Over the years, Financial Services has been one of the most disrupted industries, driven by rapid technological advancements, the rise of fintech, and evolving customer expectations. This has led to Financial Services websites becoming key digital engagement hubs for customers to interact with their respective providers.
Digital experience challenges in financial services
While financial institutions have adapted to the changing environment in which they operate, and digitally transformed over the years, many still struggle to deliver seamless, personalized experiences.
This challenge is reflected in our findings from the recently released Websites 2025 Report, where 92% of marketers across industries, including Financial Services, emphasize the importance of personalization in driving impactful business outcomes. However, only 32% believe their current CMS (Customer Management System) platforms support effective personalization, highlighting a gap between ambition and execution.
Likewise, only 11% of financial institutions say they deliver excellent customer experience, and the number is only 28% when it comes to above average customer experience delivery.
Customer switching
The gap in delivering seamless, personalized experiences in Financial Services has resulted in increasing customer dissatisfaction. In the US, 28% of bank account holders indicated a willingness to switch their primary bank at the next opportunity in 2024, a 12% increase from 2019.
In the UK market, major banks like Barclays have seen more customers switching away than joining through the Current Account Switch Service over the past year. According to data from CASS, between Q4 2023 and Q3 2024, Barclays lost an average of 1.34 customers for every customer gained through customer acquisition from competitors. A key driver of this switching behavior is the expectation for digital-first, hyper personalized banking experiences. Gen Z and Millennials overwhelmingly prefer mobile-first and AI-driven interactions, demanding more than just basic digital banking services. According to research done by Finder in Jan 2025, 4 in 5 members of Gen Z surveyed in the UK have or intend to open a digital-only bank account.
For traditional banks, competing against digital-first challengers, like neo-banks and fintech disruptors, means prioritizing hyper-personalization, AI-driven engagement and omnichannel experiences.
Bridging the gap
In today’s generative AI era, offering AI-powered personalization including chatbots, virtual assistants, personalized content and behavior-based recommendations have become a necessity for financial institutions. Customers today expect their financial journeys to be seamless and tailored to their needs, whether they are exploring mortgage options, seeking investment insights or managing everyday transactions.
To bridge this gap, financial institutions are integrating AI-powered personalization tools with modern CMS platforms to deliver real-time, tailored experiences. A CMS is no longer just a content repository.It plays a central role in ensuring that personalized content is dynamically delivered based on customer behaviors, preferences and interactions across multiple channels.
As financial institutions refine their personalization strategies, they are also turning to AI-powered decisioning engines and personalization tools like Sitecore Personalize to enhance the way personalized content, offers and recommendations are delivered. A CMS that works seamlessly with personalization tools allows financial marketers to move beyond static content, and create responsive, customer-first digital experiences that evolve in real time.
This is well reflected in our findings from the Websites 2025 Report, where a striking 97% of marketing executives surveyed, including those from Financial Services, identified AI and automation as critical to the future success of their websites.
As quoted from the 2025 Website Report, “The growing importance and capabilities of AI will be essential to a website e.g., chatbots/virtual assistants, delivery of highly personalized content, etc.
However, the shift towards digital-first financial services has also elevated security and privacy risks. Financial institutions are now dealing with rising ransomware attacks, data breaches and cyber security incidents. In fact, 2023 saw the highest number of cyber incidents and data breaches in financial services for the period between 2013 -2023.
Personalization and AI/GenAI
The Websites 2025 report highlights personalization (78%), and AI/GenAI and optimization (75%) as the top two areas for websites investment in the next three years.
Financial service websites are elevating customer experience by:
- Localizing personalization to improve experience and better align with regional regulatory compliance
- Offering personalized financial advice, recommendations for financial products based on user behavior
- Delivering personalized and consistent cross channel experiences(online and offline) to boost engagement and customer satisfaction
Banks and financial institutions are also leveraging AI-powered chatbots to personalize customer interactions and enhance support experiences. These chatbots provide 24/7 customer support across regions, enabling customers to get their queries addressed and complete regular banking tasks without physically connecting with a support agent via phone, live chat or in-person visits.
Financial Services leaders, like Bank of America, have already made huge strides in this area with over 98% of their clients getting answers from their virtual assistant Erica. Since its launch in 2018, BofA’s Erica has surpassed over 2 billion interactions and has helped 42 million clients (as of April’2024). While it took 4 years to reach 1 billion interactions, only 18 months was needed to reach the 2 billion, which once again highlights the increasing adoption of AI-powered chatbots and their growing maturity.
A lot of innovation is also happening in security compliance as well with financial institutions investing in website security, fraud detection and risk prevention initiatives to safeguard customer data, and provide customers with frictionless experiences. In fact, fraud detection is identified as a key use case for AI in Financial Services, with 85% of senior payment professionals indicating it as key application in 2024.
AI-powered CMS: The core foundation of website innovation
Financial services firms are already seeing the impact of a modern AI-powered CMS in transforming their digital experiences. Acrisure, a leading US fintech firm, leveraged Sitecore XM Cloud to enhance their direct-to-customer engagement. Their new website, built on XM Cloud, has achieved 100% faster page loading speed, improvement in lighthouse scores and an 80% increase in SEO scores. The new platform also seamlessly integrates with Acrisure’s digital models and AI technologies, ensuring a faster and more intelligent customer experience.
Similarly, Sparebanken Vest, a leading Norwegian bank, adopted Sitecore XM Cloud, a cloud-based modern CMS. The switch enabled the bank’s marketing team to create and update digital content without relying on technical resources, improving content production efficiency by 80%. It resulted in greater agility, faster execution and an 88% reduction in the time needed to develop and release website front end code, freeing up teams to focus on higher value digital initiatives.
These examples highlight how financial institutions are leveraging modern CMS platforms to enhance personalization, integrate AI capabilities and strengthen security and compliance.
For deeper insights into the trends, priorities, and challenges shaping the next generation of financial services websites, download our 2025 websites report.