SMB Lending Strategies is a multi-dimensional consulting firm focused on helping a diverse group of clients address challenges and achieve their respective goals, using a business lending offering to drive strategic initiatives, serve desirable customer segments, capture opportunities and grow revenue.
We are well-versed in key aspects of business lending from varying vantage points. On the foundation of a deep knowledge of product and process, we have built programs for financial services firms and other entities that serve business owners looking to use access to capital as a means of serving their clientele and igniting interest and opportunity in their own offering, as well as lenders looking for strategic referral partners to grow their volume.
We help clients:
While we are a great fit for almost any business serving a business-owner clientele that would benefit from access to capital, we work primarily with:
While the opportunity is significant, a journey into business lending and the strategic partnerships space brings some critical nuances that just don't come up in the standard sales and business development process.
As a driver that's been down this road many times before, we are able to offer a cost-effective, time-saving approach to avoid what in less experienced hands, risks turning into a complicated, expensive, potentially embarrassing boondoggle.
We know which relationships are likely to offer significant value, how to properly position the offering and what resources and commitments will be required to unlock their full potential. We know how to build these relationships, create crucial awareness, what works and of equal importance, what has historically proven to be a waste of time and resources.
And as a consultant that is not tied to any single provider, we are able to offer our partners strategies, solutions and options that are unbiased and based on our deep experience, offer the best fit to meet their specific needs.
At SMB Lending Strategies, LLC, we work closely with our clients to understand their needs and develop solutions that are tailored to their unique challenges.
We make the critical investment of time and effort to learn about a client's industry, business, structure, distribution channel and existing capabilities, and are always mindful of the client's business philosophy, existing resources and prioritized initiatives.
We then work with our client's leadership team to create a roadmap that lays out what it will take to get them there with as little expense, frustration and delay as possible. And then we help our client execute that game plan, making adjustments along the way to assure success.
In the past 12 years, I have successfully built and managed a wide variety of strategic partnerships for the two largest non-bank lenders in the SBA's 7(a) program.
I have witnessed first-hand, how business lending, properly positioned and well-executed, can drive revenue for a lender, while simultaneously offering a strategic partner an equally valuable opportunity to satisfy more customers and energize their business owner client segment to enable them to achieve highly desirable growth in their own, core products and services.
I've built these strategic relationships from the ground-up and watched them grow into high-value, recurring streams of opportunity with some terrific and unexpected added benefits. I've learned how to determine which relationships offer true opportunity and of equal importance, which are likely to be a waste of time and resources - as well as what will be needed from both partners to maximize the potential of the relationship.
I'd personally welcome the opportunity to learn more about your business, discuss your goals and your challenges, and to see where we might help.
- Adam E. Epstein
A well-built, well-executed business lending offering provides financial institutions, independent advisory firms (RIAs), broker-dealers and financial services companies the opportunity to meet key client needs, attract new relationships, fend off competitors and build their reputation and brand.
Perhaps even more importantly, we have witnessed first-hand how business lending, positioned properly, can offer a vital key to open the door to the highly desirable business owner client, for lending, wealth management, investment, cash management, insurance and benefits, business services and for other related services that an institution offers and might want to provide.
While incremental revenue, retained relationships and new business opportunities are great measures, we have found that the most successful relationships are ones where the offering enables the strategic partner to unlock a client segment that is crucial to the growth and success of its own, core business.
We have had very significant success in this space because we fully understand what it takes for a business lending offering to truly be a valuable asset to a financial advisor.
While much of the lending world is fixated on a "low touch", fintech model, our offering is built on meshing emerging technology with a consultative, "high-touch" approach that focuses on client experience and enhancing the Advisor/Client relationship at every opportunity.
Many business lenders are just not prepared to deliver the level of customer service that a Financial Advisor needs to enhance their relationship with the high net worth and emerging affluent client.
We are able to help our clients choose the right lender relationship to meet their needs, set service standards to assure that the lender lives up to its promises and provide continued support to the partnership as an intermediary to deliver the level of customer service needed to have the partnership succeed.
We have built highly successful business lending referral relationships for Broker-Dealers, Independent Financial Advisors (RIAs) and Financial Services firms. The services we provide include the following:
High-value strategic relationships offer non-bank lenders a unique opportunity to materially impact sales, revenue and profit margins. Rather than growing volume by chasing opportunities on a one-off, jump ball basis, a well-chosen, well-built relationship offers the ability to enjoy a consistent flow of higher quality opportunities with improved economics - a win-win outcome for both parties in the relationship.
