Business Wire: Bank of America and Washington Mutual Reign in Online Banking Study, Keynote Reports; Dramatic Competitive Shifts Observed Across Online Banking Industry

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Bank of America and Washington Mutual Reign in Online Banking Study, Keynote Reports; Dramatic Competitive Shifts Observed Across Online Banking Industry

SAN MATEO, Calif. -- Keynote Systems (Nasdaq:KEYN):

--New Competitive Intelligence Details How Leading Online Banks Compare in Site Experience, Responsiveness and Reliability

--Bank of America and Wachovia Significantly Improve Online Customer Experience

--Washington Mutual and Bank of America Dominate First Industry Study of Site Responsiveness and Reliability

--Overall, Online Banking Sites Are Laggards in Service Levels Compared to Credit Card and Stock Trading Sites

New competitive intelligence from Keynote Systems (Nasdaq:KEYN), The Internet Performance Authority(R), uncovers dramatic competitive shifts in customer experience and significant issues in site responsiveness and reliability in the online banking industry. The study shows that Bank of America and Wachovia have made strong gains to lead the banking industry in the experience they provide to their online customers. The study also found that Washington Mutual is the current industry leader in online service levels, a measure of overall site responsiveness and reliability.

According to the Keynote Customer Experience Rankings for Online Banking Customers study, Bank of America, the nation's second largest bank, recaptured its lead as the top online banking site regaining ground lost to much smaller competitors last year. Keynote's third annual study of the customer experience at online banking sites is based on research with 1,200 customers as they interacted with one of 10 leading banking Web sites.

A companion study, the Keynote Service Level Rankings for Online Banking Customers, is the first in an ongoing series of annual competitive service level studies that Keynote will conduct to benchmark overall site responsiveness and reliability for the banking industry. The study found banking industry Web sites as a whole performing poorly, lagging behind the performance of other financial services sites such as credit card and stock trading sites. On average, bank sites are unavailable to customers more than 15 hours per week because of technical issues. The service level study is based on over 6,500 measurements of site responsiveness and reliability taken for each site over a three-week period.

Keynote evaluated the Web sites of the following companies: Bank of America (NYSE:BAC), Bank One (NYSE:JPM), Chase (NYSE:JPM), Citibank (NYSE:C), National City (NYSE:NCC), PNC Bank, SunTrust (NYSE:STI), US Bank (NYSE:USB), Wachovia (NYSE:WB), Washington Mutual (NYSE:WM) and Wells Fargo (NYSE:WFC).

"This is one of the most dramatic competitive shifts Keynote has seen in the financial services industry," said Dr. Bonny Brown, director of research at Keynote. "The study shows Bank of America and Wachovia significantly improved the online experience for their retail banking customers -- and it is paying off for them in terms of customer satisfaction and loyalty."

Of the online banking sites in the study, Bank of America, Wachovia and US Bank were determined to be the best sites according to the Keynote Customer Experience Rankings, an overall measure of online customer experience based on evaluation of more than 250 metrics.

Keynote Customer Experience Rankings
                Banking Web Sites
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  1 Bank of America
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  2 Wachovia
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  3 US Bank
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Bank of America improved its performance across the board in the 10 key categories that drive customer satisfaction, brand affinity and adoption of online customer services, topping the industry rankings for online bill pay satisfaction and customer support. Wachovia showed dramatic increases over last year in several areas, significantly improving its online brand image in large part because of its removal of fees for online bill pay services. US Bank and Citi are also satisfying customers with their online bill payment services.

Bank of America, which has the industry's highest satisfaction with online bill payment, according to the study, also has the industry's highest use of online bill payment and the greatest percentage of customers accepting online statements. More than 70 percent of Bank of America customers participating in the study reported using the bank's online bill pay services, and 30 percent reported accepting online statements. Wachovia, with the elimination of its online bill payment fees and improved services, saw a more than 50 percent gain in the number of customers using its online bill pay services, according to year over year comparisons provided in the study.

In terms of site reliability and responsiveness, as measured in the Keynote Service Level Rankings for Online Banking Customers, the Washington Mutual and Bank of America sites performed best.

Keynote Service Level Rankings -- Site Responsiveness
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  1 Washington Mutual
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  2 Bank of America
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  3 Wells Fargo
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   Keynote Service Level Rankings -- Site Reliability
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  1 Washington Mutual
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  2 Bank One
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  3 Bank of America
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"As an industry, banking Web sites perform quite poorly in terms of site reliability and responsiveness," said Ben Rushlo, manager of professional services with Keynote. "In an industry that heavily markets the availability of Web sites for after-hours self-service tasks, a lack of site availability should be a major concern. Technical problems with a site can also heighten concern for consumers already wary about privacy and security issues."

According to the Keynote study, banking Web site availability and reliability during peak hours is very poor in comparison to other financial and retail industries. Across Keynote studies in other verticals, sites are generally reliable and available 98% to 99% of the time. In this study, banking Web sites were shown to be reliable and available just 96% of the time. This translates into significant periods when bank Web sites are unavailable to customers, an average of 15 hours of site downtime per week. In comparison, credit card sites average 98% availability and online brokerage sites average a stellar 99.6% availability.

"Although several leading sites handled load very well without slowing down, most of the sites studied had a problem handling customer volume and load," said Rushlo. "The banking industry appears to be a victim of its own success in that infrastructure development has not stayed ahead of the growth in popularity of online banking services."

Online banking and bill payment features continue to grow in importance to banks in luring customers, with 55% of online consumers saying such services are a key factor in bank selection. Online banking services even trump the importance of branch locations and ATM locations, as well as customer service, in importance to consumers. According to the study, only fees and service charges, considered critically important by 65% of online consumers, outpace online bill payment in importance.

The Keynote Customer Experience Rankings for Online Banking Customers and Keynote Service Level Rankings for Online Banking Customers, which may be purchased together or separately, provide in-depth competitive analysis of the banking industry online and contain hundreds of additional data points and a detailed analysis of study findings.

For an abstract about the Customer Experience study of Banking Web sites: http://www.keynote.com/downloads/cem/Keynote_OnlineBankCE.pdf

For an abstract about the Service Level study of Banking Web sites: http://www.keynote.com/downloads/slm/Keynote_OnlineBankSL.pdf

For more general information about both studies: http://www.keynote.com/solutions/ci_onlineBanking.html

Customer Experience Management

Keynote's customer experience management (CEM) services offer both competitive intelligence studies and custom engagement services examining consumer attitudes and behavior on the Web. To learn more about Keynote's CEM solutions, visit: http://www.keynote.com/solutions/cem_syndicated_research.html.

Service Level Management

Keynote's service level management (SLM) solutions provide enterprises with the tools to align IT and e-business goals. To learn more about Keynote's SLM solutions, visit: http://www.keynote.com/solutions/service_level_management.html.

About Keynote

Founded in 1995, Keynote Systems (Nasdaq:KEYN), The Internet Performance Authority(R), is the worldwide leader in services that improve the performance of online business and communications. Over 2,100 corporate IT and marketing departments and 14,000 individual subscribers rely on Keynote's growing range of measurement and monitoring, service level and customer experience management services to improve e-business performance by reducing costs, improving customer satisfaction and increasing profitability.

Keynote Systems, Inc. is headquartered in San Mateo, California and can be reached at www.keynote.com or in the U.S. at 650-403-2400.

Keynote, The Internet Performance Authority and Perspective are registered trademarks of Keynote Systems, Inc. Other trademarks are the property of their respective owners. (C) 2005 Keynote Systems, Inc.