The Forrester Wave™: Financial Services CRM, Q3 2023

Financial Services CRM Vendor Product Comparisons 2023

Key features and pros and cons of top Financial Services CRM products:

BUSINESSNEXT - Leaders

Pros:

Composable cloud-native platform to accelerate digital transformation
Strong vision to unify data lake, customer experience, and customer data platform
Superior product roadmap focusing on intelligent, continuous, and autonomous platform
AI infused across platform for prospecting, lead generation, and customer 360 view
Strength in financial services domain knowledge
Platform ease of use

Cons:

Strategy does not emphasize supporting agent- and advisor-led customer service
Lacks contextually relevant AI-powered knowledge management assistance for agents and advisors

Microsoft - Leaders

Pros:

Superior vision to power customer experience, employees, and optimized operations through enhanced data and intelligence
Robust customer insights and 360-degree view of customer
Predictive analytics from previous customer interactions and real-time conversations
Virtual agent chatbots using natural language
Ease of integration with other Microsoft tools
Good customization possibilities
Significant roadmap improvements to AI-driven solutions including ChatGPT and copiloting systems

Cons:

Financial-services-specific prepackaged capabilities are patchy
Investment and wealth management is less advanced than retail banking or insurance

Salesforce - Leaders

Pros:

Well known in CRM market with portfolio breadth dominance
Robust marketing engine and extended developer network
Exhaustive app ecosystem with more than 5,000 prebuilt apps
Extensive partner ecosystem with 200,000+ expert consultants and agencies
Superior roadmap including personalized marketing, OOTB onboarding templates, and compliance features
Strong prospecting and outreach capabilities through campaign designer and journey builder
AI-based customizable UI and data models
Prepackaged Einstein AI insights

Cons:

Reference customers noted strategy did not always translate to execution
Struggles with packaging and licensing cited by customers

Creatio - Strong Performers

Pros:

Full-featured CRM suite marrying marketing, service, and sales in no-code platform
Robust process management engine enabling citizen developers to model, deploy, and optimize workflows and AI models
Supports customer 360 view, goal tracking, and next best offers
Ease of use, navigation, and composable architecture praised by reference customers
Cloud-based and onsite options available
Enterprise-ready composable architecture with wide range of reusable elements

Cons:

Lacks some prebuilt financial services functions
Analytics and account opening functionality requires customization for financial services
Investment and wealth management specific integrations are missing
Does not prioritize certification of third-party apps and broader range of OOTB industry capabilities

Pegasystems - Strong Performers

Pros:

AI-powered decisioning and workflow automation through low-code platform
Strong ability to automate large-scale repetitive tasks
Outpaced other vendors in prospecting and outreach through robust campaign orchestration
No-code decision-making at lead generation stage
AI and next best actions infused within customer 360 elements
Verticalized workflows support retail banking and insurance
Roadmap focuses on unifying experiences, composable architecture, and deepening automation

Cons:

Missing key industry-specific elements
Does not support investment and wealth management
Misses the mark on client goal tracking
Lacks financial-services-specific prepackaged capabilities such as customer self-service journeys and employee profiles
Declined to participate in full Forrester Wave evaluation process

ServiceNow - Strong Performers

Pros:

Unified workflow orchestration and automation capabilities
Robust employee collaboration tools through embedded channels
Advanced work assignment routing
Extensibility through declarative actions and API accessibility
Strong, curated agent and advisor role-profile support
Superior roadmap including core banking integrations and process-based UX improvements
Reference customers note stout app integration marketplace offerings

Cons:

Offers customer service functionality but only basic sales and marketing
Sales and marketing are not a focus
Depends on third-party integrations for crucial financial services elements like lead generation and prospecting tools

Oracle - Contenders

Pros:

Cloud-based solutions strategy bringing together siloed back-office processes, customer interactions, and real-time data
General-purpose solution supporting customer through entire journey with human-assisted and automated touchpoints
Dynamic and AI-based lead assignment and routing for robust lead generation
Embedded playbooks, guided insights, next best actions, and guided workflows for agents
AI-driven insights in knowledge management
Automated help center portals for customers

Cons:

B2B financial services market is current focus - moving away from legacy financial-services-specific solutions
Missing industry-specific prepackaged capabilities for B2C retail banking, insurance, and investment and wealth management
Declined to participate in full Forrester Wave evaluation process

Total Expert - Contenders

Pros:

Purpose-built CRM for mortgage industry
Broad prospecting and outreach capabilities
Retail banking integration tooling favoring mortgage-related businesses
Hundreds of prebuilt compliant assets connected to journey creator and campaign builder
Intelligent customer journeys with automatic triggering events and workflow rules
Reference customers praise ease of use, customer support, and vendor's business understanding

Cons:

Focuses on lending elements but lacks broad financial services capabilities
Vision lacks differentiation
Lacks substantive lead generation and prioritization
Missing prepackaged analytics, customer self-service, knowledge management, and goal tracking
Less programmatic customization compared to other purpose-built CRM solutions
Roadmap lacks focus on AI and ML to optimize journeys and automation

HubSpot - Challengers

Pros:

Highly flexible pricing and product bundling with customizable hubs
Tools such as chatbot for retrieving support resources and sidebar for employee collaboration
Role and profile identification with relevant knowledge and workflow support
Pursues product-led growth motion with freemium editions
Roadmap focuses on increased customization, ease of navigation, and business reporting tools

Cons:

Lacks depth in financial services
Strategy is not to deliver purpose-built solution for financial services
Not built specifically for retail banking, insurance, or wealth management roles
Lacks depth of crucial functionality including prospecting and outreach, lead generation and prioritization, customer insights and 360, and customer goal tracking
Declined to participate in full Forrester Wave evaluation process

Zoho - Challengers

Pros:

Software aims to streamline processes, build customer relationships, increase sales, and improve customer service
AI-based intelligent assistants to streamline interactions and predict customer needs
Broad capabilities in lead generation and prioritization, knowledge management, and automated workflows
Generic prepackaged integrations available
Extensive partner ecosystem in 170+ countries
Product-led growth motion with freemium editions for small customers

Cons:

Customizable but lacks key prepackaged financial services integrations
Strategy is not to offer purpose-built solutions for financial services
Capabilities lack depth and OOTB financial services capabilities of leading CRM solutions
Does not offer prepackaged integrations specific to retail banking, insurance, or wealth management
Misses the mark on prospecting and outreach, self-service, goal tracking, and 360 view
Declined to participate in full Forrester Wave evaluation process

FAQs

Q: Which vendors are Leaders in 2023?

A: BUSINESSNEXT, Microsoft, Salesforce

Q: What does "Leader" mean in Forrester Wave terms?

A: Leaders in the Forrester Wave are vendors that demonstrate the strongest current offering combined with the strongest strategy in the financial services CRM market. Leaders show superior performance across key evaluation criteria including prospecting and outreach, lead generation and prioritization, customer insight and 360 view, AI and automation capabilities, and financial-services-specific functionalities. They also exhibit strong vision, innovation, roadmap execution, partner ecosystems, and market presence. Leaders are best positioned to support midsize to large financial services firms with complex process management needs across retail banking, insurance, and investment and wealth management.

Q: How do I interpret a Forrester Wave?

A: https://www.forrester.com/policies/forrester-wave-methodology/

Report:

Top Vendor Products for Financial Services CRM in 2023

Financial Services CRM Vendor Product Comparisons 2023

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FAQs

Q: Which vendors are Leaders in 2023?

Q: What does "Leader" mean in Forrester Wave terms?

Q: How do I interpret a Forrester Wave?

Reference