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Tips From Tibbs: Vendor Marketing Guide
November 6, 2023
The fine line between being successful and being stagnant in the equipment finance industry can easily be determined by vendor relationships. Cheryl Tibbs (CEO/Owner at Equipment Lease Co.), a veteran in the field, recently released her Vendor Marketing Guide this past October. The ten-chapter booklet covers various aspects, including vendor marketing, contact building, crafting value propositions, and more.
Vendors are businesses authorized to sell equipment to end-users, Tibbs explains, and establishing a relationship with them can take a broker that is used to hunting for individual deals to instead being the recipient of multiple deals per week. But how to get that business is where most brokers get stuck.
“I think a lot of brokers get stuck with, ‘Well, how do I find vendors and what exactly is a vendor?’” she told deBanked. “I think that chapter three sticks out in particular, just making contact, knowing how to find a vendor, what to say when you get a vendor on the hook, and how to engage with that vendor.”
Tibbs said that brokers often assume that vendors already have a bank in-house when that is not always the case. This thinking might also lead them to shoot too low even when they do solicit them.
“A lot of equipment brokers they market to vendors and say, ‘Hey, send me the stuff that your people won’t finance’ and I think if you ask for trash, you’re going to get trash,” said Tibbs. If a relationship is built properly, a broker can get the vendor’s A-paper clients, she added.
Not only does the guide breakdown vendor relationships but also provides examples of how to pursue them, whether it be email, in-person, etc. The guide is not where education ends for brokers, however. Tibbs believes it’s an on-going learning experience.
“I think if you’re making money and you’re building these relationships, that’s motivation in and of itself, to continue to sharpen your knowledge with regard to this,” she said.
A Thousand People Expected at deBanked CONNECT MIAMI 2026
February 9, 2026deBanked CONNECT MIAMI 2026 taking place on February 12 at the Fontainebleau in Miami Beach is projected to log more than 1,000 registrations. If you were on the fence about going, this is the event to go to if you work in or with the small business finance industry. Due to capacity, registration could shut off in advance of the event so be sure to have your tickets already. You can REGISTER HERE.
deBanked MIAMI on Track for Record Event
January 29, 2026deBanked CONNECT MIAMI 2026 taking place on February 12 at the Fontainebleau in Miami Beach is currently on pace for deBanked’s largest event turnout in history. If you were on the fence about going, this is the event to go to if you work in or with the small business finance industry. Due to capacity, registration could shut off in advance of the event so be sure to have your tickets already. You can REGISTER HERE.
Becoming a Successful Broker
January 22, 2026ARE YOU READY FOR DEBANKED CONNECT MIAMI 2026?!
Check out the full agenda for February 12th at the Fontainebleau.
There will also be tech demos happening non-stop on the show floor. This event is one you won’t want to miss.
REGISTER BEFORE IT’S TOO LATE.
Role-playing and The Value of Practicing Sales Calls
March 31, 2025deBanked asked several brokers over the past month about the value of role-playing with colleagues to prepare for real life sales engagements. Below are some excerpts of what they said.
Cheryl Tibbs, Commercial Capital Connect: “Before my broker life, I was a call center supervisor, so just really familiar with call centers making cold calls and that type of thing. So it’s very important [to role play], I think you have to practice. You don’t want to read a script, you don’t want to sound robotic, but you want to be engaged enough where you can have a good conversation with people without having to really think about it.”
Is there a point where practice is no longer necessary?
“Our industry changes day-to-day, little by little, things are changing. So I think it’s just always incumbent upon us to sharpen our skills. That means practicing at least once a week.”
Josh Feinberg, Everlasting Capital: “Role-playing is like stretching before going for a run. It makes it possible for you to be fast on your feet and really be able to have the answers when you’re talking to a, let’s just say, a construction company that does equipment financing, and they’ve financed all of their equipment. A lot of times they’re going to be more knowledgeable about the equipment financing and leasing product than a lot of the brokers that are going to be talking to them in regards to it.”
Is this something you do with your own reps?
“Yes, especially when someone is newer or starting out, role playing is essential to even a point just like on Equipping The Dream, we need to make sure that we’re call-coaching too. While we’re listening to them on the phone we’re in their ear telling them what to say, just to have them get used to it. And then we do a bunch of different role playing…we’ve done it hundreds and thousands of times over the years”
Adam Oster, Canyongate Financial: “We have a set list of questions: understanding the merchants needs and building that relationship. And if I know somebody’s really good but they’re not doing well, then we’ll go back and say, ‘Hey, let’s role play. Because there’s something—you’re too complacent, you’re missing something, or you’re not listening to the customer.’ So role play is very important.”
