Innovation to Outcomes:
Open Finance and Financial Wellness

Welcome

0:00-1:50

Shayli Lones: Hello everyone and welcome to the MX Product Forum.

At MX, you've heard us talk about the money experience. It's every interaction that your consumers have with their finances.

Whether opening a new account or working towards financial goals, every touchpoint along the way should be simple, safe, and personalized.

Now, more than ever before, consumers need to trust that their financial providers will provide an experience that helps them manage their financial lives.

Today we’ll be sharing our research and point of view into how by embracing open finance and providing financial wellness tools, you can meet your consumers where they are and deliver powerful money experiences that improve adoption and drive engagement.

We have an exciting lineup for you.

First, you'll hear an update from Nandita Gupta, our Chief Product Officer, regarding the newest product release and how MX is making open finance more accessible than ever before.

Crystal Anderson, our VP of Product, will then share the highlights and key takeaways from our latest consumer research. Our panel of experts will join her to discuss how they are using consumer data to improve the money experience.

Stick around after the panel to hear from two of our MX product managers for a demo of MX Insights and our latest product offering Data Access.

As we get started today, introduce yourself in the chat and let us know where you're watching from. Be sure to use it throughout and ask questions. The MX team is online and ready to talk with you.

And now, I’m happy to introduce Nandita.

Introducing Data Access

1:51-7:38

Nandita Gupta: Thank you, Shayli.

Hello everyone and welcome. I joined MX as the Chief Product Officer back in September 2022, roughly 8 months ago. I lead our product, data science, and analytics teams.

Having lived on four continents and now having to manage our family’s finances between the U.S. and India, I have experienced firsthand the challenges of managing money and how broken the money experience really is.

If you think it’s hard to get combined insights from your Robinhood, Bank of America, and Venmo accounts, try tying all of these together or easily move money between accounts in the U.S., Africa, and Asia – in short, it’s not easy!

My hope and vision is to unleash the power of financial data by making it really usable and actionable so that everyone - literally everyone around the world - can have a better money experience.

We’ve seen technology transform every aspect of our lives from shopping to travel to entertainment. But despite all these technological advancements, managing your money seems to get harder, not easier.

As such, we really have an opportunity and obligation to improve the money experience while delivering better customer and business outcomes.

We all can do more as an industry to improve the money experience.

So how do we improve the money experience?

Late last year, we launched MX Access - which is an open finance API platform. We focused on the ability to improve the customer data-sharing process by removing the credentials from the ecosystem and eliminating the need for screen scraping.

But, we learned that there was so much more potential. Once access is enabled, you’re able to unlock a new stream of data that helps you learn more about your customers and identify opportunities for growth.

And because of that, today we’re announcing that MX Access is now Data Access with expanded and enhanced capabilities.

Data Access improves the data-sharing experience for customers by giving them control over when, where, and how they connect their accounts and who they share their financial data with.

It helps data providers - like many of you - improve the customer experience by enabling tokenized API connections to safely, securely, and efficiently share consumer-permissioned data.

And, over the past several months, we have integrated feedback from partners and clients. In addition, we have also incorporated what we're learning in the market.

We heard you when you asked for an easier way to stand up an interoperable API that was aggregator agnostic.

We heard you when you asked for analytics and insights that could help you understand customer data-sharing behaviors.

We heard you when you asked for pre-built legal documents for onboarding data recipients and data access management tools that put you back in control to protect your customer’s data.

And we heard you when you said it needed to be easy.

Today, I’m excited that our Data Access product is not only available and live in the market, it is now free to all data providers.

At MX, we believe EVERYONE should have access to their data, regardless of where they choose to bank. Whether it’s banks, credit unions, fintechs, and any financial technology company with consumer accounts can now implement and deliver a better data-sharing experience at no cost.

Data Access will not only help data providers provide tokenized API connections that enable consumer-permissioned data sharing, but will also provide access to actionable insights on what their customers are doing – where, when, and why they are sharing their data.

What this means is you can now easily understand what apps and services your customers are using. With this information, you gain insight into where their accounts are and what products or services they are seeking so that you can also offer these or partner to offer these, opening new opportunities for your business growth.

And Data Access gives your customers a secure way of connecting accounts with their favorite apps, helping you reduce your call center volumes around broken connections or poor experiences.

Data Access is a holistic open finance platform that is completely unique in the market. It is designed to make onboarding third-party data recipients easier and gives you insight into your product gaps and opportunities to better meet your customer needs.

