Clearwater Credit Union Launches Alkami’s Digital Banking Platform to Activate Member Engagement Strategy

Enhancing its digital experience strategy, Clearwater Credit Union deepens member connections with timely insights and intuitive member marketing engagements

CNBC Analysis: How Alkami’s Platform Became Clearwater Credit Union’s Digital Scalpel for Member Engagement

As consumer expectations for hyper-personalized banking services reach unprecedented levels, Clearwater Credit Union—a Montana-based financial cooperative with $1.2 billion in assets and 65,000 members—has deployed cloud-based fintech architect Alkami’s suite of tools to transform its digital banking infrastructure into a precision instrument for relationship-building. The partnership, announced on Thursday, highlights a growing trend: mid-sized institutions using data choreography to compete with Wall Street’s digital muscle.

J.D. Power-certified platform enables real-time financial empathy

At the heart of this transformation lies Alkami’s Digital Banking Platform, which Clearwater Credit Union now utilizes to orchestrate cross-channel member interactions through a centralized cloud ecosystem. Deborah Colby, the credit union’s chief marketing officer, describes the technology as “financial GPS” for member engagement: combining transactional analytics with behavioral insights to anticipate life events—whether buying first homes in Bozeman or navigating retirement transitions—and deliver contextually relevant advice in real-time.

“Our physical footprint covers 96% of Montana’s counties,” Colby tells CNBC, referencing the state’s challenging geography. “But building 56 branches to achieve ‘face-to-face’ connection would be economically reckless. Instead, we’re redefining the branch experience through silicon and software—not concrete and carpet.”

This strategic pivot arrives as 78% of consumers now expect banks to predict their financial needs, according to EY’s latest global banking survey. Alkami’s data engine—recently re-architected post its $42 million Series C fundraise—converts terabytes of spending patterns, bill payment histories, and investment flows into member lifecycle predictions that Clearwater’s teams leverage through intuitive dashboards.

Mazen Letayf, Alkami’s VP of customer lifecycle management, offers a telling analog: “Clearwater isn’t just opening accounts—they’re opening windows. Each data point becomes a vantage to view members’ financial journeys holistically, turning balance sheets into roadmaps.”

The New Banking Battlefield: Algorithms vs. ATMs

In an industry where J.D. Power reports mobile banking satisfaction scores now rival traditional teller services, Alkami’s solution—the same system earning certifications from Quality Counts since 2022—operates at the intersection of three critical vectors:

1. Device Agnosticism: Unified UX across smartphones, tablets, and desktops
2. Hyperlocal Personalization: Geofenced mortgage alerts in growing markets like Missoula
3. Compliance Autonomy: Automated risk assessments woven into marketing workflows

Analyzing this case study reveals much about fintech’s evolving role in regional banking. When Clearwater identified a 43% surge in mobile-only users during the pandemic, leadership faced a pivotal choice: expand infrastructure with vaults and security guards or invest in digital ecosystems enabling 24/7 virtual advisement. The decision? Scaling their Alkami implementation to process over 1.3 million monthly transactions as of Q1 2025.

Operationally, Alkami acts as Clearwater’s digital equivalent of a composite branch network. The platform’s CRM layer now executes 48 contextual campaigns monthly—from student loan refinancing windows to small business equipment financing prompts—without human intervention. Counterintuitively, these algorithm-driven engagements have boosted service request conversion rates by 17% versus manual outreach, per internal metrics shared with CNBC.

From Transactions to Transitions

What differentiates Clearwater’s approach isn’t mere digital delivery—but chronobanking. The institution’s webhook-driven integration with Alkami’s analytics captures spending anomalies (e.g., a member’s HVAC expenditures during Montana winters) to trigger preapproved home improvement loan offers before customers even recognize financing needs.

This predictive strategy comes at an inflection point: 37% of Gen Zers now consider their bank’s app more important than local branch proximity, according to Celent. For Clearwater, digital banking isn’t replacing human interaction—it’s creating engineering moments where technology faciliates the right conversation at the right time.

The credit union’s new capabilities extend beyond account holders. Using anonymized aggregate data, their ESG team measures community financial health indicators monthly—tracking metrics like small business loan utilization rates and investment account growth in historic districts. Maintaining profitability while achieving this dual mandate? Alkami’s modular architecture, which Fortune 500 banks use to add features incrementally, keeps implementation costs 31% below industry averages for similar institutions.

Having processed transactions for over 22 million users as of December 2024, Alkami differentiates itself through its API-first design. Unlike legacy core banking systems requiring full-scale replacements, their solution integrates layers—allowing clients to pilot features before full rollout. This “release early, iterate often” philosophy mirrors Silicon Valley’s deployment models while respecting the cautious compliance requirements of financial cooperatives.

As Montana’s largest certified Community Development Financial Institution (CDFI), Clearwater has been challenging regional banking norms since 1956. Their digital strategy now mirrors this ethos: using advanced analytics not for shareholder margins, but to multiply member value. The Alkami integration represents phase one of a three-part transformation charted during their recent board renewal, focusing first on homeownership enablement and ultimately small business advising.

Watch this fintech evolution unfold in real-time at clearwatercreditunion.org—where the mountains meet the metaverse.