Today at Finovate, Meniga introduced its new Challenges module, a digital offering to support banks in helping their customers manage their finances by using fun and social incentives.

Meniga Challenges improves people’s financial health by making it possible to save money in small attainable increments. It does this by combining proven community-reinforcement and gamification techniques, such as those popularised in consumer fitness trackers and health apps (e.g. Fitbit and Strava), letting users share and compare their weekly or monthly goals and achievements with peers.

Based on Meniga’s extensive research on how to engage users with any financial personality type, the Meniga Challenges user interface applies proven logic that short term goals drive long term gain. With only 20-30% of the population “conscientious” about financial planning, early testing of Meniga Challenges shows high levels of engagement from people who struggle financially while also keeping the motivated groups engaged.

The unique new product offers a variety of habit-forming challenges. Examples include category-based spending challenges e.g. “no fast-food for a week”; one-off challenges such as “the Chopping Block” shows users their subscriptions so that they can unsubscribe from redundant ones; and The Meniga Money Monster that “steals” variable, random amounts from a user’s current account and puts it into savings. This is useful for anyone who is trying to manage their finances including the least motivated people who find it difficult to save. (See “Notes to editors, below, for details.)
 
Finnur Magnússon, Chief Product Owner: “We developed Challenges to help people with any financial personality type gain financial independence. By combining social online fun with techniques that drive positive daily lifestyle changes, we applied an approach to finance already proven in other areas like health. Small everyday changes can make a huge impact on the customer’s long term saving and spending pattern.”
 
The result: Meniga Challenges supports personalised, better financial habits for end users, and a new way for banks to engage and retain customers.

Georg Ludviksson, CEO and Cofounder Meniga: “Digital banking should be both personal and inspiring: by offering a single compelling app that appeals to all types of customers banks can finally provide value beyond simple financial transactions. Ever-changing regulatory hurdles such as PSD2 and the threat of a rapidly evolving fintech industry are forcing retail banks to innovate to maintain meaningful relationships with customers and their role in society.”

Meniga’s suite of services enables banks to remain compliant to regulatory changes, apply data for targeted marketing, and truly engage all of their customers with relevant activities and content.

Meniga Challenges will be available from February 2017 as part of the company’s Digital Banking Solutions package that also includes the activity feed and personalised insights for banks and their customers.