Building for Trust: Fintech Products

Consumers want to trust where they put their money. If you have never seen this clip, watch this clip. It’s a worth a good laugh.

In the past few years, there has been an explosion of new financial technology (fintech) startups and products. Fintech products are arguably some of the hardest products to build.

Most new fintech startups and products are trying to convince users to move money into their product or platform. This is not a light decision by any means. Money is extremely personal and important to most people, so making decisions like these usually requires a lot of trust and input.

So how do you build a product that allows users to trust you with their money?

Well, here’s what I think.

First, what are my qualifications to talk about this?

• I am a product manager with 2-3 years of experience.

• I have worked for two successful fintech companies:

  • Titan, College Ambassador in 2020.

  • Commonstock (acq. by Yahoo Finance), Product and Community Analyst.

• I have been involved in the stock market heavily since 2016.

• I have tested and trialed multiple different financial technology apps.

• I am a technologically savvy Gen Z’er

• I have a passion for the space and believe that it has been, and still is, ripe for disruption.

I think there are a few key parts to building a successful fintech product. They all stem from the same idea; Your users need to trust your product and your company. This can be done through a few means, but I am going to touch on ones that revolve around product.

First, Design.

This goes without saying. You know the design of a financial product when you see one. They aren’t all color and rainbows with fun fonts. They usually consist of monotone colors with an academia-like font. It feels sophisticated and modern, yet simple. There is no filling white space for the sake of filling white space, everything that the user sees is usually a value-add to the experience. This design is very typical for financial products, therefore users can have a sense of familiarity with it and it will feel like a place where they would put their money.

These are just my observations and feelings as a consumer I am no expert in design though so let’s move on.

Second, let’s talk about the landing page and onboarding.

In my last job as a PM, I spent a lot of time optimizing landing pages by diving into the analytics and user recordings to find why and when users drop off. A lot of times in this particular consumer product, it was simply just confusion.

The issue was we were asking users to make a big financial decision. We were asking them to drop at minimum a few hundred on a subscription product. As soon as they entered the page, they could easily drop off if they don’t understand what they are buying.

There are similarities with financial products. When users hit the landing page, or the first few steps of onboarding, everything needs to be simple and transparent. Why should they put their money with you? Are you FDIC insured? Why should they trust you? A user should know the most important information about your product within 60 seconds of hitting the landing page.

To me this is the most important part of the funnel for financial products and startups.

Next, let’s dive a little more into my area of expertise. Product research.

Any good product conducts a fair amount of user research by either talking to customers or by diving into the analytics. I spent a good amount of time in my last job conducting these types of research projects. They can produce monumental insights that help drive larger strategy and product decisions. A lot of times when building a product, you are so close to it that you cannot see the product the way a consumer can. This is especially important for financial products. Talking to users and conducting walkthroughs of the product with a user will help drive the product forward in the best direction.

Beyond the interview, dive into the analytics. Every time I conducted user interviews and made an important discovery, I would check to see if I could back up the discovery through our analytics. Sometimes it would check out, sometimes it wouldn’t, but being able to back product decisions with real data is a superpower.

This is my take on user research, I think it is important for all products, but I think it is especially important for financial products. I have seen companies who do a lot of user research and some who do very little. Talking to your customer is by far the best way to go.

Finally, you just have to have a damn good product.

As I wrote in my piece Nothing Else Matters, having a good product is the end all be all. The product needs to solve a real user issue in a new innovative way. You can have the best designers and marketers in the world, but if the product isn’t good, nothing else matters.

So to highlight, here is what I believe makes a great fintech product/startup:

1. A great product

2. Tons of user research

3. Good and familiar design

4. Great landing page and conversion funnel metrics

5. Solid track record and returns*

*only if necessary

Final Note

Thanks for taking the time to read if you are seeing this final note. I love the financial technology space and have spent hours researching and exploring it, so I figured I would spend some time writing about it. By no means is this the golden rule for how to build a successful financial product; this is just my opinion.

If you’re building in this space, reach out I would love to chat. 🙂

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