By Devon Kinkead

When Savana Morie’s recent article in Credit Unions Magazine highlighted Wright-Patt Credit Union’s transformative Pathways to Homeownership initiative, it struck a particularly personal chord for me. Having spent the first 18 years of my life in Dayton, Ohio, I’ve witnessed firsthand the challenges facing Northwest Dayton—the very communities Wright-Patt is working to revitalize.

But beyond the personal connection, this story represents something even more powerful: the intersection of mission-driven purpose and data-driven precision that defines modern credit union growth.

The Challenge Hidden in Plain Sight

Wright-Patt Credit Union ($9.3B, Beavercreek, OH) has emerged as one of the two largest purchase-money lenders in the Dayton area, with more than half their mortgages going to first-time buyers. As President and CEO Tim Mislansky shared with Morie, “Affordable homeownership is one of the keys to financial success. When we can help members become homeowners, we can help them build wealth, strengthen families, and create lasting communities.”

That commitment is admirable—and it’s backed by a $1.3 million investment from the WPCU Sunshine Community Fund to construct 30 new homes in Northwest Dayton over the next three years. But here’s the question every mission-driven credit union must ask: How do you find the right people to fill those homes?

The Data Behind the Dream

This is where prescreen marketing transforms theory into impact. Our recent (Sep 2025) Growth Opportunities Analysis for Wright-Patt Credit Union revealed something remarkable:

Within just 5 miles of Wright-Patt’s 40 branches, there are 172,328 credit-qualified individuals ready for mortgage opportunities—representing a potential loan volume of $35.8 billion.

Let me put that in perspective. While Wright-Patt is building 30 homes over three years through their Pathways initiative, there are over 172,000 qualified mortgage candidates already living in their branch network footprint. These aren’t random names—these are real people who:

• Have FICO scores between 680 and 850
• Have demonstrated responsible credit behavior with no current delinquencies
• Meet industry standard underwriting criteria (below)
• Live within a short drive of a Wright-Patt branch
• Are currently without a mortgage or are first-time homebuyers

Criteria Definition	Rule Summary
FICO Score	Between 680 and 850.
Total number of debt counseling trades excluding collections	Equal to 0.
Total number of trades presently 30 or more days delinquent or derogatory excluding collections	Equal to 0.
Total number of trades ever 30 or more days delinquent or derogatory occurred in the last 12 months including collections	Equal to 0.
Total number of trades ever repossessed	Equal to 0.
Number of months since the most recent trade ever charged-off including indeterminates	No charged-off trades ever.
Total number of public record bankruptcies	Equal to 0.
Total number of trades excluding collections and student loans including indeterminates	Greater than or equal to 3.
Number of months since the oldest trade was opened excluding collections and student loans including indeterminates	Greater than 36.
Total number of non-medical collection trades	Equal to 0.
Total balance on medical collections	Less than or equal to $2,000.
Total number of first mortgage trades ever foreclosed including settled first mortgages	Equal to 0.

Not all 172,328 will qualify for enough of a loan to meet market home prices so, the credit union should take market prices into account when designing the prescreen campaign ensuring that any such policy does not create a disparate impact under the ECOA or Fair Housing Act.

From Mass Marketing to Mission Alignment

Traditional mortgage marketing casts a wide net and hopes for the best. Prescreen marketing does something fundamentally different: it identifies individuals who already qualify for your specific lending criteria before you ever reach out.

For Wright-Patt’s Pathways to Homeownership initiative, this precision matters even more. Director of Community and Social Impact Ivy Glover told Morie that the program includes a five-week homeownership readiness program, one-on-one coaching, and financial education sessions. That’s a significant investment of time and resources—which makes targeting the right candidates from the start absolutely critical.

“We didn’t just cut a check,” Glover explained. “We committed to making homeowners.”

The Micronotes Advantage: Turning Data Into Opportunity

Our Automated Prescreen™ platform analyzed 1,809,213 Experian records within 5 miles of Wright-Patt’s branch locations. After applying Wright-Patt’s underwriting criteria, we identified 723,188 qualified prospects across all loan categories.

For mortgage opportunities specifically, here’s what we found:

• 172,328 qualified mortgage candidates
• $35.8 billion in potential loan volume
• Average loan qualification: $154,314
• All candidates living within a 5-mile radius of 40 branches across 182 zip codes

Once the program is executed, each prospect receives a personalized, firm offer of credit—not a generic “you might qualify” message, but an actual pre-qualified offer with specific loan amounts, rates, and monthly payments based on their individual financial profile.

Bridging the Education Gap

One of Glover’s key insights in the article particularly resonates with our approach: “I wish we’d started the education piece sooner.”

This is where prescreen marketing creates a natural bridge between acquisition and education. When you reach a qualified prospect with a specific, personalized offer, you’re not starting a conversation from scratch—you’re answering a question they may have already been asking themselves: “Can I afford a home?”

For Wright-Patt’s target demographic in Northwest Dayton—where over 70% of residents rent and more than 40% are housing-cost burdened—seeing a concrete, qualified mortgage offer can be the catalyst that transforms “someday” into “now.”

The Ripple That Could Become a Wave

Glover shared with Morie: “I tell my team all the time: Every drop makes a ripple, but some make a much bigger one. This is a big ripple moment.”

She’s absolutely right. But imagine if Wright-Patt could systematically identify and reach every qualified mortgage candidate in their branch network? What starts as a ripple could become a genuine wave of homeownership transformation.

Our analysis reveals opportunities across multiple product categories that support the journey to homeownership:

• 104,890 qualified personal consolidation loan prospects ($1.4B volume) to help clear high-interest debt
• 53,010 HELOC/HELOAN consolidation opportunities ($6.7B volume) for existing homeowners looking to refinance
• 47,764 auto loan refinance prospects ($1B volume) to free up monthly cash flow

Each of these products plays a supporting role in the homeownership journey—helping members improve their debt-to-income ratios, build credit, and position themselves for mortgage qualification.

A Personal Note on Coming Home

As someone who grew up in Dayton, I’ve watched neighborhoods transform—sometimes for better, sometimes for worse. The 2019 Memorial Day tornadoes that sparked the original Pathways to Homeownership initiative devastated communities I knew well.

What Wright-Patt is doing goes beyond lending. As Glover notes, “My teacher lived down the street; my doctor was two blocks over. One of the goals is to restore that sense of community and accountability where people know their neighbors and look out for one another.”

That’s the kind of community impact that makes this work meaningful. And data-driven prescreen marketing is the bridge that connects mission to execution—ensuring that every qualified member who could benefit from these programs actually knows they exist and can access them.

The Path Forward

Wright-Patt still needs to raise an additional $2.75 million to complete Phase III of their housing initiative. But as Mislansky told Morie, “We believe this, along with continued fundraising and collective storytelling from all the partners, will lead to the additional funding needed to complete the next phases.”

Perhaps, if Wright-Patt can help more first-time homeowners at lower cost, it can funnel some of those savings into Phase III.

That storytelling becomes even more powerful when backed by data. When donors and partners can see not just 30 new homes, but 172,328 qualified opportunities waiting to be realized, the vision expands from a project to a movement.

Making Every Connection Count

Wright-Patt’s Housing Collective represents exactly the kind of cross-departmental, mission-driven thinking that defines successful credit unions today. But mission without mechanism is just aspiration.

Prescreen marketing provides that mechanism—the ability to:

1. Identify qualified prospects with surgical precision
2. Reach them with personalized, firm offers of credit
3. Convert interest into applications
4. Learn from post-campaign analytics and improve next campaign performance
5. Scale successful programs across your entire branch network

For a credit union committed to making “more than half” of their mortgages to first-time buyers, the ability to systematically identify and reach 172,328 qualified mortgage candidates isn’t just a nice-to-have—it’s a strategic imperative.

