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> Posted by Tanaya Kilara, Financial Sector Analyst, CGAP

Customer-centricity is about providing solutions based on a deep understanding of customer needs, preferences, and behaviors. This is a concept that is easy to agree with but difficult to implement. Financial service providers serving base of the pyramid (BOP) customers struggle with generating customer insights, but more importantly, with translating those insights into better products and services for BOP customers. In a recently released CGAP Brief, Beth Rhyne and I explore the relevance of customer-centricity for financial inclusion.

Our starting point is that BOP customers differ significantly from their wealthier counterparts. They have informal, irregular incomes, different spending and consumption patterns, different relationships with financial institutions, and need different consumer protection measures. Developing this understanding of customers and their differentiated needs is the first step in serving the BOP market with relevant financial services. Many financial service providers presume that this market can be served by the same products as those of higher income customers, or at best, that they can treat this entire market as a single segment. Providers need to recognize different needs and segments and therefore provide different financial solutions that cater to this market.

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