New app to supplement brokers’ value

Borrowers can use Wealth Desk to manage their financial accounts, loans, properties and superannuation funds under one digital umbrella, while also receiving automatic living expense analyses in real time.

For brokers, the app acts as a “sales tool, icebreaker [and] database builder”, according to CashDeck, providing them with custom landing pages to send their prospective or existing clients and strategic partners to.

It can be used as the basis of a cash flow service or as a gift for event attendees, the fintech said.

Referring to statistics from the Mortgage & Finance Association of Australia’s Young Professionals Report 17/18, which found that 65 per cent of mortgage brokers consider marketing and lead generation challenging, CashDeck chief commercial officer Owen Joyce speculated that this could be because many brokers find it “daunting” to approach new borrowers cold.

He added that the Wealth Desk app could help brokers provide value upfront to new clients.

“This is a great way to start a relationship,” Mr Joyce said.

The fintech has claimed that more than 1,000 brokers use its products, which includes the Credit Ready tool that enables brokers to retrieve clients’ bank statements and provide a detailed living expense analysis. The app was rolled out earlier this year amid ongoing scrutiny of how lenders and brokers collect and investigate borrower expenses.

“While nobody can tell exactly what measures will come about, change is certain, and smart brokers will already be making changes to their business processes. Compliance will be top of the list, and for brokers, this will mean more accurately assessing living expenses — an onerous task,” CashDeck said in May.

“Technology must come into play here and can do so very early on in the conversation.”

A number of other companies have launched marketing tools this year, including Connective’s new platform for automating client engagement called the Digital Marketing Hub, which allows brokers to segment clients so that marketing messages can be tailored to different groups based on their characteristics.

Pepper Money recently announced the addition of new tools to its Alternative Lending Marketing Toolkit to assist brokers with social media marketing, while broking franchise and aggregator Loan Market also provided its brokers with marketing tools to boost lead generation online and offline.

[Related: New software aims to help brokers prepare for tougher lending]