The Bottom Line

Wright-Patt Credit Union is doing exactly what credit unions were founded to do: serving people of modest means and rebuilding communities from the inside out. Their $1.3 million investment, their five-week education program, their partnership with community organizations—all of it represents the best of the credit union movement.

Micronotes’ role is to ensure that this incredible work reaches everyone who could benefit from it. That James, the single father in Northwest Dayton who’s been renting for years discovers he actually qualifies for a $154,000 mortgage. That the young couple making ends meet learns they could consolidate their high-interest debt and free up $261 per month. That the family dreaming of homeownership finds out their dream is actually within reach.

As Mislansky concluded in his conversation with Morie: “We believe this program can change lives, revitalize communities, and demonstrate what’s possible when mission-driven organizations work together.”

With 172,328 qualified opportunities waiting within just 5 miles of Wright-Patt’s branches, the question isn’t whether they can change lives—it’s how many, and how fast.

Start your credit marketing journey today

By Devon Kinkead

In “Navigating Compliance Challenges in the Age of Data‑Driven Financial Marketing,” Alyssa Armor, VP Product, Financial Services at Vericast reminds financial marketers that the era of hyper-targeted, data-rich campaigns comes with very real regulatory and reputational risks.

A few key takeaways:

• Marketing teams must integrate compliance functions at the campaign design stage, not treat compliance as an after-thought or a final checkbox.
• The use of machine learning / AI in targeting introduces risks of disparate impact, because many input variables (credit-score, homeownership, ZIP code, income) correlate with protected classes.
• The shift from broad-reach to precision-targeting amplifies both opportunity and risk: what was once “reach everybody” is now “reach the right set of people,” but in doing so, marketers must still guard against unfair exclusion or unintended bias.
• Because of increased regulatory scrutiny and the sophisticated analytics now available to regulators themselves, financial institutions cannot assume “we’ll check compliance after launch” will suffice.

In short: the article’s perspective is that compliance is no longer simply a cost center—it must sit front and center in the workflow of data-driven marketing.

My Reaction

Ms. Armor’s perspective is spot-on. At the same time, I’d argue that the story goes beyond “marketing must be careful”—it’s marketing must be smart, iterative, measurable, and compliance-enabled. Two themes stand out:

1. Measurement and optimization: Data-driven marketing means you can measure a lot—response rates, conversion, cost per acquisition, lost applications to competitors, etc. But too often compliance constraints are treated as static (“we have to check X, Y, Z”), rather than dynamic (“what do we learn from each campaign about risk exposure, bias, and performance?”). Without measurement loops, you won’t improve.
2. Embedded compliance automation: The article rightly points to modelling risks, disparate impact, and third-party vendor exposure. But if you try to manually manage compliance review of every algorithm, model, channel, offer creative and audience segment, you’ll choke the campaign cadence. That’s where automation + AI compliance tooling become vital.

The good news: when you combine post-campaign analytics (what happened, what worked, what under-performed, where we got conversion or lost volume) and compliance AI/tools (pre-launch monitoring, bias detection, automated creative rule-check, vendor monitoring, audit trails) you begin to build a virtuous loop of campaign-to-campaign improvement.

Bridging to Prescreen Marketing: Why the Micronotes Lens Matters

Turning to the prescreen marketing context (as the Micronotes blog posts emphasise) offers an instructive lens. According to our “What Standard Chartered Taught Us about Speed—and How to Apply It to Loan Growth” piece, the prescreen business lives at the cross-roads of underwriting, marketing, compliance (FCRA), data, channels.

Key points from that piece that apply here:

• They emphasise a structured operating model (single ranked backlog, weekly huddle, visual board) to deliver campaign slices, measure cycle time, track “right-first-time” rates, etc.
• They call out explicitly that one of the metrics to measure is “right-first-time rate: % of slices that launch without rework (proxy for clean inputs & compliance).” 
• Post-campaign analytics are central: they talk about “review post campaign analytics and determine what’s winning market share and what isn’t.”

If we overlay this with the compliance challenges highlighted in the Financial Brand article, one can see how the alignment becomes critical: you cannot just launch a prescreen campaign and hope for the best. Instead you should embed into the prescreen campaign lifecycle:

• Pre-launch compliance gate: Use compliance AI/tools to check creative language (FCRA disclosures, equal-opportunity language, nondiscriminatory language), audience segmentation (check for potential disparate impact), vendor data quality, data sourcing, data modelling for bias.
• Launch + tracking: As the campaign runs, capture response metrics, conversion, channel performance, cost per acquisition, lost volume to competitors.
• Post-campaign analytics: Segment by geography, credit tier, product type, channel, audience slice. Identify what worked (and what didn’t) — including where compliance issues or risk exposures appeared (for example, high rework for creatives, high regulatory review time, or unexpected audience exclusions).
• Feedback loop: Use the insights from the post-campaign review to refine the next campaign slice: adjust targeting, refine model inputs so as to reduce bias risk, adjust creative language to improve clarity/disclosures, adjust channel cadence, reduce cycle time, improve “right-first‐time” rate.

In other words: compliance is not a static checklist before launch—it becomes part of the continuous improvement loop. And that loop is measurable because of the analytics.

Why This Combined Approach Matters

Here are some of the major reasons why blending post‐campaign analytics with compliance AI and tooling is increasingly mission-critical:

1. Speed wins — In prescreen marketing, offers go out and often conversion decisions happen very quickly. If you drag compliance review or fail to learn from prior slices, you lose the moment. This Micronotes piece shows how the feedback loop allows faster cycle time and higher throughput.
2. Risk reduction — As The Financial Brand article emphasizes, using data and AI for targeting can inadvertently create disparate impact. If you only deploy campaigns, you risk model error, discriminatory outcomes, regulatory scrutiny or worse. Integrated compliance tooling helps detect and mitigate these risks early.
3. Performance improvement — Analytics show what works (which slices convert, which channels yield, which segments are responsive). That fuels smarter segmentation, channel mix, creative personalization, which in turn drives better ROI. Meanwhile, compliance review ensures that the changes you make don’t violate guardrails.
4. Auditability & documentation — Regulators expect you to show not just “we complied” but “we have processes, we review, we measure, we adjust.” Having both analytics and compliance tooling means better documentation of campaign decisions, segmentation rationale, model logic, creative review history.
5. Competitive differentiation — Many institutions treat compliance as a cost and slow down their marketing. If you embed compliance smartly and use analytics to iterate, you can move faster and smarter than competitors who are still stuck in manual, slow workflows. Micronotes emphasizes flow, fewer slices in process, finish top priority slices every week.

Practical Steps to Implement the Combined Approach

We advise financial institution (bank or credit union) to operationalize this approach through a phased roadmap:

Phase 1 – Baseline & Governance

• Map your current prescreen marketing workflow: who owns targeting, creative, compliance review, launch, and post-campaign analytics.
• Establish clear governance: marketing, compliance/risk, data science/analytics functions must be aligned and have defined roles.
• Identify key metrics: cycle-time from slice start → launch, cost per funded loan, response rate by segment, conversion by channel, right-first-time rate (compliance reworks).

Phase 2 – Compliance AI & Tooling Enablement

• Deploy or integrate a compliance technology platform that can: pre-scan creatives for regulatory language/disclosures, evaluate audience segmentation for bias/disparate impact, monitor vendor data and model inputs for fairness and auditability.
• Train marketing/data teams on how to interpret compliance flags and adjust accordingly.
• Establish pre-launch compliance gate: no campaign goes out without automated compliance check + human sign-off.

