Melissa Wright Chief Sales & Marketing Officer at American Pacific Mortgage, Most Inspiring Finance Leaders of 2021 Profile

Melissa Wright
Chief Sales & Marketing Officer at American Pacific Mortgage


Melissa Wright Chief Sales & Marketing Officer at American Pacific Mortgage, Most Inspiring Finance Leaders of 2021

“Leading the People & Company to New Heights”

Melissa Wright faced the daunting task of rebranding American Pacific Mortgage Corporation (APM) early in her tenure. Since APM had been around for over 25 years, there was a lot to look at and take into account. She took a holistic approach to the rebranding of APM, looking at their core values and who they are as a company and (perhaps more importantly) at how others see them. She worked with a team to hone in on the voice of the company and with each member of the senior leadership team to tell the story of APM going forward in their voices. Her imprint can be seen in all areas of the company, both internally and externally, from visuals to communication, to sales and marketing strategies.

“I was very lucky to have had great mentors and a strong network, leading to my taking over as president of a large mortgage company early in my career,” says Melissa. “This served me well when I recently took over as Cheif Sales & marketing Officer for APM. I’ve spent a lot of years building and managing branches and the revenue of the company, while also managing the marketing department and our strategic objectives. Yet, coming into 2022 I will be transitioning to focus full-time on growing the success of the company and its originators, and leveraging proven marketing and sales strategies to help them and the company succeed.”

Melissa has had the amazing opportunity to formally mentor young women, mostly during their high-school years . “I was vested in growing their confidence, nurturing their dreams, and encouraging them of their value in the world. It’s been such a highlight of my life to watch these girls turn into amazing women, leaders, entrepreneurs, mothers and stellar humans,” she says. “The biggest lesson I’ve learned is to listen and trust. Listening to what people are saying is important, but really hearing what an underlying issue might be is crucial to mentoring, growing, and building a team and growing as a leader myself.” Armed with this unique ideology, Melissa has taken the company to new heights.

APM was born out of a single originator wanting to do it better. That hasn’t changed, and Kurt Reisig has seen to that. It’s in their DNA to constantly do better and be better. Pain points are always there, but they lead by doing as a company. Nearly every one of the leaders has spent time as an originator, so they understand what it’s like to sit across the table from a borrower or referral partner. “The biggest pain points we’re facing are similar to what the rest of the industry is facing – increased costs of doing business, growing our business regardless of outside forces, and maintaining our integrity and core values throughout,” explains Melissa. “A lot of companies talk about culture, but APM is different – you see every team member, including leadership, truly walking the walk. We treat everyone like family because no matter how much we grow and change the underlying feeling is that we ARE family. Part of my job is to keep that in the forefront of everything we do, both internally and externally, and to help people new to the family not only get it but feel it.”

The company’s most significant ongoing project is what they call Project PRIMO. It’s a global view of the entire process of originating, processing, and closing a loan, both internally for loan officers and operations and externally for the customers. PRIMO stands for Production Reimagined and Modernized, and while they have launched several pieces of the project, including AI underwriting, changes to how they leverage their resources, they are continuing to focus on putting tools in the hands of the loan officers to take as much friction out of the origination process as possible. “Internally, our focus is 100% on our customers – the originators. Making them more efficient so that they spend their time in front of a borrower is our top priority. Externally, we want every client who is going through the process with APM to leave knowing they’ve made the right decision, and that their experience matters to us.” IEWL


Company

American Pacific Mortgage

Management

Melissa Wright
Chief Sales & Marketing Officer
American Pacific Mortgage

Description

American Pacific Mortgage has been helping customers reach their homeownership goals since 1996. We are a company built and led by a senior group with decades of experience in mortgage lending.


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