A secure and seamless experience is of utmost importance to Singapore consumers, with more than half of them willing to trade data for a personalised experience, but expecting incentives and discounts in return, according to a report from Wirecard.
The report, conducted in February 2020 in partnership with Blackbox Research, covered 1,007 Singaporeans across all demographic groups and reveals six digital megatrends.
First is the rise in adoption of super apps, which are stand-alone, multi-service mobile applications that enable users to perform several functions on a single platform. More than half (53%) of Singaporeans are current users, with a third (35%) keen on trying them this year.
Brands need to consider offering transactional capabilities, paired with a loyalty program across multiple services within a single app to offer their customers a seamless experience.
Second is the adoption intelligent virtual Assistants (IVA), such as Siri and Alexa. Singaporeans want to use IVAs to control and monitor home utilities (76%), home and cybersurveillance (73%), and smart home devices (72%).
Developing a proactive IVA strategy could soon become an essential requirement for businesses.
Third is the need to build customer loyalty to maintain brand competitiveness. Experience has become such a focal point for consumers that 60% of Singaporean consumers are willing to pay more to receive exceptional service.
Findings show a gap between service delivery and customer expectations that is notable in healthcare (20%), banking (19%) and insurance (18%). None of the sectors had managed to match or exceed consumer expectations.
Fourth is frictionless omnichannel experience for customers. Majority of Singaporeans start by browsing or researching online (78%), before proceeding to purchase online (58%) or offline (42%).
Banking (46%) is the sector in which Singaporeans expect a seamless experience that integrates physical and digital channels.
Fifth is the power of incentives and cost-savings. More than half (52%) of Singaporean consumers are willing to share their data in return for a degree of personalisation. This could include discounts (45%) and reward-based incentives for ideal conduct (39%).
Businesses need to strike a balance between a simplified user experience and security, ensuring that data is handled responsibly.
Sixth is the trend of new technologies accelerating the adoption of digital payments.
The vast majority of Singaporeans are already going cashless, with 60% using mobile wallets and a further 19% indicating that they want to use it in the next year. Social commerce adoption, which is the use of social media as a communication and e-commerce platform, is also set to grow from 28% to 32% throughout 2020.
