How Do Cleo Users Feel About AI?

We’ve been big believers in AI as a financial wellness tool for years. Just look at how helpful Cleo is- over 71% of users feel better about their money situation thanks to our app. Thanks to our expert User Research team, these insights and more are being uncovered with real users who have real money problems. 

In this blog, we’ll dive into their study, including: 

• Their financial pains and stresses
• What they need in a money coach
• How Cleo is ready to support

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What Are Our Users' Current Pain Points?

Our User Research team is tapped into how the Cleo community is feeling about their finances. 

They asked users what their current money experiences are like. Here are some of the sentiments they shared: 

• Users are feeling stressed, overwhelmed, and worried about their spending. They feel that it’s taking them too long to achieve their financial goals and are doing their best to adhere to the timelines they’ve set for themselves. Lifestyle inflation has had a massive impact on those who are realizing that they’re wasting income on things they don’t need. They’re also putting off paying down credit card debt because it doesn’t feel urgent (yikes).
• Investment advice is valuable, and our users are trying to grow their savings ASAP. They’re seeking information not only from financial literacy influencers but family and friends. In the US, it is common for people to grow up without this knowledge since financial literacy is not taught in most school systems.
• People are still determining what financial goals they should be setting for themselves. They’ll keep mental notes of how they’re spending and generally focus on necessities.

Being aware of the Cleo community’s consciousness on a financial level is instrumental in ensuring that we’re building out valuable experiences in the Cleo app.

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What Are Our Users’ Feelings on AI?

Generally speaking, there is a lot of skepticism around the usefulness of AI. Cleo wasn’t always this sharp, either; our developers have made some tremendous leaps and strides over the past several years in making her more efficient. When it comes to finances, how effective do people think AI is? How can we continue to increase trust in our product?

When it comes to AI, here’s what’s on our users’ minds:

• They are unsure how to make AI work best for their personal finances. Users felt they didn’t know the right questions to ask; similar to how you’d feel when you meet a human financial advisor. They also felt that AI chatbots should be lightning-fast with responses and that those messages should be resourceful.
• There is still mass skepticism surrounding sharing private data with AI. Of course, Cleo never shares or sells your data, and your banking info is encrypted with Plaid- so your info is safe with her. However, we agree that consistent reassurance and transparency around this is crucial.
• Users who are already familiar with ChatGPT know its flaws. They’re not sure how good ChatGPT can be with numbers. One mentioned that they prefer for helpful information to be presented in a way that can be easily bookmarked, such as a linked article, instead of chat responses. 

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How Do Our Users Want Cleo To Help?

We now know our users’ financial worries. We understand how they feel about AI. So, if they teamed up with Cleo to stop living paycheck-to-paycheck, what do they expect from a financial coach? 

The unanimous sentiment seemed to be: they want their money coach to, well, coach them on what to do next:

• Users would love for more  guidance on what to do next with their finances
• People would like to set more realistic goals for themselves
• More personalized insights that dig a little deeper into their habits

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So… What Now?

Thanks to the hard work that our User Research team is doing, these insights can be shared broadly with our product squads who are continuously iterating on the existing functionality within the Cleo app. From here, Cleo’s superpowered LLMs can only become more insightful.