Sales Force Automation For Community Financial Institutions Like Banks and Credit Unions

Sales Force Automation is moving from one-size-fits-all solution model (like Siebel or SalesForce) to solutions / products targeted towards specific market segments. For example let’s take a look at ResourceOne from CoreTrac. It is a CRM / Sales Force Automation product for community financial institutions like Banks and Credit Unions.

It’s standard features are:

1. Lead and referral tracking
2. Loan and deposit pipeline management
3. Sales force automation
4. Case management
5. Contact management
6. Client relationship management (CRM)
7. Compensation/Incentive tracking
8. Reporting

ResourceOne includes features to meet the varying scope of a community Financial Institutions contact management and sales force automation needs, such as opportunity management, effective marketing, client retention, increased productivity, and employee retention.

Two of their noteworthy modules are:
Profiler
Profiler uses the demographic data of your clients to recommend products to meet their needs. The institution defines the needs for each product and the profiler recommends the products for individual clients and prospects (e.g., if a parent has a teenager turning 16, recommend a car loan). This allows anyone using ResourceOne to recommend the right product at the right time.

AutoLead
AutoLead takes the guesswork out of sending referrals. The administrator creates rules that control how leads are sent. Should the leads be sent to individual employees, to a department, or to a whole branch? Should a particular product always be sent to one department? With AutoLead, you decide where leads are sent and who is responsible for the action.

With today’s announcement of Service Center, a tool for banks and credit unions to manage call centers and capture business generated through inbound calls, ResourceOne creates a strong presence in this niche. This added functionality should be beneficial to institutions that want to capitalize on opportunities created from customer service issues. Calling officers can better understand the relationship of clients and build rapport that hopefully will lead to long term and satisfied clients.

I think the industry is ripe for more such specialized sales force automation solutions. They can encapsulate deeper domain knowledge and yet would require less customization. I expect such solutions to give mega CRM / sales force automation providers like SalesForce or Siebel a serious competition in their niche market.