Phase 3 – Post-Campaign Analytics Framework

• Build dashboards: For each prescreen campaign slice, capture performance by segment (credit tier, geography, product, channel), and also capture compliance metrics (e.g., creatives reworked, audit findings, complaint rates, regulatory flags).
• Conduct reviews at fixed cadence (weekly or biweekly huddle + improvement hour) where marketing and compliance meet to evaluate last week’s campaign slice, blockers, performance, compliance issues.

Phase 4 – Feedback & Continuous Improvement

• Use analytics findings to adjust subsequent campaign slices: e.g., target a higher-response segment, adjust offers or messaging, shift channels, refine model inputs to reduce bias risk.
• Use compliance findings to refine the targeting/creative/compliance interplay: e.g., discover that certain combination of filters correlated with protected class over-exposure → adjust modeling or segmentation logic.
• Track improvement over time: show how cycle-time improves, right-first-time rate increases (fewer reworks), cost per funded loan decreases, conversion improves.

Phase 5 – Scale & Institutionalise

• Once this feedback loop is proven for one or two products or regions, scale to multiple product types (auto refi, HELOC, personal loan), and across geographies.
• Document your workflows, audit trails, dashboards and embed this into the operating rhythm.
• Use the data to show to senior management/regulators: “here is how our campaign-to-campaign improvement process works, and how we manage compliance risk while driving growth.”

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Final Thoughts

The intersection between compliance and growth in data-driven financial marketing is no longer optional—it is strategic. The article from The Financial Brand makes the case clearly: as targeting becomes more precise, the margin for error shrinks, and regulatory scrutiny tightens. The prescreen marketing commentary from Micronotes adds actionable operational discipline: define slices, track cycle-time, measure “right-first-time,” run improvement cycles.

By marrying post-campaign analytics (to capture what the market told us, what worked, what didn’t) with compliance AI/tooling (to monitor risk, bias, regulatory alignment) you build a campaign machine that is both compliant and optimized. In effect: you move from one-off campaigns to a continuous improvement engine where compliance is baked in—and growth is the outcome, not an accident.

Learn more

By Devon Kinkead

When Nelson Repenning, my former professor at MITSloan, business partner, and friend and Don Kieffer tell the Standard Chartered story in their new book, There’s Got to Be a Better Way, the headline isn’t “more meetings fixed everything.” It’s that good work design turned a 120-day approval slog into a 20-day flow, unlocking >$250M/year in otherwise foregone revenue. They did it by (1) connecting the human chain—putting all 16 risk owners and project leads in a single weekly huddle guided by a rank-ordered “common backlog”—and (2) regulating the flow so the top one or two items got finished every week before starting more. 

That one design change eliminated the asynchronous back-and-forth (conflicting asks from separate risk functions, local reprioritization, task-switching) that was burning calendar and cash. And because work flowed in a shared lane, problems surfaced immediately and were handled in a separate weekly “improvement hour.” 

There’s a second lesson embedded earlier in the book: start small, let results travel. At Standard Chartered, thousands of bite-size problem-solving projects compounded to $150M impact in <2 years and 10,000 colleagues using the method. 

Now, what does that imply for loan growth using automated prescreen marketing?

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Prescreen has the same failure modes—and the same fixes

Automated prescreen lives at the intersection of lending (underwriting, rates), marketing (creatives, cadence), risk/compliance (FCRA), data (Experian ADS), and channels (email, direct mail, digital banking, SMS). The work crosses functions, so static, serial handoffs create the exact gridlock, task-switching, and local prioritization that slowed Standard Chartered’s approvals. 

Micronotes Prescreen is built to automate the mechanics—eligibility, offer generation, file exchange with Experian, compliant creatives, launch and reporting—but organizational flow decisions still determine your cycle time from “market signal” to “offer in-hand.” 

Here’s how to apply Standard Chartered’s moves to prescreen—verbatim, this quarter.

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1) Create a single, rank-ordered Prescreen Backlog (the “common backlog”)

• Make one list of the top 3 prescreen “slices” (e.g., Auto Refi for existing customers, HELOC consolidation within geo X, Personal Consolidation to attriters). Order by NPV per calendar day so every day of delay is visible cost—just as Standard Chartered priced each day of approval slip. Then, finish the top 1–2 slices every week. 
• Tie each slice to concrete inputs Micronotes Prescreen needs: underwriting criteria, rate/fee sheets, campaign settings. Don’t start the slice until those inputs are “clean.”
• If you don’t have the data to start building a Prescreen Backlog, get a free near-branch loan growth opportunity analysis here.  

Why this works: a common backlog kills local reprioritization (“my campaign first”) and channels everyone to the system’s critical path—exactly what drove the 120→20-day drop at Standard Chartered. 

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2) Run a weekly Prescreen Huddle plus a separate Improvement Hour

• Huddle (45–60 min): CLO, CMO, Compliance, Risk/CRO, IT/Data, and Campaign Ops meet once, live. Review the top of the backlog: Did last week’s slices ship? What’s blocking the next two? No status theater; demo the actual deliverable (selection file generated, creatives FCRA-checked, Experian file returned, comms in the queue). Micronotes enable this process through a weekly campaign update email as shown below in figure 1.  

Figure 1

• Improvement Hour (30–60 min): Pick one change you can make this week to remove the biggest blocker (e.g., rate-sheet version control; faster compliance template path, faster responses on creative updates). This mirrors Standard Chartered’s second weekly ritual. 

Why this works: separating delivery from improvement keeps flow moving while also increasing capacity week-over-week. 

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3) Visualize the work with a simple wall/board tied to the tool’s artifacts

Map the end-to-end Micronotes Prescreen flow for each slice and move a single card left-to-right only when the real artifact exists:

1. Inputs locked (underwriting, rates/fees, campaign settings) → 2) Selection file generated & sent → 3) Prescreen file received (PII) → 4) Compliant creatives approved → 5) Channel queued → 6) Launched → 7) Results posted (opens/CTR/response, booked loans/HELOCs, NPV).

This keeps everyone aligned to the actual mechanics of the platform—Experian ADS, selection/prescreen file exchange, FCRA-checked creatives, and deployment/reporting—so you’re visualizing truth, not opinions.  Micronotes facilitates this process with a Monday.com work board.

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4) Limit WIP: fewer slices in process → faster cycle times

If the board “goes pink” (everything is late), you’ve overloaded the system. Cancel or pause slices until work moves. Don’t confuse busy people with a productive system—a misconception Standard Chartered had to dismantle. 

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5) Start small and scale

Pilot with one campaign (e.g., ALR to existing members via email). Prove cycle-time and revenue gains, then replicate. That’s how impact spread inside Standard Chartered—thousands of small wins rolling up to nine-figure value. 

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A 90-day prescreen playbook (field-tested)

Weeks 1–2: Design for flow

• Stand up the single backlog (top 20 slices ranked by NPV/day).
• Establish the weekly huddle + improvement hour; publish attendance and rules of engagement.
• Finalize the wall/board mapping the Micronotes Prescreen stages to visible artifacts. 

Weeks 3–6: Ship two slices

• Lock underwriting criteria + rate/fee sheets for slice #1 and #2.
• Generate Selection File → send to Experian → receive Prescreen File (PII); stage compliant creatives; launch. 

Weeks 7–10: Raise the ceiling

• Use Improvement Hour to remove the biggest blocker (e.g., rate-sheet freshness, compliance templates).
• Review post campaign analytics and determine what’s winning market share and what isn’t.

Weeks 11–13: Scale what works

• Keep backlog strictly ordered; finish the top 1–2 every quarter.
• Publish results: cycle time (days from slice start→launch), booked balance/loans, NPV/day freed by faster flow. Tie back to objectives: marketing share, wallet share, conversion, compliance, reporting. 

