Fintech in the Middle East is growing fast, but trust remains the biggest currency. Whether you're launching a new neobank in the UAE, scaling a payments platform in Saudi Arabia, or introducing digital investment tools in the wider GCC, your success depends on more than just a slick app. It depends on whether people believe in your product enough to move their money, share their data, and build long-term habits.
At Hi Mum!, we help fintechs and financial institutions in the Middle East build digital products that people actually trust, and keep coming back to. We’ve worked with banks and challengers alike to design and validate tools that meet high standards for both usability and regulatory governance.
Here’s what we’ve learned about building trust where it matters most.
One of the fastest ways to lose trust is confusion, and unfortunately, that’s still common in financial products, especially when teams rush to market without deeply understanding user needs.
We always begin by listening, not just to business goals, but to the people you're building for. What do they understand? What’s unclear? Where do they hesitate? In our recent work across the region, we’ve seen how even small missteps in onboarding or copy can lead to big drop-offs in confidence.
Customers in the UAE and wider Gulf often expect experiences to match international benchmarks - clear, guided, and in their language. The most effective products strip back complexity, offer reassurance at key moments, and make it easy to recover from mistakes. That means designing for local expectations, not just importing models from the West.
Trust doesn’t come from launch-day promises, it comes from day-to-day reliability, and that starts during the design process.
We work in fast, iterative cycles, prototyping and testing early to make sure what we build is shaped by real users, not assumptions. In recent sprints, even small changes to language or layout have shown potential to influence how people respond to digital tools, a reminder that the details really do matter.
For Huru, we introduced features that let users personalise their goals in a way that felt flexible, not prescriptive. We then tested these journeys with real users in the UAE to ensure they felt intuitive and trustworthy in context.
This early-stage insight saves teams from making expensive mistakes. It also gives internal stakeholders confidence that what you’re building will land well, not just technically, but emotionally.
Data is powerful, but in the Middle East, how you use data can make or break your relationship with the customer. Consumers are increasingly open to digital finance, but wary of being “sold to” without consent.
We help fintechs design personalised experiences that feel supportive, not intrusive. Think contextual nudges based on goals, not generic promotions. Timely reminders that help users stay in control, not pressure them into new products.
In our work with platforms like Snoop, we’ve designed insight-led journeys that surface useful financial prompts based on spending behaviour, but always with transparency and opt-in control. That same philosophy applies across regions: trust grows when personalisation serves the customer, not just the bottom line.
Another signal of trust? That your product feels like it was built with the region in mind, not retrofitted after the fact. That’s why we co-create products with local teams from day one, embedding their knowledge into everything from feature prioritisation to tone of voice.
We bring the structure, pace and design leadership. You bring market knowledge, cultural nuance and regulatory insight. That blend is what leads to products that resonate with users and meet governance standards across the GCC.
In markets like the UAE, Saudi Arabia and beyond, digital banking and fintech are becoming mainstream. But adoption alone isn’t enough. To thrive, your product needs to be trusted by first-time users, cautious adopters, and digitally savvy customers who have global benchmarks in their pockets.
We help fintechs and financial brands build that trust, through real insight, rapid validation, and products that are transparent, reliable, and user-first.
If you’re looking to launch or scale in the Middle East, we’d love to help you create a product experience your customers believe in.
Let’s build something better, together.
