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The Signicat Blog

Onboarding wins: how customers increased conversion rates

Total Economic Impact™ study shows conversion rate boost

We think of the world today as a digital one. But right now, more than two-thirds of potential customers are abandoning digital applications. And if anything, things are getting worse, not better.

68% of consumers dropped out of a digital sign-up in 2022, up from 63% in 2020. That equates to €5.7 billion in lost revenue for financial services firms alone each year, according to the latest Signicat Battle to Onboard research.

It’s clearly not great for customers if they’re so frustrated that they quit part-way through the process never to return. Either because it takes too long (21%) or they’re asked for too much information (a further 21%).

“We wanted to offer a more seamless digital journey than the one we had in the past, and Signicat helps resolve [that] pain point from a business and customer journey perspective.”

Director of business development and digital capabilities, financial services - Forrester TEI study

It’s even less great for financial service providers and their conversion rates. Because the time, effort and cost associated with customer acquisition are large. And the fully loaded costs of failing to convert them into customers even larger.

The opportunity cost of the customer lifetime value could be significant and outstrips new customer acquisition costs. And with competitors only a mouse-click away, no business can afford to turn away genuine customers, or gets a second chance to make a first impression.

Improve conversion rates with remote customer identification

Knowing who you are dealing with is becoming increasingly critical as part of customer acquisition and retention, especially in regulated sectors. But how do businesses achieve this without compromising the customer experience or increasing abandonment?

Today, an increasing number of organizations are embracing digital processes, including digital identification and verification (ID&V) of customers. It’s clearly quicker, cheaper and more efficient to verify a person’s identity or sign a contract digitally than in person.

Nevertheless, digitalization is no panacea. Organizations must coordinate various considerations. They must deliver a secure, smooth and scalable onboarding journey, prevent fraud, comply with local regulations and advance the customer experience.

Signicat’s value is in offering an easy digital journey for the customer, meeting AML and KYC requirements, and still at the same time reducing fraudsters.

Director of business development and digital capabilities, financial services - Forrester TEI study

Signicat’s digital identity platform streamlines time-consuming, manual processes during customer acquisition with a single platform to verify and authenticate individuals and businesses. It offers a comprehensive one-stop-shop that includes identity proofing, authentication, fraud prevention and electronic signing, plus optimized orchestration of these workflows.

To quantify the business upside and cost savings enabled by Signicat’s solutions, in 2023 Signicat commissioned Forrester Consulting to conduct a Total Economic Impactä (TEI) study. The study examines the potential return on investment (ROI) businesses may realize by implementing Signicat solutions to inform technology investment decisions.

19-percentage point conversion rate increase, Total Economic Impactä study shows

Forrester interviewed five representatives with experience in using Signicat. And aggregated the interviewees’ experiences, combining the results into a single composite organization. The study revealed that Signicat has a pivotal role when it comes to higher conversion but also complying with local and regional AML regulations. 

  • An increase in customer conversion. Due to robust local identification methods across multiple markets and quicker, streamlined verification process, the composite organization experienced a 19-percentage point increase in client conversion rates. This was equivalent to €3.2 million net profit over 3 years.
  • An increase in profit from incremental customer acquisition. Signicat contributes to safely accessing higher-risk market segments and verticals. Effective and localized identification methods enable the composite organization to access new types of customers with peace of mind. Ultimately, this increased its total addressable market, so much so increased profit from additional customer acquisition totaled €423,000 over 3 years.
  • Improved customer experience. Signicat’s automated verification process reduces onboarding time for customers from a few days to just a few minutes. The potential for exceptions during authentication also decreases, improving the overall customer experience. Onboarding customers quicker also contributed to the composite organization’s revenues faster. 
  • Reduction in fraud costs. First impressions count. No organization wants to drive genuine customers away. But fraudsters? Not so much. Due to its different identification methods and fraud monitoring capabilities, Signicat reduces the number of fraudulent customers the composite organization onboards. It also prevented fraudsters, who are impersonating genuine customers, from accessing customers’ accounts or portals, resulting in a 75% reduction in fraud rate, or €7.5 million over 3 years for the composite organization.

“With Signicat, customers now have the feeling of a brand that offers a smooth digital journey as the first thing they see when they onboard, which makes a great first impression.”

Director of business development and digital capabilities, financial services - Forrester TEI study