Driving App Engagement with Gamified Rewards at LazyPay
Project Overview
Project: Improve user retention & engagement on the LazyPay mobile app.
Industry: Fintech
Daily Users: 4M daily active users (2022)
LazyPay is a “Buy Now, Pay Later” credit payment method that lets users pay at 2,500+ merchants through the merchant apps. Many users rely on LazyPay for fast, convenient payments, and due to their trust in the platform, most set up automatic debit to repay every 45 days. However, only 15% of users actually open the LazyPay app to manage repayments or explore other services.
From a business perspective, this represented a high-value opportunity: increasing app engagement could unlock additional revenue streams and strengthen long-term user relationships.
Challenge
We needed to drive engagement on the LazyPay app beyond repayment reminders, encouraging users to explore deals, rewards, and additional services.
The main questions were:
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How can we make users open the app more often if they already set auto-debit?
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Can a reward-based, gamified experience influence behaviour and retention?
Roles & Responsibility
Product Strategy & UX Design
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Conducted user research & analysis: Leveraged internal data tools (Google Analytics, Hotjar) and benchmarked competitor strategies to understand repayment habits and engagement bottlenecks.
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Designed and tested an MVP rewards system: Created a gamified retention strategy to validate whether rewards could drive app engagement.
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Facilitated cross-functional collaboration: Led workshops with teams to align on expectations, challenges, and roadmap priorities.
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Iterated based on insights: Refined the product through continuous observation of user behaviour and engagement metrics.
Process
Discovery & Insights
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Analysed repayment behaviour and app usage patterns by internal data tools like Hotjar
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Found key engagement moments (e.g., checking deals during lunch payments)
MVP Ideation & Design
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Explored ideas to gamified rewards on the app.
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Built a lean MVP to test hypotheses without heavy investment and considering technical constraints.
Testing & Iteration
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Launched the MVP in phases
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Observed user behavior, iterated reward design, and optimized engagement flows
Discovery & Insights
Research findings
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Many users relied on LazyPay for lunchtime food orders, appreciating the speed and convenience over traditional checkout methods.
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Around 50% of users visited the app mainly to check deals across merchants.
(This video showcases how I gathered insights in Figma and the key steps of my design process.)
Research Findings
User segments
Key Insight: Understanding these user segments helped us tailor the rewards system to meet diverse motivations, balancing short-term engagement with long-term retention.
• Promising Talent - 70%
These users value convenience over cashback. They're consistent, rely on auto-debit for payments back to Lazypay, and mostly use LazyPay for quick weekday food orders.
• Deal-Driven Users -25%
These users are motivated by offers alone. Loyalty is low and, they use LazyPay only when it gives them the best deal, otherwise, they switch. Their behavior is opportunistic, but they’re highly responsive to short-term value.
• Devoted Users - 5%
This group uses LazyPay across multiple merchants, daily. For them, it’s about comfort and reliability, not just discounts. Their deep engagement made them a great reference group for longer-term loyalty strategies.
MVP Iteration & Design
Ideation & Concepting
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Facilitated cross-functional workshops to brainstorm a variety of engagement solutions.
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Explored gamified reward systems and retention-focused UI patterns to encourage repeat app usage.
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Developed wireframes and low-fidelity prototypes for the selected concepts, visualizing potential interactions and gathering early feedback.
Ideation & Concepting
MVP Design & Testing
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Built a lean MVP to test whether a rewards system could influence user behaviour.
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Focused on high-impact elements only, ensuring the MVP could be quickly launched and iterated.
Key insights from a lean MVP
Insights were collected by observing user patterns through analytics tools and interviewing devoted users two months after launch:
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Variable rewards effectively engaged users, increasing app interaction without significant cost.
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Gamified referrals demonstrated the power of expiry and loss aversion. Users responded strongly to incentives they might miss.
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KYC completion rate doubled, unlocking new business opportunities and reinforcing the value of integrating engagement mechanics with core product flows.
Iteration & Optimization
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Monitored user interactions and engagement metrics to assess the MVP’s effectiveness.
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Iterated on UI patterns, reward mechanics, and prompts based on observed behaviour.
More Than Numbers
The efforts were recognized with the 🏆 PayU Global Thank You Award 2020 and 🏆 CEO Spot Award. But beyond awards, what truly mattered was how users responded. LazyPay became a payment app that users trusted and enjoyed.
Key Takeways
MVPs Are More Than Just Tests, They’re Conversations
This project showed me that an MVP isn’t just about launching fast, it’s about starting a conversation with your users. Listening, learning, iterating. It’s about building products that really resonate on a human level.
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