How does this take place?
“If they’re here locally, we’ll do it in-house a lot of times. I’ve got a couple people—one in California, one in Austin, Texas, so we have to do it over the phone. And if somebody’s thriving, I’ll ask them, ‘What are you doing? What are you saying to your dealerships or your customers that are helping you get deals?'”
How AI is Scaling a Veteran Small Business Financing Brokerage to New Heights
March 19, 2025“There are [AI] voice systems out there that have just blown me away,” said Cheryl Tibbs, owner of Atlanta-based Commercial Capital Connect. “So we are using those and I’m implementing some in my office in my day to day—we have an AI receptionist that answers the phone, it just frees up time.”
As a broker, Tibbs recognizes the value of being able to answer a potential client anytime, anywhere, but there needs to be time to sleep, train others, and expand as well. And thanks to the advent of actual AI, it’s now become increasingly possible to scale on multiple fronts where it wasn’t before. Tibbs told deBanked that she’s been using AI to duplicate herself across anything she can.
“So we train these models on everything about our business, everything about us, and it can just answer questions, either through chat or having a conversation,” she said.
AI can call leads or qualify a customer through online chat at three in the morning if need be—not theoretically; it’s doing it for her already.
“Some mornings I wake up, I see full conversations between the conversational AI and somebody that filled out a lead form,” she said. “The chat agent has the ability to send them a text message with our full application link, or book them on our calendar.”
But more customers coming in the door means more questions from her team about where to place a deal. She’s got a solution for that, a bot she created named BrokerBuddy that can answer on her behalf when she’s not available to do it herself.
“I trained it on most of the lender guidelines that we work with, so they can just go in and just type a question, you know, ‘hey, BrokerBuddy, I’ve got a customer with a 680 FICO score.’ He says, ‘two years time in business, looking to buy a $40,000 skid steer. What else should I ask him? Which lender in our organization do you think will do this deal?'”
There’s a role for AI to just skip the questions and place a deal all by itself using advanced algorithms, something many tech companies tout these days, but the human nuance is a key component to her service, since any deal could be equipment financing, SBA, or working capital rather than solely one thing. It’s not always immediately obvious which one it’s going to be or what the customer would prefer. Way back in the day, Tibbs started purely with MCAs, back when they could only be done via a credit card machine. Since then she added equipment financing, working capital loans, and SBAs. For a long time now, she’s offered it all. She pairs up customers with the best fit and relies on her knowledge and relationships to know what’s going to work and what’s not.
“SBA is a hot button right now and merchants are really excited to know that this is definitely a possibility,” Tibbs said.
One opportunity with SBAs in particular is to consolidate MCAs, which, if the business owners qualify, can have a tremendous impact. Sometimes these business owners find her by seeing her posts online, and they reach out. Maybe it’s her they’ll get right away, or maybe it’s her AI. In any case, all of her experience has long since led other brokers to refer their own business to her, since she has a reputation for being able to get the deals done.
“I’ve been operating as a super broker most of the 20 to 25 years that I’ve been in this alternative space,” she said, “and as a super broker, I’m able to offer my broker partners more stuff than they even thought about. […] I study this stuff. I eat, live, and breathe it.”
While it’s unclear if AI qualifies as alive, her band of automated agents are beginning to breathe the rush of it all right alongside her. So many brokers (and lenders) are diversifying their product sets that her referral business is escalating, and she wouldn’t be able to scale without the assistance.
“Even though we get appointments, if we’re not on the phone with that merchant usually within three to five minutes, sometimes it’s hard to get them back on the phone. And even if they make an appointment, they may not show up. Having that instant engagement it definitely helps.”
Broker Battle Finds a Champion
January 14, 2024At the Miami Beach Convention Center in Miami Beach, Florida, thousands of viewers packed a hall to witness the first ever Broker Battle™ at deBanked CONNECT. After the rules of the competition were explained, six broker contestants waited eagerly for their turn to face four judges and with that a chance to win a grand prize of $5,000. Their goal? Choose from one of three pre-defined sales scenarios and show off their knowledge and abilities to the judges. Here’s what happened:
The Broker Battle was introduced
Broker Battle judge Daniel Dames (Bitty Advance) held up a Title belt
Irving Betesh (Advance Funds Network) had the distinction of going first. He came prepared!