Whether these partnerships take the form of straight loan referral or a more detailed lender service provider relationship, we can help a non-bank lender find the right partners and set up the relationship for success.
Our overall game plan for building successful strategic lending referral partnerships for non-bank lenders includes the following:
For banks and other financial institutions, whether they currently lend to businesses or not, a relationship with one or more strategic lending partners can help address lending opportunities outside of the lender's comfort zone, enabling them to satisfy customers, attract new relationships and enjoy cash management opportunities without incurring expense or taking on undesirable credit risk.
These relationships can be structured in a variety of ways:
Our overall game plan for building successful strategic lending referral partnerships for banks and other lenders includes the following:
We believe that the sales function in many organizations does not reach desired goals because salespersons, from management to BDOs, are asked to deliver a skillset that requires extremely diverse talents that may not be natural in one person. While a great sales manager may have the technical and organizational skills to lead a team effectively, that does not necessarily mean that they have the tools to develop a marketing strategy to grow the business, or to mentor team members to execute on that strategy. And likewise, BDOs that can structure a deal effectively and move it through the underwriting process, might just not know where to find, court, capture and manage productive referral relationships.
We have had significant experience and success in supporting the sales function, filling in capability gaps and offering the opportunity to meet management's revenue expectations: Our support includes:
In the business lending space, effective marketing sits at the crossroad of the right message, the right audience and the right time, based on current market conditions. You can have the best product in the world, but if your core customer is not aware that it exists and how it can benefit them, well.......
In our experience, even the most capable marketing departments are challenged by the nuances of the business lending space. Understanding product detail, current market trends and value proposition for various audiences requires the involvement of a subject matter expert.
We have deep experience supporting the marketing function, including:
We frequently find that a borrower knows that they need capital, but really isn't aware of the most likely place to secure that capital or the form that capital should take to best meet their specific needs and the function of their business.
And so, each opportunity brought to us begins with a short, consultative discussion of the borrower's business and borrowing needs. If we believe the opportunity can be financed, we move the borrower in the direction of one or more pedigreed providers that we believe will offer the best combination of fit, certainty and favorable loan terms.
While we certainly will provide a borrower options, we do not subscribe to the "jump ball" theory of lending advisory. Business owners are just too busy to be swamped with a large, unvetted list of potential providers.
Based on many years of industry experience and deep relationships in the space, we have a go-to list of best-in-class strategic partners to help us help our clients address the business borrowing needs of their customers, including:
Let there be no doubt - referral lending relationships will ultimately succeed or fail based on borrower experience. A good borrower experience will drive more interest in the relationship and more opportunities, while poor borrower experience, even in transactions that fund, will doom the referral relationship to eventual failure.
We are available to assist our partners with challenges in their lending process that improved, might offer the opportunity to improve borrower satisfaction. We will assess issues, engage with key stakeholders, gain consensus (as needed) and offer specific strategies and actions to address stated needs.
We have deep experience in most facets of the business lending process, including:
With over 25 years of experience in lending and business advisory services, Adam most recently has served in an executive capacity for the two largest, publicly traded, non-bank lenders in the United States Small Business Administration’s Small Business (7a) Lending program.
Adam identifies, develops and guides all aspects of business lending referral relationships with banks, financial services/wealth management advisory firms, asset-based lenders and other high-value strategic partners that serve business owners, helping them satisfy and retain more of those customers and their deposits/assets, attract new relationships, unlock strategic client segments and enhance their brand. Successes include growing relationships from concept to annually recurring multi-million dollar revenue streams with two of the largest financial services firms in the world.
Additionally, based on extensive product, process, sales, marketing, talent management, legal and compliance experience, Adam has served as Executive Director – Strategy, working with C-Suite leadership to assess a wide variety of challenges and develop and implement responsive sales, marketing and process initiatives to improve customer experience, referral source satisfaction, workplace culture and revenue growth.
Prior to entering the business side of the lending space in 2012, Adam was a Partner in a NYC banking boutique law firm, serving as legal counsel and adviser to financial institutions, businesses, family offices, and high net worth individuals, specializing in business and commercial real estate finance.
Adam is a graduate of Tufts University and the Maurice A. Dean School of Law at Hofstra University and is a Member in Good Standing of the New York State Bar.
Contact us at: info@smblendingstrategies.com
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