Find What Works And Double Down
Lead generation and marketing can be complicated. There are so many possible roads to take that choosing one and sticking to it becomes extremely difficult.
Our best advice is to choose one or two of the lead generation methods weve discussed, stick with that strategy for a while, and try to maximize its potential. If it doesnt work, try to figure out why, and move on.
But if you find a strategy that works well for your business, double down. A formula that works well online is likely to continue working for a while. Whether thats content creation, ad campaigns, or social media, increase the dial and collect more data.
The possibility of generating an endless stream of mortgage leads 24/7 is not that far out of reach.
Advertising To The Community
Use Mortgage Leads Data To Know Your Conversion Process
The data you gathered while tracking your interactions with mortgage leads is very important. It will help you know which mortgage leads to still continue to follow up and which ones you need to drop. Like the fish analogy at the beginning of this article, if your net did not catch a matured fish ready for food, you need to nurture them more than usual till they are ready to convert to sales.?
You need to monitor and update the mortgage leads data in your CRM regularly to make them useful and effective.?
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With So Much Noise And Such Big Competitor Mortgage Marketing Budgets How Do You Stand Apart
How do you compete with the giants?
How do you maximize your NMLS login?
How do you improve mortgage lead generation?
Even if you are doing the right things attending networking meetings, talking to real estate agents, updating Facebook hourly it is hard to translate this activity into mortgage leads.
So what is left? Cold calling? Really? Most people we know would rather mop floors than spend time making 100 calls per day with the possibility of only one or two actual conversations.
You are better than the mortgage mills on service and price
In your heart of hearts, you know your rates, service, turn-around and return times are way better than the giant mortgage sweatshops and cubicle farms. You make every NMLS login worth it because you know your products and rates will save homebuyers many thousands of dollars over the life of their mortgages. But when you are massively outspent by the mortgage mills, its hard to get the message out there where the right homebuyers will hear it.
What Are Leads For Loan Officers
For loan officers, leads are people who are looking for a loan and have a high probability of paying back their loan. They are potential clients who are looking for a loan officers services and match the loan officers description of an ideal client. To gain a new lead, you collect the contact information of an interested potential client.
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Lead Generation Method #: Social Media Marketing
Social media giants like Facebook, Twitter, and others have made it harder for businesses to promote themselves online in recent years. Facebook, namely, has slashed the number of people that can be reached organically through normal, unpaid posts by businesses in an effort to push their advertising platform.
But even with all of the changes, social media is still a fantastic way to connect with your current and past customers, as well as acquire new ones.
Facebook is an easy place to share, create, and promote news, your content, and special offers. Its fast and straightforward to make a quick post and to share your companys latest article or video. Facebook is also a great way to display your trustworthiness as a lending institution. Prospective customers will look up as much information as they can about your firm before they ever ask you to help them originate a mortgage. Having a Facebook page with good reviews, followers, and activity will help them legitimize your services, making them more likely to reach out.
Beyond Facebook, an underutilized platform for many businesses is LinkedIn. LinkedIn is the number one social media platform for professionals. Not only does it have some of the best organic post reach out of almost all of the major social media networks, but it also is home to professionals who would make excellent business partners for your business.
Referrals And Competitive Differentiation
Having a diverse web of sources to generate new mortgage leads is critical to growing business for all but the most accomplished of MLOs.
Yes, the most consistently profitable way for a loan officer to fill their pipeline is to develop partnerships with the top real estate agents and builders in their area that consistently refer new business. Combined with a database of satisfied past customers to prospect, these sources encompass the main trio of referral-based mortgage leads.
This is no secret, nor is it surprising when a high producing LO says their business is 100% referral-based.
The downside of this truth is that every LO in the industry wants to accomplish the same thing. This creates a ridiculous amount of competition for those mortgage leads. Most Realtors and builders already have preferred partners they trust, so if you want to increase your lead velocity, its important to diversify referral sources, have a competitive differentiator, and think outside-the-box.
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Linkedin Automation For Outreach
LinkedIn is one of the best sources of leads if you are promoting yourself online. But it can also be very time-consuming, especially if youre manually prospecting. This is why automation is a lifesaver for a lot of professionals.