At MX, we’ve built on a culture of being bold. And today, we’re taking this first step because we believe in building a better money experience for everyone.

This is our way of helping move the industry forward to a more secure, reliable way to share financial data — again, at no cost.

And this is just the beginning. Data Access is just one part of the larger MX Intelligence Platform that we’ll be announcing later this year.

Our Director of Product for Data Access, Trent Riddle, wil be sharing with you an exclusive demo of how Data Access can transform the way you engage with your customers.

But first, let me turn it over to our VP of Product, Crystal Anderson, to share insights from our latest research and introduce our panel of industry experts.

Research Insights

7:39-13:44

Crystal Anderson: Thank you Nandita. Hello everyone, thanks for joining us. I’m happy to be here and sharing our latest research on consumer trends.

Our finances are complicated. And our industry is responsible for making that experience easier, more personalized, and more intelligent.

Consumer sentiment toward financial services has been all over the charts lately. You’ve seen the headlines. It’s not surprising that consumers are unsure of what to do next. Earlier this year, we dug into “what consumers want from their financial services providers,” and what we found is, the most requested feature was tools or services that help them understand their financial lives and achieve their financial goals.

This is why we decided to focus on financial wellness and consumer perception for this report.

This survey of just over 1,000 American adults included an even split in responses across each generation.

The key themes we found were around Comfort. Security. Balance. Stability and Peace of mind.

These are what come to mind when consumers were asked what financial wellness means to them. But, the most common theme to surface was financial wellness is more than just being able to pay bills. It’s about being able to live without worrying about money.

The top 3 insights and trends from the research may or may not be surprising.

First, financial stress remains high; however, consumers are ‘somewhat’ optimistic for the future

Second, consumers want experiences and solutions that are easy, connected, secure, and personalized

Third, building and keeping trust is critical. Open Banking plays a critical role in building and strengthening trust.

According to our research, 48% of consumers say money is stressful.

Common money stressors include bankruptcy, foreclosure, job loss, debt, health care costs, divorce, taxes, and food or housing insecurity.

Financial stress impacts our body and mind. It has been linked to increased anxiety and depression, as well as insomnia and more.

In fact, 47% of our respondents claimed that thinking about money makes them anxious - and 76% agree that they are worried about rising costs due to inflation.

In spite of this, 44% of consumers state they ‘feel confident that their financial situation is better than 12 months ago.’ This is even higher among younger generations, with Gen Z at 56% and Millennials at 51%. And, those who identify as Asian, Black, Hispanic, or other are at 50% compared to those who identify as White.

Our research shows that consumers are readying themselves for potential market changes.

• 40% are depositing less money into savings or investment accounts
• 45% are not currently contributing to a 401(k) account
• 65% are cutting items from their budget to save money

Consumers are being very intentional with their spend.

They are reconciling their financial caution and their fiscal caution with their spending impulse by being highly selective about which brands and experiences they choose, selecting those that deliver high value while abandoning those that do not.

While some consumers are preparing for potential market changes, others are embracing new financial goals that go beyond just paying the bills.

Today, consumer spending accounts for approximately two-thirds of the U.S. economic output.

It is a key metric of growth, as well as a good gauge of consumer financial health.

Homes and automobiles represent major purchases for most people.

When asked, ‘in the next twelve months, do you anticipate any large purchases such as a new home or car’:

• 16% stated they plan to buy a new house
• 30% stated they plan to buy a new car

This illustrates that consumers feel a bit more confident about what’s ahead.

Today’s money experience is complicated and disjointed.

Currently, the average consumer has seven financial accounts across numerous financial institutions … more than 2 banking applications … and 3 to 4 fintech applications on their smartphone.

According to our January research report “What Consumers Really Want,” when it comes to money management, consumers want to be able to connect ALL of their financial accounts and see all of their financial data in one place.

Our current research explored how respondents currently track and manage their finances.

Unfortunately, our findings uncovered that most consumers do not have a good way to track and manage their finances.

• 45% stated they only check finances through their financial accounts. This is even higher among older generations
• 19% use a budgeting tool or app to track their finances
• 18% use a spreadsheet or other manual process to track their finances

What’s more, nearly 1 in 10 respondents stated that they do not track their finances at all.

We’ve all heard the expression - knowledge is power. Without a complete 360-degree view of their finances and proper tracking and management tools, consumers truly do not have the data they need to manage their finances.

