Sainsbury’s Digital Director: “Unsexy” Open Banking Is A Powerful Customer Experience Tool

03 Apr, 2020

Open Banking data represents a powerful but underrated customer experience and personalisation opportunity for brands, says Andrew Hogwood, Sainsbury’s Marketing Director, the latest guest on MAD//Fest’s partner podcast, Shiny New Object. 

Open Banking data represents a powerful but underrated customer experience and personalisation opportunity for brands, says Andrew Hogwood, Sainsbury’s Marketing Director, the latest guest on MAD//Fest’s partner podcast, Shiny New Object. 

Open Banking is the regulatory measure that forces banks to open up customer transaction data to third parties. Developers are then able to build services and applications through APIs.

For marketers, this financial data provides rich insight into the lives of customers outside of their own customer data. 

For example, Open Banking data can enable brands to better understand when a customer tends to book a holiday, where they purchase coffee from and their overall spending behaviour. They are then able to provide more relevant marketing and offers, particularly if they have partnerships with other relevant brands. 

Brands can also use the insight to evaluate their “share of wallet” in relation to key competitors.

Speaking to Shiny New Object host and Automated Creative Founder Tom Ollerton, Andrew is enthused at the potential for Open Banking to provide better experiences, personalisation and more relevant offers that “remove hassle from the lives of customers”.

Whilst brands must obtain consent from customers, store information securely and steer clear of intrusive marketing messages, Andrew regards Open Banking as a “step change for the kind of marketing and services you can offer the customer”.

In the podcast, Andrew also explains why it’s crucial for marketers to first pinpoint what financial data is genuinely useful and how it would be relevant to their marketing activities.

You can listen to the podcast now on Spotify, Apple Podcasts,  Soundcloud and YouTube.