The financial services industry must strike a careful balance: driving innovation while staying compliant, earning customer trust while optimizing efficiency, and modernizing technology without disrupting legacy systems.
The payoff that you get for all your trouble will be worth it. Financial services organizations that fully commit to digital transformation often unlock smoother operations, stronger customer relationships, and a more agile business model ready for future challenges.
Let’s walk through how digital transformation is reshaping financial services and what it really means for you, your users, and the future of your business.
Key takeaways
- Customer expectations drive transformation: 73% of banking customers expect the same level of service from their bank as they get from tech companies like Apple or Amazon.
- Legacy system modernization is critical: Financial institutions spend 60-80% of IT budgets maintaining outdated systems rather than innovating.
- Data analytics unlock competitive advantage: Banks using advanced analytics see 126% higher profit margins than those relying on traditional methods.
- Digital-first design reduces operational costs: Well-executed digital transformation in finance cut processing costs by up to 90% for routine transactions.
- Enhanced security and transparent transactions: A modernized tech stack boosts trust and meets rising regulatory demands.
Financial industry makeover: what’s changing now
The financial services and banking sector is under pressure. Modern users expect personalized services, top-notch experiences, and enhanced security, all delivered in real time, on any device. Regulatory compliance is tighter. Competitive dynamics are shifting as fintech companies redefine what banking services can look like.
Yet, many financial institutions are still operating on legacy systems built decades ago. These systems weren’t designed for digital channels, mobile apps, or machine learning. They weren’t designed for customers. As a result they get slow operations, high maintenance costs, poor user experience and lost customers.
Main steps for digital transformation in banking
The banking and financial industry is all about speed, tech, and giving customers what they actually want. If banks want to stay in the game, they’ve got to level up with digital transformation. And for that according to McKinsey financial services organizations investing in comprehensive digital transformation can get up to 20-30% improvements in customer satisfaction and 15-25% reductions in operational costs.
But it’s not just about slapping on some new apps, it’s a whole vibe, a journey to rethink how things work from the ground up. Check the lowdown on the main steps banks need to take to go digital and stay ahead up to date.
1. Audit legacy systems
Identify bottlenecks. Which systems are siloed? Which APIs are missing? Which workflows rely on outdated manual inputs or lack real-time data access?
⚡️ What works: Look for tools that don’t integrate with others, especially across departments (e.g. CRM not talking to support or risk tools).
2. Introduce advanced technology with purpose
It’s tempting to chase the newest tech like cloud, machine learning, NLP, RPA. But tech alone doesn’t solve real business problems.
Ask yourself: What are we trying to fix, speed up, or understand better? Because when these tools are introduced with purpose, they don’t just digitize processes, they transform outcomes.
- Cloud computing makes your infrastructure elastic, scaling with your needs.
- Machine learning reveals patterns in customer behavior you couldn’t spot manually.
- Natural language processing turns customer conversations into actionable insights.
- Robotic process automation cuts out repetitive work, freeing your team for higher-impact tasks.
3. Redesign the user experience
Customer experience is the front line of digital transformation in the financial industry. Users want to check balances, transfer money, or manage portfolios, it all needs to feel intuitive, fast, and safe.
Modern financial services must compete with every other app on your customer’s phone. After all, 53% of users will abandon an app if it takes more than 3 seconds to load. That means sleek interfaces, clear information architecture, and seamless interactions.
🤓 Pro tip: Use Figma for rapid prototyping and collaborative feedback loops.
What financial services organizations get wrong
Most digital transformation initiatives fail because they focus on technology before strategy or worse, before people.
Misstep #1. Thinking digitization = transformation
Moving your services online is not digital transformation. Launching a mobile app doesn’t fix broken processes. Real transformation starts with understanding customer data and user behavior, then using that insight to redesign how your systems work from front-end UX to back-end logic.
Misstep #2. Ignoring internal resistance
Change is uncomfortable, especially for teams used to the old ways of doing things. But successful digital transformation requires user adoption internally first. You need buy-in from your key stakeholders: operations, compliance, engineering, design.
Misstep #3. Skipping the MVP phase
Financial services companies often aim for full-scale deployment from the start. That’s risky. A better approach? Build a testable MVP, validate with real users, and iterate fast. That’s how fintech startups outpace giants.
What successful leaders in financial services do differently
Here’s what sets successful digital transformation strategies apart in the financial industry.
They prioritize data analytics
Big data isn’t just for forecasting. When leveraged correctly, it reveals pain points, usage patterns, and conversion roadblocks across all digital platforms. Smart analysis drives smarter product design.
