So when do we start the cleaning up?
I stumbled onto an article today through payday pundit. Its a site I like to cruise by every once in a while during the wee parts of the night. Now majority of the time when you go to a news forum - you expect to read something different. That’s why its called a “news forum”, because the information on it is NEW. When I go by this site and a dozen other payday loan news forums I don’t get new news. All I tend to hear about is payday loan legislation, and state regulation. The source of the demand in regulation stemmed originally from consumers whining about payday loans. A lot of different cries about high APR rates, abusive collections policies, illegitimate payday loan operations - the list goes on. Now I can see that in the birth of our industry, mistakes like these often happen. But as a multi-billion dollar industry, in the direct spotlight of the mass media WE CANT AFFORD TO HAVE COMPLAINTS LIKE THIS!
I feel like much of our industry is really running away from a problem more than taking care of it. Collections numbers increasing? Double the APR rates! Borrowers not paying back? Call their employers and annoy them until they pay you! State regulation killing off the business climate? Start a Internet payday loan! Get the picture? We’re all guilty of it in one shape or form, but none of us are willing to admit it. All the while, the problems we avoid are brewing into epic proportions. Its time that we start cleaning up our image to the public eye, address our problems, and treat our industry the way it needs to be treated - like a multi-billion dollar industry.
Do you see Wells Fargo flashing dollar signs to advertise their loans? - No
Do you see Allstate insurance coloring their buildings green and yellow? - No
Does Discover Card visit your work if you behind on a payment? - No
Whether or not you believe it, when you decide to get into the payday loan industry you’re taking a step into a enterprise venture. This business can make you money - almost guaranteed, but that doesn’t mean you can get away with murder. Over the last few years in the payday loan industry, I’ve learned one great lesson: The payday loan industry can bring you profitability fairly quickly, but it takes hard work and commitment to sustain the income. With that said - ask yourself a few questions:
What are you doing to make your customers LOVE your service?
How are you presenting your company and service to the public?
How are you sustaining your profits while retaining the general approval of your customer base?
What are you doing for your industry to fight for reasonable state regulation?
How closely are you following state guidelines?
Keep in mind, the best of the best know how to answer these questions without really taking time to think. Cash Advance America, Urgent Money, Rapid Cash, Cash Connection - these companies follow guidelines from state to internet operations. You can bet that these companies will be around for at least the next 20 years. Reason? Because they’re always improving their business by providing the right kind of finance products, exploring new customer audiences, tuning their collections process, and adjusting public out look. Keep in mind that in ANY retail establishment, success is mainly based off customer satisfaction. Heres a great example:
Its a general consensus that a retail brick and mortar store can only attract customers as far away as 7 miles. Maybe less. Its also a general consensus that brick and mortar stores should be located in a neighborhood with a demographic income of 45k per year or less. When I started Green Valley Financial, we broke both those rules. We were located in a neighborhood with houses in the margin of 400k and above. We didn’t have any flashy signs out front, or even neon signs. In general when drivers passed us by, we looked like a mom-and-pop financial services office. It was our service, and financial products that brought our customers into the door. Though we weren’t in the correct income demographic, we serviced customers from as far as 40 miles away. Our customers were so dedicated to our brand, they would ride a bus for 2 hours and pass by dozens of retail competitors just to do business with us. Green Valley Financial had no advertising campaign. Our new customer base was consistently brought in by older customers. Why would they go through that much trouble to see us? Because we cultivated their love for our service! Green Valley Financial offered a handful of FREE budget planning services to help customers get out of financial trouble. If a valued customer calls in and says they can’t make it on time, we say “Sure. Just come back the next paycheck” or “Just come by and pay what you can” - of course exercised with certain limitations. We offered extraordinary rates for age old repeat customers, and we even sent out thank you cards on payments with little discount coupons. We brought the phrase “personal touch” to the payday loan business.
Its time to let go of the “lets run a business as cheap as possible” attitude. Its time to spend more money on presentation, customer satisfaction, technology, and compliance. Ask yourself - In any given industry, isn’t the customers USUALLY the supporters of the product or service? YES. As lenders in the payday loan industry we need to start turning our customer base around to support US.