GCash Case Study
Mabuhay Manila!
Back in December, I decided to spend my holidays travelling around the famed 7000 islands of the Philippines whose tales of beauty have left the world in awe.
A few days into my trip, I realised it was frustrating to travel around the country with lots of cash, since use of credit cards and ATM's are not as wide spread in the islands. In addition to navigating my way across the country, I had to worry about safely bringing cash (along with my other valuables) around which has divided my attention from the beautiful landscape that I crossed half of the world just to witness.
My AHA! moment came when I noticed that this wasn't unique to me. It was something everyone had to deal with - bringing cash around. Fueled by natural curiosity, I started asking the people I came across with - Why do you only transact in cash? Can you re-imagine how life can be like if you had other ways aside from paying in cash? Is that something you would want?
From these conversations, I have learned two key things a majority of Filipinos remain unbanked and the banking infrastructure has yet to reach a scale that can be widely spread across the islands.
The challenge: GCash refresh
Over the years, GCash has transformed itself from just being a mobile wallet to being a lifestyle superapp. Both the convenience and the security it provides has convinced it's millions of users to welcome it as a staple of their everyday lives. With GCash's growth momentum, now is the perfect time to build an even stronger foundation for a more scalable product; one that can transform the day-to-day of Filipinos.
Redesign is not an easy task. Aside from it being time and resource consuming, there is always that risk of alienating existing users. But knowing that ultimate objective of this exercise is to give users a better, more seamless experience I have taken the bold move of taking a working design and tried to make it even better.
For this case study, the goal was to try to give the GCash app a fresh look by introducing a more user-centric experience.
First moment of truth: The 'Homepage
One of the first big decisions I made, was to move away from the burger menu (top left corner) to a tab bar menu. The lack of structure in the burger menu, made it look like a feature dumpster. This means that sensitive and personal users information has the same importance as a third party offer and promotion.
A tab bar menu gives us the benefit of a more structured visual representation by putting a sense of hierarchy of importance for the different sections. It also gives us a solid base that allows for the easy addition/highlighting of new features in the future without disrupting the visual flow.
Home: This is where the core actions of the platform can be done. This includes any action that is money movement related - from transferring money to friends and family to paying bills. At the same time, this page serves as a 'discover area' for new promotions as well as for users education and tips on how to use the platform.
Main action: This triggers the QR code scanner which can evolve to be the main money transfer or reception channel.
Profile: This is where the user can manage all the account settings, such as adding bank accounts, changing security level, and so on.
Adding a tinge of personality
Using more personal touches - use of a more social approach to some of the day to day usage of the app, such as in money transfer, can help strengthen product affinity by giving users a semblance of community.
Inclusion of locally relevant icons - a minor change that can have a large impact on users is changing the icons to something more relatable and instinctive to our Filipino users.
Introduction of a ChatBot - it is one of those small features that can evolve with time. This can have a huge impact on the overall product experience and customer support part, while also allowing the platform to help resolve users' issues more efficiently.
GCash growth opportunities
My experience of living and working in Mainland China taught me a lot about QR codes and their benefits.
Aside from cost, security and versatility the added benefit of this technology is the scale of it's presence and it's use in most Asian countries. For certain, through a set of strategic partnerships with different players in the market, this can allow Filipinos to be able to use GCash in different parts of the world.
Financial management 101 - by adding this feature, we are helping users to manage their finances better. This will help them build a more conscious habit of monitoring their expenses, which can eventually lead to better financial decisions and opening up the opportunity for GCash to move into more advanced financial offerings.
The special ingredient: Bayanihan
As beautiful as the islands are, it is really the people that makes the Philippines stand out. Filipinos are no stranger to helping each other out, with bayanihan at the core of who they are. This presents an opportunity for GCash to stand out from it's competitors and be uniquely Filipino.
When I was in the Philippines during Christmas, I was surprised when I was declined by several orphanages to do some charity work. I was told that there already was an overwhelming number of people who were helping out. I found that this is even more apparent during the recent events, where in lots of individuals stepped up to help their kababayans.
To help our GCash community thrive, I have in mind several in-app actions that can build up a strong company CSR by giving the opportunity to Filipinos to help out different charities and causes even during ordinary times.
Points for a cause: all year round users can be given the option to reconvert their collected points for the cause of their choice.
Round'em up: users can be given an option to automatically round up their payments to the nearest peso and donate the excess amount from their bill to their preferred cause.
Even this little acts, can add up and make a difference.
Despite not having visibility of the product roadmap, which made the exercise a bit more difficult, I have created this refreshed design based on two key principles - users at the core of everything, while still ensuring scalability. While there are still many other things that can be done, I have thoroughly enjoyed doing this design exercise in hopes of giving Filipino users a more seamless and enjoyable GCash experience.
Any other ideas? Reach out, let's discuss.