PREMIUM –  The mobile app is at the top of most banks’ digital strategy. This is especially true for José “Pepe” Olalla, head of business development at BBVA Compass, the U.S. subsidiary of the Spanish bank BBVA S.A.

At BBVA Compass all innovation initiatives fall under Olalla’s business development department. And among the various innovation efforts Olalla oversees, the mobile app is “absolutely one of the most crucial,” he told Bank Innovation. 

“The mobile is more important to us because we are a small bank,” Olalla said. (The bank has $86.5 billion in assets.) “The bank’s mandate for profitability is brought on by growth, and mobile makes it easier to scale, and it’s much more cost-efficient. So, for us there is a double reason why it’s so important.”

The second — more obvious — reason, Olalla explained, is customer experience. For this reason, the team makes sure to release new features and services on the app every month.

Right now, the focus is on the Green Button, a “feature that allows customers to open accounts or apply for products in a click,” Olalla explained. “The newest product we are going to include on the Green Button is insurance,” he said.

So, a customer can sign up for insurance “a variety of insurance,” Olalla said, (health, life, travel, pet etc.) by clicking on the “green button.”

“Once we start offering this functionality, we will see what works through trial and error, and tweak accordingly,” he said.

Bank backed P2P platform Zelle is also on Olalla’s roadmap for BBVA Compass’ mobile app.

Although, Olalla could not provide a timeline, he said “Zelle has bottleneck traffic right now, but we are working with them to get on their system and give our customers that functionality. And it will happen soon.”

An integration on Zelle might have to be done through the bank’s in-house core processor.

Other functionalities that BBVA Compass recently added to its mobile app include an intelligent search option, direct deposit, and the ability to transfer balance between different cards. The bank also added an option for customers to apply for a personal loan through its Green Button, which it calls express personal loans.

BBVA Compass is based in Birmingham, Alabama.  Most of its branches are concentrated in Alabama, Arizona, California, Colorado, Florida, New Mexico, and Texas.

BBVA Compass does not reveal the number of its mobile app users.