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What to measure (and why finance will love it)

• Cycle time per slice (days): Your version of Standard Chartered’s “120→20.”
• $ per calendar day: NPV of incremental bookings divided by elapsed days, so the backlog is ordered by value of speed (not politics).
• Right-first-time rate: % of slices that launch without rework (proxy for clean inputs & compliance).
• Throughput: slices shipped per week.
• FCRA compliance adherence via templated creatives & approvals in the tool. 

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Bottom line

Standard Chartered’s results didn’t come from heroics—they came from designing the work to flow across functions: a single backlog, one weekly lane to finish work, and a habit of fixing the system every week. Automated prescreen has the same cross-functional anatomy and benefits from the same operating system. Wire these principles on top of Micronotes Automated Prescreen—clean inputs → selection → Experian → PII → compliant creatives → launch → learn—and you’ll reduce time-to-offer, raise conversion, and create space for discovery instead of firefighting. 

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Source: Repenning & Kieffer, There’s Got to Be a Better Way (Standard Chartered approvals flow, common backlog, improvement hour, and quantified impact). 

By Devon Kinkead

Introduction

Banking futurists keep announcing the death of the branch. Yet, real data tells a more complicated story.

Micronotes’ post-campaign analytics revealed that home equity loan conversions increased sharply the closer members lived to a branch. Members within one mile of a branch converted at five times the rate of those more than five miles away — and beyond 15 miles, conversions nearly vanished.

That finding seems to contradict Brett King’s provocative thesis in Branch Today, Gone Tomorrow, summarized in The Financial Brand, which argues that branches have become functionally irrelevant in the digital age.

So which is true? Are branches still essential, or are they obsolete?

The Data: Distance Still Drives Conversions

Distance Range (mi)	Conversion Rate
0–1	0.5 %
1–5	0.1 %
5–10	0.1 %
10–15	0.2 %
15+	0 %

Micronotes Analysis, Feb 2025 — new customer HELOC Firm Offer of Credit

Why This Happens: It’s Not About Transactions — It’s About Trust

The conversion lift near branches isn’t a relic of paper processes — it’s a psychological signal. Physical proximity reinforces trust, familiarity, and confidence in a brand’s permanence.

When the product is high-stakes — like pledging home equity — prospects want the reassurance that someone nearby can help. A branch’s mere existence reduces perceived risk, even if the borrower never walks through the door.

In short: branches still move people, even if they no longer move paper.

Behavioral Mechanisms Behind the Branch Effect

1. Trust & Reassurance
   Proximity communicates stability — “If I need help, I know where to go.”
2. Hybrid Journeys
   Digital buyers still toggle between screens and conversations. A nearby branch lowers friction when they need a human step.
3. Local Brand Exposure
   Branch presence amplifies marketing awareness via signage, sponsorships, and community footprint.
4. Engaged Member Cohorts
   Households near branches often have stronger engagement or relationship tenure, which compounds conversion probability.

Reconciling Brett King’s Argument

Brett King is right about one thing: the traditional, transaction-centric branch has reached the end of its useful life.
Routine banking is mobile-native. Consumers want instant, 24/7 access and invisible infrastructure.

But our data show that for high-trust, high-involvement decisions, branches still exert measurable influence.
They no longer define banking — they reinforce belief in the institution behind it.

In that sense, King’s thesis and the Micronotes findings are two sides of the same coin.
Branches aren’t obsolete; they’re evolving from utility to symbol.

The New Model: Branch-Light, Trust-Heavy

1. Digital-First, Branch-Smart
   Design campaigns digitally — but leverage branch proximity as a conversion multiplier for complex products.
2. Geo-Weighted Marketing
   Use distance from branch as a predictive variable. Increase bids or offer value inside a 15-mile “trust radius.”
3. Redefine the Branch Footprint
   Shrink physical square footage, but expand reach through micro-hubs, co-locations, and advisory centers.
4. Equalize Digital Trust for Distant Members
   Provide virtual consults, video closings, and live-chat concierge services to neutralize the distance penalty.

The Takeaway

The data and the futurists are both right — just about different things.
Yes, digital dominates transactions. But trust — the invisible currency of banking — still benefits from physical proximity – particularly when the stakes are high.

Branches may be fewer and smaller in the future, but they’ll remain powerful conversion amplifiers in markets where emotion, risk, and reassurance intersect.

The smartest banks won’t be branch-heavy or branch-free. They’ll be branch-light — and trust-rich.

By Devon Kinkead

The shift in American retirement investing over the past two decades offers crucial strategic insights for community financial institutions. According to Parker et al.’s forthcoming Journal of Finance study, middle-class Americans now invest 71% of their retirement wealth in equities—a dramatic increase from the 58% documented by Ameriks and Zeldes (2004) in the 1990s—largely driven by Target Date Funds (TDFs) becoming default investment options after the 2006 Pension Protection Act (PPA).

Understanding Target Date Funds

Before diving into the implications, it’s worth explaining what made TDFs so transformative. A Target Date Fund is essentially a “one-stop shop” retirement investment that automatically adjusts its mix of stocks and bonds as you age. Think of it like cruise control for your retirement savings. If you’re 30 years old and plan to retire around 2060, you’d choose a “2060 Fund.” According to Parker et al.’s research, “A typical TDF maintains 90% of its assets in equity funds until roughly 20 years before retirement date, and then decreases this share as employees age to 40-50 percent in equity at target retirement date.” The genius is that this rebalancing happens automatically. You don’t need to remember to make changes, understand market timing, or even know what percentage of stocks versus bonds is appropriate for your age. The fund does all of this for you, solving a problem that had plagued retirement savers for decades: most people either took too much risk near retirement or too little risk when young.

The Power of Smart Defaults

The most striking finding is how effectively default options shape financial behavior. Parker et al. document that when employers switched to TDFs, “younger new enrollees (those aged 25-35 when they enroll) [invested] 5% more of their financial wealth in the stock market” (specifically 5.5% as shown in Table IV). Meanwhile, older workers reduced equity exposure—both moves aligned with optimal lifecycle investing theory. Remarkably, even workers who weren’t defaulted into TDFs eventually adopted similar strategies, with the researchers noting this “convergence” effect over time.

For community banks and credit unions, this demonstrates the enormous responsibility and opportunity in product design. When we talk about “defaults,” in this context, we mean the pre-selected options that automatically apply unless a customer actively chooses something different—like the standard overdraft protection settings on a checking account or the automatic minimum payment on a credit card. Every default setting—from savings account auto-transfers to loan payment structures—shapes member financial health at scale.

Income Disparities Demand Targeted Solutions

The research reveals stark differences by income level. According to Table IV, lower-income workers benefited most from TDF defaults, with their equity allocation increasing by 5.99% compared to just 1.86% for workers in the highest income tercile. This suggests automated, well-designed financial products can help close wealth-building gaps.

Community financial institutions, which often serve more diverse income populations than large banks, should prioritize developing simplified, automated products that guide less financially sophisticated members toward better outcomes without requiring active management.

The Persistence Problem in Savings

While portfolio allocation improved dramatically, contribution rates barely budged. The study finds that “average retirement saving rates across all birth cohorts average 4.5% at age 25 and 8.5% at 65 years of age.” The Pension Protection Act’s savings-focused provisions actually correlated with decreased contribution rates initially. As shown in Table VI, “those aged 25-35 [had] -0.43% of income [lower contributions] for those age 25-35, and [this] becomes increasingly negative with age, reaching -1.2% for those age 55-65.”

This highlights a critical challenge: changing savings behavior is far harder than changing allocation behavior. Community institutions need to recognize that simply offering better savings products isn’t enough—they need comprehensive strategies addressing the psychological and structural barriers to saving.