But can be tricky: you need to do it right or else you might end up in LinkedIn Jail. Thats just another term for getting your account restricted or suspended. LinkedIn doesnt want users to spam other users with unsolicited messages, which is unfortunately something that a lot of automation tools do.
What you need is a safe and effective way to automate your outreach on LinkedIn without putting your account at risk: You need to get Kennected.
Things To Consider When Buying Mortgage Leads
So the time has come to invest in lead companies. But how do you know which one is the right one for you?
When I was a new loan officer, finding a lead company was not easy, I can remember logging onto Yahoo, typing in the search phrase mortgage leads and being bombarded with links to lead companies all claiming to have the best leads and the best deal for me!
But what was the best deal for me? Well, what I was looking for? Taking my time, I began to write down exactly what it was I was looking for. Did I want refis, purchases, or both? Did I want leads from several states or just one? How much could I afford?
Before I invested any money, I decided to do my homework. I went to read the companies terms and conditions. I spoke with their customer service reps and asked many questions. I read reviews on the web to see what kind of experience other loan officers had with the companies I was considering.
One thing to keep in mind: No lead company can guarantee you a 100 percent closure rate, and they are very up front about that. If that is what you are looking for, you can end your search now.
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Loan Officer Salary Can Vary Widely
- Similar to a real estate agents salary, a loan officers take home pay can range dramatically
- It all depends on how much you sell/close in a given year
- If youre a top loan officer, you can make a ton of money
- If youre just an average or underperforming LO, expect comparably lower salaries
Wondering how much a loan officer makes an hour? Or what the average mortgage loan officer salary is?
Well, take note that most loan officers do not receive a base salary, only commission, so they are paid for performance. Sales performance.
The median income for a loan officer in the United States was $63,650 in 2016, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics . That works out to an hourly wage of $30.60 per hour, which isnt terrible by any stretch.
My assumption is that the number wont change a great deal in 2017 or beyond, not that I would focus on the numbers from the Bureau of Labor Statistics anyway.
A better gauge might be the quarterly reports from a company called LBA Ware, which has a ton of data on loan officer compensation.
They said the average LO produced 51% more in volume during Q3 2020 versus $1.7M per month in the same period in 2019.
And per-loan commission was 106 basis points in the third quarter of 2020, meaning the average LO made over $27,000 per month.
That works out to over $300,000 annually if theyre able to keep that up consistently.
If you break that down as an hourly wage, it could be very high if loan volume is solid and efficiency is high as well .
A/b Test Landing Pages
Testing different text, images and calls to action on your landing pages that your ads send people to is just as important as testing your actual ads. You can create three identical ads that send people to three different landing page variations and see which one performs the best as well. After youve optimized your ads, its time to start optimizing your landing pages.
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Why Use Mortgagebite Professional
As a Mortgage Loan Officer, for new ways to win. Other mortgage lead websites are overpriced and not user-friendly for you or your clients. MortgageBite is simple, direct, and you only pay for leads when you win.Spending hours and hours doing all of the work yourself can be frustrating, expensive and time-consuming.
MortgageBite’s easy lead generation system allows you to focus on closing loans, not finding them. Sign up for a free MortgageBite Profile today!
Use Long Tail Keywords
As mentioned above, the key to getting great results with search ads is to find keywords that your audience is searching for but competitors havent thought of. This can best be done by using longer, most specific keywords. These longer keyword options are called long tail keywords, while shorter options are called short tail. For example Get a mortgage or just mortgage would be short tail, while how do I get a mortgage in buffalo ny would be long tail. In general short tail keywords will have more competition and be more expensive as theyre easier to think of, so the easiest way to get cheaper clicks with search ads is to use long tail keywords. You can ad as many keywords as you want to an ad campaign so make a list of as many keywords options as you can think of and try them out. See what works and what doesnt.
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Create An Everything I Sell One
One of the number one brush-offs in sales is the Send me something request. Dont be offended, be ready. Have the one-page PDF designed to show all the options you can provide and the benefits of working with you.
Now, even customers trying to brush you off are getting one more positive brand impression from you.
