India’s recent demonetization move brought about a lot of unexpected changes for the growing economy. With a large value of currency notes put out of circulation at that moment, digital wallet solutions like Google Tez have a perfect opportunity to gain a foothold in one of the fastest growing economies in the world.
Services have sprung up from familiar and unfamiliar quarters, offering a slew of options for those looking to replace their physical wallets with a digital one. WhatsApp recently began testing its Payments feature in the Beta version of its app. This allows users to send money to other WhatsApp users by utilizing the UPI platform. Google also launched its own digital wallet solution for India in the form of Google Tez, competing against the likes of already established solutions like Paytm.
To keep the competition on its toes, Google has now integrated a chat option within Google Tez, allowing users to maintain a conversation centered around their transactions with each other. The simplistic chat option is slowly rolling out to Tez’s 13.5 Million active users in the country. The chat will help improve the user experience by allowing users to add meaningful context to their transactions without needing the user to jump to a different app.
On the face of it, having “yet another chat application” might seem like a very typical Google move. But in Google’s defense, this particular integration does make sense in view of the evolving digital wallet space in India. WhatsApp’s eventual full-fledged jump into WhatsApp Payments will give it a commanding hand over digital wallet services in India thanks to the messaging platform’s immense popularity. Paytm also recently integrated Inbox within its app, allowing users to chat and create groups within what was once a digital wallet service. Other less popular digital wallet solutions have either already integrated a chat option or are in the process.
Google’s Tez app had a promising start within India. Can the app survive the competition that WhatsApp Payments will bring to the scenario? That’s something to look out for in the future.
What are your thoughts on Google Tez’s chat integration? Could Google have executed chat functionality better by leveraging any of its existing chat applications? Let us know your thoughts in the comments below!
Via: Economic Times