Next, we’re looking at mobile experiences.

Today’s consumers do more, want more, and expect more from their mobile experience.

Our research found that:

• 39% of consumers use the same username and password on multiple apps so that it is just easier to remember
• 29% have connected multiple financial accounts into one app to simplify how they manage their finances
• 60% prefer multi-factor authentication when accessing finances through a mobile application

These behaviors reinforce their need for more. More Ease. More Connection. More Security. More Personalization.

And now, I’m excited to invite our panel of experts to join me as we dive deeper into the research and what they are seeing with their own users.

Panel Discussion

13:44-13:57

Crystal Anderson: Welcome, everyone. Today we have with us two of our partners. Carlyn and Jana. Would you like to introduce yourself and your company?

Carlyn, why don’t you go first?

13:58-14:48

Carlyn Lamia: Thanks, Crystal. Yes, absolutely First, thank you so much for having us here today and having me here today. We're really grateful for the partnership with MX, and we've gotten a lot from your products and services as we translate them into our own products and services. So thank you again.

I'm here from Achieve. We're a 20-year-old digital personal finance company . We started with a single product 20 years ago — debt resolution. We help, in that product, we help consumers who are struggling with personal debt to get out from under that burden, avoid bankruptcy, and become debt-free and move on with their lives. Over 20 years, we've also introduced several lending products, including unsecured personal loans as well as home loans. And, this week we launched one of our apps, called MOLO — money left over. So we've gone from…

14:49-14:50

Crystal: Congratulations!

14:50-15:10

Carlyn: Thank you. Yeah, big. It's a big deal. We're very excited, and we're very excited about the roadmap for that app. So we've got from a debt resolution company to a multi-product financial services company to, you know, a full suite digital personal finance company with free products and services, really helping consumers get to where they want to go.

15:11-15:16

Crystal: Great. Thank you. Thank you so much for joining us, Jana, introduce yourself to us, please.

15:17-15:58

Jana Manley: Sure, my name is Jana Manley and I echoed those sentiments. I I just love being on these conversational type calls again and getting to talk about how we're using different money products, if you will, to help the lives of consumers. So I am the senior Vice President for marketing and digital strategy here at Suncoast. And, Suncoast is the largest credit union in the State of Florida, I believe. Last time I checked, we are still about No. 8 in the nation. So we have a very big membership base over 1.1 million numbers that we are so happy to be able to help improve their financial lives. And so we're very excited to be able to talk about exactly how we're doing that, and how we're looking to do that differently with partners like MX.

So I'm just very grateful for you guys having us on.

15:59-16:22

Crystal: Thank you again. Thank you so much for joining us. Well, let's jump into our discussion, and the first thing I'd love to talk about is the money experience, and we know it plays such a vital part in customer adoption. So I'd like to start with you just telling us as we take a look at your organization and how you're thinking about that, what role does data play in that? And, Jana — why don’t we start with you?

16:23-18:14

Jana: Sure, I would tell you that data is the center point of anything and everything that we should be doing as an industry right now. I think that one of the things that we've looked at is, how do you use that, then, to be more proactive in the way that we're communicating with members. And I'm not just talking about marketing right, and the way that we're actually servicing them.

A lot of times what you found in the industry, I think, is, we've been very reactive in everything that we do, and most of the time we use it, we use the data differently, right? We used it more about how is it powering the balance sheets, and how is that improving the organization. But right now I think it's important to be proactive in that.

I actually had an interesting conversation with your former CEO about 7 years ago, and that conversation went around the financial industry has the most powerful data on the planet —because we have the transactional data, which means we understand how our consumers are spending. And so how do you take that data and be proactive with it, and helping members or consumers out there understand how they can be better managers and stewards of that money and helping them make their their lives better with it? And the only way you can really do that is with that data and bringing that into more personalized levels rather than what the historical industry has done, which is kind of the batch and blast. We're talking to you about services or products that we offer but are we talking to you about it in a timely fashion? Is it relevant? Is it something that you want right now?

So data is what gives us the power to be able to do that, not to talk in batch and blast type terms about products, but to talk to members not only about what they need, because we can see that through the data, but talking to them when they may need it. So to me that's the most powerful thing that data can do is to bring us that timely and relevant ability to be able to let our members and consumers know that we have solutions that can help them, not just marketing to them.

