Banking apps have evolved far beyond balance checks. Today, they are becoming daily touchpoints where people manage their spending, plan budgets, and even discover exclusive offers from their favorite brands. For retailers, this opens a new opportunity to reach customers at the very moment they think about their finances and decide where to shop.
Merchant offers within banking apps, also known as card-linked offers (CLO), connects the worlds of retail and banking. They enable brands to communicate with customers naturally and in a trusted way. These are not intrusive banners or push ads, but added value inside an environment customers already rely on. The result is higher sales, stronger loyalty, and improved brand perception.
Banking apps as a new sales channel
Most users open their banking app almost every day to check balances, pay bills, and review transactions. Their attention is high, and their mindset is focused. A relevant offer appearing in this context feels natural, not disruptive.
Unlike standard advertising channels that compete for attention in crowded feeds, banking apps provide a calm and trusted space. Seeing a brand offer here feels like a benefit, not another ad.
Our campaign data shows that more than 60% of users interact with an offer within 48 hours of seeing it.
Why banking apps are so attractive for retailers:
- Daily engagement in an environment customers already trust.
- High credibility where promotions feel like benefits.
- Full measurability of campaign performance.
- Seamless integration into everyday customer behavior.
Acquisition and retention in one channel
Card-linked offers are not just short-term discounts. Thanks to anonymised transaction data, brands can target customers based on real purchase behavior instead of assumptions or cookies.
A retailer can offer cashback to people who have never shopped with them before while motivating existing customers to come back or spend more.
How merchants can use CLOs effectively:
Acquisition: Reach and convert new customers. CLOs let merchants identify potential buyers based on their real-world spending in related categories. For example, a coffee chain can target users who frequently spend at competing cafés but have never visited their brand.
Retention: Re-engage past customers and encourage repeat visits. CLOs enable personalised reactivation campaigns by recognising lapsed or infrequent shoppers. Merchants can tailor offers to win them back - say, a 10% cashback if they haven’t made a purchase in 90 days.
Upsell: Increase basket size or promote new categories. With CLOs, merchants can use spend thresholds or product-category triggers to guide users toward higher-value behaviour. A grocery chain might offer a bonus reward for spending over a certain amount or buying from under-performing product lines.
Each offer has a clear goal to attract, retain, or strengthen the customer relationship.
Read how enriched transaction data enables smarter targeting and personalisation.
Direct impact on sales and measurable results
CLO campaigns are measurable down to the last transaction. Every step, from viewing to activation to purchase, can be tracked accurately. Retailers know exactly how many customers saw the offer, activated it, and completed a purchase.
This makes card-linked offers one of the most transparent and performance-driven marketing channels available today. You only pay for real results, ensuring full control of your ROI
Retailers typically see sales uplift between 10 and 20 percent during campaigns, with returning customers even after the offer ends.
What you can measure with CLOs:
Impressions, activations, and conversion rates: Track exactly how many users saw an offer, opted in, and made a purchase. Because the process occurs within secure banking environments, these metrics reflect actual engagement and confirmed spend - not proxies like clicks or ad views.
Average spend and purchase frequency: CLO data reveals not just who redeemed an offer, but how their spending behaviour evolved. You can measure whether customers increased their basket size, purchased higher-margin items, or returned for additional visits after the campaign.
ROI at the campaign level: Every transaction tied to an offer contributes to a precise ROI calculation. Retailers can compare the cost of incentives directly with incremental revenue, isolate uplift from control groups, and understand the true return on each euro invested.
Learn more about how cashback and vouchers build customer loyalty.
Building brand trust and loyalty
A brand featured inside a banking app benefits from the credibility that users associate with their bank. What might feel like advertising elsewhere becomes a trusted recommendation here.
Beyond immediate sales results, CLO campaigns deliver strong brand effects. Customers associate the brand with rewards, positive experiences, and personal value. Personalised offers reinforce the feeling that the brand understands their needs, which is increasingly valuable in a noisy digital environment.
Explore how brands use CLOs to drive measurable engagement.
From short-term campaigns to long-term strategy
The real strength of card-linked offers lies in combining short-term results with long-term brand building. Seasonal promotions such as Black Friday or shopping weekends can generate quick sales impact, but long-term visibility in the banking environment builds consistency and customer trust.
Tips for a long-term CLO strategy:
Combine seasonal promotions with year-round presence: Use high-intensity shopping periods to drive immediate results, but don’t disappear when they end. Maintaining an active CLO presence ensures your brand stays visible in users’ daily financial environment, which subtly reinforces familiarity and loyalty.
Segment audiences by purchase frequency and spending patterns: CLO data enables precision segmentation far beyond demographics. You can target infrequent customers with reactivation rewards, encourage mid-tier spenders to increase their average ticket size, or reward your most loyal users with exclusive perks.
Continuously test, evaluate, and optimise benefits: The performance data behind CLOs allows you to run controlled experiments at scale. Test different cashback levels, timing, or targeting criteria to identify what drives the best incremental sales.
Integrate CLOs with loyalty and CRM programs: CLOs can amplify existing loyalty ecosystems by linking digital rewards directly to card transactions. When customers earn cashback automatically through the same card they use for everyday purchases, loyalty engagement feels seamless.
Over time, this approach turns CLOs into a core part of the marketing mix alongside loyalty programs, newsletters, and social campaigns.
A strong brand is not only visible on billboards but also present in the channels people use every day.
Summary
Merchant offers in banking apps combine trust, precision, and performance. They allow retailers to reach customers through a channel they already use daily and base marketing on real purchase data.
CLOs help brands grow sustainably by acquiring new customers, increasing spend, and building loyalty. They deliver measurable results while enhancing the overall brand experience.
Want to see how can card-linked offers work for your brand?
Get in touch with us and discover how to turn your campaigns into a data-driven growth engine.
FAQs
Banking apps provide a trusted and high-attention environment where customers manage their finances daily. Unlike noisy advertising channels, offers feel like a benefit, not an intrusion, because they appear in this high-attention environment, encouraging customers to use them as a valuable service.
CLOs use transactional data to achieve both goals. In the case of acquisition, marketers focus on consumers who shop with competitors. In the case of retention, they try to re-engage former or irregular customers with personalised offers to win them back and strengthen their loyalty.
CLOs are highly transparent. Retailers typically see a sales uplift between 10% and 20% during campaigns. Furthermore, they can measure ROI at the campaign level, track increases in average spend and purchase frequency, and only pay for confirmed results from actual transactions.
Featuring a brand in a banking app leverages banks credibility, positioning the offer as a trusted recommendation. Beyond immediate sales, personalised rewards reinforce the feeling that the brand understands the customer's needs, building a long-term positive assocciation and strengthening customer loyalty.
Marketing professional with B2B, fintech, e-commerce, and retail experience. She connects banks and retailers through data-driven personalization and commerce media, turning complex topics into engaging stories.
