Fintech Founder Feature | Three Tips for Enhancing Customer Relationships

Artis powers real-time lending and payment solutions that enable banks to drive demand to businesses by offering consumer financing at the point of need. To meet Artis and the other nine Fintechs in the 2021 ICBA ThinkTECH Accelerator, click here. For questions, please email founders@venturecenter.co.

Three Tips for Enhancing Customer Relationships

By Barclay Keith
CEO and Co-Founder of Artis Technologies

The COVID-19 pandemic shifted the modernization of traditional banking models into overdrive this year. While innovation and digitization may have been exciting side-projects in the past, they have become the undisputed top priorities for banks moving forward. Many community banks will find the highest and best use of their time and capital in partnerships with startup companies to bolster business relationships.

Economic relief efforts are temporarily keeping businesses afloat. Still, banks need to think about what comes next when short-term cash infusions reach their limits, including looking at evolving market trends. Banks will be challenged to work alongside businesses and their communities to help everyone regain their footing in this new economic environment. Below are three areas of focus for banks looking to enhance their customer relationships.

1. Have your business customers’ back.

Businesses will make larger deposits and keep customers longer if they offer more products and services. Creating additional value-add solutions for business customers encourages longer-lasting and stronger relationships, which ultimately brings more revenue to the bank.

With Artis, banks expand their community footprint and leverage demand from businesses by offering affordable consumer financing options distributed through their commercial customers. The solution is ideal for many consumer-facing industries with higher cost products and services, including home improvement, HVAC, plumbing and landscape/hardscape, as well as elective medical, dental, manufacturing, auto repair and more. This approach generates long-term cash flow opportunities and drives higher deposits.

For bankers, the question is shifting from how to efficiently process Paycheck Protection Program loans to, “How do I continue to build on the relationship with my customers and help them bounce back from this downturn?” Banks can get ahead of the game by providing capital to help companies rebound and rebuild, and by giving them the tools they need to monetize new opportunities and improve cash flow.

2.   Generate high-quality loans faster.

Community Banks might not be pushing forward on consumer lending because of challenges around: shifting to digital services, determining a borrowers’ creditworthiness, and lowering the cost of customer acquisition. And yet, consumers are still in desperate need of loans during this pandemic and beyond.

Since the pandemic, measuring credit has become especially tricky. The pandemic makes a case for using alternative data to complement traditional credit models. Income, delinquency rates, FICO, and debt-to-income ratio have been primary credit attributes for a while; however, these attributes no longer represent the whole story in a post-COVID world. Consider the number of non-reported delinquencies and how this will impact financial stability. To stay ahead, banks will need to look at alternative data sources, such as public records, utilities, social media, spend habits, employment, history of file, fraud, and risk sources.

Artis makes consumer lending easy and fast, without compromising the tenants of compliance, security, risk, or cost. Our platform combines alternative data sources with machine learning. It presents real-time loan offers that are uniquely structured to each borrower as well as the risk appetite of the bank–all done within the banking industry’s regulatory framework.

Moving forward with data-driven credit decisions, a turnkey platform, and a simple integration, banks can increase the quality and velocity of distributing loan funds and become a tremendous asset to communities in need.

3. Create new distribution channels and reach new customers.

One of the most valuable benefits fintech partnerships can offer banks is meeting the customer when and where they need financial services. Before digital banking, financial institutions interacted with customers through conveniently located full-service branches, ATMs, and other limited-service offices. The same concept applies to digital banking. The rise of online and mobile banking allowed customers to access financial services at their convenience without visiting a branch.

When a customer is ready to buy a product or service from a business, therein lies an opportunity for everyone involved:

●      The customer needs financial services, e.g., a loan.
●      The business needs to make the sale as quickly and seamlessly as possible.
●      The bank needs access to the customer and the ability to meet their financial needs.

 We created Artis to meet these needs for the benefit of all parties.

By partnering with Artis and leveraging business customers to create new distribution channels, banks can now reach new consumers trying to access financial services in the moment without leaving the purchasing experience. This model allows financial institutions to add value and drive growth for their business customers through access to their balance sheet and financial products while allowing businesses to serve within their ecosystem.

Businesses are seeking to become more integrated into the daily lives of their customers. Banks should be empowering them to offer financial services, backed by the bank’s solid reputation for security and longevity when consumers need it most. Artis makes consumer lending easy and fast. We aim to eliminate the pain and frustration associated with point-of-need financing by simplifying how consumers, financial institutions, and businesses collaborate for a lasting and meaningful relationship.

Thanks to Artis Technologies for contributing to the ICBA ThinkTECH Accelerator’s Founder Feature series! To visit the 2021 ICBA ThinkTECH Accelerator, click here. For questions, please email founders@venturecenter.co.