PayMe 2.0
Pay anyone instantly, for free.
* Work in progress, therefore processes, artefacts, and data cannot be shown due to Non Disclosure Agreement.
P2P made easy
PayMe is a simple and secure social payment app that allows people to make transactions to friends, relatives and businesses using their mobile number or PayCode (QR code).
The challenge
Mobile payments are pushing developed societies to go cashless. To maintain its privileged position and remain competitive, HSBC needed a new engagement channel through which to connect with millennials in Hong Kong. The challenge was to craft a user-friendly engaging experience in paying friends and businesses.
PayMe at a glance
Background - For Hong Kong, By Hong Kong
A local-made underdog that swept the mobile wallet landscape in Hong Kong with a pleasantly delightful design experience, cultural pride, putting users at the forefront of everything we do. PayMe evolves as a product with our users and their needs and desires. It took PayMe 17 months to acquire its first million users but around eight months to achieve the second million.
Social payments
Imagine the following situation, a group of friends go for dinner, at the end one person picks up the bill. Someone in the group would inevitably (and genuinely) forget to pay them back, leaving the bill payer feeling awkward about having to remind them, the whole situation will generate an unnecessary negative feeling. There are many social jobs at play when it comes to money as it really has the power to create huge group instability.
One interesting point to share was related to emojis. When someone asked for money back, 90% of the time they would use only emojis in the message field instead of text. Why? Because emojis are less difficult to be misconstrued as you’re operating at a deeper level than language.
A simple Sushi emoji 🍣 said so much more than “Give me the money you owe me”. It says “remember that awesome Sushi we ate together yesterday?” evoking memories of the quality time we spent together eating good food and not of the unsettled debt. As discussed above, laughter 😂, music 🎶, storytelling all play huge parts in endorphin release between friends; this is what our product tries to evoke. Make people feel good and they will come back for more 🏖️🧘🍜😗.
Re-design Process
Before starting the app redesign, we had to step back and learn how is the existing PayMe App perceived among our users, what areas should we improve and what are users expectations of the envisioned experience and the visual design language.
In order to move ahead with the redesign, it was important to understand the status quo of the existing app. A visual design review was conducted and presented to senior stakeholders outlining key areas of the app that could be improved moving forward. Recommendations on improving visual elements such as typography, iconography, color palettes, illustration, and infographics were put forward to be improved during the redesign. Consolidated visual direction mood board based on internal design team workshops and customer experience group workshops with PayMe customers.
Testing and feedback
We did a various rounds co-creation workshops and product testing at every stage of the redesign, sending out surveys for quantitative data, inviting the users to the office to for interviews, and remote self testing with users, so that we capture insights considering different contexts of use.
Secret ingredient: Local touch
To give more sense to our 'For Hong Kong, by Hong Kong' manifesto, and create a strong sense of community and belonging we decided to adapt and localize the app visuals to match what Hongkongers are used to interact with on their daily lives.
Final result
Awards
PayMe won the Gold Award in the Emerging Solutions and FinTech Security category (2017), and the Grand Award, the top prize in the FinTech category (2018) at ICT Awards in Hong Kong.
Want to know more about this project?
Get in touch