"They're the ones out there helping our partners"
The skills and connections that business development managers bring to the table significantly enhance the quality of service that a lender provides, according to Grant Armstrong, director of national sales at Community Trust.
A major reason for this is that BDMs are at the forefront of interaction.
“They’re the ones out there helping our partners,” Armstrong said in a recent episode of CMP Talk.
“Give us the story, gather the information package, the deal to meet Community Trust credit policies and maintain that quality,” he added. “That’s what we want them to do.”
Recognizing the BDM’s vital role in the transaction ecosystem, Armstrong said that one of the main goals of Community Trust is to support business managers, “making sure they’re out on the road.”
“[BDMs] can go out and see the partners in person, use digital technology,” he said. “They’re hosting webinars, they’re hosting events, they’re hosting training sessions. On average, our BDMs are out there 150 to 200 touchpoints a month, if not more, making sure that our broker partners are constantly aware of what we’re doing.”
This level of support has not gone unnoticed among brokers.
“They now know when they need the support of their BDM,” Armstrong said. “As part of that 360-service approach, they can call the mortgage advisory team. They’ve got a portal. But when they really need that person to talk them through some challenges or how they can partner better with Community Trust, they know they can just pick up the phone, they get a hold of their BDM – and they get the help they need when they need it.”
The right tool for the job
The BDM-broker interaction is a fundamental component of a successful transaction, which is why Armstrong is emphasizing that this can be accomplished only with the technology that best fits their needs.
“We have an incredible Community Trust Café, which is our portal,” Armstrong said. “Our broker partners said we want to be able to travel easier with it sometimes, so we created an app available for them to download and have rate at their fingertips - everything they need to know about their applications.
“That is what we’re here to do: bring simplicity, quality, and great products to our broker partners, and make it make it easy for them to go forward with.”
For more in-depth views from Community Trust executives, click here.
