Here’s a trick question: How many active users does your bank have?

In most cases, the answer is “I’m not sure,” because not only is the definition of bank “active user” changing, but the very notion of what constitutes a user in the age of online and mobile banking is shifting.

A few folks from the industry have recently been pondering these dynamics in Bank Innovation’s LinkedIn group. The truths about “active users” in banking are anything but clean and neat. What we do know is this:

• No two banks share the same definition of “active user.” Some financial institutions want to see consumers log in to online or mobile applications once every 90 days in order to classify them as “active.” Others need logins once every 30 days. However, logins are still the key demarcation between active and inactive user;
• Banks don’t seem to be making much distinction between logins online and via mobile device, even though the usage dynamics for each are vastly different and growing even more varied seemingly by the day; and
• It is extremely difficult to secure data on customer usage because many vendor systems simply don’t offer engagement details beyond a login date.

This all is presupposed on the fact that being an active user is being a user that logs into a banking system — but why must that be the case? Today, more banking services are being pushed to, not pulled by, consumers. As George Pasley, an FI entrepreneur pointed out, mobile banking needs to be viewed differently.

Mobile is a different monster, depending on what features you offer. For instance, I have mobile banking, but I haven’t logged in for about 18 months. However, because I get daily alerts through SMS, I am actually an active user.

Of course, he is right. When you think about it, the whole notion of an “active user” is evolving today particularly since the quantity of “pushed” banking services continues to grow. In a real sense, we could soon approach a point where the majority of banking services are “pushed,” not “pulled,” and in that case whether or not an “active user” logs on is largely irrelevant.

This “pushed” banking dynamic could be a blessing and a curse. The need to engage consumers declines since they continue to receive banking services, but on the same token, as anyone in marketing knows, you could have dead weight in your client rolls without even knowing it. File this under: Be Careful What You Wish For.