Unlocking cultural financial insights: Milo's journey with Interviews from Lyssna

Milo, a US fintech company, is dedicated to offering financial solutions for foreign nationals. Redefining the landscape of credit and financial services for global customers, Milo pioneered the first digital home lending solution to buy US real estate or cash out equity.

“Let's say someone lives in Canada or somewhere in Latin America – they don't have a social security number, they don't have credit scores, so it makes it really hard for them to get a mortgage in the US. So we provide an option for them to actually get a mortgage to purchase properties here,” shares Scott Weinreb, Senior Product Manager at Milo. 

The company was looking to extend its financial solutions to Latin America. To guide the direction of their expansion, they needed to do research to understand user behaviors and preferences in this region. In our conversation with Scott, he shared his experience using Lyssna’s Interviews feature and how he was able to gain valuable insights from one-on-one discussions with participants in Latin America.

Challenge

During the discovery phase of the new product, Scott found it challenging to conduct research in regions where the company didn’t have any established connections.

“We wanted to expand our product in Latin America, specifically Chile, Colombia, or Mexico, to allow these residents to save in US dollars, backed by a US savings bank. What makes it particularly challenging is that, geographically, our user base is quite spread out.“

Prior to incorporating the Interviews tool, the Milo team relied on early insights from internal team members, even enticing friends and family to take part in research. “That was really helpful, but I definitely wanted to dive deeper as a product manager,“ adds Scott.

He continues, “We do have part of our development team located in Cali, Colombia, but one of the biggest biases with product management, in general, is to assume that your own interactions or feelings are representative of the greater market, because what we know is that people use products in weird and unusual ways that you'd never think of.”

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Solution

Scott was already using Lyssna for other UX/UI testing. After coming across Interviews in beta, he integrated it into the development process.

With access to the Lyssna panel, Scott was able to filter the vast pool of over 530,000 panelists to his desired demographics. Scott emphasizes, "The access to that is so helpful, along with the screening questions." This pre-planning ensured that Scott was able to engage with the most aligned participants, fostering insightful conversations that precisely met his research requirements.

After participants successfully passed the screening process, Scott was able to start his scenario-based interviews. He explained, “Instead of speculating in the future, for example, ‘Would you like this product’ or ‘Would you consider using it?’, I was asking them to tell me a story about the last time they saved money or the last time they did X, Y, Z.”

He added, “We were able to have really good conversations about experiences that they've been through. Then I used that learning to apply it to our product.“

Scott further detailed his approach, “I did the interviews in two batches. The first batch was from multiple countries and then the second batch was only people in Chile, in a specific age group who were currently saving. That way, I could start to talk to our target users.”

The ability to set screening questions and drill down into specific demographics proved instrumental in targeting the right users for in-depth discussions.

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Results

After conducting the two rounds of interviews, Scott was able to gain useful insights into the cultural nuances of saving habits in different Latin American countries, which revealed significant variations.

“What I learned from speaking with these panelists was that we're trying to build a savings account in the US, but the culture of saving and the concept of saving is very different in Colombia and Mexico. They actually use their savings account like Americans use a checking account.”

This information was crucial in shaping Milo's strategy, influencing the decision to focus on countries where the cultural alignment was more conducive to the intended product offerings. 

“It’s a lot harder to be involved in a product that needs to train users to build a new habit. But in Chile, the way they use savings accounts is more aligned with how we use checking accounts in the USA, so it made more sense to launch there first.”

By using Interviews from Lyssna, Scott was able to conduct in-country research in unfamiliar territories. The insights he gathered played a pivotal role in shaping the product strategy and ensuring a culturally sensitive approach to financial solutions for foreign nationals. 

If you’re looking to consolidate your research toolkit, cut costs, enjoy an intuitive UI/UX, and access a high-quality panel on demand, then try Interviews today.