Tackling the fintech gender gap issue
Why the inclusivity of female users in our industry matters
Fintech: short for financial technology — and two industries from which women all over the world have historically been excluded from. Therefore, it’s unsurprising that when the worlds of finance and technology collided, it resulted in a hugely unexplored customer base.
This presents industries such as ours with a significant opportunity to invest in an untapped market. For example, 80% of household buying decisions are made or influenced by women. Women run 34% of the world’s businesses, and 68% of women’s companies in upcoming economies aren’t having their credit needs met. Finally, a whopping 73% of women around the world say they’re unsatisfied with their current bank services. These are statistics that big fintech players need to pay attention to.
How do we seize this enormous potential and work towards bridging the consumer gender gap? How do we bring more female users onboard and make them aware of today’s fintech products and apps? More importantly, how do we design a better service that matters to the contemporary woman?
The AltFi survey
A study conducted by AltFi showed that more women (25%) than men (17%) in the UK today are unfamiliar with digital banks — and it goes beyond mere knowledge. The survey also concluded that women were less trusting of digital banks when it came to depositing their salaries (56% of women versus 37% of men).
The study was conducted as a Europe-wide survey with 4,500 participants. It was one of the largest fintech studies ever to be carried out. Its purpose was to better understand the attitude and behaviours towards mobile money and digital banking. Results across the whole of Europe were similar to those outlined above in terms of recognition of challenger banks and level of trust among men and women.
Historical context
In the financial world, plenty of research has shown that women are less confident when it comes to their understanding of money, especially in comparison to men. These are the unfortunate repercussions of a time in history when women were considered incapable of rational and analytical thinking when it came to making decisions about finances. It wasn’t until 1975, for example, that women in the UK were finally allowed to open a bank account in their name. These regrettable ramifications are still felt among the modern, money-earning, working women of today.
Similarly, women were historically cast aside in the tech sector, too, despite their countless contributions to the field early on. By the 1970s, governments around the world and the industry clued into just how powerful computers could truly be. Women in various tech jobs such as computing, coding and engineering were quickly replaced by men, who were naturally given better job titles and higher salaries. Women were systematically phased out and being forced out of their careers after marriage. Today, the tech sector still has a long way to go to fully recover from this deliberate expulsion of women in the field. It’s still an area that’s gender-biased and oppressive of women, not just internally but externally too. In some infamous cases, it’s trickled down into product design, affecting the consumer.
The historical and purposeful exclusion of women in these realms would undoubtedly explain the disconnect we still see today, especially in fintech and among users. Monese, like many other contenders in our field, is no exception. Our customer base skews male (roughly 60% versus 40%). So how do we, along with our colleagues in the fintech arena, broaden our users?
Connecting to the female user
Despite its discriminatory history and the inequalities the finance and technology industries still face today, some of the duty still falls on us to do what we can to diversify the fintech customer base. Of course, to fully do this will take some time.
In speaking with AltFi, our CEO and Founder Norris had this to say: “The network effects that help you grow can have the tendency to produce customers that are similar, and if men inherently are more trusting of digital products, then they recommend it to people like themselves”, he explained. “What we are doing right now is continue to improve the product offering, continue to test out different messaging and look at meaningful partnerships that will help us reach more women”.
Fully tapping into the female market is important. That’s if we truly wish to be better than the traditional banks and often-out-of-touch financial institutions. We started with a vision of being a mobile money account that’s inclusive — and this must include women. We need to appeal to those people and communities who’ve been historically underserved and underrepresented in these realms. At Monese, this has always been at the heart of our mission.
To truly begin to include women in conventionally male-dominated spaces, we must all change the way we serve and think of our consumers (i.e., as not just solely for men, the digitally savvy or financially literate). It’s something we must all play a role in — from the media, financial establishments to banks and fintechs. It’s a major chance to fully capture this audience and one certainly not to be missed by our industry in particular.
