Consumers Don’t Take One Road to a New Account Anymore. Your Marketing Can’t Either.
By Corey Wrinn, Managing Director at Rivel Banking Research
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A prospective customer hears about a rate from a friend, checks your website, Googles competitors, scans YouTube reviews and then sees an AI-generated answer before ever clicking apply. That is the new account opening journey for banking consumers, and it is not moving through one obvious entry point.
That matters because many internal debates on marketing still assume there is one channel that can be the overwhelming favorite. Our latest Rivel research suggests there is not.
- When we asked people who recently opened an account why they chose the institution they did, no single reason cracked 15%.
- When we asked where consumers go to research a new product, no single channel was more important than 45%.
The decision is fragmented, and so is the journey to it. That is the whole ballgame, and it changes how we should think about spending.
There Is No Single Reason People Choose You
Based on a Summer 2026 custom Rivel research project, this is what recent consumer account openers told us drove their decision to pick the financial institution they did:
- Preexisting relationship: 15%
- Promotional offer: 14%
- Quality and ease-of-use of technology: 12%
- Referrals from friends and family: 10%
- Range of products: 9%
- Size and reputation: 9%
- Local presence: 7%
- Referral from a trusted banker: 5%
There is no runaway winner, and that is the point. The reasons people pick you are spread across relationship, price, technology and word of mouth. They also split hard by generation:
- Existing relationships matter most with Boomers. A preexisting relationship drove 21% of Boomers but only 8% of Millennials. The loyalty you can count on from older customers is not there with younger ones (yet).
- Younger customers shop on price and product. A promotional offer topped the list for Gen X (20%) and mattered far more to Millennials (16%) than to Boomers (11%).
- Technology is a real acquisition driver. Ease-of-use of apps and websites drove 16% of Millennials to their choice — double the 8% among Boomers.
- Gen Z leans on outside voices as they learn. They were the most likely to cite a friend or family referral (13%), a trusted banker (9%) and a site like NerdWallet or Bankrate (8%, versus just 1% of Boomers).
If your entire pitch rests on one message — “we have the best rate,” or “we’re your neighborhood bank” — you are likely speaking clearly to one segment while underserving the others.
The Research Journey Is Just as Fragmented
Now layer on the second finding from the same Rivel study — the channels people actually use to research a new product. For a checking account, your own website leads at 43%, which is important, but not enough on its own. A traditional search engine is close at 34%, friends and family at 30%, review sites like NerdWallet and Bankrate at 16%, AI-powered search summaries at 14% and social or YouTube at 14%.
Two patterns matter here:
- A single prospect rarely uses just one of these channels. They cross-check. Someone might land on your site, verify you on a review site, ask a friend and confirm with an AI summary, all before they ever walk in or click “apply.”
- Your website’s advantage shrinks as products get more complex. It drives 43% of checking research but only 26% for money market accounts and 20% for trust and estate planning. (Trust is especially telling, where 40%-plus say they have never researched the product at all.) Those are opportunities for the institution that shows up with a clear answer first.
AI Is Already Part of the Research Journey
It is tempting to wave off AI as a rounding error in the above results, but the numbers say otherwise. Based on Rivel’s 2026 research, roughly one in seven consumers researching a checking account leaned on an AI-generated search summary, and an additional one in 10 went straight to a tool like ChatGPT or Claude. Add those together, factor in that most “traditional” digital searches now serve an AI overview at the top, and AI is already influencing a meaningful share of the research journey.
This should not send you into a panic but rather reframe your decision making on marketing investment. AI does not invent an opinion of your bank on its own, it builds one from what already exists — your website, third-party coverage, review sites and what customers or members say about you. If your message is consistent and verifiable across those sources, AI is more likely to repeat it. If it is thin or contradictory, AI may surface someone else’s clearer story or opinion instead. Most AI tools are not simply another channel to buy like newspapers and TV. They reflect how coherent your market presence is right now.
The Job Is Consistency Across the Journey
Together, the findings point to a simple conclusion — you cannot buy your way to growth through one channel, and you cannot win it with one message. Prospects are building their own path, using different sources to confirm different parts of the decision. The institution that consistently wins new business is the one whose story holds together no matter the order prospects encounter it. Some areas to consider focusing starting today:
- Audit your message across every channel, not just your own. Pull up your website, your Google listing, your top review site profiles (NerdWallet or even Reddit), along with an AI answer to “best checking account in [your market].” If the rate, the tagline and the story don’t match, fix that before you spend another dollar on reach.
- Segment the message, not just the media. Lead with technology and promotional value for Millennials and Gen X, relationship and stability for Boomers, and third-party proof for Gen Z. Same brand, different entry points for these groups. Broad but effective starting out.
- Feed the sources AI reads. Publish clear, structured, question-and-answer content that directly addresses what prospects ask and build outside coverage and reviews. Consistent information across credible sources is what AI is more likely to repeat.
- Show up first for the products consumers find confusing. For money market accounts, CDs, mortgages and trust and estate planning, 30%-40% of consumers aren’t looking at all online. Be the institution that shows up with a plain language answer, and you have a chance to earn attention before the field gets crowded.
- Measure what moved. Don’t judge the effort by impressions on one channel. Track whether awareness, consideration and reputation are climbing across your market since those are the measures that better reflect a journey that’s fragmented like it is today.
The bottom line: There is no single path to a new account anymore. Consumers are building their own route across search, reviews, referrals, your website and AI-generated answers. The institutions that win will not be the ones that bet everything on one channel or one message. They will be the ones whose story is consistent, credible and easy to confirm everywhere consumers look.
