Starling was featured and recommended on the Martin Lewis special last week. What does Monzo have to do to get featured on this scale? Starling’s servers crashed due to the amount of people trying to register for accounts.
I’d absolutely love for this to happen to Monzo, and such a huge influx of people realising how great it is. I’ll be honest, when I tried Starling I found it had a very corporate feel, essentially a legacy bank but done app based. Monzo feels more personal, and you feel respected for your custom here, and that Monzo owes everything to its customers, and those who are also investors. I also found Starling’s customer support extremely poor, slow, and nothing like the fast responsive service here at Monzo. Starling’s 12 month ban for people who close their accounts, is another drawback, none of which happens here. I had seen this ban reported on other websites, and other places online.
As of 24/06/18 - I also know now it is reported on their website under the ‘FAQ’s’
I also get advertisements for Starling, during apps!
What does it take for Monzo to get national promotion like what Starling get? For me, Monzo is leagues ahead and I would love to see Monzo continue to thrive like it has been.
I checked out Starling App Store ranking the day after they had the Martin Lewis shout out. They were still below Monzo (Monzo was 12, Starling 13), and Monzo had around 3k signups that day. Monzo gets that level of signups almost every single day.
No need to advertise when your product does all the talking!
This happened to Monzo at the beginning of last summer and whilst it exposed Monzo to far more people, a significant proportion only used Monzo for international transactions and withdrawals.
With the rapid growth, primarily for this purpose, before Monzo could launch features that brought in income, and before it could move away from prepaid, it led to introduction of fees for excessive cash withdrawals, leading to some negativity amongst users and some bad PR.
Organic growth, as mentioned above, is working out just fine for Monzo, with less risk. Growth through word of mouth builds excitement, brand engagement and loyalty.
Martin Lewis, whilst well researched, brings a load of people wanting something for nothing.
I’ve just researched a personal comparison review, the result in the end was actually Starling due to a couple of simple features such as 0.5% interest on savings, other than that and being able to add more than 1 account to saved payee’s there isn’t much different from today’s date. The roadmap for monzo is active and it’s on track to meet the gaps on competitors, like above natural growth is much better than advertising.
The support and friendliness of monzo makes it ahead in my opinion and in 3 months time it looks to be on track to be the best and I’m prepared to wait
That’s good to hear I think the customer service moreso than features makes Monzo shine above its competitors. The features are amazing don’t get me wrong but here you actually feel like you matter to the bank, and you’re not just a faceless name on a computer screen there to make the bank a profit.
I’d rather not see anymore freeloaders here that watched Martin Lewis, we’ve just got rid of them after the Option 3 vote… hopefully they have all gone to Starling and stay there.
Obviously my opinion harsh as it may be but it’s true.
A newbie here, and even though Martin has his fans… He comes across very shouty and knows it all. Can’t watch him for long. This company reminds me of giffgaff (but for banks).they only started doing ads. After problems getting a high street acc. They amazing service gets a 10 from me…
The thing with that sort of promotion is that it doesn’t sustain in the same way that word of mouth does.
It’s not a continual thing that you can rely on. It is great to have, and I’m sure Starling are very proud of it though! So congratulations to them!
We believe in making our app so helpful and delightful that people are bursting to tell their friends about it because it’s been such a positive influence in helping them control their finances. That kind of growth really is something you can’t buy.
Starling is just a legacy bank in the making… Just wait and see how they are in 12 months time… Anne Boden might talk a good game but she is still the former COO of Allied Irish…
Monzo on the other hand are like Ronseal… they do what it says on the tin… We know what we’re going to get… we can engage with staff via this forum for example… Can you speak to Howard from the Halifax in the same way? No you can’t… and it’s these sorts of details that make Monzo stand out…
In my opinion Monzo can grow by word of mouth alone… the Hot Coral card is a good topic of conversation, then you can show people the app in action… what more do you need?
It defo is I spotted a hot coral card right across the office today, and ended up going over to speak to him, since then its lead onto IFTTT conversation, and joint accounts. Got about 4 potential signs up from office chit chat
I also get the impression that the asterix next to the starling link on the MSE website, advising of payment for referrals might be a good indicator too!
Just checked out the Starling review on MSE and noticed this curious bit in their stated need to knows:
Need-to-knows
You can download Starling Bank’s app for iOS or Android.
You can make up to three cash withdrawals a day, totalling a max £300.
Money in your account will earn 0.5% AER interest on up to £2,000 and 0.25% AER interest up to £85,000.
etc …
You can make up to 3 cash withdrawals a day? Are they talking about when abroad or just in general?
I think the customer service moreso than features makes Monzo shine above its competitors. The features are amazing don’t get me wrong but here you actually feel like you matter to the bank, and you’re not just a faceless name on a computer screen there to make the bank a profit.
