What Mobile Trends Mean to the Financial Services Industry

There is no question that mobile usage within the financial services industry is growing exponentially. Improved networks, increased applications and deployment of multiple smartphone technologies have encouraged quicker adoption by consumers and industry professionals alike. As in many other industries, these technologies have helped blur the lines between personal and professional use.

Banking and financial services business leaders who understand the changing wireless landscape will have an easier time leveraging their web presence and gaining a strategic advantage by deploying applications that support a mobile workforce. Here are a few trends related to mobile deployment and usage to get you started in that analysis:

• Global mobile users are expected to surpass desktop internet users by 2014.
• On average there will be one mobile phone for every person on earth by 2015.
• 41% of U.S. online consumers own a smartphone.
• Sales of tablet PCs are expected to reach 500 million by 2014.
• More than 2 billion people have mobile phones but no bank account (expansion opportunity) 
• M2M generated revenue will triple for businesses by 2015.
• In the past year mobile searches have grown four fold.
• Half of all mobile searches lead to a purchase.

It is critical to optimize your company’s online presence to support the increased number of users browsing and accessing information, possibly on your organization and its services, on their phones. 

You may want to begin by testing your website on multiple mobile devices or with a simulator. Most users now expect their online mobile experience to be on a par with their desktop experience. According to Google about two thirds of mobile users will not re-visit a site if it doesn’t load after two tries. If you find that the site isn’t loading correctly or easy to navigate have your team build out a mobile version of the site or optimize the existing site for mobile viewing.

It is equally as important to provide your employees with secure, remote, mobile access. The number of companies working virtually continues to grow as they interact with customers, conduct business transactions and attract new prospects while away from the office. Employees today want to use their own mobile devices to increase their own productivity. One of our partners, Cisco, has embraced this Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) vision and continues to build solutions to help IT departments who are receiving an increased number of requests to support a wide variety of these technologies. 

Cisco AnyConnect Secure Mobility Solutions is a great place to start for providing secure access to your enterprise. Their Mobility Client now supports the more popular devices used by your organization’s mobile workforce including phones and tablets running on the Android, iOS (Apple), Nokia Symbian and Windows Mobile platforms. To learn more about how these solutions offer a common, predictable user experience while also addressing productivity and security concerns please give us a call and we’ll be happy to provide you with more information.  Our team of consultants and solutions experts is ready to help assist you and your team with gaining insight and developing a roadmap to a more competitive future for your organization.

Building an Environment to Support Scalability and Rapid Deployment

There are three primary factors that define the security of your organization’s applications and information while also enabling quick and reliable transmission of that data over a converged network; the hardware that makes up your technology infrastructure, the network that your data is transmitted over and the people who support it. Having the right balance of these elements will contribute to sales, customer service and innovation. It will also make your business more agile by establishing an environment that supports scalability and rapid deployment.

Here are a few of the other benefits associated with creating this type of ecosystem:

• Provides both employees and customers with the information and support they need when they need and on their preferred devices
• Strengthens connections with customers to increase loyalty and satisfaction
• Connects people in less time and with contextual relevance
• Personalizes the customer experience with voice, web, email, video and social media
• Accelerates time to resolution by using an integrated communications network to identify and resolve customer issues

One of our partners, Cisco, offers a suite of Unified Communications resources to make sure that your data is secure and your apps run effectively over a single converged network. Products like their Virtualization Experience Client, UC Gateway and Business Edition 6000 contribute to an improved customer experience. Their products also help enable collaboration by offering reliable communications support for delivering multiple applications like voice, video and presence services to various types of devices and IP endpoints. Embracing Cisco’s technology allows your IT team to support business-critical apps and data while also providing your organization with interoperable connectivity to your communications provider. 

The right communications partner will allow businesses to access information, strengthen relationships and enable success. They can also provide you with the correct mix of connectivity to match your needs and budget. Find a service provider who can deliver voice and data networking at the best cost per service. This might mean that your information runs on the networks of multiple providers. But companies like IPLogic, who offer carrier solutions, can serve as a single source for billing, customer support and help managing multiple communications services and providers.

Your IT team will appreciate the functionality of the Cisco equipment and management interface. And you will benefit from the purchasing and admin assistance that a third-party communications provider can offer. Engaging a partner allows you to augment your existing team with additional technical expertise and support. Adopting this model can also deliver access to immediate assistance with upgrades and hardware maintenance.

Taking a look at each of these critical components is the first step to improving the experience for both your employees and external stakeholders. Let us know how we can help you identify the right hardware, technology and communications configuration to support your organization’s growth and continued success.

Focus: Managed Services for the Healthcare Industry

Challenges such as constantly shifting government regulations, growing staffing issues, increasing expenses, competition and rapid changes to the economic payment model are driving the need for a review of the industry’s technology needs and assumptions.  Significant change can often be challenging in any industry. But for both patients and providers it can be especially disruptive.  The fact also remains that these changes can also produce tangible benefits for all stakeholders.  Engaging a competent partner to provide assistance and expertise in managing through these changes will help your organization effectively address its technology strategy and navigate many of the potential negative impacts caused by these industry changes.

A competent managed services provider that brings relevant industry experience and expertise will help your organization address the shifting requirements in maintaining and monitoring critical technology platforms responsible for electronic health records (EHRs), lab information systems, patient billing, HIPAA compliance, practice management, HL7 interfacing with clinical devices, storage and physician mobility. They should be expected to help reduce liability associated with regulations impacting the industry by maintaining secure and compliant systems. If you select the right provider to partner with they should also be able to contribute to reduced healthcare costs, decreased downtime and improving the services and experience you provide to your patients.

So, how do you get started? 

Begin by researching a few managed services providers to see what they offer and the industries where they have experience. Their websites are an obvious starting point. Be prepared to also dig a little deeper into the range of technical expertise offered by their employees. This can often be found by the scanning the business partners listed on their website (Cisco, VMware, NetApp, etc.) or the industry / technical certifications they promote (Partner Certification or Specialization level, GOLD Level, CCIE, CCNA, etc.).

The next step, once you have identified a group of possible service providers, is to identify one service that can serve as a starting point to assist with your technology management strategy. For example, below is a list of the typical service offerings:

• Backup and Recovery - Provides redundant access and portability for critical patient information while also reducing exposure to HIPPA violations as outlined in this past blog post.
• Communications - Carrier solutions can address your telecommunications and networking requirements with voice, data and video connectivity built specifically to align with your needs.
• Engineering Support & Maintenance - Skilled technology professionals are available to supplement your internal team by assisting with network, infrastructure and application support as well as performing hardware upgrades and replacements.
• Mobility - Wireless devices are managed and mobile applications are secured and maintained to deliver increased efficiency.
• Network Monitoring and Management – Devices and components that exist on your network to manage communications and applications (e.g. servers, routers, etc.) are proactively monitored 24x7 to deliver the benefits outlined in this past blog post.
• Security - Protects information and applications utilizing technologies ranging from anti-virus software to firewalls and encrypted data transmission.

Limiting the initial interaction to a single service or two gives you the opportunity to begin interacting with a few managed services providers, learn more about their offerings and capabilities and make a more informed decision based on experience.