Banks in Ukraine and abroad struggle to differentiate
We helped the Ukrainian branch of the leading Polish bank to develop a compelling value proposition for the lucrative customer segment
By helping IT specialists to buy their first homes, we significantly expanded the demand for the mortgages
The Challenge
The IT industry is growing rapidly in Ukraine year by year. There were around 250K specialists in Ukraine by the project’s launch.
Ukrainian IT specialists have a much higher income than average Ukrainian citizens. Thus, banks are very eager to attract them.
The challenge is that many banks compete for a relatively small audience. Every IT specialist is a customer of several banks. Banks struggle to differentiate their offerings to attract more IT specialists.
Kredo bank invited Lanka to understand the segment’s needs and design a value proposition.
Key insights
The team had a pre-conception that wealthy IT specialists demand premium services. That was not the case: fancy perks were not attractive to many IT guys.
Interviewing our segment, we saw the evolution of financial needs among IT specialists:
Young specialists earn much more than average Ukrainian. They would like to own an apartment and can afford a mortgage. Their problem is a lack of competence. They are inexperienced with choosing developers, apartments, and financial terms. The bank realized that the problem was a lack of knowledge, not a lack of funds.
Experienced IT specialists have satisfied all material needs (like a house, cars, education for kids, traveling, etc.) and struggle to find a way to invest their money. Usually, they buy more real estate.
The team
Consultants worked in collaboration with the x-functional Kredo team. The team consisted of the heads of the business line, risks, sales, and marketing departments.
Lanka facilitated workshops, prepared team members for the interviews, and advised on prototyping and testing. Due to COVID restrictions, we had to manage some workshops remotely.
The team from the bank performed most of the interviews and prototype tests and prepared the implementation roadmap.
The solution: do not push – create a demand.
Our interviews with young IT specialists showed that many want to buy their own apartment. Instead of selling them the product, we offered them a service: we can teach you how to avoid mistakes with their most significant purchase in your life.
Explain to young specialists how to get a loan
The team organized webinars for the employees of their corporate clients. The topic was “How to choose a developer and get a mortgage.” Of the audience actively enrolled for the webinar, 10% left their contact details to receive a mortgage offer.
Help young software developers to choose a real-estate developer
We formed a ranking of reliable developers based on open financial data. 80% of clients were interested in getting an assessment of developers by the bank
Help young specialists to compare the financial terms
The team developed the tool to compare the financing terms provided by developers and by the bank
The Outcome
The team decided to focus on the younger audience. We shifted our focus from the financial terms of the mortgage to the education of less experienced clients.
We designed a series of solutions that teach youngsters how to look for an apartment, choose the developer, compare financial terms, etc.
Kredo has changed its approach to designing new banking products and hired an in-house service designer.
Please, invite us to co-design a differentiated service for your customers.