7 Elements of Highly Effective Fintech Companies

January 6, 2022 Entrepreneurs, Start-ups, Small Businesses, FinTech and Alternative Finance, Fintech Services, Innovation and Resources, Voices No comments

Rich Thinking | Jan 6, 2022

7 elements of highly effective fintech companies - 7 Elements of Highly Effective Fintech Companies

Businesses focused on fintech are hardwired to fulfill customer needs, reduce customer pain points, and introduce new ideas that shape a better experience. Early stage startups may have more flexibility to shape their brand, product, or culture, but even larger organizations that are looking to make a similar pivot are finding value in making a change from the norm.

Startups are fast at testing and iterating. As a product marketing consultant for fintech startups, validating product-market fit is essential for hypergrowth and sustainability. Once achieved, it takes smart, customer-focused decisions to drive ultimate success, starting from product to brand, and from customer service to culture. These mechanisms also include rigorous reassessments to ensure they’re adapting to a continuously evolving landscape.

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Successful financial businesses, regardless if it’s a large organization or an early-stage startup, adhere to these core elements.

Your customer wants to work with other humans.

1. Humanize your business

It’s unfortunate, but for customers in modern times, placing trust in businesses is at an all-time low. Modern brands are focusing on enabling human emotions within their business. It reflects on virtually every aspect of their public-facing self: ad headlines, PR, packaging, content marketing, and “meet the team” segments from the top down. Customers feel greater trust when they can see the people working behind the scenes.

One important takeaway: humanize the brand, brand the human. Ultra successful organizations brand their management team as experts themselves. That may be why more fans follow Elon Musk or Mike Novogratz on Twitter over their respective company brand accounts.

Your customer wants an easier life.

2. Get creative and simplify your customers' lives

It’s no secret that AI tools, such as robo-advisors, have taken market share from traditional financial institutions. A product should make the customer experience simple without sacrificing time or money, and at best, minimizes the customers' need to think. It begins by answering questions for them. If your customers have a preferred communication channel, make the necessary changes to accommodate that.

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In most cases, ideas that simplify your customers' lives may be deemed as too much of a resource hog internally. However, a closed mindset will inevitably lead to another company stealing market share from you.

Your customer wants honesty.

3. Be more transparent than you’re traditionally comfortable with

From a customer POV, offering greater transparency during financial transactions has become a standard.

Hidden fees have always been a crux for customers. Wise (formerly Transferwise) made the smart move to not only offer lower fees for currency conversion, but their transfer screen also includes a detailed breakdown of where each dollar is going (while simultaneously showing how much they’re saving compared to competitors like PayPal). It’s the little things that count.

Your customer wants to be heard.

4. Create feedback loops for service-driven opportunities

Better service is always a primary motivator for retention. However service-driven initiatives need to continually evolve to keep up with customer expectations. Scrap initiatives that are outdated.This can only be achieved by creating a feedback loop in your customer lifecycle that is repeatable and actionable.

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Lastly, take ownership when bad service is apparent. Accountability and humility can go a long way to not only those affected, but those watching from the sidelines.

Your customer isn’t a number.

5. Continually refine your customer personas

Digging deeper into your customer personas can help your product and marketing efforts. While it’s easier to see your customer base as defined by a few lines of text, defining your audience into numerous segments and increasing granularity will better define your scope as a business. Never default to treating your customers like a number. Focus on developing better segmentation in your CRM to optimize your customer funnels.

Your customer wants to work with a winner.

6. Make education part of your content strategy

Thought leadership is essential in building a successful business. Budget planner Mint revolutionized the industry by focusing on delivering content that educated prospective and current customers with the knowledge needed to plan and meet their financial goals. Your content team, which consist of content creators and subject matter experts, need a sound strategy that focuses on answering customer questions - whether they’ve thought it up first or not.

Your customer wants to work with good companies.

7. Create a solid cultural foundation that supports diversity and inclusion

Having an organizational structure and strategy that supports diversity and inclusion is imperative. Embedding D&I initiatives into a company culture begins with recurring training sessions and fostering open communication, but it also means changes to hiring practices from both management and non-management roles. Organizations that support D&I in its foundation unlock greater hiring capacities, stronger customer onboarding and retention, and a healthy work culture.

See: Culture and Diversity Leadership: Tale of Two Doors

Financial organizations are continuing to fine-tune their culture and product/marketing strategy to reflect the changing directions of their customer base. In order to succeed, startups and large organizations in financial services need to adopt a mindset that is adaptive, open-minded, and forward thinking.

Authored by:

Reggie Tan, Founder of Rich Thinking, is a senior growth hacker and marketing strategist, with specialization in fintech, cryptocurrency, and blockchain applications.

This article is featured in NCFA's digital magazine, Fintech Confidential (Issue 4). Click to read the latest thought leadership, insights and trends about Fintech in Canada:

Checkout NCFA's digital magazine, Fintech Confidential (Issue 4) --> here

NCFA Jan 2018 resize - 7 Elements of Highly Effective Fintech Companies The National Crowdfunding & Fintech Association (NCFA Canada) is a financial innovation ecosystem that provides education, market intelligence, industry stewardship, networking and funding opportunities and services to thousands of community members and works closely with industry, government, partners and affiliates to create a vibrant and innovative fintech and funding industry in Canada. Decentralized and distributed, NCFA is engaged with global stakeholders and helps incubate projects and investment in fintech, alternative finance, crowdfunding, peer-to-peer finance, payments, digital assets and tokens, blockchain, cryptocurrency, regtech, and insurtech sectors. Join Canada's Fintech & Funding Community today FREE! Or become a contributing member and get perks. For more information, please visit: www.ncfacanada.org