Connect with the author: suraya.randawa@curinos.com
Excerpted from the author’s presentation at FinovateSpring 2026 on May 8 in San Diego.
Sustainable deposit growth increasingly depends on a bank’s ability to be efficient in acquiring, converting and retaining new-to-bank relationships. But that challenge is becoming harder as acquisition costs rise and balances at origination decline. According to Curinos data, customer acquisition costs for traditional financial institutions increased 77% from 2019 to 2025, while customer balances at acquisition are now 11% lower than in 2023.
But growth is no longer about spending more on marketing—it’s about using data and decision intelligence to acquire the right customers. Curinos has demonstrated that targeted acquisition can more than double campaign response rates and generate more than five times higher balances at acquisition by focusing on prospects most likely to bring long-term value.
And when it comes to converting those customers, reducing the friction at onboarding is one of the most effective levers to pull. Banks with high “Journey Effort Scores”—caused by excessive fields, taps, and onboarding complexity—are losing customers to national banks and fintechs with more seamless digital experiences. Lower-effort application and onboarding journeys, on the other hand, have been shown to produce materially better outcomes, including 13% higher completion of initial PII fields, 20% greater completion rates, and double the likelihood of first-week funding.
The Benefits of Lower Journey Effort
more applicants completing the
first PII field
more completed applicants
likelihood of funding
new accounts in Week 1
Sources: Curinos Digital Acquisition Benchmark and Curinos Digital Banking Analyzer
