Archive for the ‘Marketing’ Category

Can P2P Lending Cross the Chasm?

Friday, May 7th, 2010

This is a guest post by Tuomas Talola, CEO of coming Finnish P2P lending site Lainaaja and blogger at Cloudfunder.

Peer-to-peer lending has been growing rapidly since the inception in 2005. Lending amounts are small compared to traditional banks, but potential is immense. What would it take to really break into mainstream and become a potential option to large customer masses?

What Is the Chasm and Target Customers?

Geoffrey A. Moore wrote a highly appraised book called Crossing the Chasm in 1991. The book was about high-tech products marketing during the early stages and the difficulties of reaching majority of customers. In this post I’ll take a look what can be learned from the insights of the book and how to apply it to P2P lending.

Crossing the Chasm - Source:Wikpedia

According to Moore, there is a chasm between early adopters (technology enthusiasts and visionaries) and the early majority (pragmatists). Visionaries and pragmatists have very different expectations and this might be the reason why many technology products fail. Selling to the Early Adopters is easier, they are people who are always looking the new revolutionary technologies. As a group, they are easy to sell but very hard to please. (more…)

CommunityLend Taps Broker Market

Wednesday, April 21st, 2010

Canadian p2p lending service CommunityLend announces:

MorWEB partners with CommunityLend Inc. to provide direct access to
unsecured lending options for the Canadian Mortgage Broker market

Marlborough Stirling Canada (MSC) is pleased to announce that direct access to CommunityLend, Canada’s only online Peer-to-Peer lending service, will now be available to the broker market using MorWEB.

MorWEB brokers will now be able to seamlessly refer clients directly to CommunityLend to arrange unsecured loans from private investors.  This will provide another value added service to customers of mortgage brokers using MorWEB.  Phase one of this novel integration is now available on the MorWEB platform with a more comprehensive integration scheduled for later this year.

CommunityLend, , launched earlier this year and is exploring a number of different marketing options to spread the word about its services and to recruit good quality borrowers looking for more competitive rates for small unsecured loans.

”We are excited by the opportunity to work with one of Canada’s leading software providers to the Mortgage industry,” noted Michael Garrity, CEO of CommunityLend.  “We understand the important role of Mortgage Brokers in helping their clients to find the best rates on loans to meet their needs. …”

Since CommunityLend is restricted to accredited investors* by regulation, this marketing move uses an existing multiplier to reach potential lenders. It continues the earlier reported trend of existing financial institutions partnering with new p2p lending players.

(Source: CommunityLend blog)

*corrected - an earlier version of the article wrongly stated “institutional lenders” – see comment below

Smava Poland: Cooperation with Financial Consultants as Offline Sales Channel a Success

Tuesday, November 24th, 2009

In October Smava Poland (Smava.pl) entered a cooperation with Euro Finanse, an independent vendor of financial products and services. Smava says the cooperation already yields very positive results. The first three weeks of cooperation brought a 50% growth in loan volume.

Euro Finanse was selected as partner due to it’s sales strength and presence not only in the large cities but with 450 financial consultants throughout the country, says CEO Przemysław Moscicki.

Apart from sales activities the consultants can handle additional tasks like verifying identities of borrowers in person and validating income statements.

To my knowledge Smava.pl is the first p2p lending company to use an offline sales channel to sell the service.

Lending Club Promotion: 2500 Dollar Prize for 25000th Investor

Friday, September 4th, 2009

Lendingclub.com currently runs a promotion. The 25,000th investor to register wins 2,500 US$. To be eligible a registration is enough (no purchase/investment necessary). The winner will be announced after Oct. 31st.


Be the 25,000th Investor!

Interest Free Loan

Wednesday, July 1st, 2009

The borrower who receives the 10,000th loan from Zopa UK will be lucky – it will be an interest free loan.

Furthermore Zopa has a referral promotion in July. Zopa pays 100 GBP (approx. 165 US$) to members that refer a borrower who successfully gets a loan in July.

Giles Andrews on Building Zopa

Monday, June 1st, 2009

Giles Andrews on building Zopa, it’s brand and differentiating from banks.

Zopa Member Video Competion – Explain P2P Lending

Saturday, May 9th, 2009

Zopa has run a member competition, asking members to explain how Zopa works for a borrower or a lender.

I watched several of the created videos. My favourite is the video below by Glenmation.

Selected Kiva API apps

Friday, May 1st, 2009

The Kiva API allows anyone to develop applications that use the data from Kiva loans. Below are screenshots from two Kiva loan apps.


Kiva loans by country of borrower – source Kivadata.org (more…)

Kiva Loan Matching Plans

Wednesday, April 15th, 2009

I am blogging this live while listening to the Kiva conference call. Kiva plans a loan matching program, where lenders and institutions can opt to automatically match loans made by other lenders.

Some statements/explanations from the conference call:

  • Today 6 or 7 people out of 100 that visit the Kiva website actually make a loan (conversion rate)
  • Lenders can select to match any loan, or select loans by criteria
  • Lenders can opt to match immediately or only if they have periods of inactivity
  • Minimum account balance allows to reserve some money in the account (only balance over this minimum is used for matching)
  • Donations to the Kiva organisation are mandatory(!) when using the matching feature

Kiva says the new feature allows to automate the lending process and hopes that it inspires others to lend more.

The matching program will probably be launched in summer 2009.

On terms of automation there are similarities to the autobid feature MYC4 has.

See the following presentation for more details on the plans.

Matching Presentation Con Call April 2009

On other issues, there was the message that chances are good, that the Ebony Foundation (a MFI) repays outstanding loans (approx. 40,000 US$).

Pertuity Direct starts affiliate program

Monday, March 16th, 2009

P2P Lending service Pertuity Direct has launched an affiliate program. The new referral marketing campaign of Pertuity Direct pays:

  • 35 US$ for each referred completed and approved borrower application for a loan
  • 50 US$ for each completed investor application
  • performance incentives for websites that generate at least 5 leads per month

The campaign runs at affiliate network CJ, where Lending Club does administrate it’s affiliate program, too. Lending Club pays 35 US$ commission for each loan application and 60 US$ per lender registration plus performance incentives.

See earlier posts about p2p lending services using affiliate marketing.