Gantry, Inc. approached Ascendix to hire a Salesforce Consulting partner to provide consulting services for their Apto installation. After performing a baseline CRM audit, demos, and final investigations, Gantry switched to AscendixRE for Capital Markets because it already contained the required functionality; hence, investing in rebuilding Apto didn’t make sense.
Ascendix sat down with Caleb Coffman, Special Projects Director at Gantry, Inc., to discuss the issues with data validation, management, and visibility in their previous CRM, and the benefits of switching to AscendixRE for Capital Markets to perform client prospecting, deal management, and capital source management.
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Ascendix: Please introduce Gantry – industry your company operates in, services it provides, etc.
“ Gantry is a commercial real estate mortgage banking company. We are an intermediary between real estate owners and the lenders that provide capital for commercial real estate investments. We are the largest privately owned mortgage banking shop in the USA and have been in business for over 30 years.
Gantry helps clients who already own properties to restructure their debt, or provides debt sources when purchasing a commercial real estate asset. In the USA, there are life insurance companies that lend to commercial real estate investors, but they do not lend directly to consumers. A company like Gantry provides access to these types of capital sources.
At Gantry, we have relationships with roughly 40 correspondent life insurance company lenders, which is one of our distinguishing features and value we add.
”
Ascendix: What are the most challenging technological aspects of the Capital Markets niche?
“ There are a couple big issues:
1) Manual contact management for prospecting
To bring new business from potential borrowers, we manage thousands of contacts and track all related information.
If you have a thousand people in your CRM, you do not remember when you called a contact six months ago and the results of the conversation. Historically, logging such details was done manually in Outlook, Excel, etc.
2) Understanding who our lenders are (Lender validation)
Gantry has relationships with roughly 40 Life Insurance Company correspondent lenders. However, a few years ago we were closing loans with an additional 100 lenders (credit unions, banks and others all over the United States).
Unfortunately, proper management of that information, data validation, understanding who they are, and tracking their programs was tough and required a lot of manual work. Therefore, each of our producers (salespeople) did it on their own.
These are probably the two biggest technology issues for our producers in the Capital Markets niche.
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Ascendix: How did you track lender sources / lender profiles before implementing the solutions provided by Ascendix?
“ Each producer (there are about 45 producers at Gantry) runs their own business. Most use an Excel document to list which lenders to send the deal to, track the status of each request, and track the incoming quotes. The actual, full data was stuck in Excel, Outlook or somewhere else and there was no sharing of any data.
When we got the demo from Wes where he showed the Capital Source and Deals objects, we did not even think about using another product except AscendixRE to track our capital sources and the related data.
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Ascendix: Before partnering with Ascendix, was Apto the core system used at Gantry apart from Excel and Outlook?
“ Yes, Apto was used the most. There is also another subset that uses Pipedrive and a smaller subset uses Act!. ”
Ascendix: What motivated Gantry to switch from Apto to AscendixRE for Capital Markets?
“ 1) The structure of Apto
The way Apto was set up was too complicated, making it hard for everyone to use and get value from. As a result, Apto wasn’t used effectively or consistently.
2) Disarray in Contact Database
Our contacts in Apto were all over the place due to poor record type controls. Fixing them required a lot more time and effort than we anticipated.
3) Poor support
The support we got from the previous Salesforce consulting partner and Apto itself was extremely challenging. We were receiving minimal to no support, leading to a loss of confidence in the program. Our consultant partner caused more harm than good.
Things got worse when Apto was bought by Buildout, so they did not even know their future.
One reason I was hired at Gantry was to tighten this up and figure out the Apto program. However, we quickly started to realize that Apto was not the optimal solution moving forward. As a result, we reached out to Ascendix’s Co-founder and President Wesley D. Snow.
”
Ascendix: How did your partnership with Ascendix unfold?
“ The first inquiry from Gantry’s side was to conduct an audit because Ascendix has a team of expert Salesforce consultants that provides CRM audit and assessment services, since Apto is based on Salesforce.
We started working with Chris Edwards who conducted the audit and highlighted the challenges within our system setup. She was very thorough and knowledgeable, and investigated the amount of work and money required to fix it up. However, it wasn’t long before we considered switching to AscendixRE CRM for Capital Markets because of the consultant’s expertise and excellent service.
Wes and the team conducted a demo and it was everything we wanted in a much tighter format with objects specifically for capital markets that Apto didn’t have.
”
Ascendix: What were the factors that prompted your decision in favor of AscendixRE?
“ 1) Salesforce-based nature of AscendixRE, ensuring a smooth transition.
2) Simpler system structure, focusing on capital sources and streamlining various other processes.
3) Available integrations.
4) Topnotch consultants that supported onboarding and growth.
That’s why the decision to switch to AscendixRE CRM became a complete no-brainer for Gantry.
”
Ascendix: How did Ascendix Search (one of the modules within AscendixRE) contribute to marketing efforts within the AscendixRE CRM?
“ Ascendix Search allows us to find lists, track different tags, and empower our users to see and update their data, which is not possible in the basic Salesforce search.
Ascendix Search is a huge time-saver for us and is highly recommended even if you aren’t using AscendixRE for Capital Markets.
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Ascendix: What types of integrations, customizations and automations did Ascendix implement to your AscendixRE for Capital Markets?
“ Our integrations are Act-On (marketing automation), Revenue Grid (connects Outlook to Salesforce), and Zoom phone and video program. We’ve consistently updated and customized our instance to cater to our needs, a benefit of being in a program based in Salesforce. We have multiple automations that do things like prompt tasks at certain stages and update records after certain actions. ”
Ascendix: Did AscendixRE for Capital Markets provide the visibility that you were looking for?
“ Of course, 100%!
Data visibility is my biggest goal and brings me the most joy. AscendixRE for Capital Markets helps me to reach the required level. I do not know any other program that can do what it is doing and especially for capital markets. It is built specifically for what we need!
”
Ascendix: Has the implementation of AscendixRE for Capital Markets bundled with CRM consulting services Ascendix provided helped you or your colleagues boost productivity?
“ We experienced a productivity increase in the prospecting side because all calls inbound and outbound emails, Act-On campaign emails, and tasks and meetings are saved automatically to each contact record. This means if the producer opens a contact, all their previous interactions with that client are immediately visible. That is incredibly important.
Regarding Capital Sources, we now have a central location to make and update lender programs that all users can see. We then use that data in the Deals object to find potential lenders using Find Capital Sources (an Ascendix Search tab that automatically searches Capital Sources against the deal criteria), bringing visibility to potential lenders and streamlining lender lists. Seeing the capital sources and understanding who can lend on what will result in deals.
The ability to access a record quickly and see all communications saves Gantry a lot of time. Before switching to Ascendix, there was no way to have that level of visibility. We were flying blind most of the time and it was all 100% manual.
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Ascendix: Would you recommend AscendixRE for Capital Markets to others? Would you recommend Ascendix Technologies as a CRM consulting partner?
“ 100%!
It is amazing to have confidence in the Ascendix team and product. I’m putting a lot of energy into this and so the Ascendix team’s help and support on their great product gives me so much confidence!
I’m sure that what we are building today is also going to work in ten years.
”
Kateryna creates engaging content about Salesforce consulting, Ascendix products, and CRM best practices for the commercial real estate industry and legal services. Her articles provide readers with relevant data, stats, business tricks and overviews of new industry trends and CRM updates.
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