Linkedin Ads & Organic Leads
LinkedIn is a professional social network with a user base that consists of CEOs, business owners, managers, marketers, recruiters, and workers from different industries. These are the people you want to target as a mortgage loan officer. Compared to users of other social networks, LinkedIn users are more likely to hire you for your services.
It has over 756 million users, and each year more people are joining LinkedIn. It also has a higher conversion rate compared to other social networks simply because professionals are more likely to convert.
When promoting your services on LinkedIn, you can go for a more text-based approach. Long-form articles tend to do better here than in other social networks, especially if they are well-written and informative. But other forms of content are welcome here too.
You can also try LinkedIn ads: this is one of the best advertising platforms when it comes to social networks. With a carefully-crafted message, you can easily reach your ideal targets using LinkedIn ads.
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Close Up More Sales With A Quick Response
One thing seafood lovers? like is freshness. A fisherman needs to catch his fish and sell it very fresh. Keeping it will make it go bad, thus selling such a fish is not workable again. The same goes for lead generation. Once you generate mortgage leads, you need to sell to them when they are fresh. Leaving them means they will grow cold, and that translates to no sales.?
A research carried out by HBR on 1.25 million sales leads received by 29 B2C and 13 B2B companies revealed that:
?Firms that tried to contact potential customers within an hour of receiving a query were nearly seven times as likely to qualify the lead as those that tried to contact the customer even an hour later and over 60 times as likely as companies that wait 24 hours or longer.?
When a visitor comes to your website and submits a lead form, they are convinced that you have something to offer them. This gives you an opportunity to quickly respond to them. If you contact them when they are still hot, you are more likely to convert them into paying customers.
This means that spending money and efforts on lead generation only becomes fruitful if leads are promptly responded to and turned into paying customers.
Do you know that taking longer than 5 minutes to contact a lead can lead to an 80% decrease in lead qualification?
Therefore, the earlier you respond to mortgage leads the better conversion you get.
Brace Yourself: Everything Is About To Be Disrupted
There is a MASSIVE elephant in the room:
Right now, mortgage brokers think they can run Facebook or Google ads, get leads, and close those leads just like the big boys can .
Theres one word preventing that from happening:
TRUST.
Did you know that mistrust is at an all-time high online, and its getting worse.
Just look at people getting scammed left and right. Getting their identies stolen..and more.
I used to think:
Once you got the lead , you were good to go. Wrong!
If youre a local mortgage broker, most likely you have NO BRANDand if someone sees you for the first time, and submits their info, youre looking at an astronomically small chance they are willing to trust you to do business right now.
So why can Lending Tree, Quicken, Rocket Mortgage, and Zillow do it, but I cant?
Good question, its called Social Proof and Brand. Almost everyone knows who they are, and they trust that they wont get scammed.
Additionally, they have massive budgets, so they can play the long game to break even.local mortgage brokers dont have that luxury.
But Dont Worry, We Have a Plan That Will Work Through 2020 and beyond for Local Mortgage Brokers.
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Create Process And Borrower Templates
Consider your routine processes and borrower communications and turn each of those activities into templates and checklists to help you quickly accomplish those tasks. These templates will help you to avoid procrastination and ensure that all of the details are covered.
Another benefit to templates in this area is that they are carefully considered and can be reviewed for compliance no problematic statements or characterizations as you try to speed the process for your clients.
Lead Nurture Method #: An Email List
Email lists are amazing for three reasons:
Youre marketing to people who have agreed to hear from you.
Youre marketing to people in a personal way.
Youre marketing to people on demand.
Because of spam laws and regulations, anyone you add to an email list must give express permission for you to do so. Otherwise, they may report you for spam, and you could face heavy penalties. But as long as you have permission, sending emails to an expanding list of subscribers can be one of the most powerful ways to create new business.
You can send many different types of emails. Some of the more common ones are:
Company newsletters
Insights
News curation
Be sure that whatever youre sending to your email list provides value. Also be sure to come from a place of helpfulness, not sales. Overselling in your emails will lead to a higher unsubscribe rate. Only trickle in special offers every so often.
To get started, simply use one of the many email systems on the market, build a list, and watch the leads flow seamlessly.
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