Venture Solutions has been printing and mailing customer communication for more than 50 years, and print remains the cornerstone of its deployment services. So as the company has built its eSolutions over the past 10 years, it has done so with those print and mail services in mind. As a result, Venture has created a truly integrated multichannel framework of both print and eSolutions that successfully handles any multichannel deployment requirement.
“In the near future, print and mail will remain a critical deployment channel for the financial services industry,” said Mark Lammers, strategic solutions director. “However, the communication world is heading toward electronic solutions, particularly using mobile devices.”
Venture creates a smooth pathway to paperless solutions, helping its clients get to the next step in that process — wherever they are starting from. Venture will consult, help set realistic goals and provide solutions to improve the online and mobile experiences to drive eStatement adoption. The company also provides a full lifecycle program that capitalizes on personalized communications that educate, inform and provide easy ways for customers to drive paperless adoption via mobilized solutions.
“Venture builds strong partnerships with our clients to understand their needs. In our relationship review program, Venture|partners, we have a strategic dialogue with our clients and discuss future opportunities to help clients remain in the forefront of its industry,” Lammers said.
Meeting consumers where they are most comfortable, Venture’s deployment channels include web-based self-service portals. In fact, when developing eSolutions for its clients, Venture designs them with a mobile-first approach to ensure they are optimized on any mobile device. As a result, Venture delivers documents that look good on mobile phones and are easy for consumers to navigate.
In addition, Venture has a preference center that allows customers to choose when and how they want to be communicated with, within compliance limits.
“Companies are focused on retention and organic growth, but those goals cannot be achieved without providing a great customer experience,” Lammers said. “Venture’s preference center services — which include both building the site and managing the preference data — has proven to create that positive customer experience.”
Implementing a preference center is a win-win for servicers, who get happier customers while conserving resources and saving on postage and print-related servicing. The preference center also provides and maintains an audit trail and the required permissions to satisfy the eSign act.
A preference center provides an easy transition to consumers from paper-based to electronic solutions, especially eStatements. By providing eStatements with online billing options, servicers get faster payments while giving the customer a convenient payment option.
The company also uses SMS text as a critical step in some of its deployment strategies. For example, a SMS text message can be sent to a consumer that contains a link to their document. Typically, this involves an authentication process that Venture manages as well.
“In recent years, one of the biggest changes in transactional communication is the desire to dialogue with a consumer, rather than just sending one-way communication,” Lammers said. “An effective tool in two-way communication is using mobile solutions — creating features that allow consumers to respond immediately via a mobile device.”
Venture has developed its products and deployment channels to fit the needs of the mortgage industry, paying special attention to compliance demands.
“Venture continually invests in its production systems and security infrastructure with its client’s compliance requirements in mind. A key element of that is the Venture|access tool that includes archive and search functionality which provides quick retrieval of any document in its original form,” Lammers said.
Venture makes these systems and documents available for client audits to ensure its clients are passing every phase of their own audits.
“As customer communication becomes more complex through increased regulation and consumer demands, communication deployment providers will need to provide a breadth of services to fully meet the needs of the financial services industry,” Lammers said. “Venture continues to invest in state-of-the-art technology, as well as experienced personnel who understand the technology and the needs of the financial services industry.”
Mark Lammers, Strategic Solutions Director
Mark Lammers has 25 years of experience in the areas of business development, data solutions, database development, document composition and programming.
As a strategic solutions director, he identifies client opportunities and works to help meet client needs through Venture’s data-driven products and services. He is also instrumental in new product development.