The Fintech Showcase at REACH 2022 on Wednesday featured several seven-minute, fast-paced, highly informative presentations about the latest innovative solutions to move credit unions forward — where a Best of Show Award was awarded to WithClutch.

(View/download conference and event photos from the REACH 2022 Photo Gallery)

As financial services continue to evolve and change at a rapid pace, so does the technology that supports the credit union industry. Fintech is transforming the credit union industry to enhance member experiences, improve operational efficiencies, and mitigate risk.

In the same vein, credit unions leaders joined the conversation during this inspiring showcase at the California and Nevada Credit Union Leagues annual conference, which was extremely relevant for REACH attendees. WithClutch delivered its presentation, Why Recapture is the Most Important Lending Strategy for Credit Unions, and attendee-credit union leaders learned about direct-to-consumer fintech lender approaches so they can outcompete that arena. They engaged in ideas and discussion on “how to lend like a fintech” and “leveraging technology for automation/efficiency gains.”

Several more latest innovative products and services to help credit unions ultimately achieve greater performance and growth were there as well, including:

• Welcome to the Fintech Revolution — DoubleCheck Solutions: Addresses pending regulations from the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) and legislation from Congress; provides audit trails which can mitigate the potential of class-action lawsuits; allows real-time fraud prevention; offers flexible revenue opportunities; keeps members in mainstream banking; and drives member acquisition and retention.
• How Credit Unions are Leveling Up Member and Employee Experience with Artificial Intelligence — interface.ai: How artificial intelligence (AI) can help credit unions of all sizes tackle operational challenges, with examples of how credit unions are providing the best member experience; free up employees to focus on higher priority tasks and build relationships with members; and how credit unions are experiencing guaranteed returns on their investment.
• Voice360 with Voice Authentication — Posh: There are several competitors in the conversational AI and voice biometrics space, but extremely few that have co-developed the integration of the technologies. However, Posh and Illuma are the first to co-develop the integration with a focus on the needs and use cases prevalent in credit unions. This focused effort will result in a solution that is right sized for credit unions to optimize costs and deployment efforts, as well as offer the easiest user experience for members. One of the key challenges for voice biometrics in a conversational IVR environment is the limited amount of speech captured from the caller during a typical interaction. This has forced most vendors to offer active authentication in the IVR (repeat predefined phrases like 'my voice is my password' to enroll and authenticate). This results in a poor user experience, limits adoption, and hurts return on investment. The partnership between Posh and Illuma will eliminate the need to repeat a specific pre-defined phrase like 'my voice is my password' and yet provide secure biometric authentication in the IVR. The Posh and Illuma collaboration is a prime example of innovation driven by the direct request of our credit unions clients. It’s the advancement they have been asking for, and our combined solutions help credit unions make a big step forward in digital transformation with measurable impact on operational efficiency, security, and member experience.
• Intelligent Marketing Automation, Powered by Member Data, Focused on the Member Journey — ORIGENCE: Learn how arc MX syncs with virtually all core, consumer and mortgage origination providers. Discover how marketing automation delivers relevant member communications resulting in increased completed loan applications, funded loan volume, deposit growth, and overall member experience. See a 360 degree view of member accounts and marketing correspondence. View dynamic business intelligence dashboards with user customization.
• Credit Union Mindshare in the New Era of Financial Services: Leveraging the Mission of Financial Wellbeing to Increase Sales Opportunities — Paperwork: Delivers contextual product offerings to members, promoting product adoption and boosting interest and non-interest income; creates long-term engagement and product stickiness, through key product features like financial calendar, collaboration-friendly digital organizer, and account synching across financial institutions; provides credit unions with data and analytics, so that credit unions can better understand their members’ comprehensive financial pictures and corresponding product needs; improves members’ financial wellbeing with insights and tips based on their own unique financial life and goals; uses financial health score to show members where they stand and how they can improve, while also providing the credit union with measurable data demonstrating the success of the program.
• Make Connecting with Your Members a Breeze — Coconut Software: How Coconut matches members with the right expert and book time with them instantly, before they set foot in a branch; allow members to seamlessly move between online, virtual, and digital channels without sacrificing experience; keep everything your staff needs to deliver an end-to-end virtual service with our built-in video solution.
• Growing Member Wallet Share in a Digital Economy — CuneXus: growing wallet share; call center and branch sales enablement; non-member acquisition; and increased non-interest income.
• Investments as a Service — Eko: More than 50 percent of Americans prefer to invest their money with the trusted financial institution such as their credit union. However, when a credit union is not offering a digital investment solution, their clients will find it elsewhere. Younger generations are less loyal to their credit union, so if they don't find the products they like, they will just go somewhere else. Currently, digital and low threshold investing is the #1 most important thing younger generations are missing from their financial institutions. When credit unions only offering investment services via a financial advisor, less than 1% of their banking clients invest with the credit union. At the same time, when credit unions offer, in addition to the financial advisor also Eko's digital investment solution, they convert on average 12% of their banking clients to also invest with them. The main reasons for this big gap are 1) Eko is easily accessible via the existing online platform of a credit union, a platform that members know and trust, 2) Eko's $10 minimum makes it possible for every member to invest, not only the wealthy ones, 3) getting stated with Eko takes only 5 minutes in a fully automated process, 4) Eko is automatically connected with member's bank accounts and 5) Eko gives live dashboards of the performance of the portfolio, while users can easily deposit and withdraw with the click of a button as often as they like. Offering a digital investment solution not only improves product offer and attracts younger members, it also significantly improves revenue — generating an average return on investment for credit unions of 17-times.
  
