How Financial Services Brands Can Drive Stronger Engagement and Retention

Customers are setting a higher bar for financial services institutions. Establishing trust and foregrounding security was always core to success in this industry, but customers today expect a lot more. They expect their most sensitive financial and personal details to be managed responsibly. They also expect their data to be used to improve their experience, surfacing relevant, timely information that goes beyond account alerts. The stakes are higher with every push notification, email, and SMS, as discerning customers use all of the above and more to connect with their banks, their mortgage lender, or their financial advisor.

Modern variables call for modern solutions in customer messaging that meet or even exceed customer expectations. But using customer data responsibly to deliver relevant and engaging experiences, isn’t only a win for customers—financial services brands also stand to make gains in the long run, too.

Customer Engagement in the Financial Services Industry

Not all channels are created equal for all messages, and emerging channels have gained ground. According to survey data from the 2025 Customer Engagement Review (CER), 40% of financial services companies named messaging apps, such as WhatsApp, Line, and Kakao, as their biggest channel they are using or want to use in the next year.

By sending the right message on the right channel, financial services brands can better serve their customers. Financial services brands should adopt a cross-channel approach to customer engagement, because we know that customers expect to connect across SMS, email, in-app messaging, push notifications, and more.

The Impact of Cross-Channel Messaging

How successful are financial services companies at achieving those goals? The most recent Braze user data suggests strong engagement across channels has a tangible impact on customer retention in financial services.

The 2025 CER data found that 51% of surveyed financial services companies design their customer engagement strategy to improve a combination of engagement metrics and downstream metrics monetization, retention, and loyalty.

Of financial services companies using Braze, those that sent zero messages on any channel vs. those that only sent messages via one channel saw a 2.9X increase in 90-day retention. Furthermore, companies that engaged customers on two channels vs. one saw a 69% increase in 90-day retention. While 90-day retention is a small window into what long-term loyalty might look like through the lens of customer engagement, the short-term results are promising.

Final Thoughts

Consumers today are used to engaging with brands across different devices, platforms, and channels. To provide an experience across all of those touchpoints that feels valuable, meaningful, and cohesive to the individual customers, financial services brands must serve the right message at the right time. That means “listening” carefully to what customers have to say every time they engage with your messages—or taking note when they don’t. While listening and adjusting messages accordingly delivers the experiences customers want, financial services brands also have the chance to go beyond short-term monetization goals, building enduring relationships as a result of successful customer engagement.

Forward-looking statements
This Blog post contains “forward-looking statements” within the meaning of the “safe harbor” provisions of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995, including but not limited to, statements regarding the performance of and expected benefits from Braze and its products. These forward-looking statements are based on the current assumptions, expectations and beliefs of Braze, and are subject to substantial risks, uncertainties and changes in circumstances that may cause actual results, performance or achievements to be materially different from any future results, performance or achievements expressed or implied by the forward-looking statements. Further information on potential factors that could affect Braze results are included in the Braze Quarterly Report on Form 10-Q for the fiscal quarter ended March 31, 2024, filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission on December 10, 2024, and the other public filings of Braze with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. The forward-looking statements included in this blog post represent the views of Braze only as of the date of this blog post, and Braze assumes no obligation, and does not intend to update these forward-looking statements, except as required by law.