Community Banking 2
A commercial community bank in Wisconsin was seeking additional opportunities for their bankers to develop relationships. The bankers had limited time to find new opportunities and keep accurate data.
The partnership with Business Development Pros led to the community bank increasing its reach and brand awareness in the region, resulting in more relationship opportunities being uncovered for the bankers.
BDPros conducted outbound outreach via multiple channels to find opportunities for the bankers to develop new relationships.
BDPros helped the bank gain a greater understanding of their reach and more precise data as to where success came from so that it could be replicated.
With BDPros taking point on follow-up and sales process management, the bank manager gained a greater understanding of his bankers' effectiveness.
BDPros researched new leads for bankers using scraping tools for municipalities that looked at potential new opportunities that would need to be financed.
Challenges
The community bank had no CRM and only tracked the path from point of initial outreach to closing with no analysis of other variables that could be contributing to success.
The community bank’s team did little prospecting themselves. They relied heavily on referrals and uncovering opportunities at trade shows or conferences instead of proactively seeking new leads via multi-channel outreach.
Tracking of banker effectiveness and contacts was limited. There was no transparency in what bankers were doing and who they formed relationships with. This put the bank at risk for loss of business if the banker were to leave.
Follow-up was disjointed, with many opportunities falling through the cracks due to a banker’s lack of follow-through or attention to detail.
The bank manager was worried that involving a third party in the prospecting process would lead to worse outcomes and weaker relationships. They wanted a smooth, easy hand-off process.
Solutions
Business Development Pros built and customized a CRM for the community bank, creating and scheduling regular reports on various data points for greater transparency.
Our team researched potential opportunities using multiple industry-standard methods to gather contact information and streamline multi-channel outreach.
We facilitated the development of relationships between new leads and the assigned bankers by providing detailed notes ahead of meetings and joining the initial meeting to make the introduction from prospect to banker.
BDPros ensured timelines were met and needs were properly fulfilled by following up post-meeting with the bankers, handling any necessary follow-up as required and logging any meeting notes in the CRM.
Alongside the bank manager, we developed a workflow and process for prospect handover and follow-up to prevent more opportunities falling through the cracks.
Results
The community bank’s strong partnership with Business Development Pros has led to multiple years of exceeding pipeline goals and millions of dollars in loans.
The creation and usage of the custom CRM led to increased transparency via the logging of meeting notes and advanced reporting capabilities.
BDPros set an average of 1-3 meetings a week for an average of 41 a year. Overall, we set over 130 meetings for the bank!
The sales and handoff process BDPros developed has led to stronger relationships and a reduction in business lost due to lack of follow-up.
Throughout the relationship with the community bank, a total of over $15 million in loans were signed by the bankers, with millions more in the pipeline.
To date, the BDPros team has uncovered over $125 million in opportunities, exceeding pipeline growth goals every year.