Priority CEO Thomas Priore has led a change in the company over the past few years, providing an example of what a fintech company can offer to businesses of all sizes. While it started as a payments pcessing company, Priority now provides enhanced payment and banking solutions, taking a leadership position in this growing area of financial services.
Priore said the company's success starts with a simple concept: Identify the pain points for businesses and then develop solutions. He shared that the key takeaway when considering Priority's approach is the idea of "meeting the customers where they are."
"We try really hard vertical by vertical to understand the pain points," Thomas Priore explained. "How can we use our technology and what we excel at—which is collecting, storing, lending, and sending money—to solve those pain points?"
Starting from that idea, Priority has devised a number of financial tools that leverage innovative technology to address common business challenges.
What Types of Services Does Priority Offer Businesses?
Priority offers a unified commerce platform that streamlines collecting, storing, lending, and sending money. The immediate benefit is that businesses can handle multiple financial tasks through one platform with the support of Priority's team of experts.
The goal of the unified commerce platform is to eliminate barriers between different sales channels and financial services, giving business leaders the ability to provide customers with a consistent and efficient experience across all touchpoints. It also allows them to better manage their cash flow, accelerating the speed at which they can receive payments from customers and make payments to employees and vendors.
Some of the most popular services provided by Priority include CPX, an end-to-end B2B payments platform that automates 100% of accounts payable, and Plastiq, which allows businesses to gain quick access to working capital through their credit cards. The company's MX Merchant Suite gives businesses one place to manage everything from billing and sales tracking to inventory and customer engagement. And its powerful Passport platform seamlessly integrates payments, treasury, and banking services. It allows businesses of all sizes to accelerate cash flow, streamline transaction reconciliation, and optimize working capital.
Thomas Priore Offers Examples of How Priority Services Support Businesses
In speaking about the evolution of Priority from a payments processing company to one that offers expanded finance and banking solutions, Thomas Priore said the change is driven by concentrating on practical issues.
For example, he noted that Priority clients who operate in the construction industry can use the company's banking solutions to prevent workers from having to go to a payday lender to cash their checks. "You think that's going to make them more loyal? 100%," he said.
He also pointed out that a restaurant owner can lower turnover rates by paying employees faster and providing immediate access to tip money collected at the end of the day. These advantages are in addition to the improvements in B2B payments processing that Priority offers. They typically result in the ability to pay vendors faster, potentially earning early pay discounts.
"These are practical issues that businesses struggle with. They just never thought, 'Oh man, you can actually help me solve this.' And that's what we're endeavoring to do at Priority," Priore said. "Our products should help you solve these other business realities so you can stop thinking about how you're going to manage those problems and manage your bottom line."
He added these products have applications across companies in almost every service industry. "People working in service businesses are often living paycheck to paycheck. So, anything you can do to accelerate cash and deploy it to employees with precision and speed, that's a really good outcome."
Priority Software Integrates with Legacy Systems
Thomas Priore believes another key in the growing fintech industry is providing services that make it as easy as possible to integrate new technology with existing systems. Every Priority product that has a user interface is also accessible through API and "can be integrated into other systems or it could sit underneath a system," he said.
Priority also can help businesses that deal with the complexities of operating in different states, including being subject to federal, state, and local taxes and fees. Priority software allows companies to set up a subledger for each tax jurisdiction, allowing them to properly direct money as it comes in.
The financial services Priority offers work in tandem with existing relationships with banks, noting that the tax situation provides an example of this. "Priority has utilized its technology and our customer has leveraged our banking services to create this elegant ecosystem that matches with their general ledger, but still maintains the collaborative relationship with their key lender or banking relationship to maximize cash acceleration and working capital optimization."
He said this level of service goes back to his central theme about what Priority does: Meet customers where they are. "I'm a small-business owner, even a small-to-midsize-business owner running my business," Thomas Priore said. "I don't have time to chase down self-service for technology. I want a consultant, an expert, to help me. Well, we have a really efficient way of delivering an expert to your door."
