Tuesday, April 17, 2018 Stamford, CT USA — In banking, the analytics arms race is on. Commercial and business banks are late to the analytics party, as advanced analytics have been adopted at a much faster rate in a range of other industries — including consumer banking.

According to a new report from Greenwich Associates, The Analytics Arms Race, by the end of 2018, some of the fastest-moving business and commercial banks will deploy data analytics platforms. These banks are eying the prospecting and sales process, where new analytics could result in significant gains in key metrics such as sales, win rates and client retention—and ultimately in revenue growth and profitability. 

“In the past, banks could afford to postpone technology and analytics investments in favor of relationship managers and other staples—those days are over,” says Duncan Banfield, Greenwich Associates Managing Director and author of the new report. “In the middle market, small business and other segments, banks are now forced to match the efforts and investments of analytics leaders just to keep pace.”

Good News For Analytics Latecomers
The good news for analytics latecomers: There’s still time to act.  Although the industry as a whole has been so slow to ramp up analytics capabilities, it’s not too late for even the slowest-moving banks to catch up. That window will not remain open forever and is closing fast. 

As banks start integrating insightful analytics into line operations and strategic decision-making, the gap between analytic high achievers and the rest of the industry will widen. That gap will grow quickly as banks work with external providers and consultants to integrate data on company spending, satisfaction and relationship quality with current providers (or competitors). 

“Armed with insights from this data, these U.S. commercial and business banks will create a competitive advantage that will be difficult for rivals to surmount,” says Duncan Banfield. “Our new report assesses the current state of the ‘front end’ data analytics movement, identifies the impacted areas and provides recommendations to leverage analytics in sales and other business functions.”