Strategic Imperatives for Community Institutions

1. Embrace Behavioral Architecture Design products with optimal pre-set features based on member demographics and lifecycle stages. A 25-year-old opening their first checking account should have different automatic settings (like default savings transfers or overdraft preferences) than a 55-year-old consolidating retirement accounts.

2. Automate Complexity Away TDFs succeeded by making sophisticated rebalancing automatic—growing from “less than $8 billion in 2000 to managing almost $6 trillion in 2021” according to the paper. Community institutions should similarly embed financial expertise into product structures, offering “set-it-and-forget-it” options for debt payment optimization, emergency fund building, and long-term savings.

3. Deploy Continuous Automated Prescreening Following the model described by services like Micronotes, community institutions should implement continuous automated prescreening to identify when members qualify for better rates or products. This proactive approach can automatically alert members when they’re eligible for lower-cost loans or better account features, reducing borrowing costs without requiring members to constantly shop around. Just as TDFs automatically rebalance portfolios, automated prescreening can continuously optimize members’ financial products.

4. Focus on the Underserved The dramatic benefits for lower-income workers suggest community institutions can create significant value by designing products specifically for financially vulnerable populations, potentially partnering with employers to integrate these into workplace benefits.

5. Rethink Financial Education The TDF revolution succeeded not through education but through structural change. While financial literacy remains important, community institutions should prioritize making good financial decisions automatic rather than relying solely on member education.

6. Leverage Regulatory Tailwinds The Pension Protection Act shows how regulatory changes can catalyze massive behavioral shifts. Community institutions should actively engage with regulators and policymakers to advocate for frameworks that enable better default options in banking products.

The Long Game

Perhaps most importantly, the research shows these changes took time. As Parker et al. note [in Table V], the effects persisted but declined over five years—for young workers, the equity share difference between treated and control groups went from 3.63% in year two to 2.57% in year five. Community institutions must commit to long-term strategies, measuring success not just by immediate adoption but by sustained behavioral change across their member base.

The transformation of American retirement investing proves that thoughtfully designed defaults can overcome decades of suboptimal financial behavior. For community banks and credit unions committed to member financial wellness, the lesson is clear: the architecture of financial products matters as much as their availability. By embedding expertise into product design and making optimal choices automatic, community institutions can drive profound improvements in financial outcomes—particularly for those who need it most.

Source: Parker, J.A., Schoar, A., Cole, A., & Simester, D. (forthcoming). Household Portfolios and Retirement Saving over the Life Cycle. Journal of Finance.

By Devon Kinkead

In the hyper-competitive HELOC consolidation market, where a recent campaign revealed competitors capturing 96% of actively interested prospects, financial institutions need more than traditional marketing approaches. They need a strategic framework for interpreting and responding to competing market signals.

The Four Forces Shaping HELOC Marketing

Drawing from an MIT Sloan strategic signal framework, HELOC marketing operates across two critical dimensions: time horizon and impact level. This creates four distinct categories of market forces that demand different strategic responses:

Continental Drifts (Long-term, High Impact)

The fundamental shift in consumer debt patterns represents a slow-moving but transformative force. With credit card rates hovering near historic highs and home values appreciating steadily, the structural opportunity for HELOC consolidation continues to expand. This isn’t a trend to chase quarterly—it’s a multi-year positioning play that rewards institutions building sustained market presence.

Lightning Strikes (Short-term, High Impact)

The $73 million in lost opportunities revealed in recent campaign data represents a lightning strike—a sudden, stark revelation of competitive vulnerability. When prospects who received your targeted offers choose competitors 34 times more often, you’re facing an immediate crisis requiring rapid response. Speed-to-decision, digital application capabilities, and instant pre-approval processes become non-negotiable.

Smoldering Embers (Long-term, Low Impact)

The underperformance in prime credit segments (811-850 scores) represents a smoldering challenge. While not immediately catastrophic, the persistent inability to capture high-value relationships accumulates opportunity costs over time. These segments require patient relationship-building strategies rather than mass marketing campaigns.

Surface Ripples (Short-term, Low Impact)

Minor rate adjustments and promotional offers from competitors create constant market noise. The temptation to respond to every competitive move dilutes focus from strategic priorities. Not every signal demands action.

Strategic Response: From 3% to Market Leadership

Success requires different responses to different signals:

For Continental Drifts: Build persistent market presence through monthly awareness campaigns and content marketing that positions your institution as the consolidation expert. This isn’t about immediate conversion—it’s about being top-of-mind when prospects are ready.

For Lightning Strikes: Implement emergency protocols for competitive response. The data shows high-DTI borrowers (64%-77%) convert at 8x the rate of prime borrowers. Immediately reallocate resources to these underserved segments while building the operational capabilities (24-hour approval, digital applications) that competitors already possess.

For Smoldering Embers: Develop differentiated value propositions for premium segments. Stop competing on rate alone. Instead, bundle wealth management services, offer relationship pricing, and create exclusive experiences that justify choosing a local lender over national competitors.

For Surface Ripples: Establish clear criteria for response. Not every competitor’s promotion warrants action. Focus on structural advantages rather than tactical reactions.

The Behavioral Economics Advantage

The most successful HELOC consolidation campaigns leverage behavioral triggers that transcend traditional demographic targeting. Monitor signals like multiple credit card balance increases, recent property value appreciation, or changes in payment patterns. These behavioral indicators predict consolidation readiness far better than credit scores.

Geographic performance data reveals another crucial insight: success concentrates in markets with existing brand recognition. Rather than spreading resources thinly across all territories, double down where you already have trust and awareness advantages.

Execution Through Focused Priorities

The path from 3% to 30% market capture requires ruthless prioritization:

1. Speed and Simplicity – If competitors approve in 24 hours, you need to approve in 12
2. Segment Specialization – Own the high-DTI segment while competitors chase prime
3. Behavioral Targeting – Replace demographic campaigns with trigger-based outreach
4. Local Advantage – Leverage community connections where national lenders can’t compete

The Strategic Imperative

The HELOC consolidation market presents a clear dichotomy: massive opportunity shadowed by intense competition. Success belongs to institutions that can decode competing signals, distinguish critical forces from market noise, and execute targeted responses with precision.

The $73 million that walked to competitors wasn’t lost to better rates—it was lost to better strategy. By understanding which signals matter, when to act, and how to respond, financial institutions can transform from market participants to market leaders.

The question isn’t whether to compete in HELOC consolidation—the continental drift of consumer debt makes that inevitable. The question is whether you’ll interpret the signals correctly and act strategically before competitors capture the next $73 million.

Learn more

By Devon Kinkead

Prescreen marketing looks like a slam dunk: millions of consumers carry high-interest debt, sit on untapped home equity, or are primed for consolidation. Yet despite the potential, most prescreen campaigns fizzle. Conversion rates hover in the low single digits, or fractions thereof, while competitors scoop up the very prospects you’e identified and reached out to.

The problem isn’t the concept — it’s the execution. Too many institutions still treat prescreen like a blunt instrument: broad offers, generic messaging, slow processes, and little follow-through with zero optimization. In today’s market, that just won’t cut it.

The good news? By applying structured problem-solving methods and great technology — the same kind used in top consulting firms and operational excellence programs — banks and credit unions can turn prescreen marketing into a repeatable growth engine.

