Case Study: Americash
Americash Improves Productivity and Efficiency using Drip Marketing feature among many other attributes of Leads360’s Lead Management Solutions
Challenge:
- Wanted a better distribution engine to quickly get leads to the loan officer
- Needed a more comprehensive method to track leads, and to improve accountability program
- Needed to progress from a manual to an automated method of rotating leads
Solution:
- Implemented Leads360 web software to manage incoming sales leads
- Drip Marketing feature improved communication with current and prospective clients
- Custom reporting tool enabled management to quickly design and distribute comprehensive reports
- Improved year-round consistency of lead management
Results:
- Agent activity can be accurately identified and tracked
- New employees can be trained within one week
Americash is a Southern California-based originator of residential mortgage loans. Licensed as a direct lender in 19 states, the company’s objective is to provide low cost, competitively priced mortgage products, backed by outstanding service. But Sales Manager Chad Church recognized the need for a better distribution engine for getting leads to their loan officers. Americash had been using Lending Tree’s Apex, which limited the company’s ability to rotate a lead, and required manual supervision. Church wanted an automated system with an improved trackability and accountability program that would eliminate a situation where “playing favorites” with leads was possible.
“That’s what we achieved by utilizing Leads360. Over the years we’ve used different products and different software programs, but none of them had as dramatic an impact on our overall contact ratio as Leads360,” Church said. “Now we have a much better understanding of who’s calling leads and who isn’t, and we’re better able to get those leads in the hands of a loan officer that is ready to execute them.”
Church cited Leads360’s familiarity with Apex software as a critical deciding factor. “The Leads360 software was Lending Tree Apex on steroids. It provides much-improved capabilities in lead management, but it was also something that was already familiar to us, so a tremendous amount of modification wasn’t necessary to fit our specific needs. Even with our new hires it’s a very user-friendly product. I can take somebody who has never worked on lead software and within a week have them doing automated emails, exporting to an XML format, and downloading to a mail merge. It’s not difficult to master.
“One of the most positive benefits has been the reporting tools that allow us to review any transaction history. From a tracking standpoint it’s kept us a lot more on target with our leads and improved the overall efficiency of our operation. When a customer calls I can pull up the file, review the conversation log, and know exactly what’s going on,” Church added.
The use of drip marketing, a strategy that involves sending out several promotional pieces over a period of time to a subset of sales leads, has allowed Americash to improve the consistency of its marketing campaigns, and to more effectively nurture current and potential clients. “We’ve been doing it for a long time and it’s been very successful for us. With Leads360 we’ve been able to expand our capabilities in following up with leads via customized emails specific to their situation,” Church said.
Productivity has increased “across the board” thanks to the real-time delivery of Leads360. Lead conversions have increased 2-3%, sometimes more. The entire Americash operation now runs at a more rapid pace. If an agent doesn’t act upon a lead within ten minutes it automatically transfers to the next agent.
“If a guy goes to lunch and forgets to log out, a lead is not sitting for an hour waiting for him to get back,” said Church, who describes the impact of Leads360 this way: “Picture a 500 pound guy trimming down to 180 pounds. That’s what the transformation feels like with Leads360. It’s a fantastic product.” Customer support via telephone and online chat has been outstanding. “I appreciate knowing that calls aren’t routed to some call center and to people who don’t know what’s going on. I’m always able to reach someone who’s knowledgeable about the product and that speaks my language.”
Was Leads360 worth the investment? “No question about it,” Church affirms. “You save one deal and you’ve justified the cost of the product for a month.”