18:15-18:31

Crystal: That's great. Yes, thank you so much. I remember my first conversation with Ryan also about the power of data, so that definitely sticks with you. What are you seeing over at Achieve, as it relates to the role of data within the money experience and customer adoption?

18:32-21:02

Carlyn: Yeah, thank you, Crystal. Jana — I love your answer. And I would just say, wow, we we think about things the same way it sounds. We're 20 years old as I said, so we have 20 years of rich transactional data on our audience on our consumer user group. So we also have 20 years of credit data that we've gathered, you know, both in marketing as well as in supporting the consumers that we're actively serving.

So we have transactional data, the behavioral data with respect to our relationship with these consumers and the credit bureau data. All of that. And now, obviously, you know, more recently we've begun to add in the money data — MX’s rich set of data on the consumers that we're serving as well.

All 3 of those things and other third party data along the way helps us primarily do 2 things. And just like Jana said, data is the center. You have to be looking at the data. It doesn't tell you the answers. You have to ask right questions, but the questions that we ask of the data are things like what products and services do these consumers need? What are the solutions that will actually drive value for our audience?

We look to the data to find where we think consumer outcomes can be improved, or where in their life journey and their trajectory, do people maybe start to struggle? And how do we get those people in a personalized way, as Jana was saying, back on track so that they can actually reach their goals and get to where they want to be? So we use data to to drive our products and services, the strategy, to innovate those things so that we're stepping into the right gaps and solving the right problems

The other way that we use data is to speak to people in a manner that is personalized to them, so that they understand, just as Jana was talking about, we're not, you know, we're not trying to… We don't have a hammer, and therefore everything becomes a nail, right. Consumer finance doesn't work that way. Money is personal, and so experiences also need to be personal and personalized.

So we use the data in aggregate on our audience, but also at an individual level, as we get to know people, to speak to them in a way that makes sense and is relevant to their lives. And so, yeah, data plays a critical function in our company, both internally and externally.

21:03-21:43

Crystal: Thank you. Yeah. I heard so much from both of you about how to use data to personalize the experience, and ensure that you're really curating the product experience, and that you are talking to them in a very personalized way. So I absolutely love that.

That really heads into the next thing that I wanted to talk about, which is, you use all of that data to create this very personalized experience and that is what helps you meet your consumers financial needs and their expectations. But what I'd love to hear from you is how you then translate that to achieving your business goals, or does it? Carlyn, why don't we start with you?

21:44-23:38

Carlyn: Yeah. So I… This question is a question that we love to answer at Achieve, because our business goals are directly related to the consumers that we serve and their goals. The product that we started with 20 years ago that I mentioned, called debt resolution, is a part in which consumers who are struggling — they want to avoid bankruptcy. They have too much debt. They need help to service that debt. We really help them as I said earlier, you know, step out from under the burden of that debt, and have a plan and a path that they can execute to become debt-free.

That's an important set of context, because the way that we make money in that business is by delivering the outcome. We don't make any money until we deliver consumer outcomes, and so the tying together, you know, our business goals with our consumers goals is just one for one in the way that our product works. And that we're very proud of, and it's served us and our consumers well. As I mentioned, we've set up lending businesses as well over time. The most recent is our home loans business, and which we actually have as part of the underwriting process a check to see how much money we're saving the consumers who are going to take out a loan from us, and on average is about $800 a month.

So you're getting up to like savings of $10,000 a year, which is very significant for consumers, especially in the environment in which you know, inflation is not helping consumers who are buying groceries, and, you know, servicing their daily finance needs. Interest rates are rising so anything that we can save consumers which we feel strongly about as part of our mission is something that we want to bake into the products. And it is not an accident that the way that we make money is by delivering outcomes.

23:39-23:41

Crystal: Jana, how about you?

23:42-24:40

Jana: Sure, I really love to talk about this as well, because one of the things that I am so proud of is I am a 25-year legacy banker and I have moved into the Credit Union space for the last couple of years with Suncoast. And what I love about credit unions is it’s people helping people at the core of the business right? So the focus that we have is making sure that we're identifying products and services that that consumers may need, that may help our members. And we're even looking outside of our traditional products and services. We're looking at partnerships as we've done with MX and with others. We're looking at fintechs. How do we get out there? And how do we partner with people that can bring maybe non traditional products and services to the table that could help our members, because at the end of the day, with our philosophy of people helping people, we know that if we can help our members and then our members are doing well, but that in turn, just by nature helps the bottom line. I've said for years, if you do right by the consumer, the profits and the bottom lines will follow, and I truly believe that to the core. And I think in the space that we're in, that's really what we're looking to achieve.

