Why banks are missing what you need, and how Aboutgoods will upgrade the game ?
How Aboutgoods, plans to redefine the way Digital Banks interact with their users.
Banking as an institution almost as old as the earliest forms of civilisation. The first prototype banks, were created for merchants of the world, and began around 2000 BC in Assyria. Since, the world, the economy and society as a whole have evolved substantially.
Not until recently, besides offering more sophisticated financial products, banking has remained pretty much unchanged. A symbol of trust, reliability with its ups and downs during economic cycles, but pretty much stagnant.
However, the 21st century, technological innovation and a new era of consumer’s have completely rattled this millenary institution, which previously could only survive under a centennial brand, and a physical presence, walking distance from your house or workplace.
Digital Banks and Fintechs have revolutionised the way in which we interact with banks, making it motionless, agile and practical; whilst bringing banking into our phones, creating trust and transparency with lower fees, if any. They have challenged the status quo, which a decade ago seemed impossible, delivering a better service and making our life’s easier, transferring banks into our pockets.
We, in Aboutgoods want to further help propel this revolution, by redefining the way a user can interact with their mobile bank, simultaneously helping mobile banks understand their users; to not offer them what they think they need, but what they really wish.
[…] helping mobile banks understand their users; to not offer them what they think they need, but what they really wish.
Nowadays, most banking data consists of geo-location, transactional data and little more then that. Even though this allows banks to better know who their users are, they still need to unlock the last galaxy of data, which is what do users purchase down to a brand level. Did he buy diapers for his baby born child? Or maybe food for his pet? All these questions still remain unanswered unless they transact in specialised stores; and still, digital banks cannot really know what the user bought.
It is true that most Europeans and North Americans prefer to interact with mobile banking rather then go physically to the retail bank (over 70% according to Forrester Research), however in Europe the banks mobile touch point, according to Forrester research is mostly used to check balances, see payments and make transfers. Forrester research studies show that mobile banks and Fintechs, need to understand better consumers in order to get closer to them, and this way interact more with the users, rather then through the regular interactions. Unlocking this universe of data through our ticket reading solution, which extracts and categorises the product data in a physical receipt, can bring endless opportunities to banks, but most importantly users.
The customer is king; this is the philosophy that all digital banks and Fintechs who focus on improving user experience, have built their business models around. Imagine if you have a monthly budget for groceries and you spend more then expected? How will you find out in what you spent it, if you don’t have the ticket? Conceive a solution, that by simply taking a picture one could extract all the nutritional values of what they shopped, measuring the nutritional intakes one has consumed weekly? Envision, your mobile bank recommending you where to shop more effectively, as through your average basket it could determine where its more economical to shop, next to your office rather then your house? These are the added functionalities that our SDK offers, this boosts user acquisition and retention, whilst increasing post-transaction user engagement. All this can be done, by simply giving a user the option to link a receipt, to a transaction.
Conceive a solution, that by simply taking a picture could extract all the nutritional values of what you shop, to measure the nutritional intakes you consume weekly?
In parallel, mobile banks will be able to understand better users, to create more accurate profiles which will allow to target promotions more precisely, and therefore engage and establish loyalty with existing and new users. Another paradigm unlocking this data, is the possibility to allow mobile banks and Fintechs to interact with services, creating digital ecosystems such as N26 is doing with Glovo and Tencent. These digital ecosystems are the future, even though they are still in an early stage this is where things are heading.
Our mission is to be the bridge between banking and users, adding that missing piece to the equation that will make banking part of our lives not only financially, but in our day to day needs. We are passionate about what we do, have been working on this solution for 5 years, and finally have it ready to improve mobile banking for users through our novel functionalities; and help mobile banks better understand users to deliver the next generation in user experience.
Original author of this article is my teammate Antonio Irusta ;)
Aboutgoods Team