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The Prescreen Success Checklist

Here’s a step-by-step framework you can embed directly into your campaign planning:

1. Scope & Goals
   • Define what success looks like: loan volume, share of wallet, primacy, or long-term profitability.
   • Segment by creditworthiness and geography.
   • Benchmark current performance (conversion rates, cost per acquisition, loss to competitors).
2. Diagnose the Gaps
   • Use tools like the 5 Whys or a simple issue tree to uncover why prospects aren’t converting.
   • Audit your data quality: Is it fresh, predictive, and clean?
3. Form Hypotheses
   • Example: If we personalize offers with projected savings in dollars, conversion in Segment X will improve by 20%.
   • Design pilots to test these ideas.
4. Fix the Friction
   • Automate prescreening and offer generation.
   • Cut time from offer to funding to under 24 hours.
   • Bake compliance into the process so it doesn’t slow you down.
5. Sharpen the Message
   • Tie offers to real needs: consolidation, cash-flow relief, flexibility.
   • Use behavioral triggers — like debt utilization or life events — to time offers for when customers are most receptive.
6. Measure What Matters
   • Track: response rate, competitor win/loss, funded loan amount, usage of credit lines, CPA, profitability, and customer satisfaction.
   • Run A/B tests on messaging, channel, and offer structure after optimizing for behavioral economics.
7. Align & Scale
   • Ensure marketing, underwriting, and product teams share incentives that go beyond raw acquisition.
   • Pilot in one region, refine, then expand.
   • Move from one-off campaigns to continuous, always-on engagement.

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From Missed Opportunity to Market Edge

The institutions that win in prescreen marketing don’t just “blast offers.” They diagnose root causes, test relentlessly, streamline execution, and build feedback loops for constant improvement.

Think of this checklist as your field guide. Apply it campaign after campaign, and you’ll do more than improve response rates — you’ll deepen relationships, grow share of wallet, and future-proof your lending business.

Prescreen isn’t the future. It’s the battlefield. And with the right system, you can win. Prescreen smarter, not harder.

Learn more

By Devon Kinkead

The $73 Million Wake-Up Call

When we launched a HELOC consolidation campaign targeting prospective accountholders for HELOC debt consolidation opportunities, we knew the market was competitive. What we didn’t fully anticipate was just how much opportunity our client would leave on the table – and more importantly, what those missed opportunities could teach us about acquiring new relationships in this massive and hyper competitive market.

Campaign Performance: The Hard Numbers

Let’s start with the reality check. Our campaign sent 21,000 targeted offers to non-customers between Q2-2025, resulting in:

• 21 direct sales ($3.7M in new HELOC originations)
• 2 indirect sales ($64K)
• 712 lost sales to competitors ($73.3M)

That’s a sobering 3% market capture rate, an a unit loan basis, meaning competitors won over 96% of the prospects who were actively seeking HELOC consolidation solutions. With an average line size of $176,190, each lost prospect represents not just immediate lending opportunity but potentially decades of relationship value.

Geographic Performance: Where We Won and Lost

One Northwestern state emerged as our strongest market with 13 direct sales from 4,560 offers (0.29% conversion), particularly in one county where we captured 6 sales. This success suggests we have brand recognition or competitive advantages in these markets that we’re not leveraging elsewhere.

Conversely, another Western state – where we sent 5,817 offers – yielded only 3 direct sales (0.052% conversion). This dramatic underperformance in such a large market demands immediate attention. The data shows we’re losing significant volume in high-value metros where average loan amounts exceed $250,000.

Segment Analysis: Finding Our Client’s Sweet Spot

The most revealing insights come from our segment performance:

Winners:

1. High DTI Borrowers (64.4%-77.2%): Despite only 119 offers, this segment converted at 0.84% – our highest rate. These borrowers desperately need consolidation and are underserved by traditional lenders.
2. Mid-Tier Credit (601-642): With 0.55% conversion, this segment outperformed prime borrowers, suggesting our value proposition resonates with those who may face challenges elsewhere.
3. Large Loan Amounts ($148K-$251K): This segment delivered 8 direct sales with a remarkable 6.40% market share gain, indicating we’re competitive when significant consolidation is needed.

Underperformers:

1. Prime Credit (811-850): Despite sending 2,373 offers to this segment, we achieved only 0.29% conversion. Premium borrowers clearly have better options or stronger existing banking relationships.
2. Lower DTI (Below 51%): These financially stable prospects showed minimal interest, likely because they have less urgent consolidation needs or better alternatives.

The Competitive Reality: Why We’re Losing

The 712 lost sales tell a crucial story. These prospects:

• Received our offer
• Were actively in-market for HELOC consolidation
• Chose a competitor instead

The 3% loss conversion rate (versus our 0.1% direct conversion) means competitors are 34 times more effective at converting these prospects. This isn’t just about rate – it’s about brand awareness, speed, process, relationship, and trust.

Strategic Recommendations for Next Campaign

1. Double Down on Underserved Segments

Immediately reallocate budget toward high-DTI and mid-tier credit segments. These borrowers have fewer options and show 3-8x higher conversion rates. Create specialized messaging that addresses their unique consolidation challenges using behavioral economics best practices.

2. Show Up and Speed Up Response Times

With $73M walking to competitors, we must assume awareness and speed are killing us. Implement:

• Monthly campaigns to build brand awareness
• Instant pre-approval capabilities
• Automated document collection
• Same-day callback guarantees
• Faster digital application process

3. Geographic Rebalancing

Shift resources from underperforming states to high performing ounties. However, don’t abandon large states – instead, test localized strategies:

• Partner with local mortgage brokers
• Implement geo-specific rate promotions
• Test Spanish-language campaigns in appropriate markets

4. Rethink Prime Segment Strategy

Stop mass-marketing to 811+ credit scores. Instead:

• Create premium, relationship-based outreach
• Offer wealth management bundles
• Lead with financial planning, not just consolidation

5. Enhance Value Proposition Messaging

Our current messaging isn’t differentiated enough. Test:

• “Local lender” advantages versus national competitors
• Success stories from similar DTI/credit profiles
• Calculators showing total interest savings
• Clear timelines: “Approved in 24 hours, funded in 5 days”

6. Implement Behavioral Triggers

The campaign treated all prospects equally, but behavioral data could dramatically improve targeting:

• Multiple credit card balance increases
• Property value appreciation in their area

The Path Forward: From 3% to 30% Market Capture

This campaign revealed both our client’s vulnerabilities and our opportunities. We’re competitive in specific segments and geographies, but we’re getting crushed elsewhere. The good news? We now have clear data on where to focus.

For our next campaign, success means:

• Achieving 15%+ market capture in high-DTI segments
• Doubling conversion rates on home turf
• Building awareness and reducing speed-to-decision from days to hours
• Creating segment-specific value propositions that resonate using behavioral economics best practices

The $73 million that went to competitors represents more than lost loans – it’s lost relationships, lost deposits, and lost lifetime value. But it also represents our opportunity. These prospects were interested enough to apply for our client’s HELOCs. They received our offers. We just didn’t give them enough reason to choose us.

The market for HELOC consolidation is massive and growing. Rising credit card rates and home values create perfect conditions for this product. Our challenge isn’t finding prospects – it’s converting them before competitors do.

With these insights and strategic adjustments, we’re not just aiming to improve our conversion rate – we’re targeting a complete transformation of how we compete for new accountholder relationships in the HELOC consolidation space. Order your near-branch growth analysis to start your HELOC consolidation journey here.

By Devon Kinkead

In today’s fiercely competitive financial landscape, simply acquiring new customers isn’t enough. The real battle lies in achieving primacy—becoming the primary financial institution that customers turn to for all their banking needs. With research showing that primary relationships generate 3.2x more revenue and 8x lifetime value compared to secondary relationships, the stakes couldn’t be higher.

Yet most financial institutions face a sobering reality: while 83% of consumers maintain one primary banking relationship, the average bank believes it has far more primary relationships than it actually does. This disconnect between perception and reality represents both a challenge and an opportunity—one that Micronotes addresses through its innovative two-pronged approach of intelligent customer acquisition and strategic relationship deepening.

