How to Adapt to the Evolution of Payments With Melissa Kopp of Neural Payments

Episode Summary

Change is difficult for everyone – for some more than others. Communication – whether to employees or account holders – can make change much more palatable.

In this episode of the Digital Banking Podcast, Melissa Kopp got into the need for communication in the corporate world and pointed out the importance of fintech for increasing an FI’s speed to market. She and host Josh DeTar discussed changes in consumer payments, the risks of this process, and fintech’s role in all of this.

Key Insights

⚡Conversation solves all problems. As a sports fanatic, Melissa firmly believes in team spirit and emphasizes that all challenges can be overcome through open conversation and acceptance of different opinions. “We need to be open to change. And I know that sounds corny and kind of strange, but we really do — because the cheese has moved,” she said. “And we need to be open to new ideas and new ways of doing things so that we can deliver seamless experiences. We need to move away from legacy.”

⚡Fintech doesn’t have to be a bad word. According to Kopp, fintech is not your FI’s enemy. “Fintech sometimes gets classified as, ‘Oh, this is a competitor. This is someone who is going to actually take business away from me,’ when the opposite is true,” she told DeTar. “The opposite means that this is someone who’s going to increase your speed to market. This is someone who’s going to be able to implement cool new solutions. Your end users want what they’re asking for; they’re just going somewhere else and getting it right now. And we, as fintechs, are going to be able to help embed these solutions and these kinds of trusted applications for you.”

⚡FIs should communicate and educate accountholders about changes.If your FI doesn’t change, it will fall behind. Buy if your FI changes too fast – especially without communicating those changes – your FI will alienate many of its accountholders. According to Kopp, you need to explain every change you make to users. “Really help folks to understand, hey, here are the problems we’re solving,” she said. “Yes, it might cause you to step back and learn a new process, but once you do, man, it’s going to open up a whole new world of possibilities for you.’ So we have to hold hands in some cases, but we have to educate, and we have to be there to make answering questions and helping easy when they need it.”