It is 2021 and still many of us make the mistake of considering the Millennials as the most advanced and smart generation of recent times. Perhaps, this is because of the fact that the people who belong to Generation Z or even Generation Alpha are yet to become a significant customer segment of 21^st century. Before I proceed to my main points, I am clarifying below what are meant by different generations so that all of us are on the same page.

As you can see, Generation Z or in short, Gen Z is the generation with a starting birth year of 1997 and ending birth year of 2012. It is the generation which succeeds the Millennials (also known as Gen Y), who were born in between 1981-1996. Before the Millennials, there were Generation X or in short, Gen X (born in between 1965-1980) and Baby Boomers (born in between 1946-1964). There are also other generations which succeed the Gen Z and precede the Baby Boomers. To avoid confusion, I am not taking those generations into consideration for now as people of those generations are either too old or too young to be considered as our potential customers.

I have also prepared a table to show the current minimum and maximum ages of different generations in 2021 and estimated minimum and maximum ages in 2030 and 2037.

I am not stating this based on any data or fact, but I assume that people in between 25-40 years of age are the largest retail customer segment for a bank in any given point of time. I am not saying that this is the most profitable segment. However, there is no doubt that this is the most important customer segment for any bank simply because of its mere proportion or size. Based on this logic, it can be said that currently, Millennials is the most important customer segment for Eastern Bank Ltd. (EBL). However, if we fast forward to 2030, then we will see that Generation Z will start to take the leading position. By the year 2037, Generation Z will in fact become the most dominant customer segment for Eastern Bank Ltd.

Now, questions may arise that why EBL should start preparing itself now in 2021 given that Generation Z will not truly come in the scenario before 2030. Some may even ask that why we should bother to take any special preparation for serving the Gen Z. Can’t we serve them the way we have served the Baby Boomers, Gen X, and Millennials?

So, what’s so special about the Gen Z?

If you have noticed, the obvious special thing about Generation Z is the mere fact that they have been born in between two centuries and even two millenniums. They are the people who have been born during the internet boom of 1995 to 2000. In a sense, these people belong to the first generation of truly digital natives. Whereas the people of other generations have grown up without the influence of internet technologies and adopted those technologies after becoming adults or coming of age, people of Gen Z have completely grown up under the omnipresent influence of different modern internet technologies, such as, computer, internet, video games, mobile phone, social media, etc. For this simple reason, Gen Z is also known as the Digital Natives whereas the people of other preceding generations of Gen Z are known as Digital Immigrants. Because of this, Gen Z people have some distinct characteristics and personality traits unlike any other generation.

So, what are the differences of Gen Z with other generations?

The personality traits mentioned in the image may seem stereotypical. It is true that someone from a particular generation may not have all the typical personality traits of his/her generation. It is even possible that people of two different generations may have many things in common. However, it is also true that we wouldn’t treat a 60-year-old person the same way we would treat a teenager. For this reason, it is essential that we understand both the subtle and obvious differences among different generations.

Gen Z as Banking Customers: What to Expect?

There are some common misconceptions about the Gen Z. Some of the most notable misconceptions are:

• They don’t want to visit banks’ branches.
• They are not interested in personal finances.
• They are more interested in spending than saving.

Different researchers have found the complete opposite results. Though this behavior may change over time, but at present, people of Gen Z visit banks’ branches more than the Millennials do. This frequent branch visits by Gen Z also show their greater interest in achieving financial literacy and thus, being able to take their own financial decisions. They are also more reserved in terms of spending and instead, they are more interested in savings. Perhaps, this is because they have seen the financial struggles of Millennials and Gen X and they don’t want to repeat the mistakes of their previous generations.

How to prepare ourselves to serve the Gen Z?

In spite of all the differences, there is one common factor which influences the banking preferences of all the generations and that is Trust. For a financial company, being trustworthy will always be the most important trait. We cannot expect to earn the brand loyalty of Gen Z, which is already pretty rare among this generation, without being trustworthy and transparent. For previous generations, relationships with banks’ employees played important roles in maintaining customers’ loyalty. Unfortunately, this will not be the case for Gen Z. They will change their banks even at the slightest hint of absence in trustworthiness and transparency.

Secondly, we will have to redesign, not eliminate, our branches. Even though Gen Z are also known as Digital Natives, iGen, and Centennials and they prefer to learn, communicate, and spend digitally, there will always be need for banks’ branches for this generation. In order to achieve lifelong relationship with a Gen Z customer, we will have to give him/her an omni-channel banking experience and branches will play an important role in that. However, our branches will have to be redesigned in order to cater to the tastes of the Gen Z. We can transform our branches to ‘Banking Cafes’ where customers will be able to drink coffees, eat snacks, casually chat with the Relationship Managers, and meanwhile avail banking services. Thus, branches will become such a place for the customers where they will feel at ease and secured.

Thirdly, we should not limit our innovation to only transforming the traditional banking services and bringing them in digital platforms. Rather, we should look for ways to innovate and provide such services which never have been provided by banks before. However, we will also have to keep in mind that creating a cluttered banking application with unnecessary features will only push the Gen Z customers away. The key is to find the fine balance between usefulness and convenience.

Lastly, Gen Z people already spend most of their times online and this will increase even more by the year 2030. So, whether we want to communicate with these people or provide them banking services, we will have to do those digitally without any doubt. Gen Z customers will not only avail the banking services online but also assess those services by communicating with their online communities. So, in order to remain on top of those customers’ minds, we will have to be where the customers will be, whether it’s Facebook, YouTube, Instagram, or even TikTok.

Written By: Amin Md. Mehedi Hasan, Head of Digital Channels Digital Financial Services, Eastern Bank Ltd.