Editor’s Note: This is a guest article written by Erica Cosentino, Marketing Manager at Boss Insights.

In today’s rapidly evolving business landscape, small and medium-sized businesses (SMBs) play a crucial role in driving economic growth and innovation. As these businesses seek financial support to fuel their expansion, lenders and financial institutions (FIs) face the challenge of making informed lending decisions in a dynamic and diverse market. 

This is where the power of data analytics comes into play.

By leveraging data analytics effectively, FIs can not only mitigate risks but also improve efficiency, enhance customer experiences, and maximize profitability in the SMB lending space.

Data analytics offers a profound impact on small business lending, paving the way for a more data-driven, efficient, and inclusive financial ecosystem that fuels the growth and success of small businesses worldwide.

But allow us to start with the basics:

Why Is Data Important for Lenders and Financial Institutions?

Data analytics has emerged as a powerful tool in the realm of small business lending, enabling lenders and financial institutions to make informed decisions based on accurate insights. By harnessing the power of data, lenders can gain a deeper understanding of the businesses they are evaluating for loans. 

“With lending in a constant flux, banks need to plan for a future that is inherently uncertain,” says Bob Legters, Chief Data Officer for FIS. “But there are some things we know. The future of lending is digital and will be driven by data. And digitalization of the lending process has the potential to drive better lending decisions, significant cost savings and an improved customer experience.”

Firmographics, a subset of demographic data that focuses on business characteristics, plays a pivotal role in this process. It encompasses valuable information like industry type, company size, location, and revenue, providing lenders with critical insights into a business’s financial health, growth potential, and industry trends.

One of the key benefits of leveraging firmographics in small business lending? The ability to assess creditworthiness accurately. Traditional lending methods often rely heavily on subjective evaluations and limited information, making it challenging to assess the risk associated with lending to small businesses. 

Lenders and FIs can establish a more comprehensive and objective credit risk assessment framework by layering data into their decision-making process. 

They can identify patterns, correlations, and historical performance indicators that enable them to make more informed lending decisions, reducing the risk of defaults and non-performing loans.

How Might Data Analytics Impact Your Financial Institution’s Lending Strategy?

Put simply, your FI can make better, more informed decisions by leveraging data and gain a deeper understanding of the SMB lending landscape. 

Data analytics, including firmographics information, allows it to: 

• assess risk more accurately, 
• develop tailored lending solutions that meet the unique needs of small businesses, thus providing a better SMB customer experience, and ultimately, 
• go beyond traditional lending practices and move towards a more data-driven approach, where lending decisions are based on objective criteria and statistical models, leading to more precise lending strategies.

Moreover, data analytics can enable financial institutions to improve the efficiency and speed of their SMB lending processes. 

Traditional lending practices often involve manual underwriting processes that can be time-consuming and resource-intensive. With data analytics, financial institutions can automate various stages of the lending process, such as credit scoring and risk assessment, by leveraging algorithms and predictive models. 

By streamlining these processes, financial institutions can significantly reduce the time it takes to evaluate loan applications, make lending decisions, and disburse funds. This enhanced efficiency not only improves the overall customer experience for small businesses but also enables financial institutions to increase loan volumes, expand SMB lending portfolios, and capture a larger share of the market.

The Right Technology for Small Business Lending Data

As the lending landscape continues to evolve, embracing data analytics will be key to staying competitive and fostering a thriving ecosystem for small business lending. But how can you get your hands on that data, to begin with?

Technology like Boss Insights and Fundica help lenders and FIs to better execute their small business lending strategies. 

Fundica’s AI-powered funding search engine helps the right SMB clients to find your lending institution. Then, Boss Insights’ API connects you directly to the SMBs’ accounting, banking, commerce, payroll, and other financial software to speed up the underwriting process and better serve your clients on an ongoing basis.

Embracing the power of data analytics in small business lending has the potential to reshape the financial landscape, creating a more efficient, inclusive, and impactful environment for lenders and borrowers alike. By leveraging data-driven insights, FIs can unlock new opportunities, mitigate risks, and provide tailored support to fuel the growth and success of small businesses around the world.