NLG launches accountant-broker collab program

The Accountant-Broker Collaboration Program, open to all NLG brokers, aims to help fulfil the personal and/or business finance needs of accountants’ clients and act as a strong cross-referral partnership.

It also enables brokers to substantially increase revenue and facilitate business growth by diversifying distribution and revenue streams, according to the group.

Steve Lake, partnerships director at NLG, said that the official launch of the Accountant-Broker Collaboration Program marked a “significant milestone” towards the aggregator’s vision of becoming “the leading provider of finance and broking services to accountants and the preferred boutique aggregator to brokers in Australia”.

“Accountant-Broker Collaboration Program is a bespoke initiative that benefits all stakeholders,” he explained.

“It materially extends [a] broker’s and accountant’s service proposition, supercharges referrals, and boosts lead generation. It also enables both professions to provide a more holistic offering and deliver exceptional client outcomes,” Mr Lake said.

“Having the ability to formally collaborate with accountants to facilitate residential or commercial finance represents a tremendous opportunity to better service clients,” Mr Lake continued.

NLG said it would consider accounting firms of all areas of expertise and locations nationwide for the program.

“The first option is to partner with an accountant via a reciprocal relationship model to facilitate client funding requirements,” the NLG partnerships director said, however he added that the preferred model over the pilot had been for accountants to appoint an “in-house, commission-only broker as a contractor”. 

He suggested that this had been popular as it was “an extremely cost-effective and flexible strategy that extends the firm’s service proposition and diversifies revenue without resource or accreditation constraints — including the time, stress, hassle or expense of hiring a loan writer directly,” Mr Lake concluded.

Earlier this year, NLG announced it had partnered with SME broker training provider Accendo Financial to subsidise brokers who commit to its short course series and commercial finance literacy mentoring program.

Speaking at the time, Trent Carter, co-founder of Accendo Financial, commented the partnership would help NLG brokers “embrace diversification and become more confident in their discovery process, financial analysis skills, and writing a successful credit submission”.

“We’re confident that this program will help build value in the broker’s business by creating stickier clients, increasing revenue, and driving repeat and referral opportunities,” Mr Carter said. 

[Related: National Lending Group makes commercial pivot]