  

Impactful REACHtalks and REACH Deep breakout sessions took place on Thursday, challenging credit union leaders to try something NEW at their organizations. Credit union leaders gained new insights in operations, innovation, new technologies, and thinking differently as they continue to serve their members going into late 2022 and 2023:

‘REACH Deep’ Sessions
Bundles of educational opportunities were in reach for attendees during REACH Deep breakout sessions, social impact sessions, and other discussions on noteworthy and relevant topics for today’s modern credit union leader:

• Reaching Beyond Recession — Members and the Economic Outlook: With continued inflation and rising interest rates, are we ready for another downturn and can another recession really be avoided? Eyler will provide a view on labor, housing and financial markets to help better understand local economies in 2023 to 2025.
• Embed or be Embedded — Can Credit Union System as a Service Transform our Approach to Embedded Finance?: Buying and Borrowing are converging. Consumers want buying experiences that is fast, easy, and simple. Those experiences include embedded finance options that steer buyers to the credit option most preferred by the retailer. Is your credit union prepared?
• Community Development Credit Unions — Approach and Practices to Financial Inclusion: Community development credit unions focused on financial inclusion can disrupt the marketplace through non-traditional real estate and green lending, deepening their impact and creating generational housing equity. Join Inclusiv experts as they share proven strategies and key success factors to effectively serve this emerging opportunity.
• No Lead Left Behind: Whether leads are generated through marketing campaigns or opportunities walking into a branch every day, credit unions are missing out on millions of dollars of loan production by not having a proper sales and service infrastructure woven into the organization’s culture. Gain an understand how focusing on increasing sales and providing a great Member Experience do not have to be mutually exclusive.
• Data Isn't the Problem — Activating It Is: Credit unions have robust amounts of data, so the challenge is not data acquisition but rather data activation. It’s time to demystify big data and learn from your peers the pitfalls and advantages of launching an enterprise data effort. This case-study style format will provide real data use cases as well as considerations on how to get the most from your enterprise data.
• Say Yes to More Members — More Approvals in Less Time with Automation: Recent innovations in data and technology aren’t about the model or the software, they are about saying yes to more members and improving the experience for both members and employees alike. In this interactive session, hear real-life strategies used by lenders to increase approvals while decreasing risk and come away with ways your credit union can leverage automation to fuel sustainable, inclusive growth.
• Haunted Overhead and the Hybrid Workplace: Is your Board shifting their focus from virtual spaces to your physical places? With staffing, members and overhead on your mind, are you having trouble explaining your evolving workplace strategy? Get answers to the top 5 questions Boards are asking about CU locations, reaching new members, staff retention and whether it makes sense to reconsider owning vs leasing scenarios, from HQs to branches.
• What Board Volunteers Need to Know about GRC: A strong governance, risk and compliance framework is critical to a credit unions future growth. Learn about best practices for establishing a GRC structure for long-term sustainability. Understand NCUA guidance and expectations to take back to the next board discussion.
• Serving the Underserved — Relationship-Based Lending for Financial Inclusion: When life happens, financial access is key. Do you know where your members turn for cash when there’s more month than money or unexpected expenses arise? It should be your credit union, not a payday lender. During this session, we’ll discuss the important role credit unions play in protecting their members’ financial futures, driving financial inclusion, and improving the well-being of underserved communities.
  
  

‘REACHtalks’Sessions
REACHtalks were high-impact, straight-to-the-point, 10-minute discussions:

• REACH for Your Members — How to Attract, Engage, and Retain Members: ORIGENCE
• Loan Pricing 101 — What Not to Do as Rates Rise: ALM First
• Strategies for Growing Loans and Members in Uncertain Times: Upstart
• AI and Fair Lending — This Changes Everything: Zest AI
• Putting the Member at the Helm of Their Own Experience: Coconut Software
• How to Use Your Credit Card Program to Win Against 'Buy Now, Pay Later' (BNPL): Fiserv
• Boarding the Bullet Train for Faster Payments: Catalyst Corporate FCU
• The Battle Against Fraud in an Evolving Digital World: PSCU
• Integrated Solutions to Help Achieve Digital Maturity: Co-op Solutions
• The Metaverse — A Member Experience Destination: PSCU
• Mitigating the Effects of the Great Reshuffle: Gallagher Executive Benefits
  
  

Stay Engaged During REACH
Attendees and League staff will be sharing photos, comments and memories through Twitter (@CUatREACH), LinkedIn (#CUatREACH), and the REACH 2022 Photo Gallery. 

REACH is one of the credit union industry’s premier annual events, attracting leaders and system partners from across California, Nevada and the United States. This year it’s held from Nov. 1 – 4 at the JW Marriott Desert Springs Resort and Spa in Palm Desert, CA!

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