Super Apps: Driving Growth Opportunities in Banking and Financial Services

Our recent E-book, “Looking Ahead, Staying Ahead”, explores some of the key trends, lessons, and insights from organizations across the globe as they navigate the risks and opportunities arising from an evolving and fraught geopolitical and economic landscape. One of the new growth opportunities in banking sector covered in the E-book is the super app. 

First coined in 2010 by Blackberry founder Mike Lazaridis, the super app is a one-stop tech app that offers a seamless, integrated, efficient, and contextualized experience. It has been gaining traction through the years, with heightened popularity in recent history. For instance, Chinese consumers have become familiar with WeChat offering a mix of payments, social media, and messaging in one place. Meanwhile, Elon Musk has claimed that his takeover of Twitter is largely driven by his desire to create a super app.

Super apps present many growth opportunities in banking sector, a one-stop tech app that allows users to access several services from a single platform. Despite increasing adoption, many banks would rather promote their own app and product suite. This could be restrictive to consumers, especially now that super apps offer payment and other services from a single platform, reducing the bank’s share of transactions. Take Apple, for example. Their super app is actually hardware. Their phones, computers, and watches already feature several apps that support the customer journey. And once Apple Pay was introduced, allowing Apple devices to make immediate payments, it became essential for retailers to offer an Apple Pay option. Of course, there is a bank behind Apple Pay, but the user interface is the platform itself.

Neobanks are quickly understanding that super apps may very well be how consumers want to access banking services. In Latin America, at least 12 of the 20 most prominent neobanks are now offering marketplaces where their cardholders and customers can shop. In fact, Banco Inter in Brazil has reported significant revenues since rolling out its marketplace at the beginning of 2020. Essentially, the marketplace can become the source of profit to sustain the ­financial operation when the ­financial services have extremely low fees.

The real value here is increasing customer engagement with your brand. Are you only offering an app that allows the customer to check balances and arrange direct debit payments, or are you offering a way for customers to shop and support their financial lifestyle? Since you know your customers holistically, you can provide products and services curated for them, which defines their future state of loyalty and stickiness to your platform.

 The number of super apps in the market is limited. That’s why banks must act quickly to secure a partner to maintain or grow their market share. Another option would be for banks to develop their own super app that covers financial and non-financial services or to create a banking and financing super app. Forward-thinking banks are prime candidates for this new business model and equally new territory. Banks, however, will still need a provider to label all the data, and this is where data labeling capabilities will also become increasingly important.

Expecting customers to use a banking app merely for account management now feels incredibly dated. Customers want their bank to connect different areas of their life to facilitate shopping, loyalty, and access to bargains. Simply put, a ubiquitous and frictionless engagement that is a result of exploring growth opportunities in banking sector.

Download our E-book, “Looking Ahead, Staying Ahead”, to learn more about super apps and other trends shaping the industry.

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