They build modular, API-ready systems
Rigid platforms are dead weight. Yet, 70% of IT budgets in the banking industry are still spent on maintaining current systems, which leaves little room for real transformation unless priorities shift. The shift is toward composable architectures: lightweight, scalable, and integrated via APIs. This improves operational efficiency and lets you plug in new technologies without breaking your system.
They put UX at the center
The financial sector has traditionally treated UX as a “nice-to-have.” That’s over. Today, a frictionless, secure, mobile-first experience isn’t a bonus, it’s the bare minimum. After all, 58% of customers say they would switch financial providers for a better digital experience.
✅ Pro tip: Treat every user interaction like a transaction, it must be fast, secure, and emotionally intuitive.
They see compliance as a design constraint
Regulatory compliance is a fact of life. But when baked into the product from the ground up, it becomes an asset. It builds consumer trust and ensures secure transactions: two things no fintech product can survive without.
Cross-sector learnings: what financial services can learn from other sectors
In industries like retail, logistics, and healthcare, digital technologies have already transformed how businesses attract and retain users. Financial services can borrow from these lessons:
- Retail: Companies have gone beyond just selling products, by tapping into data, they create ultra-personalized experiences. Think tailored recommendations, customized deals, and seamless shopping that feels like it’s made just for you.
- Healthcare: Protecting sensitive info is huge here. Companies have built super-secure systems that let patients and doctors access important data anytime, anywhere, without risking privacy.
- Logistics: Real-time tracking and predictive analytics are their secret weapons. By monitoring shipments live and using data to anticipate delays or demand spikes, they keep everything moving smoothly and efficiently.
These industries have embraced new systems to serve new clients. It’s time for finance to do the same.
Lazarev.agency’s cases for better UX in financial services
A McKinsey study showed that financial institutions that invested in digital innovation and customer experien
ce outperformed laggards by 3.5x in total returns to shareholders. This proves that focusing on user-centric design is a key driver of business success.
Accern Platform
Accern needed a full redesign to improve user trust and clarity in AI-driven financial data classification. Lazarev.agency rebuilt their interface from scratch, focusing on transparency, real-time insights, and team collaboration.
Key strategies:
- Emphasized data veracity with clear explanations and source citations
- Enabled real-time news updates and sharing tools
- Designed modular, customizable dashboards
Results: Boosted user trust and engagement, contributing $40M revenue over 7 years.
Tratta
Tratta wanted an intuitive dashboard to simplify complex financial data and streamline payment management. Lazarev.agency created a clean, data-driven interface with easy navigation and customization options.
Key strategies:
- Presented key financial metrics with simple graphs
- Designed an intuitive payment workflow
- Allowed user customization via widgets
Results: Increased user satisfaction and daily engagement.
Prismatic
Prismatic’s advanced accounting platform needed a user-friendly overhaul to handle subsidiaries, permissions, and data imports smoothly. Lazarev.agency designed a stepwise onboarding process and introduced branching tables for clarity.
Key strategies:
- Developed detailed onboarding covering data import and setup
- Created branching UI for managing subsidiaries and permissions
- Focused on easing transition from legacy systems
Results: Faster adoption and reduced user support issues.
Blank
Blank required a sleek, professional interface for account management. Lazarev.agency used a monochrome palette with bold typography to create a trustworthy, easy-to-navigate dashboard.
Key strategies:
- Applied minimalistic monochrome design
- Used strong typography for readability
- Prioritized simplicity and quick access to key features
Results: Enhanced brand credibility and improved user experience.
Do you want greater value from your digital platforms? Prioritize the customer journey. Optimize UX. And build transformation efforts on actual user data.
How Lazarev.agency helps financial services companies stay competitive
We uncover what your users actually need through qualitative interviews, usage tracking, and behavioral analysis. Then we turn that into a design direction that aligns with business goals.
If you’re launching a fintech startup or revamping an enterprise-grade platform, our MVP approach delivers fast, testable prototypes, so you can get real feedback before going all-in.
Got a product that feels outdated? We’ll audit, optimize, and redesign the experience with clarity, precision, and measurable outcomes. You get less risk and more traction with our BFSI digital transformation.
Digital transformation in the financial services industry is about meeting customer demands with clarity, speed, and trust. Financial services organizations that win in this increasingly digital world will be the ones that align emerging technologies with real human needs.
No more band-aids. It’s time for bold moves. Want to turn your legacy platform into a modern, customer-first financial product? Then give Lazarev.agency a call and we will help you design smarter, faster, and more human-centric experiences. Let’s build what your customers actually want.
