“Through Mayaa, we aim to redefine the word finance for both parents and teens by solving their problems in unique ways.”
Sonali Bansal (Founder & CEO, Mayaa Money)
Women in finance are breaking the glass ceiling of the finance industry. Bringing a unique perspective to the table, women are pushing the barriers and diversifying their role in the finance sector. Standing among many powerful women in the finance industry, Sonali Bansal envisions promoting financial literacy and financial inclusion in India. She says, “The alarming disparity of financial knowledge between demographics has spurred me to pursue a career in this field”.
Around 70% of the Indian population struggles with financial security, controlling rising expenses, and bad financial habits. To help people with effective money management and implementation, Sonali incepted Mayaa Money in 2022.
The supportive professionals working at Mayaa Money are committed to making India financially sound and literate by using the power of technology.
The Journey Of Determination
“She will rise with a spine of steel and a roar of thunder”. This line by Nicole Lyons truly fits the story of Sonali Bansal. With immense perseverance, grit and resilience, she is making her unique identity in the business landscape. The entrepreneurial blood is in Sonali’s veins. Coming from a business family of three generations in the financial services sector, Sonali grew up listening to conversations at the dining table that were always around finances.
With a strong educational foundation of a major in Economics and a minor in Mathematics from the prestigious Wellesley College, US, Sonali paved her way to professional success. She gained deep insights into the economic world while studying at the London School of Economics.
She gained on-hand experience by working with Fortune 500 companies like EY, KPMG and Equirus Capital. The experience further cemented her financial expertise and armed her with the importance of financial literacy. After returning back to India, she found out that the disparity in financial knowledge between demographics had been rising alarmingly. This spurred Sonali to pursue a career in this sector.
The Genesis of Mayaa Money
At the young age of 25, Sonali took an entrepreneurial leap of faith and laid the foundation of Mayaa Money. Sonali says, “Despite finances being ingrained within me, I realised that personal finance in particular was never at the forefront of our discussions.”
Shedding the light on some hard-hitting facts, Sonali mentions, “There are 440 million millennials, out of which, over 250 million are financially dependent and lack awareness about investing and having financial goals, which means that 70% of them are financially illiterate”. This void offered a huge opportunity for Mayaa Money to propagate as an investment platform that would provide modern solutions for smart savings and investments.
Once the idea of Mayaa Money was conceptualised, she realised that having the idea was the easiest part. The actual hard work lies in the execution of the idea. The vast amount of research, licence approvals and software development led to a lot of sleepless nights for Sonali and her team. “While I might be the brain behind its inception, equal amounts of credit goes to my team who have treated it like their own and have been instrumental in its growth at a managerial as well as ground level,” asserts the Founder.
A Smart Solution For Money Management
Mayaa Money is a one-stop money management platform for smart savings and investments. It is an interactive platform designed for parents and youth to become financially aware and independent with the help of gamified learning tools, savings and investment options. The concept of financial stability is rooted in effective money management and implementation. It helps people in mitigating the risk and be better prepared for unforeseen circumstances.
The youth having access to financial apps not only helps them gain discipline when it comes to money but also introduces them to financial knowledge, which can help them shoulder financial responsibilities alongside their parents. Exploring this trend of the financial app, Mayaa Money was launched with the aim to make the next generation financially empowered and independent. It also makes parents more conscientious in their planning for their kid’s future goals and dreams.
The Mayaa Money app has a unified dashboard for managing family savings and investments and keeping track of the progress in an easy, distinguishable manner. Teenagers are inculcated into the process through gamified financial learning, which helps them understand and incorporate responsible financial habits.
Mayaa Money also offers a prepaid card for people of all age groups, the card enables users to save and spend digitally along with analysing expenses to get insights into their spending habits. In addition to this, the company offers microsavings in digital gold and silver with fixed deposits and mutual funds coming very soon.
Sonali asserts, “With respect to marketing strategies, I am a strong believer in the fact that your product needs to have the pull instead of it being the other way around.” Understanding the needs and wants of the customers, the expert team at Mayaa Money builds a customised product that suits them the best. This is also one of the key reasons why customers trust Mayaa for their financial needs.
A Smart Way To Manage Your Finances
The platform of Mayaa Money offers a smart way to manage finances and make intelligent saving choices. Currently, the user can track expenses, and start saving & investing in the form of digital gold and silver through the Mayaa app. More interactive options like fixed deposits & mutual funds shall be added to the list very soon.It enables the youth to become financially independent and smart at a young age through digitised pocket money and gamified financial learning solutions.
“Mayaa is poised to bring about a revolution in the savings and money management space by allowing families to take charge of their financial goals and instil a sense of financial responsibility within them,” says the brainchild.
The Crowning Achievements
In April 2022, the company launched the MVP version of its app with an approach to understanding user response and testing. The app received a phenomenal response from across the country and the company onboarded more than 20k users and pulled Rs. 13 crores worth of transactions within a span of just 6 months.
For a stellar entrepreneurial journey and great leadership stint, Sonali was also featured in the “Women Entrepreneur Magazine” India as one of the Top Chief Business Officers.
The Way Ahead
Driven by the fact highlighted in a recent study, more than 76% of Indians still do not have a basic understanding of the financial management domain, Mayaa Money envisions empowering Indians to be financially stable, smart and secure. Channelizing the power of technology, the platform is reinventing the way money is perceived and handled in today’s digital era.
‘The Grit in the Oyster Makes the Pearl’
Sonali believes “you cannot lose in life; you either win or learn”. Do not be afraid of failures, make mistakes, but make sure to accumulate the lessons from them and move on to the next step. She further adds, “Confidence and passion are the two things that you should always have by your side. There will be many hurdles, but you have to believe in yourself and strive towards excellence”.
Do not let anything stop you from achieving your ultimate goal.