24:41-25:16

Crystal: Yeah, great. You both talked a lot about how you're helping consumers, especially given the current environment and everything from home loans to being able to satisfy daily needs like purchasing groceries. So I would love to to shift to that topic which is the macroeconomic conditions that we're in, and this ever changing competitive landscape. What do you think are the greatest challenges and opportunities facing financial services providers like us given this environment? Jana, why don’t we start with you?

25:17-28:56

Jana: Sure, I would say in this environment one of the things that we're facing that's one of the biggest challenges is there are more competitors and very different that are in this space, and a lot of those are not always out to do the best by the consumer. They're looking to take advantage of the situation that's happening out there. And so I think that we have to be looking at things just very differently than we have in the past, and making sure that we're out there and proactive, and in front of the members and in front of the consumers, to let them know that we do offer those products and services that can help them, and making sure that they're not turning to maybe some of those that i'll just say may not have their best interest at heart, and and I think we've all seen a lot of that that's coming into the the space. And, particularly when you talk about money, right?.. that's one of the places where you're seeing very non traditional competitors come into play, and then they're all looking at that payment space, right? Because that's where that's where the data is. I mean seriously — that's what they're going after, more so than anything they want that data so that they can be able to to know what we know about our consumers and our members, and use it in very different ways.

And so I think that it's ever more important for the financial industry as a whole to rethink and reimagine the way that we're looking at how we're helping our consumers and making sure that it's not the way that we've always done things. The industry as a whole, and I don't speak to any one particular institution, has always been more of a “If we build it, they'll come” model, and that's not what's happening out there. it's being able to be in front of them and talking to them not just about the products and services, because the products and services that are offered are a thing. They're necessary. But it's really what are the benefits? How are they helping me? And many consumers oftentimes don't even know what exactly those products and services, and how well — I will say they don't know what they are — but they're not always sure about exactly how they benefit them, particularly going back to the personalized situation we're talking about.

How does the product or service that I'm looking at benefit the particular situation that I'm in? And so that's where I think that that's a challenge. It's a challenge just to be able to articulate that in a one-on-one manner, right? In a very personalized way when a lot of times what you're dealing with is not humans to humans talking anymore, right? The digital space has become so proliferated, and everyone can Google anything that you want. And virtually, you can find anything that you need. But do you really understand the impact or the outcome, as Carlyn mentioned, of what that actually means to you if you decide to go down that path?

And so as an industry, how do we make sure that we're educating — educating the consumer, educating the members — in a way that not only that it's factual but in a way that they can consume it, so that they can actually see the tangible and personal benefit to them. And so that's a challenge, right? When you're talking about, when you're not dealing with what used to happen with you're sitting in front of a desk, and I can talk to you for 30 min about what's going on in your life. That's why going back to you, and I don’t mean to keep harping on it, but going back to the data, because the data can be that predictive type of information that helps us be out there, because if they're looking for something, they don't know what they're looking for, and we can be there for them in that time and space, then we get that opportunity to then talk to them in a way that's meaningful, and can help them with what they're doing.

And that's where we're seeing some of those competitors come into play because they simply haven't had the same models that's happened in the financial industry before, and they're really looking at it a little differently, and we've got to be able to play in that space, and in that way, to be able to to really serve the members and the communities

28:57-29:03

Crystal: Great. Carlyn, what are you seeing in terms of the environment and the challenges in this space?

29:04-34:25

Carlyn: Well, what a pleasure again to follow a great answer. We think about things a lot of the same way it sounds like once again. So the experience, the situation of the American consumer, and these days, as your research that you walk through has shown, is consumer debt is at an all time high Inflation has made everything more expensive in our lives, so budgets are tighter. Interest rates have also risen a ton in the last year, which means that the debt consumers are carrying is more expensive for them at the same time as their daily needs are also more expensive. So the American consumer is, is in a phase.. there's different segments, right? This there is no generalization that applies to every consumer in our country, obviously. But there is a sense of pause. Let me be very thoughtful about where all my dollars are going, because I recognize whether my wallet is tight today or I'm a little, maybe, worried that in 3 or 6 months things might feel a little different. I'm gonna take a pause. I'm gonna be very thoughtful about the decisions I'm making with respect to where all my dollars are going.