The Primacy Imperative: Why It Matters More Than Ever

Banking primacy isn’t just about holding multiple accounts—it’s about becoming the trusted financial hub where customers conduct the majority of their financial activities. Consider these striking statistics:

• 60% of checking account customers represent 98% of relationship dollars at most banks
• Primary households maintain 23% higher balances and remain with their bank twice as long
• The top 10% of checking households average $147,000 or more in combined deposits and loans
• Leading banks like Chase achieve 75% primary relationships with 95% retention rates—10% better than the average institution

In contrast, the remaining 40% of customers contribute just 2% of household relationship value. This disparity underscores why the journey from acquisition to primacy is critical for sustainable growth.

Step 1: Intelligent Acquisition with Micronotes Automated Prescreen

The foundation of primacy begins with acquiring the right customers—those with the highest potential for deep, lasting relationships. Micronotes Automated Prescreen, powered by Experian’s vast credit database of 230+ million consumer records, revolutionizes how financial institutions approach customer acquisition.

Beyond Generic Outreach

Traditional acquisition strategies rely on broad campaigns with generic messaging that often falls flat. Micronotes changes the game through hyper-personalization that speaks directly to individual financial situations. Instead of “Get a great rate on a personal loan,” prospects receive messages like:

“John, you can refinance your $40,639 debt from 19.890% to 8.642% and stop overpaying $280 per month in interest.”

This level of specificity, made possible through the integration of Experian’s comprehensive credit data and Micronotes’ behavioral economics messaging, can achieve something remarkable: negative loan acquisition costs through dramatically higher conversion rates.

Multi-Channel Excellence

Understanding that modern consumers expect omnichannel experiences, Micronotes Automated Prescreen delivers through:

• Custom branded email campaigns
• Direct mail integration
• Digital banking re-presentment
• SMS engagement

This comprehensive approach addresses the 33% increase in direct mail costs while meeting the demand for digital experiences that 68% of buyers now require.

Comprehensive Product Support

Rather than limiting institutions to a “product-of-the-month” mentality, the platform supports simultaneous campaigns across multiple loan types:

• Auto Loan Refinance and Purchase
• HELOC/HELOAN (Traditional or Consolidation)
• Personal Loans
• Mortgage New Home Purchase
• Credit Card (Balance Transfer or Rewards)

The result? Financial institutions using Micronotes Automated Prescreen report outcomes similar to Atlas Credit’s success with Experian’s platform: 185% increase in new loan originations and 80% reduction in campaign delivery lead time.

Step 2: Deepening Relationships with Micronotes Cross-Sell

Acquiring customers is just the beginning. The real value emerges when those relationships deepen over time. Micronotes Cross-Sell transforms how banks engage with existing customers, moving beyond transactional interactions to build meaningful, primary relationships.

Recognizing Life Events as Opportunities

Every significant deposit represents a life event—an inheritance, home sale, bonus, or retirement distribution. These moments are critical inflection points where customers make decisions about their financial future. Micronotes Cross-Sell uses predictive analytics and real-time monitoring to identify these events and engage customers at exactly the right moment.

Consider these real customer interactions captured through Micronotes:

• “I’d like to speak with an investment advisor”—connecting large depositors with wealth management services
• “I’d like to open a CD”—securing long-term deposits through timely engagement
• “[Using funds for] vacation and dental expenses”—providing budgeting advice that reinforces the bank’s advisory role

The Power of Digital Conversations

Unlike traditional cross-selling that relies on branch visits or cold calls, Micronotes engages customers through their preferred digital channels. The platform’s microinterview technology creates personalized, conversational interactions that:

• Achieve 30-40% click-through rates on educational campaigns
• Reduce marketing spam by 5X while improving offer relevance by 10X
• Generate warm leads automatically without manual intervention

Proactive Retention Through Intelligence

By analyzing customer behavior patterns and attrition indicators, Micronotes identifies at-risk relationships before they leave. The platform then:

• Triggers targeted retention campaigns
• Offers personalized incentives to establish direct deposit relationships
• Promotes sticky services like bill pay and mobile deposit
• Connects customers with bankers for relationship-saving conversations

The Synergy Effect: How Acquisition and Deepening Work Together

The true power of Micronotes emerges when both solutions work in tandem. Here’s how the integrated approach drives primacy:

Immediate Engagement Post-Acquisition

New customers acquired through Automated Prescreen immediately enter the Cross-Sell ecosystem, ensuring no momentum is lost. The platform begins learning about their needs, preferences, and life situations from day one.

Data-Driven Personalization at Scale

Information gathered during the acquisition process informs future cross-sell opportunities. A customer who refinanced an auto loan might later receive perfectly timed offers for home equity products or investment services based on their improving financial position.

Continuous Relationship Building

Rather than viewing customer relationships as static, Micronotes treats them as dynamic, evolving partnerships. The platform continuously:

• Monitors account patterns for opportunity signals
• Delivers educational content to build trust
• Identifies optimal moments for product recommendations
• Measures engagement to refine future interactions

Real-World Success: Community Banks Leading the Way

Community banks and credit unions using Micronotes report transformative results:

The Farmers Bank leveraged exceptional deposit monitoring to engage high-value customers: “We had a customer with a significant deposit who shared that they planned to live off the money while relocating. That kind of personalized feedback was something we couldn’t have gathered before.”

FNB Community Bank saw immediate impact: “The first few months of reporting were eye-opening. Even when someone simply responded to a survey, we knew we were making a connection.”

Valliance Bank solved their digital engagement challenge: “We’re trying to reach individuals who aren’t coming in and won’t answer phone calls. Micronotes gave us a solution that engaged customers in digital spaces.”

The Technology Advantage: Analytics and Automation at Work

Micronotes leverages cutting-edge technology to make primacy achievement scalable:

Machine Learning for Prediction

Advanced algorithms analyze millions of data points to predict:

• Which prospects are most likely to respond to a particular offer
• When existing customers are likely to need help and advice
• Which customers are at risk of attrition

Behavioral Economics for Engagement

Messages are crafted using proven behavioral economics principles, increasing response rates and driving action through:

• Social proof and peer comparison
• Loss aversion messaging
• Personalized value propositions
• Timely nudges and reminders

Seamless Integration

Pre-integrated with major core banking platforms, Micronotes can be live in as little as one day, with no lengthy proof-of-concept required.

Measuring Success: The Metrics That Matter

Financial institutions using Micronotes track their journey to primacy through key indicators:

Acquisition Metrics:

• Cost per funded loan
• Conversion rate from offer to application
• Average relationship value at origination
• Speed from campaign to funding
• Market share gains

Relationship Deepening Metrics:

• Products per household growth
• Share of wallet expansion
• Net Promoter Score improvement
• Deposit retention rates
• Cross-sell success rates

Primacy Indicators:

• Direct deposit adoption
• Bill pay activation
• Mobile/online banking engagement
• Average account longevity
• Total relationship profitability

The Path Forward: Building Your Primacy Strategy

Achieving primacy requires a fundamental shift in how banks approach customer relationships. Here’s how to get started:

1. Define Your Primacy Criteria

Move beyond simple product counts to understand true relationship depth. Consider transaction frequency, channel usage, and total relationship value.

2. Assess Your Current State

Analyze your existing customer base to identify:

• Current primacy percentage
• High-potential secondary relationships
• At-risk primary relationships

3. Deploy Intelligent Acquisition

Use Micronotes Automated Prescreen to attract customers with high primacy potential, focusing on those who can benefit most from your products and services.

4. Activate Relationship Deepening

Implement Micronotes Cross-Sell to engage new and existing customers through personalized digital conversations that build trust and identify opportunities.

5. Monitor and Optimize

Continuously track performance metrics, refine targeting criteria, and adjust messaging based on customer response patterns.

Conclusion: The Primacy Advantage

In an era where customers can switch banks with a few taps on their phone, achieving and maintaining primacy has never been more challenging—or more critical. The institutions that succeed will be those that combine intelligent acquisition with strategic relationship deepening, creating a virtuous cycle of growth and loyalty.

