Digital payments provider eyes ‘tremendous growth’
A Bahamian digital payments provider yesterday said it is expecting “tremendous growth” as the volume of electronic transactions continues to increase amid the COVID-19 pandemic.
Herbert Cash, Kanoo’s chief financial officer, told Tribune Business that digital payments – and the adoption of digital wallets by Bahamian consumers – has “increased” drastically over the last few months as users receive unemployment and other social benefits electronically.
He added: “COVID-19 is the main driver for all of this. Banks have even seen greater use of their online banking services. We recognise that more persons are comfortable using the wallet services, and more merchants are using it to collect and process payments.”
Kanoo is an approved financial institution (AFI) for the Bahamas digital currency, the Sand Dollar, and Mr Cash said he is expecting “tremendous growth” for Kanoo and the industry as a whole as this and other digital products continue to roll-out.
He said: “We see not only significant interest in The Bahamas but also throughout the English-speaking Caribbean. Kanoo’s digital gift card platform has been a tremendous benefit for many persons. This is our way to encourage persons to shop locally and support our domestic businesses and the labour market by extension.”
Mr. Cash added that Kanoo has a “two-part strategy” for educating both consumers and merchants. “Together, they make our wallet and digital ecosystem work,” he said. “Kanoo feels the best value-based approach was to focus initially on our merchant users to maximise their benefits to wallet users/consumers.
“This is being done through targeted campaigns, such as digital gift card promotions, while simultaneously running awareness campaigns on Kanoo’s capabilities on social media. Visuals also play a major role in our awareness campaigns.
“This includes our ‘Merchant Minute’ segments and a ‘How-To’ video library available on our YouTube channel. We also have ‘pop-up’ events at participating merchants where we interact with users in real-life interactions to demonstrate the app’s benefits.”
Mr. Cash continued: “Kanoo uses several tools to engage users from a market level. In February, Kanoo had a consumer-driven campaign called ‘Love me some Kanoo’ using our merchants’ small group.
“This month, we’ve launched our ‘Merchant Madness’ campaign geared towards merchants using the app’s market interface to serve consumer wallet users better. This will be a systematic and interactive campaign to help merchants and consumers better understand the wallet platform, and utilise it practically with the shops they like to shop at. Initiatives like these will continue throughout the year.”
Kanoo’s target market will be “those in need.” To this extent, Mr. Cash added: “We are proud of our work with certain government agencies, charities, and food distribution organisations that use digital solutions to serve their respective communities better.
“Kanoo believes in education greatly, and views our marketing budget as the resource for education campaigns given the level of awareness needed for this new industry. As a result, Kanoo has set aside considerable funds ranging from $5,000 to $20,000 monthly for the education campaigns, including live events for Kanoo wallets users and the Sand Dollar introduction for merchants and users. We understand education is vital to the meaningful impact that digital solutions like Kanoo seek to have.”
By YOURI KEMP
Tribune Business Reporter
ykemp@tribunemedia.net
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