Scottsdale, Ariz., Jan. 21, 2020 – Cornerstone Advisors announced today the formation of PeerMetrix®, a new company providing Performance Vault, a cloud-based platform designed to give financial institutions on-demand access to Cornerstone’s exclusive bank and credit union revenue, staffing, spending, and customer service benchmarks.
“For the past 18 years, Cornerstone Advisors has worked with hundreds of financial institutions collecting and analyzing the detailed data that helps drive high performance,” said Eric Weikart, a Cornerstone partner and president of PeerMetrix. “As the technology that fuels Cornerstone’s benchmarking data grew more and more complex, it made sense to create an affiliate company that would enable us to offer clients a self-service technology platform that delivers on-demand access to this impactful data.”
Performance Vault is offered as a subscription service that supplies banks and credit unions with access to hundreds of peer benchmarking metrics across dozens of banking areas, enabling them to create automated apples-to-apples comparisons and “what if” scenarios to set realistic, measurable performance and investment targets.
“Knowing how a financial institution performs and compares to peers translates to a critical advantage in the organization’s long-term success,” Weikart stated. “The advanced business analytics and insights in Performance Vault can uncover countless opportunities for growth, innovation, and competitive leverage.”
Richard Padula, senior vice president and director of finance at First Midwest Bank, an $18 billion asset bank in Chicago, one of PeerMetrix’s newest clients, said he is looking forward to the capabilities that Performance Vault will bring to his bank. “The software and data will be key in helping us execute on our commitment to continuous improvement and maximizing the experience and value proposition for our customers, colleagues, and shareholders,” Padula said.
“PeerMetrix will be a game changer for our company,” said Brian K. Williams, president of $1.4 billion asset First Farmers & Merchants Bank, Columbia, Tenn., a Performance Vault subscriber. “In a very user-friendly format, the platform has provided our institution with the ability to objectively measure productivity and efficiency against our peers.”
Cornerstone has found that an enterprise-wide benchmarking discipline can lead to roughly $4 million of performance improvement opportunities per $1 billion in assets. “Unfortunately, this approach has been rarely used by mid-size and regional banks and credit unions,” said Scott Sommer, chief executive officer at Cornerstone Advisors. “Performance Vault will help financial institutions instill the discipline to realize their true potential.”
Cornerstone Advisors and PeerMetrix will be hosting live Performance Vault demos at Bank Director’s Acquire or Be Acquired Conference, January 26-28 in Phoenix. Stop by our booth to learn more.
Cornerstone Advisors, a management consulting firm focused exclusively on helping banks and credit unions improve their profitability and elevate performance, delivers services in the areas of Strategy, Performance Improvement, Contract Negotiations, Technology, Mergers and Acquisitions, Payments, and Delivery Channels. For more information, visit crnrstone.com.