Nudge — The Financial Mind Companion

Empowering users to discover, understand, and make the most of their unused financial benefits to help them meet their life goals.

Inspiration

We noticed a massive communication gap between members and financial institutions in communicating their benefits/perks to support the members meet their monthly financial goals.

Financial institutions like Sound Credit Union have countless resources & benefits to help members succeed, yet customers often don’t know these benefits exist or how to access them.

Sound Credit Union’s challenge pushed us to ask:

What if your bank could surface every benefit you qualify for, right when you need it, automatically?

That question became Nudge, a “Deals & Benefits” hub built directly into the Sound Credit Union mobile app.
Nudge helps people save money, reduce financial stress, and finally make the most of their relationship with their bank.

How We Came Up With It

When studying Sound Credit Union’s existing digital experience, we noticed a gap in how information and benefits were being communicated to members.

The credit union has strong community programs, loyalty incentives, and specialized accounts, but members often have to dig through multiple pages, emails, or customer service interactions to learn about them. This creates friction and missed opportunities.

We realized that many users weren’t taking advantage of the tools already available to them simply because those benefits weren’t being surfaced in real time or explained in a way that felt relevant to their daily lives.

That observation inspired us to design Nudge — a bridge between Sound Credit Union’s ecosystem and its members.
By embedding an AI assistant directly into the app, we could deliver clear, conversational, and personalized guidance that helps people unlock hidden value without having to search for it.

What It Does

Nudge adds a smart, conversational “Nudge” tab inside the Sound Credit Union mobile app.

Through this tab, users can:

Receive personalized recommendations to save money based on spending behavior.
Discover local deals with distance indicators and limited-time offers.
See curated perks across categories like food, travel, credit or debit cards, and subscriptions.
Track total monthly savings and gain insights on how to increase savings.
View detailed breakdowns and analytics, including savings by category and progress over time.
Activate deals in one click, instantly applying rewards or discounts through Sound Credit’s ecosystem.

It translates confusing benefits & data into friendly, actionable guidance that helps members make smarter financial choices with ease.

Benefits of Nudge

For Members: Helps them easily discover and use perks they already qualify for, saving money they can put toward monthly payments and financial goals.
For Sound Credit Union: Provides insights into member spending trends, allowing smarter cashback offerings that attract and retain more members.

Challenges We Ran Into

**Developing personalized deals logic"

Designing recommendations that felt personal without overusing or misinterpreting user data required careful tuning, for which we used custom gpt models to help with spending categorization.

Data Privacy & Security

Managing sensitive financial patterns while keeping user data private was a major technical focus. Our approach to this was using secure, industry standard tools & servers, and having the solution integrated to existing banking apps, which enabled secure data access.

User Experience Consistency

Ensuring analytics, charts, and AI insights all stayed visually and contextually consistent was more complex than expected, especially when data regarding user's banking behavior was very little. To solve this, we trained our gpt model on bank statements from Kaggle to improve consistency.

Enabling Geolocated deals

Due to a lack of experience in using APIs for geolocation, it took us to time to learn about using the members' device's built-in GPS components for getting anonymized geolocation data in way that it fulfills our needs to deliver personalized deals to our members.

Accomplishments That We're Proud Of

Seamless integration within the Sound Credit app instead of building another platform.
An accessible, user-centered design that balances several features in one clear and functional layout.
A system that directly helps users save money and uncover value they already have access to.
A product that supports Sound Credit’s mission to make financial wellness accessible for all, including low-income and underbanked members.

What We Learned

How small design choices can make financial information feel less intimidating.
The importance of clear communication when showing people their savings and progress.
Personalization must respect privacy. Transparent consent and editable data logs are essential for credibility & building *trust.
Visual feedback matters. Real-time savings analytics and one-click actions give users visible wins and increase satisfaction.
Iteration is key. Prototyping helped us refine tone, hierarchy, and user flow long before coding.
That the best tools don’t just show numbers. They help people feel confident using them.

What’s Next for Nudge

We plan to use the prize money and our 6 months at CoMotion Labs to turn Nudge from a prototype into a real, working feature in partnership with Sound Credit Union.
Our goal is to collaborate closely with Sound’s tech and member engagement teams to connect Nudge with real user data and benefits programs.
Once the first version is ready, we’ll run a small beta launch with Sound members to test how people actually use it day to day.
Through that pilot, we’ll collect feedback, track engagement, and learn what truly helps people feel more confident managing their money.
Using that feedback loop, we’ll keep refining the design, simplify what feels complex, and focus on making Nudge something members trust and enjoy using every day.

In the end, Nudge isn’t just a feature. It’s a step toward making banking feel more personal, supportive, and human again.