Why the Apple Card contains the recipe for the future of consumer banking
By: Daniel Frost
Tags: Apple Card, Consumer, Future, Apple, Payments

By complementing existing services with helpful new additions, such as checking and monitoring your credit score directly from your wallet, could give iPhone users even more reason to switch to the Apple Card from their original Apple Pay solution.

Extend to gamification

Robinhood has created a unique experience — the emphasis on gamification puts Robinhood at an advantage over other trading brokerages. Anish Acharya, former product manager at Credit Karma, shares this point on the a16z podcast:

“Robinhood is a game and it’s a game that people like to talk about. It works because it feels like adulting when you actually have a stock portfolio, not because active trading is something that’s smart for almost anyone to do. So I really see it as addressing a different consumer need than Schwab is addressing, and it’s really not threatened as much by players like Schwab. So that’s an example where the fintech product is addressing a social consumer need, but at first blush, it may not appear to be the combination of social plus money.”

The social plus money approach can be applied in doses with the Apple Card to increase engagement. Implementing streaks with payment dates, adding on badges or coins for loyalty discounts, introducing Bitmoji experiences when cardholders pay puts the Apple Card in a complete other category of credit products.

Consumer social is starting to look and feel like games with certain gaming mechanisms — I anticipate the shift to gamification with consumer fintech has just started.

Extend loyalty rewards

When I interned in loyalty at Visa, there was also a similar issue of having only very few selective partners in loyalty programs. If there aren't enough selective partners, it won't incentivize users to switch. There is only so much time in a day to talk to different vendors. Vendor management is extremely time-intensive, and orchestrating contracts with them is a very long and tedious process. Finding a white-label solution like Dosh with access to over five hundred loyalty deals within one contract erases the time and effort of going one by one per contract. And by having 3% — 10% discounts with many businesses to choose from, the Apple Card becomes even better for potential suiters.

Additional thoughts

The proposals below could be identified as standard practice for the consumer banking industry after implementing it with Apple Card.

Being able to:

pay for items cross-border directly from the wallet app

have change sent directly into your wallet from a POS device

receive immersive shopping and banking experiences using VR/AR

… are all avenues that could provide an exceptional user experience for the Apple Card.

Real-time cross-border transactions

The ability for one to send money cross-border is incredibly time-intensive and expensive. Ripple, Visa Direct, and Wise have made the process more feasible over the past five years. Adding an offering for Apple Pay to transfer money cross-border right within the wallet app would be transformational for cardholders and businesses alike. Venmo has started to provide business profiles on its main app. I can see Apple potentially following suit for businesses.

Tap-to-pay reversal

Previous hackathon concept

Have you ever imagined getting change directly back to your card virtually? Here I theorized a reverse Apple Pay scenario if the cardholder asks for change. The cardholder would hold their phone up to a POS machine that takes Apple Pay, and Apple would sync it back to their wallet. When a consumer makes a transaction with cash, the extra cash (if the customer requests virtual change) will be transferred into the consumer’s virtual wallet through a POS device. Once the POS system has the information regarding the amount and destination of the customer’s change, it will pass this information to the consumer’s virtual wallet. Apple could offer this service by extending credit lines for their Apple Card or in the form of Apple Cash.

Introduction of VR/AR

VR concept for the Apple Card

The newest entertainment and gaming experiences have foreshadowed a disruptive opportunity in payments. Only 10% of the US population owns VR devices, but AR and VR will become prevalent as society evolves — It should also become embraced with the rise of Apple Glasses. Creating immersive experiences to enhance gratification and engagement could be an extra value driver for the Apple Card.

The writing is on the wall

Emphasis on rewards, gamification, immersive experiences, and enhanced ecosystem offerings will make the Apple Card a staple for years to come. The future of the Apple Card contains the recipe needed to become the gold standard for consumer banking. And the conversion of Apple Pay users to Apple Card cardholders will make Apple the world's largest “credit” company.

The question is: will people be willing to switch? My hunch says so. 