Sofie: Behavioral incentives as a key to financial wellness

Rich or poor, no one can avoid keeping their finances in order. The daily shopping, paying your taxes on time, saving a little for a vacation, and having some money left over because the washing machine breaks down at the wrong moment. We prefer not to think about it too much because everything else seems so much more fun and important. For most people, your personal household book is, at best, an obligatory number that gets as little attention as possible. Until suddenly you are in the red, or there is another reason why those finances are suddenly crucial.

And so, Astrid Bruinsma observed, it is important to get ahead of the problems. Therefore, she devised a digital platform, ‘Sofie‘, that encourages financially-active behavior before it’s too late. With Sofie, Bruinsma wants to use behavioral science to inspire people to manage their finances. The platform provides information and encourages people to act and make informed decisions.

Here’s how the app works

Using your bank statements, Sofie automatically calculates your savings: the difference between the money that comes in and the money you spend. In the app, you then create pots for specific savings goals. Each pot gets its own color and a target amount with a deadline. Sofie then calculates how much you must save weekly to achieve this goal. That saving is done through ‘automations’, rules linking saving to your behavior. As a result, financial goals become part of your daily life. For example, whenever you take your children to school, you can automatically save money for their studies for later. Sofie also interactively suggests new savings goals or proposes ‘accelerators’ for pots and automations.

An important aspect here is to make this behavioral change structural. Bruinsma: “The most difficult thing about managing your finances or meeting your financial goals is to start it and to stick with it. It’s not about whether the math is exactly right. It’s about spending money on the things that make you happy and getting it into your daily routine.”

Positive impact

Astrid Bruinsma began her career in sports and quickly rolled into the world of mortgages, data, and IT. Sofie stems from her efforts to get her personal finances in order. Sofie focuses on creating financial peace, freedom, and a greener lifestyle for Dutch citizens. The platform uses social apps to activate users financially, working with financial partners and educational institutions to gain insight into making lives more financially healthy and sustainable.

The word Sofie represents ‘social finance’: “This shows that we are a social enterprise, where impact is at the top. And that we use apps to give people financial peace and space. Inspired by someone who pays off his mortgage with a euro every time someone presses the doorbell, we came up with other ways to get started with your goals. Worry less about money and do more! With our activation modules that form the basis of the app, we want to get people moving financially. We think it’s important that your financial goals are clear, that you get started with small steps, and that you can easily ask for help.”

Behavior Change

With targeted behavior change strategies, Sofie helps users take small steps toward their financial aspirations, such as understanding their short- and long-term goals, setting a weekly budget and prioritizing their financial goals. Cleverly, income and expenses are linked so that it makes sense to the user that you set aside money for both your vacation and your taxes.

Sofie offers specific features for customers with payment problems, such as building a financial buffer and saving on groceries. On top of the app’s standard features is a “Financial Vitality Package,” which includes a vitality scan, additional workshops, vlogs, one-on-one coaching and advice, effectiveness measurements, and other financial tools. The package is based on a SaaS platform that uses behavioral science activation modules, which can be personalized and integrated into existing apps and platforms.

Twinkle

Sofie is not only there for individuals; it also contains several business functionalities. These are aimed at employers, local governments, or mortgage lenders. For employers, the focus is on reducing financial stress and costs. For local governments, the package serves as a debt prevention and aftercare tool and offers solutions to energy poverty. Mortgage lenders can use the package for customer aftercare and sustainable resolution of payment problems.

The mission is the same for all those audiences: financial health and greener living. How to achieve that? Bruinsma: “By doing your finances as a user with a twinkle in your eye, by you being in charge of your finances and getting flexibility as your goals grow with you.”