Nutmeg State Financial Credit Union CEO John Holt and Cotribute's Co-founder/CEO Philip Paul stopped by the show to discuss how Nutmeg State Financial has successfully leveraged Cotribute's digital platform to automate processes and auto-decision lending decisions. As a result, the credit union has achieved a 97.56% automation rate in application decisions. This leap in operational efficiency has enabled the credit union to auto-decision up to 89.5% of applications with all necessary checks in place.

With these impressive numbers, John and Philip talked shared how Cotribute’s technology has benefited Nutmeg State — and, ultimately, its members, as the credit union has expanded FOM nationwide with American Automobile Association (AAA). John looks to ensure that every interaction is as meaningful as it is effortless.

Working with Cotribute, Nutmeg State has automated critical processes including fraud detection, Customer Identification Programs (CIP), Customer Due Diligence (CDD), Anti-Money Laundering (AML), and account creation. Members can now benefit from customized digital product flows, facilitating seamless transactions across all devices and locations.

Check it out and let us know your thoughts. And be sure to watch the entire episode below for all the details.

Allison Cerra, Chief Marketing Officer at Alkami, joined us on the show to share findings from their recent Alkami Digital Sales & Service Maturity Model research, where they discovered that financial institutions that prioritize data utilization experienced an annual revenue growth of 20%.

A couple other findings Allison shared from their research included:

1. One-quarter of financial institutions excelling digitally have less than $500 million in assets. (In contrast, more than one in seven of the least digitally mature institutions have more than $5 billion in assets.)
2. 70% of the most digitally mature institutions now place greater importance on digital banking functionality over physical branch and call center networks.

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She also talked about some of the lessons learned for credit unions moving forward in the digital space:

• Digital maturity is linked to revenue growth
• Organization size does not solely determine digital maturity
• Even among the most digitally mature in the study, there is room to raise the bar
• Most FIs are at different areas of development

Check it out and let us know your thoughts. And be sure to watch the entire episode below for all the details.

Alabama Credit Union's President/CEO Steve Swofford and Valiify’s Founder/CEO Ted Coy, who is also Director of Innovation at Alabama Credit Union, joined us on the show to share how they have leveraged Valiify's toolset to build a digital account opening process to help achieve higher digital conversion rates (5x higher!) for credit unions -- Alabama CU in this instance.

With their focus on smaller credit unions, Steve and Ted talked about Valiify, the CUSO, and its digital account opening, loan origination, and automated marketing offerings.

They also discussed what prompted them to create this new digital account opening process to enhance the efficiency in this process for members and staff, all contributing to garnering a higher digital conversion rate -- 5x increase.

Steve and Ted shared the big goal here in creating a new digital account opening process for credit unions -- especially smaller credit unions -- making it affordable,  as the smallest credit union they serve is $45 million in assets.

Check it out and let us know your thoughts. Be sure to watch the entire interview below for all the details.

SmartVault CISO and former Cybercrime Officer Luke Kiely was our guest of honor on a recent webinar CUbroadcast hosted entitled: "How to Keep Sensitive Financial Information Safe in 2024" -- essentially addressing the best ways to stay safe from cyberattacks today.

Enjoy this clip as Luke talks about the obvious woes of ransomware, how to avoid it, and should credit unions pay it if it ever occurs at their shop.

Check it out and let us know your thoughts. And watch the entire webinar replay with Luke for all the details on protecting your organization from cyberattacks.

Community Financial Credit Union’s VP of Insights, Innovation & Impact Blake Woods, stopped by the show to discuss the launch of Community Financial's “CloseEnuff™” account -- a cash flow account to empower women amid financial disparities.

According to Blake, CloseEnuff™ has been designed to empower women and alleviate critical financial hardship caused by gender inequity. This innovative account represents Community Financial’s ongoing commitment to advancing the financial health of their communities.

He added while 95% of women are directly involved in their households’ financial decision-making, the financial services industry has largely ignored their needs and the pervasive inequities that exist in the United States. For instance, women on average are earning 82 cents to every dollar men earn. Such disparities are exacerbated for women of color, with Black women earning only 64 cents to every dollar, and Latinas earning 54 cents.
 
Reflective of societal inequities, a 2023 Consumer Financial Protection Bureau report found that overdraft and NSF fees disproportionately affect women, particularly single women, women with children, Black and Hispanic women and women who earn less than $60,000 per year. CloseEnuff™ addresses the pervasive issues of financial barriers disproportionately impacting these demographics.

Check it out and let us know your thoughts. And be sure to watch the entire episode below for all the details. (Recorded from our LinkedIn livecast.)