Showing value to overcome consumer doubts

The naysayers are out in droves. This time it’s “Mobile banking must overcome consumer doubts.” Yes, it’s natural for people to have fear and doubt about new things. Such is human nature. People like constancy.

But, mobile payments and mobile banking are no different than any other new technology that has every been introduced. And in that regard, the solution to driving adoption is already known: demonstrate undeniable value.

The value proposition is the key to driving adoption of mobile financial services. And that is precisely where mobile banking fails. Mobile banking, at this moment in time, does not offer enough value for people to look beyond their fears and apprehensions. Mobile banking is just another way for people to access their bank accounts. But, people can already access their accounts almost anytime they want. Therefore, we’re seeing that, in terms of mobile banking, the main benefit seen by consumers is the up-to-the-second balance inquiry ability. Yes, that is a very helpful feature in today’s always-on-the-go world. But, it’s not enough.

The greater value proposition is in mobile transactions, such as mobile remittances. Mobile transactions provide undeniable value to a systematically underserved market segment: the unbanked. There are over 40 million unbanked people in the US alone. And, roughly 70% over the world’s population is unbanked.

Mobile transactions bring the financial services infrastructure to this untapped consumer. Mobile transactions raise this consumer to a first-class financial citizen. Mobile transactions provide necessary tools that are currently unavailable.

So, when pundits debate the readiness of consumers for mobile banking, they are missing the whole point: Mobile banking is a vitamin, but mobile transactions are a pain pill.

m-Via at Prepaid Cards Europe – London – October 24-25

This October 24-25, m-Via’s Chris Sorensen will be presenting “Stars and Mag Stripes: what lessons can Europe learn from US prepaid successes?” at Prepaid Cards Europe.

So, if you’re going to be attending the conference, please introduce yourself to Chris!

m-Via at CTIA – San Francisco – October 23-25

This October 23-25 several of the m-Via team will be attending the CTIA Wireless I.T. & Entertainment conference at the Moscone Center in San Francisco.

This year has a great line up of speakers and panels including keynotes by Steve Ballmer (CEO, Microsoft) and Dustin Moskovitz (VP of Engineering, Facebook).

So, if you’re going to be attending CTIA we’re looking forward to seeing you there!

Western Union’s entry is good for mobile remittances industry

Western Union, GSM Partner for Global Mobile Money Transfer Service was the headline of a press release a couple days ago.

We expected to see this announcement some time ago (even before the GSMA announcement in February). It will be very interesting to see how Western Union launches a mobile offering without creating conflict for their franchisees.

This is good news for the mobile payments industry – the most difficult and expensive part of building a new market is converting non-customers into potential customers. Western Union will spend a significant amount of money educating their consumers about the safety and convenience of mobile remittances. Once they have done the heavy lifting, it wil be easier (and cheaper) for competitors to lure away the converted users with better services and pricing.