It allows consumers to verbally ask Alexa, Amazon’s virtual assistant, to search for both a mortgage or a local mortgage adviser.
Consumers need to ask Alexa to open UKMortgages and find them a mortgage, then Alexa will ask a few questions and search through over 10,000 mortgages to offer a result.
Next, Alexa provides provides the headline product details verbally and then sends a summary of the top fixed, variable and tracker mortgage results to the consumers’ Alexa app.
The search works through a given postcode or the one registered for the device to search though all the advisers listed on Mortgage Brain’s UKMortgages lead generation mobile app featuring all brokers registered to Mortgage Brain’s software.
For consumers looking for brokers, Alexa will provide the name and phone number of the nearest one, and send a list of up to 10 local advisers to the Alexa app.
Mark Lofthouse, CEO of Mortgage Brain, said: “We’re incredibly excited and very proud to announce the launch of the first ever UK Mortgage Skill [voice activated app] on Amazon’s Echo devices.
“It’s a fantastic achievement to be the first UK mortgage technology company to develop a skill to support consumers and drive business to mortgage advisers.”
End-to-end processing
Lofthouse said this is the start of a digital journey, which is part of a bigger picture and strategy.
“It is the start of a consumer’s digital mortgage experience and, after this initial introduction, they can complete a fact find online and securely exchange documents and messages through The Key, our client relationship management (CRM) portal.
“And that’s not the end of the story, as the advice process, product selection and application submission through to completion can be just as slick and efficient using our sourcing systems and application submission platform.”
The voice activated technology is the next lead generation tool phase in the UKMortgages suite, after it launched its consumer mobile ‘find an adviser’ app five years ago.
UKMortgages has been used around two million times since its launch and delivered tens of thousands of new business leads to advisers, confirmed Mortgage Brain.
“This innovation will deliver real and tangible benefits to our family of Mortgage Brain customers and is a continued demonstration of the use of our APIs and web services which our customers have been using for many years.
“Yet again, we are leading the market in delivering the next generation of technology and digital solutions. We remain justifiably proud of our past, but clearly focused on the future,” said Lofthouse.
Watch out for the Video demonstration and Mark Lofthouse interview, coming shortly.
