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UX Research - Principality digital account

Project Details

Quantitative and qualitative research to discovering our hero attributes with heavy users of the account and validating the concept of principality.

Company: XP inc
Year: 2023

Problem

In the face of a Brazilian landscape undergoing a process of multi-banking, particularly with the advent of digital banks, Open Finance, and major retail players offering services that were previously exclusive to the traditional financial market, we are witnessing a movement among financial institutions to gain and maintain principality. This concept revolves around the idea of winning the customer's preference and becoming their primary financial institution.

XP's objective is to be the investor's principal account, presenting a significant challenge given the vast array of financial services available in the market. To measure principality, several concepts have been developed to determine whether we are indeed the customer's primary account for day-to-day use. This has led to an approximate figure of only about 7% principality.

Therefore, this research has emerged with the goal of engaging with these 7% of customers to discover our hero attributes with those who use the account the most and validate whether the concept of principality, as we use it, proves reliable.

Discovery process

Quantitative Research

Survey form to:

Cross-referencing the customer's primary account against the criteria we defined for principality in order to analyze what these individuals have in common and validate the concepts we established;
Inviting customers to participate in the second stage;

Qualitative Research

In-depth interview to understand:

Why did they choose XP as their bank, and what was the process of making it their primary account?
For those who switched banks, why did they do it?
What are the attributes that contribute to maintaining the account?
What do they miss in the XP Digital Account?

Sampling

The audience sample for the research consisted of XP brand customers who had activity in the 30 days prior to the survey and were within the top 7% of principal clients. The survey yielded the following results:

Quantitative

Sent to 33,022 individuals;
394 responses;
Confidence level of 95%;
Margin of error of 5%;

Qualitative

8 clients were interviewed, among whom:
5 had AuC (Assets under Custody) of 100k+;
2 had AuC between 50k and 100k;
1 had AuC up to 50k;

Quantitative Results

Despite interviewing only clients who already met the criteria for being principal clients, one of the main findings was that this number did not have the desired accuracy, as only 58% of the clients confirmed that XP was their principal institution. In other words, approximately 40% still use another bank as their primary institution.

Clients who consider XP as their primary bank value the following three pillars the most:

58% Fee exemption
43% Ease of app usage
43% Trust in the brand

We also found that among the top 3 priorities for clients of other banks, the availability of a credit line was considered a fundamental pillar—something that XP accounts did not yet offer. This insight allowed us to contribute to prioritizing this product within the account.

Demographic data

Other important findings

The top 3 reasons for clients to have more than one account were:

To take advantage of the best benefits offered by each institution - 69%
A single account does not have all the services I need - 38%
To have a second option in case of emergencies - 35%

Finally, among the key services used by those who consider XP as their primary institution, we discovered two criteria that were not being considered in filtering the principality metric:

Recurrent payment of utility bills (electricity, water, phone, etc.), representing 64% of the most-used services.
Use of credit and debit cards with a representation of 63%.

With this information, we connected with the Data team so that they could include this filter in the metric, thereby ensuring more accuracy in the key indicator of the company's strategy.

Qualitative Results

During the in-depth interviews, the primary goal was to understand what led customers to choose XP as their primary bank and account. We discovered three key attributes:

Financial centralization | Credit card | Brand trust

Here are some comments from customers about these points:

"The advisor told me they had a comprehensive account... I became interested because I believe it reduces complexity if I can centralize these changes in just one account. What brought me in was this credit card policy, which suits me... so I made this switch." - Customer 1

"I think the biggest motivator was already having the money there in my account to invest; it becomes easier to invest. It was the ease of investment. And also, I don't need to keep making Pix to pay the credit card; the money is already in the account. So, I can pay the card directly; that's another reason." - Customer 4

"The reliability, after I had a problem [with another bank], regarding the credit limit... after that, I withdrew my money from there and put it in XP. Nothing has ever happened to me with XP." - Customer 6

"I was looking for a company that had a wide variety of investments and that was integrated." - Customer 8

In addition to winning over the primacy of other clients, a major goal is to maintain and foster customer loyalty. Therefore, we also inquired about aspects we should improve, and the two most significant points were the credit card and the comprehensiveness of banking services.

"I can't schedule a Pix." - Customer 1

"Not having some services, like mobile recharge." - Customer 2

"I don't know why they haven't resolved this yet, but when you pay the credit card bill, you still pay by boleto [bank slip]... it takes 1 day, 2 to account for this payment, and about 3 more days to receive the investback." - Customer 3

"There is no vehicle TAG; most banks already have it, and I have to get the tag from Veloe and pay a monthly fee when I could be using it on your credit card." - Customer 8

NPS

IAt the end of the interview, I asked a question to measure the NPS, inquiring how much clients would recommend the XP account to friends or family on a scale of 0 to 10. We received scores between 6 and 10, with an average rating of 8.4, resulting in an NPS of 37 points. This data demonstrated that having the client's principality doesn't guarantee that they will be a brand promoter. It emphasizes the importance of product evolution to maintain customer trust and satisfaction.

Learnings

This research has provided valuable insights to contribute to the company's strategy. Through it, we discovered the key attributes of the account and were able to guide the theme for the revenue team with the aim of communicating our strengths to other clients and attracting them to principality.

We observed a deviation of approximately 40% in the metric we were tracking, enabling us to direct adjustments to the Data team. Additionally, we identified areas for improvement, such as the completeness of services and enhancements to the XP card. We delved deeper into NPS by cross-referencing with other customer clusters to generate further insights.