How real-world validation helped this digibank launch its unique services with confidence

Take a look at all the apps that you have on your phone. How many of them would you say perform poorly? For example, apps that constantly lag, crash, or straight up are unable to perform the functions you need them to.

Chances are the answer is very few because no one puts up with apps or digital services that consistently underperform. They just delete them and find a better alternative. In fact, it doesn’t even take major issues like crashes to turn off users. With the increased reliance on digital services due to the pandemic, customer expectations for innovation, personalization, engagement, and reliability are higher than ever.

“Customers don’t care so much how much time and effort we put into our product. If they encounter a friction point along the way or can’t perform a transaction or their journey is cut short for whatever reason… There’s very little loyalty today in the market,” said Chad Friedman, regional manager for Asia Pacific at testing and digital quality firm Applause. “You have one chance to make a first impression, and that’s why it’s so important to validate [your product].”

Chad Friedman, regional manager for Asia Pacific at Applause / Photo credit: Applause

Of course, user expectations are particularly high when it comes to apps and services that handle sensitive personal information, such as payment apps. At Applause’s session during Tech in Asia’s Product Development Conference 2022, Friedman spoke to Roy Katzir, former chief marketing officer and chief customer officer at Israel’s first digital bank. Katzir discussed how his team made sure the firm’s product launched with as few issues as possible.

A unique challenge

The digibank’s business structure was completely novel to Israel at the time, which caused massive challenges at the beginning.

“Our goal was to build a digital-only, mobile-only customer experience for a bank that had no branches nor was it ever going to have any,” Katzir said. “We were on a journey to build an organization that would disrupt the local banking industry. Being that Israel is considered a startup nation, the stakes were amazing and very high.”

To build the product itself, the firm had to figure out how to develop a new application that would outperform advanced legacy banking apps and that would get customers to trust the company. They were, after all, “the new kids on the block,” as Katzir puts it.

Additionally, the firm was looking to offer its services not only to young, tech-savvy users but also to families and the general population. It needed to make sure that its app was not only secure and reliable but also intuitive and frictionless.

“We had to be super crisp when it came to building a product that would persuade people to leave their current banks or comfort zones and move to a digital bank,” Katzir recounted. “In a way, early adopters really [had to] take a leap of faith.”

Measure twice, cut once

Going up against these challenges meant that the team had to be really careful. It couldn’t afford to launch with a product that fell short of user expectations even slightly, so stringent testing was important.

“We were looking for an objective way to test our products and understand if we were meeting or exceeding the expectations of our customers,” Katzir said. “I personally don’t believe in focus groups or beta communities who operate in a closed and sterile environment. There are too many limitations with that approach – I could write a book about it.”

Nothing can replicate the feedback that actual users can provide, and the digibank needed the input of its target audience at scale and for an extended duration. Additionally, getting feedback from a good number of potential customers wasn’t enough: thorough testing meant that the user base needed to consist of a large variety of users, devices, and configurations as well.

This was a resource that Applause could provide. Its community of testers spans multiple territories, is trained and vetted, and uses a variety of devices and operating systems.

“I think we could also track patterns and cross-reference those with the data we were gathering over time with no limits to scaling,” Katzir said. “This enabled us to validate a lot of our assumptions.”

Roy Katzir, former chief marketing officer and chief customer officer at Israel’s first digital bank / Photo credit: Applause

So for instance, instead of seeing a social media review on Facebook after the product was launched, which could affect the entire bank’s image and reputation, working with Applause gave the team better visibility into what the users really valued.

Uncovering unknown unknowns

As a result of working with Applause, Katzir’s firm was able to uncover blind spots, remove friction points, and drastically shorten and simplify the onboarding and know-your-customer process. The firm could make data-driven decisions, which had an effect on the product at large – all the way down to the features and functions of the application. Katzir called it “a game changer.”

“Onboarding new customers to a bank may look simple to a user, but it’s not a small task. It requires user authentication and involves personal data which needs to be authenticated,” he said. “Without Applause and its testers, this would have pushed out our product release by months.”

Besides streamlining both the user experience as well as the digital bank’s product development timeline, the most important benefit that Katzir’s team found in working with Applause was boosting the belief in their own product.

“It gave us the confidence we needed that the products we were releasing were validated and free of any critical issues,” Katzir said.

It didn’t matter who the user was or what device they were using. ”We all knew that they were having a positive experience, and that’s what matters.”

Applause is a leader in crowdtesting and digital quality, helping leading companies deliver excellent digital experiences.

Find out more about how it can help your organization’s digital quality needs on its website.

This content was produced by Tech in Asia Studios, which connects brands with Asia’s tech community. Learn more about partnering with Tech in Asia Studios.