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backWhen you’re the global connoisseur of financial happiness for every African, everywhere, maintaining that happiness requires constant innovation and, at times, radical strategic shifts. Especially in the fast-paced world of cross-border remittances, where exchange rates are the ultimate ingredient in financial happiness.
For our diaspora-focused financial services product, MonieWorld, the strategic shift sometimes takes the form of a rapid, cross-functional initiative to launch boosted rates. A data-driven strategy that continues to fulfil our mission.
I sat with the team of brilliant DreamMakers; Suleiman, Engineering Manager; Anju and Vijyendra, Backend Engineers; and Kaushal and Emir, who lead Product across MonieWorld, to take you behind the scenes as they rallied to build an entirely new promotional engine from the ground up and ship it in just ten days, all while maintaining rigorous compliance and achieving a flawless, zero-incident launch.
The data-driven pivot—Redefining boosted rates
Our journey into promotional rates began with a clear signal from our data: a trend in customer transactions that indicated we needed to re-engage our user base. The initial strategy, launched from April through June, was straightforward: a boosted exchange rate on all standard transactions for all customers. While this was a first step, we recognised a need for a more focused approach.
In July, we paused the universal boosted rate. This pause period showed us that our approach needed to change to align with our growth objectives. The new, decisive strategy was centred on new customers on the MonieWorld app.
We reintroduced the boosted rates campaign, but this time, it was exclusive: new customers would receive a boosted exchange rate on every transaction for their first two months (60 days).
It's Important I emphasise what this benefit actually entails. This promotional rate is an actual value increase per pound, applied directly to the exchange rate on every transaction during that 60-day period.
Preliminary UX designs for boosted rates on MonieWorld
The engineering challenge—Building the promotion service
Delivering boosted rates on MonieWorld required a foundational shift in our technical architecture. To implement the new strategy, our engineering team had to build a new promotion service from scratch.
This was the central challenge: creating a dynamic pricing engine capable of handling differentiated rate options based on customer attributes and time windows.
User experience transformation
The first step was to take a look at changes in the MonieWorld application. Since rates are critical to our customers, clarity and transparency were non-negotiable.
The User Experience (UX) was updated to explicitly communicate the benefit:
Customers who qualified for the boosted rate would see a specific notification indicating they were on the "boosted rate".
The transaction journey was updated to clearly show the breakdown: the base rate plus the additional rates they received as a special offer.
This transparent approach was vital to customer adoption and satisfaction. As Emir, who leads onboarding, noted, the communications were clear, and the experience was straightforward and intuitive, resulting in no significant customer complaints or confusion after we launched.
Architectural Overhaul
The implementation demanded significant backend work. The core technical requirements included:
New backend services: We developed new, dedicated backend services to manage the promotion logic. This new architecture was designed to handle different types of promotions fairly quickly in the future, establishing a flexible foundation.
Differentiated customer segmentation logic: The service had to be rigorous in identifying the correct cohort: only new customers onboarded within the last 60 days. This required changes to how we process and validate customer status in real-time before applying the boosted rate.
Transaction-level application and arbitrage prevention: The logic ensured that the Naira bonus was applied to every pound on every transaction within the 60-day limit. Furthermore, the system needed to be robust against misuse, preventing arbitrage and ensuring the promotion was accurately applied.
The engineering effort involved approximately four to five engineers working across multiple touchpoints, including the payments team, which drove the core logic, and the onboarding team, which managed the customer qualification process.
Speed, clarity, and cross-functional alignment
We can both agree that the most remarkable aspect of the boosted rates launch was the unprecedented speed of deployment: the feature was developed and delivered in just 10 to 12 days. This rapid turnaround was achieved through exceptional organisational agility and clarity.
The key factor was clarity and direction from leadership, from the top down. Once the strategic decision was made, the entire team had to rally to deliver the change. This meant securing upfront decisions quickly, eliminating ambiguity and allowing the development teams to focus solely on execution.
The planning phase was hyper-condensed:
Quick design alignment: A comprehensive design was developed and aligned across all teams in just one and a half days.
Rapid architectural design: Architecture and technical designs were completed quickly, with the team defining what would be implemented immediately and what would follow.
Once the decisions were in place, the focus shifted entirely to implementation and testing.
The cross-functional rally
The success hinged on perfect synchronisation across diverse teams:
Payments team: Drove the core technical development of the new promotion service and backend logic.
Onboarding team: Ensured the logic for identifying and qualifying new customers for the 60-day period was implemented correctly.
Marketing and growth team: Worked on the communications strategy, ensuring the messaging clearly attracted new customers and explained the value proposition.
Design team: Managed critical UX changes to the app, ensuring the boosted rate was presented transparently and intuitively.
This comprehensive, collaborative effort ensured that every touchpoint, from communication to customer qualification to the final transaction rate, was aligned and ready for launch.
Compliance and flawless execution
For any financial institution, a promotion involving exchange rates is fraught with regulatory complexity. For the boosted rates on MonieWorld, rigorous compliance was mandatory.
Regulatory approvals
Every aspect of the initiative, including the promotion itself and all associated customer communications, had to receive a "green check" from compliance and regulation. This involved securing approvals from both our internal compliance teams and external partners before the feature could go live. The team successfully navigated these processes, ensuring all approvals were in place before deployment.
Rigorous testing
Given the complexity of the differentiated pricing logic, applying the bonus only to a specific cohort (new customers) and for a finite period (60 days) made testing paramount.
The team anticipated the segmentation challenges and conducted rigorous testing across multiple scenarios. Test plans were meticulously executed to ensure the rate boost was applied correctly and that no unintended failures or exploits occurred. The result of this rigorous testing and planning was a successful launch with zero incidents at go-live.
Preliminary UX designs for boosted rates on MonieWorld
Lessons from a successful rate
The initiative led to a substantial increase in Total Processing Volume (TPV), estimated at 20-30%, demonstrating that when the right product is combined with the right value, the results are undeniable.
The most critical takeaway, however, was the re-validation of our core customer insights:
Rates are critical: The success made it even more apparent that exchange rates are a decisive factor in customer choice.
Product and experience matter: Customers truly value a good product and a straightforward, intuitive experience.
Ready to join a team that delivers high-impact, cross-functional projects? Explore our open roles and help build the future of cross-border finance: https://moniepoint.com/careers.
