Independent Banker - April 2021 - 31

PORTFOLIO INNOVATION STATION
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Deepen small
business relationships
By Charles Potts, ICBA
ommunity banks are the
lifeblood of small businesses,
especially in the communities they
serve. With the Coronavirus Aid,
Relief, and Economic Security
(CARES) Act, community banks
played an outsize role in Paycheck
Protection Program (PPP) lending,
ensuring small businesses received
the funds they needed to keep their
businesses afl oat. Now, with the
pandemic entering its second year, it's
vital that community banks deepen
and broaden their relationship with
the small business marketplace. As
we've often said, where there's a
healthy community bank, there's a
healthy community, and vice versa.
With that in mind, it's important
for community banks to reach into
their communities to identify and
address the needs of unserved or
underserved small businesses. Gig
workers, sole proprietors and small
business entrepreneurs would benefi t
C
signifi cantly from a strong, long-term
partnership with a community bank.
Through fi ntech partnerships
and the direct advancement of
technologies, community banks
can now extend services to small
businesses beyond banking platforms
and bill payment to include small
business cash management and cash
fl ow analysis. Services like payroll,
receivables fi nancing, and timely
credit and lending opportunities
can help small businesses sustain
and grow their businesses in tough
economic times.
By providing what we
euphemistically refer to as straightthrough
or end-to-end processing,
community banks can off er small
businesses capabilities we fi nd in
the banking-as-a-service (BaaS)
environment. For example, fi tting
the bank's platform underneath the
business's technology suite can give
small businesses access to tools that
address customer authentication
as well as know your customer
(KYC), Bank Secrecy Act (BSA)
and anti-money laundering (AML)
requirements and underwriting.
Some of this is going to dovetail with
the evolution we're starting to see from
an innovation and fi ntech perspective
to create solutions for subsets of
the small business marketplace.
Community banks can now perfect
their expertise around niche subsets
like home improvement contractors or
real estate professionals, for example.
As we move through this year
and refl ect on 2020's experiences
with the COVID-19 crisis and PPP
funding, putting more solutions and
services to use that strengthen the
relationship between community
banks and small businesses becomes
even more critically important. Now
is the time to leverage the high-tech,
high-touch relationship that is unique
to community banks.
Don't miss your opportunity
this year to broaden and deepen
relationships with existing small
business customers and to acquire new
ones by off ering them the tools and
services they need to be more effi cient
and eff ective in these tough times.
It's essential that community
banks understand and leverage
their position in the small business
marketplace for the health of our
communities, our country and the
economy. With that said, many small
businesses remain unaware of the
tools and resources that community
banks have available. So, it's up to
you to tell them. If not you, then who?
And if not now, when? 
Charles Potts (charles.potts@icba.org)
is ICBA senior vice president and chief
innovation off icer
independentbanker.org Q 31
Photo by Shironosov/iStock
http://www.independentbanker.org
Independent Banker - April 2021

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