Digital Savings Product for Microentrepreneurs
Mision
To create a digital savings solution that bridges the gap between financial opportunity and accessibility, turning microfinance clients into confident digital savers through user-centred design and education.
Vision
To empower entrepreneurs and microfinance clients with the digital tools and confidence they need to save securely, grow financially, and achieve greater economic stability.
Industry
Banking
Size
Big Corp
Markets
LATAM
Timeline
8 Weeks
Team Member
2 Designer
Type of Project
External Collaboration
Need For Cange
To strengthen its digital transformation strategy, the company initiated the design of a new digital savings product integrated into its existing mobile application.
The product would allow customers to save, organise savings, create group savings networks, and move money easily between users.
Business Background
The organisation, a major financial institution with six microfinance entities and one of the largest private philanthropic initiatives in Latin America, aims to become a reference point in financial inclusion. It supports microentrepreneurs engaged in productive activities by providing financial services that foster sustainable economic and social development.
The Company
The organisation has progressively implemented technological innovations to enhance customer accessibility. The current mobile app allows users to perform essential financial operations. However, new initiatives were required to increase engagement, retention, and trust among customers with low savings habits and limited digital literacy.
Key Challenges
Low Savings Culture: Clients, mainly entrepreneurs in vulnerable conditions, tend to prioritise short-term liquidity and reinvestment over structured saving.
Limited Digital Familiarity: Many users interact with technology primarily through social media, with low adoption of formal digital banking tools.
Perception of Risk: Concerns about digital security, account hacking, and hidden charges deter engagement.
Fragmented Habits: Savings practices vary greatly among countries and entities, complicating the creation of a unified product.
Regulatory & Operational Diversity: Adapting the digital savings product to the specific contexts and regulations of three countries required careful coordination.
Objectives
Understand customer needs, fears, and motivations related to saving and digital banking.
Design an intuitive, accessible, and user-centred digital savings experience.
Test and validate prototypes with real beneficiaries before implementation.
Adapt the final product design to the three participating brands.
Deliver comprehensive documentation and development packages for product rollout.
Overcoming Obstacles
Cross-Country Alignment: One of the main challenges was unifying the diverse needs, priorities, and regulatory contexts of each country. The team worked to create a coherent product that balanced local nuances with a shared strategic direction.
Country Engagement: As the project originated from HQ, ensuring active participation and commitment from local entities required continuous communication, alignment sessions, and demonstrating clear value for each country’s customers.
Financial Education and Awareness: Understanding how to help entrepreneurs grasp the value of saving, and the different ways to do so, was essential to building a product that truly supported behavioural change.
Social and Cultural Habits: Each market had distinct social habits and saving customs. The challenge was to design a solution flexible enough to resonate across three countries without losing consistency or simplicity.
Security and Accessibility: It was crucial to guarantee financial safety while maintaining ease of use and immediate access to funds, ensuring users felt confident and in control of their money.
Lessons Learned
Financial education and emotional reassurance are key to adoption.
Local validation ensures relevance and acceptance.
Digital inclusion efforts must balance simplicity with security.
Continuous testing accelerates learning and alignment across regions.
Impact
Strengthened trust and confidence in digital banking.
Expected an increased customer engagement through a product designed around real behaviours and needs.
Broader access to formal financial services for vulnerable entrepreneurs.
Improved customer experience through transparency and education.
Results
Completed end-to-end understanding of user needs in three markets.
Validated digital savings prototype ready for development.
A “white-label” version adaptable across brands.
Conclusion
Through user research, co-design, and testing, the company created a digital savings product tailored to the realities of microfinance customers.
The project aligned technology, inclusion, and trust-building into a unified strategy; helping vulnerable entrepreneurs progress towards sustainable financial empowerment.
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