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Improving Card Deposits Through a Strategic Integration

Background

 

As a crypto trading platform, Swyftx offered customers two primary methods for depositing fiat: bank transfer and card deposit. However, card deposits were managed through a third-party provider, which introduced several challenges. As the Product Manager newly responsible for the fiat on/off-ramping, I was focused on improving the efficiency of our core flows in line with the business strategy and objectives at the time. 

 

Identifying the Problem

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Through continuous communication with our customer support team, investigation of customer support data, and analysis of our depositing and core flow funnels, we identified card depositing as a significant pain point for our users:

  • Card deposits comprised less than 2% of all deposit volume.

  • There were high drop-off rates in the card depositing flow.

  • Issues related to card deposits ranked among the top 10 most common customer support inquiries.

 

Upon further investigation, we discovered several issues with our existing card deposit process:

  1. User Experience: Our current provider required users to leave our app to initiate a card deposit.

  2. KYC Verification: First-time depositors had to undergo a secondary KYC verification process on the 3rd party provider.

  3. Verification Challenges: New Zealand customers often faced verification issues, necessitating manual intervention.

  4. Currency Conversion: Funds received were in USD instead of AUD.

  5. High Fees: Card deposits incurred fees from 3-5% taken by the the third party. 

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Compounding these issues, major banking institutions were imposing minimum 24-hour holds on non-card deposits to crypto businesses, increasing user demand for card deposits despite the aforementioned challenges.

 

Opportunity and Solution

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After extensive research, discussions, and comparisons with various card deposit providers, we chose to partner with Stripe, a global leader in financial infrastructure. Stripe's recent undertaking to work with crypto businesses posed an opportunity and their offering addressed almost all our existing issues:

  • Provided an in-app card depositing experience.

  • Eliminated repeated verification for users.

  • Offered reduced fees, allowing us to add a margin and generate additional revenue.

The Intangible benefits also included Swyftx parterning with one of the worlds largest financial platforms, providing further trust and legitimacy in a low trust industry. As well as the potential to investigate further integrations with their platform, moving to an all in one solution for financial infrastructure.  

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Implementation Process

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The implementation of Stripe involved a multifaceted approach:

  1. Design and Development:

    • Collaborated with the product designer to create first-release designs for mobile and web platforms.

    • Coordinated with the engineering manager to address technical issues and trade-offs as well leveraging Stripe's resources for accomodate the integration.

  2. Financial and Compliance:

    • Partnered with the finance team to develop financial models and projections to secure CFO approval.

    • Created product documentation to meet financial audit and ISO-20071 requirements.

  3. Marketing and Legal:

    • Worked with Stripe, marketing, and legal teams to help with the multi-channel markeitng release and communications as well as updates to user T&C's.

  4. Customer Support and Training:

    • Collaborated with the knowledge management lead to develop Help Centre articles and internal 'playbooks' for the customer support team.

    • Conducted workshops and walkthroughs to equip the customer support and account management teams with the necessary knowledge to educate customers and troubleshoot issues.

  5. Fraud Prevention:

    • Worked with the Financial Crime team to implement fraud detection and prevention measures.

 

Results

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The integration of Stripe was successfully launched to our users, showing significant improvements in the six months post-release compared to the previous six months:

  • Card deposits increased by ~90% in both count and volume (relative to total deposits).

  • Customer support inquiries related to card deposits decreased by ~70%.

  • The new solution generated additional revenue of approximately $160,000.

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