The contestants continued one by one alphabetically by last name
The conversational role playing on the stage covered the gamut, ranging from explaining APRs and contract terminology to diagnosing customer needs or trying to earn a customer’s business. Below, judges Jared Weitz (United Capital Source) and Cheryl Tibbs (Equipment LeaseCo Inc) listen in to a contestant’s pitch.
Mike Brooks (Best Connect Capital) came in with his own style
Corey Digi (Lexington Capital Group) put up a strong showing
Stanley Mitchell (CLM Financial) goes to work
Danielle Rivelli (United Capital Source) showed off her experience
Anthony Truglia (CapFront) made it known the competition wasn’t over yet
The judges had to add up their scores for each contestant to find out which TWO would make it into the final championship battle
Second from the right is judge Leo Vargas (Triton Recovery Group).
Anthony Truglia and Danielle Rivelli are declared the two finalists after racking up the highest scores
The final sales scenario is revealed!
Both contestants have to compete on stage at the same time! Oh my!
The contestants are sent offstage so the judges can deliberate
And the winner is…
Anthony Truglia!
All photos from the Broker Battle here
All photos from the rest of deBanked CONNECT MIAMI here
deBanked would like to thank all of the amazing broker contestants for participating in something bold and brand new. Thank you to Anthony Truglia, Danielle Rivelli, Corey Digi, Irving Betesh, Stanley Mitchell, and Mike Brooks. Gratitude is also directed towards the judges for their efforts, Cheryl Tibbs, Daniel Dames, Jared Weitz, and Leo Vargas.
deBanked hopes that this competition inspires all brokers to become better, to further master their knowledge of available products, legal compliance, style, and confidence. A video highlight reel of the competition is in post-production.
Interested in more from deBanked? Contact us at info@debanked.com or call 212-220-9084.
Leveraging ChatGPT for Maximum Productivity
July 28, 2023
“…It’s just been pretty impressive how we have this technology that came out that has literally changed everything, and it was almost overnight,” said Kareem Jernigan, CFO at Leasing Associates Inc.
Earlier this week the Black Equipment Finance Network (BEFN) hosted a webinar titled ‘Leveraging ChatGPT for Maximum Productivity’ for the equipment finance space. The panelists were Cheryl Tibbs, George Parker, and Kareem Jernigan.
Jernigan is already using ChatGPT in his daily work life. In one example, he said that he commonly uses it to analyze and find errors in spreadsheets. In another, he’s saving a lot of the time he normally spent on writing.
“…I also run HR, and so I have to craft communications and/or policies,” he said, “so, when you think of crafting a policy or a communication that you have to send out, before ChatGPT that would be something that would take 4 or 5 hours to do. […] That task today I could get that done in 30 minutes.”
Meanwhile, George Parker, Co-CEO at VenSource Capital, said “You can use ChatGPT with training staff. You can develop training material. You can give tests and quizzes. You can design training programs with time as an element, it can do all of that. You can even design courses with ChatGPT. You can tell ChatGPT to come up with a time frame for learning each part of a subject.”
Parker added that ChatGPT can be used for brainstorming, articles, planning, meeting content, customer service responses, and more.
Even in the finer details of equipment financing itself, the panelists said that ChatGPT can produce credit assessment profiles and analysis, analyze and summarize financial data, and scrutinize contracts,
Of course, all of this only works if one understands what to put in and takes the care to evaluate what comes out. It’s all about the proper “prompt.” One example offered of a prompt that wouldn’t work is: “teach me credit analysis.” Something like that would be too vague and would result in a response that was too broad. Part of the reason there are panels and webinars about ChatGPT to begin with is so the industry can learn how to leverage it for maximum productivity.
The CrackDown Is On! Great Article Sean... tibbs, in the september/october issue of debanked magazine. she warned that fake funders can steal deals and pocket the entire commission. they solicit deals in online forums, by email message or over the phone, and then they offer the deals to companies that really do function as direct funders, she said., , while no online forum was specified in the story, at least two forums have responded by cracking down on anonymity by suspending or banning violators., , the age of the gmail funder is coming to a close. dont buy leads from hotleads4u69@hotmail.comand definitely dont syndicate with a company that has no known address.... |
See Post... tibbs being one of them gave her a scenario yesterday and in 10 minutes she responded back very professional., , thanks again , df!!, , richard taylor, vice president of sales, , arcarius llc, direct: 201-676-2137, cell: 201-953-003... |
See Post... tibbs, , , i just want to confirm the difference between the two payoff amounts. there is no additional fee charged if a merchant pays us off through a third p... |
