Consumers are changing the way they interact with their finances and increasingly believe that their needs are not being met by their current financial service providers. In fact, 70% of consumers would likely open an account at a different financial institution for new products.

Fintechs are coming to the market every day that can easily fill the gaps and take on those customers, like Kabbage for lending, NerdWallet for saving and budgeting, and Stash for investing. Fintechs have been leading the way on these innovations, bringing new services that meet consumers’ needs. But banks have the opportunity to create these new experiences for their customers, and make them even more personalized, by leveraging the thing they have that fintechs need: data.

Fintechs are currently winning the battle for engagement, leveraging their innovative approaches to attract new customers. However, banks retain their unique position of being the hub for consumers’ financial lives and their data. They have the opportunity to strengthen their client relationships by investing in these fintech trends to elevate their digital experience and client bond. If banks can follow this path, they can retake the lead for engagement and will be better positioned to serve their current customers and the next generation.

Here are the key innovations that banks should focus on integrating:

Create a more personalized experience through intelligent data

The proliferation of fintechs means that many of us have multiple accounts that are managed in different ways. With financial decision-making happening constantly with a simple tap of our phone, there’s an even greater need to centralize all activity within one hub. By leveraging their data, banks can become that centralized hub and transform the way consumers manage their finances by making the process more dynamic. They can offer products for secure linking of financial accounts and provide a unique experience for each customer’s needs, adjust those products as priorities change and provide their customers with actionable guidance to improve their financial health.

Heading into 2022, that may be even more useful. With the rise of the omicron variant coinciding with many Americans starting new jobs or adjusting plans, centralizing all financial activity with one bank can help people weather the financial uncertainty they may be facing.

Bring finance to the consumer

Given the fast pace of change in the world and in our lives, consumers are increasingly making financial decisions in micro-moments, where they reflexively turn to their devices to learn, do, discover, watch, or buy things. In fact, 92.3 million U.S. consumers age 14 or older used proximity-based mobile payments at least one time during a six-month period in 2020 — usage that is on track to surpass half of all smartphone users by 2025. Those expenses are spreading over a lot of different places.

As non-financial consumer apps are increasingly embedding financial tools into their experiences, financial institutions must look for new ways to help people manage their financial health without turning to services outside their bank. From embedded savings solutions to investing opportunities, this will allow for consumers to easily remain financially involved no matter what they’re doing.

Provide more alternative credit solutions

Consumers are looking for new ways to finance their lives, and “buy now, pay later” is proving that. The service grew more than four times in 2021, and as demand continues to grow, more financial services companies will be offering these services. This can create opportunities for consumers but requires responsible lending practices.

As consumers continue to do more with their money, it is easy for them to lose track of their outstanding obligations and begin struggling with their ability to repay. Lenders must continue to expand how they evaluate creditworthiness and look at non-traditional indicators such as rent payments or utility payments. By leveraging that alternative data alongside traditional credit scores, lenders can provide more credit opportunities to consumers while ensuring they’re able to repay the loans.

Offer alternative digital assets

As investors look for alternative investing options, cryptocurrency continues to grow, with some putting more money into crypto than traditional investments. And as fractional shares continue to grow in popularity, beyond stocks and into non-fungible tokens (NFTs), real estate and other high-value assets, money entering non-traditional marketplaces will continue to grow.

But when exchanging fiat currency for cryptocurrency, it’s critical for trading platforms to be able to verify a user’s identity and bank account information. Data aggregation and open banking allow organizations to quickly onboard new customers and securely fund their accounts directly from the user’s bank account through real-time account verification. Banks can create a more trusted access to these assets that will allow consumers to feel comfortable about adding them to their portfolio, while keeping them alongside the rest of their portfolio.

Staying ahead of the curve

Offering new, hyper-personalized innovations fueled by user-permissioned financial data can create opportunities for new customers and expand offerings to existing ones. To keep customers fully engaged, banks and other financial institutions need to leverage the data they have to stay ahead of the curve and offer products their consumers really need in order to increase loyalty.

As 2021 showed us, consumers will continue to look for new solutions to their finances with or without their banks. According to a 2021 FICO survey, 34% of consumers have at least one shadow financial account or engage in financial activity with a non-bank financial service provider, and that percentage jumps to 47 for Millennials. But by leveraging the client relationship to be the hub for their financial lives and investing in these innovations, banks can simplify the financial process, getting the right products in front of their customers to improve their financial lives.

Farouk Ferchichi serves as the global group head (president) of the Envestnet Data and Analytics Business Division. He previously held leadership roles at USAA, Toyota, Gartner, Accenture and Citi.