And your question was, what does this mean for financial services providers? I think, for those of us who make loans, credit boxes are tightening. You know we're looking at risk in a different way updated for the, you know, current market conditions

In Achieve, we are a lender. In our other business line, we're seeing more consumers need our services right when you're talking about helping consumers restructure their debt. There are a lot of them, and an increasing number of late who need our debt settlement / resolution services. So we benefit from that counter cyclical balance. You know, in great times when people are optimistic, and you know, spending for future growth, lending is growing. In the counter cyclical times, debt settlement is growing. So we see both, and it's a very interesting vantage point back to Jana, going to the data, it's interesting to see these dynamic shifts over time.

But right now we're in a place where the consumers are pausing, being very thoughtful. It’s exactly what Jana mentioned so I will just repeat — helping consumers understand where they are. Making, for example, budgeting, easy, effortless versus effortful versus being a hurdle that it's like “Oh, I know I need to do this. But, gosh! What a pain! You know, I would rather clean my bathroom than create a budget on, you know, in Excel or in Google Sheets right? It's not fun to do. But it, boy? Is it valuable?”

Carlyn Lamia: When you see where you're spending your money, you can make better decision. You can face some of the things that you might not like all. How many streaming services are you subscribing to? Well, gosh! That actually adds up over time. I actually, you know, plugging our own app that I mentioned launch this week. I was using it earlier this week and literally within the next 2 hours, like i'm going to cancel that i'm going to cancel that, like.

Every bit of information that you can use to understand your financial situation better can lead to you making better decisions for yourself, which add up significantly over time.

So, from a financial services provider perspective, the more that we can do to educate people and give them tools and awareness in a way that they can engage with right. That is, effort less versus effort full. That helps them, you know, have in the same place, not just information to understand but a detailed explanation of what are my options there for? So, therefore, what do I do?

If we can collapse all of this into dynamic, engaging consumer experiences, not only can we help people understand our products and services, but their situation, and therefore how to take action to get to a better place. So we feel really strongly about the way, the manner in which you know we help people understand, and then make the best choice for them ourselves.

And the last thing I would say because I didn't mention it earlier, but it is relevant. We have thousands of people on the phone. So we are a digital personal finance company collecting 20 years of rich consumer data, transactional behavioral, credit bureau, money data but we also have thousands of people on the phone who are talking to consumers every day, and therefore we can personalize things much more effectively through those conversations, because we get to know people, and we listen to them.

Everyone's different, so that you know personal touch, the empathetic, human approach to personal finance, is something that really serves us well, and and you know, gives consumers a choice. Do I want to interact digitally or on the phone or both? Some combination of the 2. All of that together as a package, giving people information and empowering them to make the right choice for themselves, and then offering services that truly help. That's the virtuous circle that we feel really proud of.

34:26-36:37

Jana: Yeah. And I If I could add to that really quickly, because I love what you said about effort less versus effortful, especially when you're talking about budgeting right? Because you look back 10-15 years when budgeting tools maybe started to kind of come into their own, and maybe it's even further than but we won't go back to how long? But it was interesting because there were surveys that went out to consumers all over the place that said, do you want budgeting?

Well, I love one of the comments you made about “data empowers you to ask the right questions”. Well, the fact was that wasn't the right question to ask at that time, because who's going to say no. Everyone's going to say yes, but the point is, they don't want to do it right. No one wants to. To. Your point goes to, and but an Excel spreadsheet. And so one of the experiences I really love about the effort less. Part is okay, so let us help sort of pre-populate, using that data. Good. This is how you're spending and being more proactive with that. So it's almost like you’re creating a little bit of a budget for them… a little effortless. It's not so effortful, and it helps them right. It gives them that ability not to have to think. Well, I've got to go fill out this spreadsheet.

It's that part, and being proactive with the consumers, because that's what they really wanted. When the question was asked, do you want budgeting, and the answer was surprisingly yes. But then, when you started looking at the adoption of the budgeting tools that were out there at the time, you're getting 10% or less engaging with the budgeting tool. Why? Because no one wanted to do that, even though in their head they want to. They don't want to take the effort because it's a lot, and then sometimes budgeting can get depressing. So you gotta really take a look at that. And one of the other pieces to that. And i'm sorry this is one of my passions.

