Welcome to 2009! As I struggle to retrain my tiny brain to write 09 instead of 08, I eagerly look forward to what this year will bring! I hope all of you are putting together a solid marketing plan. I know it seems to be the same song and dance year after year, but what are you going to do differently this year?
I want you to take some time and examine your current situation and ask a tough question. That question is “Why?” Why am I in this situation? What behaviors, habits, and events have worked together to land me into my current situation – be it good or bad?
Straight answers work best here, even if it’s not what you want to hear or admit. I’ll give you a little peak into a few of these “self chats” I’ve had with myself. I put everything on paper or into files on my PC, so I can always go back and find my habits. Here’s one from a few years back:
Great mortgage marketing ideas are worth their weight in gold. In fact, I think this topic is worth a nice little chat, don’t you?
I’d would like to touch on a few points – First point being that ‘rough times’ are also hidden opportunities. Here’s an email I received from an associate of mine about 30 days ago that illustrate this point nicely:
“Hey Chad, I know you used to bid on Google Adwords a while back quite a bit. I was checking some keywords this morning and thought you would find this interesting. Last year your top 2 keywords were about $4.15 per click to maintain the #2 and 3 spots. This morning I saw that the exact same keywords are just $1.85 per click! Too funny! Not much competition these days.” Read More→
So you want to get mortgage leads in 2009 huh? Is it just me, or do the years seem to be getting shorter? Are you ready to keep the promises made this year and build the business you’ve always wanted? (One that pays very well?)
But what happens here in the real world? All these great sounding plans rarely have the staying power to make a difference right? Most plans fall by the way side as we get caught up in the day to day activities of being a loan officer.
What can be done to prevent this from happening? What lead generating activities can help you realize a great income in 2009? The following recommendations are my own personal opinions. Ultimately only you can decide what is going to work for you. Here’s my thoughts:
The Web - Saw this one coming from a mile away! You already know that the web is a great way to get mortgage leads. The internet has become a primary source of information for most of us. Weather, news, investments, research and more are all readily available.
It’s a great tool right? Are you using this tool to generate mortgage leads? If not, you’re missing out on one of the best ways imaginable to bring in more business than you can handle! I strongly urge you to learn the basics of blogging, direct marketing, and proper website deployment. Seems complex, but it really isn’t with the proper tools in place. Even the most “techno-phobic” of us can have a blog, website, and lead generating combo in place without diving too deeply into the technical part of this.
Follow Up Plan – My motto is to put as much as, if not more effort into your follow up plan as you do in prospecting! What good is a flood of leads if you cannot convert them? With such a big decision in front of them, many home buyers prefer not to make a snap decision. Heck, I know how they feel, as I do the same thing! I tend to research a bit before making a large purchase.
Knowing that most people tend to buy in this manner, you need to have an effective follow up system in place. A plan that consists of something other than “I’m calling you to touch base.” Ugh… As soon as you begin “touching base” with your prospects, you’re headed down hill. You’re a professional, and as such I’m certain you have something more valuable to offer than ‘touching base.’
Never show up empty handed when following up! Great articles, useful information, hand written thank you cards, email updates on options and more are all great additions to a follow up plan that will blow the guys who are still ‘touching base’ out of the water.
Shrink your Target, but cast a wider net – Stop going after everyone! Stop claiming that “anyone who wants to do a loan” is your target market, because it’s not true! That market is far too broad and undefined and you’ll go broke trying to tap it unless you have a 5 figure monthly advertising budget. Well… Do you? No? Good, then let’s get back to being realistic! You need to define your target, but use a bigger net to capture them if you want to generate mortgage leads with that magical quality known as ‘reliability.’. What does this illustration mean?
It means that even though you shrink your target market to a group of people you can really target effectively, you’re going to need a wider range of tools or bait to capture them. This is what I like to call ‘Market Domination.’ If you had a few web marketing activities feeding a call capture line, followed up by scheduled phone calls and finished off with automated email follow-ups, do you think you might be able to add a few extra closings per month to your pipeline?
Well of course! In fact, with such a wide net scooping up a targeted group of prospects, you stand a great chance of far exceeding just a few extra closings per month! Listen, even though I am a vendor of marketing tools for loan officers, I want you to take this advice and take action, even if it doesn’t involve my solutions.
If nothing else, get serious with yourself and ask the tough questions. Ask yourself: “Is there any legit reason why I cannot close 30 extra loans this year?” Or maybe you want to make that number 36, or 48? Whatever your goal, I want to know if there is any LEGIT reason you cannot grow your business this year.
