How do you launch a college student checking account at Capitol One?

I would start with some clarifying questions:

·         Constraints :

•  Are we looking for starting this service for US college students or global ?
•  Do we have any constraints from budget or resources perspective ?
• Are there any limitations we should take into account at the start?

·         Goal :

• Why Cap one is considering this? has the need been validated?
• What is the goal from Cap one perspective? is it more users or more revenue?

 Assumptions:

•          Capital one is considering launching this service for US college students only for age >18 yrs
•          No resource or budget constraints to build this service
•          No other limitation at this point
•          The goal is to increase user base of Cap one by offering this US college students and also generate revenue with long term loyalty.

Lets think of some user base and empathize this product offering

Users :

•          Full Time US college Students
•          Full time US college Students with part time jobs
•          Part time US college students with Full time Professional jobs:

Estimated market share breakdown (Assumption): Total students ~20M

Now at this point I would conduct a survey to collect some feedback on how the current user bases experience is , what are their paint points as part of discovery and empathy phase.

Since our goal is to both user base and also generate revenue I would pick group 2 segment in the beginning to offer this service as they have some income and their usage might be slightly higher than full time students with no work. Secondly, they may have some credit history already built so could be good target for additional offerings. ( You can pick anything as long as you can justify)

Pain Points

•          Current banks who offer this service many of them have monthly maintenance fee ( ~$5—$6)
•          Many banks require college students to have some minimum balance.
•          No overdraft fee protection
•          High Foreign transaction fees
•          No US wide network of physical ATM access
•          No cash back on debit spend
•          Age out after 24 as many banks do not offer this upto 25

Define :

Lets define the problem we will be solving considering user group 2 in mind

US college students needs checking account service which offers no monthly maintenance fee, no minimum balance , low or no foreign transaction fee and overdraft protection.

Lets solve for user group 2

lets prioritize the solutions for these pain points using VCQ framework

Develop :

So lets launch Cap one Student checking account MVP with No monthly min balance , maintenance fee and no foreign transaction fee.

Later versions could include Cash back and overdraft protection based on growth in other user base

Trade-offs :

• o   This service may not appeal to customers who are looking for cash back options at the beginning
• o   Age out customers/users is a loss who have part time jobs
• o   Foreign transaction feature may not excite or appeal to US resident students

Test:

Success measurements

• o   No. of new users add from US college students between 18-24 age
• o   No. of foreign transactions per month with each user accounts
• o   Avg. min balance per student account per month
• o   Amount of overdrafts per users to gather data for future roadmap
• o   Avg. spend per user per week to explore cash back program value in the future offerings