But one of the other pieces to that is then understanding. And how do you how to use the psychological approach to that type of thing? Small wins are big. How do you use your tools now to celebrate those small wins? Going out there and congratulating you. Go back to some of the apps that are out there, even outside of the industry that are taking psychological psychological approach to dieting right? Those types of things … celebrating small wins and not just educating, but celebrating. And I think those are the things that are really evolving in the industry that are different than how we traditionally looked at things that are going to be major game players in the coming years.

36:38-37:35

Crystal: I have so many nuggets from just listening to the both of you, and hearing your passion around this. And you know one of the things I've really picked up on is we've talked about using data to make the experience more engaging. But it's beyond that.

It's about the outcomes that you're driving, and it's about making, reducing the effort and improving the outcome, especially given the environment that we're in. And then how do you do all of that while also making it make sense for your business. So thank you both so much. I love the passion, and I love the little insights that I've received from this as well.

I'd love to end on that. What other advice do you have for your peers? What would, what would that be? What advice would you give them as we're operating in this environment and delivering such incredibly important services to consumers? Jana, why don't we start with you?

37:36-38:45

Jana: Sure I would offer 2 pieces of advice. I'll go back, maybe harping on data.. One of the problems we've had in the industry as a whole, as your traditional financial institutions have had such systems of disparate data, it's been very difficult for them to be able to bring together the data that they need and be able to use it, not just as what are the facts of it, but what are the insights behind it? What is the data tell you? And how can you use it? So I would challenge you to make sure that you're looking at bringing the data together and, as best you can, and finding solutions to be able to leverage that data.

And the second part, I would say, is, look outside of our industry. As an industry, we tend to look at the same…Who are our competitors in this space? It's no longer that. There are so many other industries that are actually attempting to come into the financial services space, particularly through money, movement, through payments, and through whatever and and even like, I said, looking at dieting apps, how are these other ecommerce spaces working? And how can we take some of the way that they're using that? And how do we internalize that? And how do we take that and and look at the way that we're doing things a little differently?

So continue to leverage data and then look outside of your space and see how things are happening.

38:45-38:47

Crystal: Right. Carlyn?

38:48-41:06

Carlyn Lamia: Once again. Great answer, Jana. The quick answer is focus on the consumer for me. What does the consumer need? Talk to them, you know you. Your team ran through your recent research. We do the same. We've got quarterly market research pull surveys to figure out well what's happening in the lives of these people that we serve. Not just the financial lives, right? As Jana was saying, like money is personal and our choices with what we do with our money, and how we, you know, make the most of the dollars that we earn is also personal. And so all our entire lives affect those decisions. And so, if we, as a financial services company, can maintain a deep understanding of what's going on in the lives of the people we serve, that helps us know.

What do they need? What are the consumer jobs to be done right now for our audience? And we have 123 million consumers in our target audience. There's a lot of different types of people in that group, so we're constantly speaking to them. Not just, you know, within our thousands of employees on the phone who we learn from, but through market research surveys and through user testing. And you know, to understand what are the current gaps in pain points that they need help with. Okay, how do we develop products and services in an innovative manner that can step in and and fill those gaps? And help, you know, relieve the burden or get them to where they want to be back to consumer outcomes? And then how do we design products and services that they'll actually want to use so that we can deliver that value, and they can receive it and move on with their lives, so that those things that today are pain points aren’t pain points in the future, because we've done such a good job listening to people and understanding their situation, psychology included for you know how to get them to a better place where they want to be?

It's always focused on the consumer. Listen to people, talk to people, solicit information, and once you're solving real consumer problems in a way that they want to engage with, the rest takes care of itself.

41:07-41:18

Crystal: The rest takes care of itself. Well, thank you all so much for joining us today. I've really enjoyed our conversation, and now we're going to pass it back to Shayli.

Closing

41:19-42:12

Shayli Lones: Thanks Crystal, and huge thank you to our panel for joining us today and sharing their expertise and insights.

Up next, you’re going to see two product demo experiences pop up beneath the screen. I invite you to join our product managers as they share what MX is doing to improve the money experience for users and how you can get started today.

Trent is going to share Data Access with you — Our new free offering for data providers enables secure and reliable data access and provides open finance analytics that help you understand more about your customers.

Then join Fred, our product manager of MX Insights. We learned today that consumers need a better money experience, one that helps them understand and improve their financial health. MX Insights is our customizable and configurable PFM solution that helps you surface insights to consumers based on their financial data.

Thanks for joining us today.