I can tell you, for most of us the answer is no. The only thingt hat is stopping you is the lack of narrow market coupled with a big ‘ol net! Add those to the picture and suddenly this business seems a bit more exciting! Want to learn the best methods to generate mortgage leads in 2009? Here they are:
I get this question an awful lot… “If you were me, what would you do to jump-start your paycheck?” It’s a fair question as I can see where many of these loan officers are coming from. Just look at how much the market has changed.
The inherent problem in answering a question such as this one though, is I am not you. I have no clue how hard you work, if you will stick with it, what you are, or are not willing to do etc… There’s many variables involved here.
HOWEVER, let’s make a few sweeping assumptions to better allow me to answer this question. I’m going to assume that you work hard, I’m going to assume that you are telling me the truth when you say “I’ve tried everything” and I’m going to assume you’re actually working when you’re in the office, instead of emailing, and surfing the web… (Haha – You knew I couldn’t resist ribbing ya a bit there)
Ok, so what’s a great way to jump-start your pipeline?
#1 – Think big, think fast
If you listen to all the people who tell you to not expect quick turnaround for your marketing efforts, you’ll only do small minded marketing, because you EXPECT failure. When you expect failure, you “play it safe.” Can any of us really name any business, or person who has just exploded their business by “playing it safe?”
I can see an interview on TV now: “Well Bob, see, we reigned in our marketing efforts, and stopped meeting prospects and waited for them to call us, and BAM!!! Next thing you know we’re going Fortune 500!”
No. You need to THINK big before your actions will reflect and mimic your dreams.
loan officer #1 – Is thinking big. Knows he’s valuable and has a lot to offer, and he plans on getting at least 3 loans this month just from his realtor partners
loan officer #2 – Has heard that it takes 4 – 6 months from the “guru’s” to get any business from realtors
Who’s going to win this? Even if these 2 loan officers are identical in every single way EXCEPT for their mindset, who’s going to win? When you play to win, you do things you normally wouldn’t. When you do things you normally wouldn’t, you stir things up, get people excited, and HAVE FUN!
When you’re getting great results, you’re having fun right? Who can’t help but smile and laugh a bit when the loans keep piling in? It’s a great feeling. If you expect to win, you will win.
So that’s my advice for today. Try changing your thought process a bit and see what happens. ASSUME that your efforts this week will pay off big time, and then act like it’s already a reality. You’ll pick up the phone more, you’ll meet more agents, you’ll touch base with past clients, you’ll ask for referrals etc.
We’ll continue this discussion in my next post. I want to talk about the actual marketing efforts now that we have your mindset on the right path…
One final reminder that today’s free telerseminar “Kick Ass Ways to get Realtor Business” is just about full. If you have not registered to get in on this, then I recommend that you click here now.
This teleseminar will be fast and furious, and I’ll be giving away some GREAT marketing strategies including:
- 3 reasons why realtors hate you
- How to get realtor attention this week (From top producers)
- How to use the internet to generate leads
And oh yea… The free link to a website where you can login to view additional strategies today! Make this call if you can! Here’s that link again!
A few weeks ago we discussed call capture systems, now we want to have a look at your email marketing. Email is a valuable tool of course, and one that all of us should be using to generate more business. Before we go any further though, I just have to get this out of my system:
- An estimated 183 billion emails are sent each day
- 2 million emails are sent around the world each second
- There are more than 1.3 billion unique email users around the world
- The first spam email was sent in 1978 to around 600 individuals
You’ve got your website up and running, and now you want to learn how to hook more visitors to your blog… It doesn’t have to be difficult. One thing I’d really like to see is more loan officers taking an interest in online marketing strategies.
This is where the industry is headed. 87% of individuals who bought a home in 2007 surfed the web first. Who wouldn’t want to take advantage of this?
One thing that really mystifies me is why loan officers seem so resistant to learning how to market on the internet? The web is a powerful mortgage direct marketing tool that can no longer be ignored. If you’re not using the web, then you’re probably losing ground. This brings us to the big question… How do you generate mortgage leads online? Read More→
I know what you’re thinking… “Hey Chad, what the heck are you doing posting on your blog at 4:37 am Monday morning!?” Well, something has been eating at me. I needed to get it out, so here we go.
When things go wrong, what do you do? When something isn’t working for you, how do you respond? I cannot count the number of times loan officers call me up begging for a solution to their lead generation problems, but in the same breath they tell me all the things they have tried that don’t work.
I’ve created an imaginary situation for you to read. This guy is a loan officer/trainer, and this is a list of his preferred methods to market himself. Would you buy into his products/methods? (The answer will quickly become obvious)
He claims to have the solution for loan officers who want to get more business from real estate agents. Who doesn’t want that right? Take a look at his marketing strategies:
This is part 1 of a 2 part set. We give you some great “hands on” in this video, so you should watch it all the way through (Less than 9 minutes) and come back in a few days for part 2. Enjoy!
