Payment card benefits were historically focused on wealthy clientele who travel a lot. Mastercard has long been making the advantages of using their payment cards more available to regular users and offers a wide range of rewards through its mujmastercard portal. The goal of our six-month project was to expand their offer with attractive benefits for Premium and Business card holders. Using Human Centered Design we looked for services that would make life substantially easier for users and bring them real benefits, thus increasing their preference for Mastercard cards.
From insights to ideas
Our joint team conducted dozens of interviews with clients from various socio-economic segments, Mastercard clients, competition clients, and people at different life stages. Analyzing these interviews, we gained more than 100 insights into people’s needs, leading us to over 250 ideas.
We subsequently tested more than 70 concepts, prioritized them, and through iteration and definition of their business potential found nine viable courses of action.
Facilitating health care availability
This proved to have the greatest potential by far. We found out that premium clients often do not have access to employee benefits (or even the option to choose them) even though they would like to use such services.
That is why we proposed a cooperation with the online service ulekare.com that would build on these key findings.
From design to launch
Following the fine-tuning of the final design of this service, Mastercard launched it in fall 2020. Premium and Corporate card holders can now consult their condition (physical and mental) with a specialist online and make an appointment with medical experts across the Czech Republic.
The service significantly decreases waiting times while also guaranteeing care from experienced professionals. It brings together more than 300 doctors who are available for consultation 24/7.
“Mastercard is an attractive company with a globally established brand in financial services. It is an area where we have strong know-how and a lot of experience. We are happy that we could help such a company launch a valuable product that users really appreciate.“ says Ondřej Moravec about the cooperation.
“In working with Direct People, we especially appreciate the speed with which we discovered the needs of our customers and the way they think about the benefits and their daily value – across three European markets. Finding valid concepts and establishing potential partnerships for their implementation then felt like obvious work. The whole process was effective, fun, and it unlocked new perspectives for the team.”
Michal Čarný
General Manager for Czech Republic and Slovakia, Mastercard
About Mastercard
Mastercard is a leader in global payments and a technology company that connects billions of consumers, thousands of financial institutions, and millions of organizations every day.