Financial access has improved significantly for poor people. But in developing countries, roughly one in three accounts sit unused annually presenting a core business challenge for many financial service providers, who have invested an estimated $13 billion in opening new accounts in recent years. Lack of use translates into lost revenues for the business and lost opportunity for the customer. CGAP's research has found that businesses that adopt a customer-centric approach deliver financial products and services of value to low-income people, increasing usage and improving business revenues. Product use in turn empowers customers and gives them control over their financial lives.
The CGAP Customer-Centric Guide is a website filled with hands-on toolkits and experiments that help financial service providers design and deliver effective financial services that meet the wants and needs of their low-income customers. Discover how customer centricity delivers for all stakeholders - employees, suppliers, consumers, competitors, shareholders and community members.
CGAP's Customer-Centric Guide: An Online Handbook
Tigo cash representative in Ghana. Photo by IDEO.org
The Customer-Centric Guide is filled with hands-on toolkits, case studies and experiments that help financial service providers design and deliver effective products and services for poor people.
Photo by Dhrubajyoti Bhattacharjee, 2016 CGAP Photo Contest
Why go customer-centric? This summary for business executives explores the opportunities, strategies and actions that lead to value for the business and for low-income customers.
CARD Pioneer’s Story: Meeting Customers' Needs
Additional Resources
Explore these case studies on how customer centricity delivers results. In the Philippines, the microinsurance company CARD Pioneer improved its revenues by 100 percent after adopting a customer-centric approach. In Haiti, Digicel faced low adoption rates in 2012 for its mobile money service. It used customer insights to relaunch its digital payment services MonCash in 2015, and within two years the number of active customers grew to 805,000 on a three-month basis from under 40,000, and transaction value increased from $3 million to $32 million. Read these and more on the Customer-Centric Guide website.
How Digicel Mobile Money used customer insights to offer new services and saw transaction volume grow 10 fold in two years.
Pioneer Microinsurance found that building a business around positive customer experience increased revenues.
AMK used customer centricity methods to transform its leadership and organizational culture.