Our Valmar Merchant Services team spent an action-packed 3 days networking with our lending colleagues, offering product demonstrations, and learning more about the hottest fintech industry trends at Lend360. Throughout each of those experiences, a few key points really stood out to us as consistent issues in loan management, and for merchants across business sectors. Read on to see what our key takeaways were from our conference experience:
1. Recession Fears are Real
Most business owners we spoke with are uneasy about what’s to come as they have never operated during a recession, let alone a recession brought on by a high inflationary environment. Because of this, lenders are now reevaluating their third-party service providers for the first time in many years. Pricing and the need to reduce costs by driving operational efficiencies are top of mind. For lenders looking to make changes regarding their third-party vendors, direct and indirect costs are being accounted for carefully in the decision-making process.
2. We’re Experiencing a Technological Transformation
The industry continues to reward lenders who utilize the latest and greatest technologies. These lenders are making better data-driven decisions and making timely pivots while creating customer experiences with less friction, resulting in higher percentages of repeat customers. Leading-edge tech not only reduces costs associated with customer churn but also helps ensure that your company is less vulnerable to today’s myriad of cybersecurity threats – which can also incur massive damages. Ready or not, it has never been a more urgent time to future-proof your business against fraud.
3. Labor Shortages Persist Across the Industry
Lenders continue to find it difficult to staff their operations, making labor a hotter topic than ever. To combat high turnover and slow hiring processes, lenders are leveraging third-party services in conjunction with technology to minimize the need for staffing. Where lenders do have staff in place, they’re leveraging that human resource for the highest-value transactions while outsourcing or automating repetitive tasks. We anticipate that this trend will continue at least as long as high inflation persists.
Prior to forming Valmar Merchant Services, we experienced the frustrations that merchants face firsthand and knew we were not alone in our struggles. So, if any of these ideas resonated with you or if you have more thoughts about trends in fintech, we hope you’ll get in touch – because we’re always eager to talk shop.
