely on meeting essential service metrics.

Which means as soon as customers’ needs evolve, there’s a problem. Instead, your BPO needs to continually renew its purpose in line with your customer’s changing lives.

Purposeful BPO is the difference between stagnant CX and service that meets your customers when, where and how they expect.

Purposeful, confident and competent BPO agents drive process improvement by their very nature. They understand the value of putting small process improvements in place to yield big long-term results.

And because they’re aligned with your business strategy, every moment-to-moment decision makes incremental progress toward your desired outcomes. Short-term wins contribute to your wider strategy.

They become a self-driving force for continuously improving CX, offering feedback and improvement suggestions to elevate and evolve increasingly better customer experiences.

Best of all, you set a new standard for customer expectations (for you and your competitors) and rise with them.

Great products and services deserve great agents.

Because no matter how great your product or service is, you’ll struggle to reach and sustain the success you deserve without empowered agents delivering differentiated CX.

The most successful fintech brands aren’t just meeting volume-driven KPIs (like average handle time)—they’re using every interaction to build brand capital that elevates CX to new heights.

Choosing a BPO that recognizes how integral agents are to driving that customer growth can give your brand an edge. A sustainable boost that drives you towards that goal of redefining what’s possible in your corner of the market.

We call it Relationship-based Outsourcing. If that sounds like something your business needs, we’d love to talk.

Megan Porter is vice president of Learning Services at Ubiquity and oversees five departments that reinforce our commitment to lifelong learning: Leadership Development, Ubiquity Academy, Quality Assurance, Training and Implementation.