M&T Bank: Designing a User-Centric Financial Insights Experience in Mobile Banking

What sparked this project?

The initiative stemmed from a growing demand among banking customers for more than just transactional tools; they wanted deeper insight into their spending habits. The project was a strategic move to enhance customer engagement and satisfaction.

Who was on the team for the project?

The project was a collaboration among various specialists within M&T Bank, including user experience designers, data analysts, software developers, and financial experts, all working together to create a seamless and insightful budgeting experience for users.

Do you have some project metrics to share?

The development process spanned several months, including phases of user research, prototype testing, and iterative design adjustments, culminating in a highly praised feature that significantly increased user engagement with the M&T mobile app.

What is your approach to working on a project like this? Do you follow a specific process or framework?

At M&T Bank, our product development process starts with in-depth Discovery and Positioning, focusing on customer needs and industry trends. For the mobile budgeting feature, this meant engaging with a diverse range of customers and banking professionals to gather varied insights, guiding the development of a tool that goes beyond tracking expenses to providing actionable financial insights. Our strategy centered on bridging the gap between data collection and financial decision-making. Through iterative design and testing, we balanced simplicity with depth, creating a user-friendly yet informative feature. This approach resulted in a budgeting tool that not only manages finances but also empowers users with knowledge for better financial health.

What did the early versions of this project look like? What did you learn from this v1?

Initial prototypes varied in complexity and functionality. The team learned the importance of balancing comprehensive financial insights with ease of use, leading to a more streamlined version in subsequent iterations.

'The team learned the importance of balancing comprehensive financial insights with ease of use'

What was the biggest challenge? Did any part of the project make you step out of your comfort zone?

One of the main challenges was integrating the feature seamlessly into the existing app architecture while ensuring data security and privacy. The project pushed the team to innovate in areas of data encryption and user interface design.

How did you overcome this challenge?

Through rigorous testing and collaboration with cybersecurity experts, the team developed a robust solution that maintained the app's integrity and user trust.

What and/or who inspired you during the creation of this project?

The team was inspired by the evolving needs of digital banking users and the potential to positively impact their financial well-being through technology.

What was your biggest learning or take-away from creating this project?

The project highlighted the critical role of user feedback in the design process and the need for continual adaptation to meet changing customer expectations in the digital banking sector.

Which part of this project consumed the most time or energy?

Developing a user-friendly interface that could handle complex financial data without overwhelming the user was the most time-consuming aspect, requiring numerous design iterations.

What was the result of this project?

The successful launch of the budgeting feature led to increased user engagement, higher customer satisfaction scores, and positive feedback from the digital banking community.