Project Overview

Westpac’s Pay Pig App for iPhone and iPod touch is the fun, educational, family-friendly app that helps kids learn the value of saving. It is easy-to-use educational app for the whole family where kids learn about savings and working towards a long-term goal. Parents simply set up chores, a time frame, reward amount and pay day for each chore/task undertaken. In turn, kids set up their goals for the things they want to save for, take responsibility for getting chores done, like washing the car or walking the dog, to save money for their long-term goals. Once the chores are completed, kids tick them off and the parents receive a notification. At the end of the week that has been set to pay the child, it’s Pay Day and the child is one step closer to reaching his/her savings goal.

Organisation

Westpac Group

Team

Head of Digital Marketing - Bryan Meredith
Digital Campign Manager - Mirka Potrykus
Executive Creative Director -Marco Eychenne
Creative Director - Anna Karena
Planning Director - Dom Hickey
Business Director – Gayle While
Account Manager – Jaime Marin
Lead Web Developer – Donald Martinez
Lead Digital Producer – Annie Chan
Technical Solutions Architect – Phuong Hoang
Back End Developer – Cahyadi Utomo

Project Brief

In the past, Australians had been relatively bad savers. We wanted children to start learning the value of money at a young age and to start working towards goals. Hence, Westpac conducted a survey (Westpac’s Kids and Money Report, 2013) and the research suggested kids who earn money through chores and use technology to track their savings are more than twice as likely (45%) to understand the value of money compared to those who do neither (18%).
Based on these facts, and to deepen customer relationships by providing helpful and engaging digital tools, Westpac developed the Pay Pig App – the modern way to encourage kids to save using technology they love – their smartphones.

Innovation is innate in Westpac Group and it focuses on being simple and helpful and the experience is the single most important driver in creating a memorable and lasting impression with our customers. In this instance, we have made it easier for our customers to track and build up on their savings to reach their long-term savings target - an easy-to-use educational app that the whole family can enjoy.

Project Innovation/Need

Smartphone users are seeking to do more on their phones and Australians are looking at ways to save. With this in mind, Pay Pig was inspired to change what saving means to our customers and making learning to earn and save interactive, engaging and fun.

This is another example of how the Westpac Group is using digital innovation to deepen customer relationships by providing helpful and engaging digital tools for our customers (even our little customers!).

The Pay Pig App is a first of its kind in Australia which brings the traditional piggy bank into the 21st Century for Australian families.

The innovation addresses marketing to a new generation – our little customers (kids 4-16 years) both existing and non-Westpac customers.

Westpac was the first to launch Pay Pig in Australia and due to its success, BankSA, St.George Bank and Bank of Melbourne (subsidiaries of Westpac Banking Group) launched similar products – Little Savers, Happy Saver and Flipper Funds respectively.

Design Challenge

We wanted Pay Pig to be used by everyone – Westpac and non-Westpac customers. The most challenging design concept was how to integrate the parents to ‘pay’ their kids pocket money for every chore or goal that they accomplish with Banking. Hence for a Westpac customer, the parent would receive a notification with a link to Westpac Mobile Banking to allow them to transfer funds to their child's Youth Reward Saver or Kids Reward Saver accounts For a non-Westpac customer, parents can pay their kids through their non-Westpac internet banking, or by cash.

User Experience

The important driver is assisting parents and kids to create and use their own special profiles that help setting chores and reaching goals a simple, fun and rewarding experience. Parents set their profile by adding kids and setting up chores like dishwashing etc. For kids, they put a list of things that they want to buy e.g. a bike. What makes it fun for the kids is that they can upload the pictures to their personalised profiles. Once the chores are completed, kids tick them off and the parents receive a notification. Depending on the Pay Day set, the child is one step closer to reaching his/her savings goal.

Since launch, Pay Pig has had over 9,700 downloads, generating more than 40 pieces of earned media across print, online, and broadcast. Customers truly love what the app offers having received great reviews from the App Store (5 stars), the industry and media:
• SMH Weekend rated Pay Pig as the “App of the week” - September 2013
• Awards - Money Magazine 2014 winner (Best New Innovative Product, Service or Feature) and CANSTAR’s 2014 winner (Best Innovative Service)
• Finalist – AIMIA (Best of Smartphone 2014)