Independent Banker - November 2022 - 29

through advanced algorithms.
Here are common issues customers
experience that AI could improve.
" My accounts are scattered at
different banks. "
" Many orphaned accounts sit inside
community banks, " says Carson
Lappetito, president of $2.5 billionasset
Sunwest Bank in Sandy, Utah.
Customers don't want a fragmented
banking relationship. " They often say,
'You're my core bank and I want my
accounts together, I just didn't know
you had an SBA loan department,' "
says Lappetito.
He believes community banks can
easily improve their ability to crosssell
by using robust data analytics and
AI to place the right products in front
of the right customers. Partnering
with vendor Neocova to identify crossselling
opportunities within Sunwest's
customer data was a game changer,
he says. " We can see customers who
are paying loans at other institutions,
estimate loan balances and generate
a shortlist by relationship manager, "
says Lappetito.
Only a few months of targeted
cross-selling has made a meaningful
impact, increasing loan production
and uncovering more deposit
opportunities for customers. " It
provided incredible fruits for us both
in additional revenue opportunities
and customer satisfaction. " While
traditional cross-sell campaigns
produced overload in the sales team,
AI eased the process for all involved.
In addition, AI enabled Sunwest to
pursue its specialty of solar lending.
" Because the value in AI learning is
a function of repetition, the more
models and use cases, the more
knowledge, " Lappetito says. Thanks
to data sets beyond his own bank, the
AI platform identified customers with
large electric bills who would benefit
from Sunwest's solar expertise.
" There's incredible value in banks' data,
and they aren't optimizing it either
because of a lack of technology or it's
locked in the core. With AI, we can turn it
into actionable insights. "
-CARSON LAPPETITO, SUNWEST BANK
" There's incredible value in banks'
data, and they aren't optimizing it
either because of a lack of technology
or it's locked in the core, " he says.
" With AI, we can turn it into
actionable insights. "
" It takes too long to get answers
to simple questions. "
The pandemic meant fewer face-toface
opportunities for community
banks. " They got creative quickly;
the adoption of virtual assistants and
chatbots spiked during COVID, " says
Nicole Harper, director, corporate
strategy at Jack Henry.
Chatbots, a software application
that can conduct an online chat
conversation via text, and digital
virtual assistants (VAs) can give
customers fast answers on their bank's
mobile app to routine questions such
as, " What's my balance? "
" Look at the top 20 reasons why
they call, and you will identify the
sweet spot of the high-volume, lowcomplexity
things that create an
opportunity to serve through AI, "
says Harper.
She says community banks can
tailor automation to their own
customer service strategies. For
example, a bank may feel comfortable
allowing a VA to solve a login
problem, while situations like a lost
card are solved by an empathetic
human. " Issues that create emotion
are where you want to stand up and
be the hero, since customers may
have less appetite for automation, "
Harper says.
Some AI platforms can even detect
emotion such as a raised voice, so
that if an interaction moves beyond
a simply query to frustration, the
customer can be sent to an agent.
While chatbots or VAs are usually
thought of as customer facing, there is
also an agent assist model. " That can
ensure your agent gets to the single
right answer quickly, " Harper says.
" Did I get the loan or not? "
" We want to balance providing the fast
answers and solutions that customers
are looking for without losing that
personal touch, " says Rory Bidinger,
chief marketing officer of Stearns Bank
N.A. in St. Cloud, Minn., adding that
business customers may have high
expectations of speed set by online
lenders who can put them in touch
with loans in a matter of minutes.
Stearns is still researching the
expansion of AI operational functions,
Bidinger says. Because the $2.3 billionasset
community bank prioritizes a
personal connection with its customers
and " commits that we will answer on
the first ring, " it is considering how to
independentbanker.org Q 29
http://www.independentbanker.org
Independent Banker - November 2022

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Independent Banker - November 2022
