Shastic, the company that developed the Facebook loan calculatorCalcubot, has announced a partnership withMeridianLink that will allow credit unionsusing that loan origination system to track loans begun on Facebookall way through closing.

Calcubot walks prospective loan customers through an interactivebuying process tailored to a credit union's lending products,according to Shastic, a Berkeley, Calif.-based technology company thatspecializes in providing online loan generation solutions.

Prospects are recaptured through the use of social mechanismscentered on interactions with co-signers and smart alerts. Calcubotthen leads prospects into the institution's loan applicationprocess and tracks conversions.

The $2.2 billion KeeslerFederal Credit Union in Biloxi, Miss., has been using Calcubotto publicize their auto and other loan programs with youngermembers since mid-2012 and came up with a way to track how manyloan applications the Calcubot entries generated, John Williamson,Keesler FCU web content manager, said.

The credit union has an optional field in its application whereit asks the member for a code number that they could have onlygotten from the Calcubot application, Williamson explained. Thisdevice allowed Keesler FCU to determine that members were fillingout loan applications after using the Calcubot calculator.

“Combining MeridianLink, an industry powerhouse, with theinnovations that Shastic brings to the market creates the potentialfor bringing lending to the next generation,” Ron Shevlin, senioranalyst at Aite Group, said.