Micronotes provides the technology and methodology to make this vision reality. By automating the complex processes of identifying, acquiring, and nurturing primary relationships, the platform enables banks of all sizes to compete effectively in the digital age.

The math is compelling: primary relationships generate 3.2x more revenue and last significantly longer than secondary ones. With Micronotes Automated Prescreen bringing in the right members and customers and Cross-Sell deepening those relationships over time, financial institutions can finally close the gap between their primacy aspirations and reality.

The journey from acquisition to primacy isn’t just about technology—it’s about understanding that every interaction is an opportunity to demonstrate value, build trust, and earn the privilege of being a customer’s primary financial partner. With Micronotes, that journey becomes not just possible, but predictable and scalable.

Ready to transform your approach to customer relationships? The path to primacy starts with a single step.  Learn more.

By Devon Kinkead

The latest Experian State of the Automotive Finance Market Q2 2025 report delivers a clear message: banks are back as the dominant force in auto lending, and the opportunity for market share expansion has never been greater. For financial institutions leveraging advanced prescreen marketing strategies, this data represents a roadmap to profitable growth in one of consumer lending’s largest segments.

The Bank Renaissance: Technology Meets Opportunity

Banks have returned as the largest lender type in auto financing, a remarkable shift that reflects both improved competitive positioning and strategic technology investments. This isn’t happening by accident—it’s the result of banks finally matching fintech speed with traditional banking trust and regulatory expertise.

The numbers tell a compelling story of precision targeting opportunities:

• Average new car loan credit scores increased 4 points year-over-year, with a 1 point increase for used car loans.
• Super Prime is the only risk tier seeing growth
• Over 83% of new loans are Prime+

For banks using automated prescreen technology, these trends create the perfect storm for acquisition success. The market is consolidating toward higher-quality borrowers—exactly the segment that responds best to financially personalized firm offers.

The Refinance Renaissance: A $71-Per-Month Opportunity

Perhaps the most striking finding in the Experian data is the explosive growth in auto refinancing. Refinance volume increased 11% from Q1 2025 and 29% from Q2 2020, with consumers saving over 2% on refinanced loan rates and average monthly savings of $47, increasing since 2024.

This aligns perfectly with our previous analysis showing that aggressive refinancing rates can increase prescreen loan offer volume by up to 40% by lowering rates by 75 basis points. When the average consumer is saving $71 per month through refinancing (as noted in the Q2 summary), the business case for automated prescreen refinance campaigns becomes undeniable.

Banks and Credit Unions using Micronotes’ Automated Prescreen technology are uniquely positioned to capitalize on this trend because:

1. Speed Advantage: Average months to refinance has been decreasing since peak in Q4 2023 so, speed wins customers and members
2. Data: Algorithms can identify the 29% of consumers most likely to benefit from refinancing from 230MM credit records, refreshed weekly, in hours
3. Regulatory Compliance: FCRA-compliant firm offers eliminate compliance risk while maximizing conversion using AI to optimize behavioral economics

Credit Unions vs. Banks: The Market Share Battle

The data reveals an interesting competitive dynamic: Credit Unions have steadily increased their share of the refinance space and offer the largest payment difference. However, banks maintain the overall lending leadership position.

This creates a strategic opportunity for credit unions to leverage their pricing advantages through automated prescreen marketing.

The EV Opportunity: Misunderstood but Profitable

EV share of new purchases dropped below 9%, but this represents opportunity, not obstacle. The data shows EV lease rates are just under 58% with average payment difference of $175 between lease and loan.

Smart prescreen campaigns can target EV prospects with education about total cost of ownership advantages, lease-to-loan conversion opportunities, and refinancing options for existing EV loans. The lower market penetration means less competition and higher win rates for banks with sophisticated targeting capabilities.

Payment Inflation: The $1,000+ Challenge and Opportunity

Over 15% of all new payments (loan & lease combined) are over $1,000, highlighting the growing affordability challenge. However, this creates prime refinancing opportunities for banks with competitive rates.

Consider the implications for prescreen marketing:

• New Customer/Member Acquisition: Target high-payment auto loans held by competitors with the right behavioral economic strategy
• Existing Customer/Member Retention: Proactively offer refinancing before customers/membrers shop elsewhere
• Cross-Sell Opportunities: Connect auto refinancing with other debt consolidation products

Technology as the Great Equalizer: Lessons from the Lending Leaders

The most successful institutions in auto lending share common characteristics that directly align with automated prescreen capabilities:

Speed and Efficiency: With terms increasing across the market and loan amounts increasing both year-over-year and quarter-over-quarter, consumers need fast decisions on larger loans. Automated prescreen technology delivers instant pre-qualification that traditional multi-vendor prescreen marketing processes cannot match.

Risk Management: Delinquencies increase year-over-year and remain high, making precise risk assessment crucial. Automated prescreen campaigns can identify the Super Prime and Prime borrowers who represent 83% of the profitable market while avoiding higher-risk segments.

Market Intelligence: Post campaign analytics reveal how much of your prescreen list that took out an auto loan you won, and why — setting the stage for continuous optimization.

Strategic Recommendations: Winning the Auto Lending Future

Based on the Experian data and our experience with successful automated prescreen campaigns, banks and credit unions should implement these strategies immediately:

1. Strategic Refinance Targeting

Based on the 29% growth in refinance volume since 2020 and our research showing rate sensitivity can increase offer volume by 40%, launch targeted campaigns focusing on existing auto loans where you can offer meaningful savings. The proven consumer appetite for refinancing—combined with average monthly savings opportunities—justifies aggressive competitive positioning.

2. Super Prime Acquisition Focus

With Super Prime being the only growth segment, concentrate prescreen campaigns on 750+ FICO scores. These borrowers represent the lowest risk and highest lifetime value, justifying premium acquisition costs.

3. Technology-Enabled Speed

Match fintech speed with bank and credit union stability. Automated prescreen technology with instant pre-qualification gives you the speed advantage while maintaining compliance and risk management standards.

4. Cross-Product Integration

Use auto loan originations as gateway opportunities for broader banking relationships. Every auto loan customer represents potential mortgage, HELOC, and deposit opportunities though, those conversion are difficult and require a thoughtful relationship deepening strategy and the right technology.

The Competitive Imperative: Act Now or Fall Behind

The convergence of rising loan amounts, increasing refinance activity, and bank market leadership creates a once-in-a-generation opportunity for institutions ready to act decisively. Balance growth has slowed, but is up year-over-year—meaning the institutions capturing market share now will define the competitive landscape for years.

Banks and credit unions using Micronotes’ Automated Prescreen technology report:

• Higher conversion rates through precise targeting
• Net negative acquisition costs as loan income exceeds campaign costs
• Improved competitive positioning through optimization

The Q2 2025 data proves that auto lending success isn’t just about having capital—it’s about using technology and data to deploy that capital more intelligently than the competition.

Conclusion: From Market Follower to Market Leader

The auto lending market is undergoing fundamental transformation. Banks and credit unions that combine the trust and stability of traditional banking with the speed and precision of AI-powered prescreen marketing will capture disproportionate market share.

The Experian data shows banks are already winning. The question is: will your institution be among the leaders, or will you watch competitors capture the $71-per-month refinance opportunity and the 83% Prime+ market while your institution settles for whatever’s left?

The technology exists. The market opportunity is proven. The competitive advantage goes to institutions that act now—at scale and with precision—to help customers lower their borrowing costs while generating profitable loan growth.

Ready to transform Q2 2025’s auto lending insights into market-leading results? Connect with Micronotes today to discover how automated prescreen technology can turn industry trends into your competitive advantage.