It’s Critical You Ask Yourself…

My post is two – fold today. Something useful, and something entertaining! It’s Friday, it’s ok for me to share…

Today I want you to ask yourself questions about your current mortgage marketing efforts. Your marketing should accomplish 3 things.

1. It should reach large groups of people

2. It should be focused to grab attention

3. It should be targeted at likely targets

Why do I bring this up? Because even those who nod their heads yes, and claim to understand these facts don’t do anything about it! When I began building websites and online marketing strategies for loan officers, I had a unique opportunity to look closely at what most lenders use as a website, as a mortgage marketing plan, as a lead generator.

Let me tell you, there’s a reason most loan officers are not earning money from their websites! Why not?

1. The same loan officers who claim they already know they should target large groups of people, and also claim that hey “do” – most definitely do not. Less than 5% of the websites and online marketing plans I’ve reviewed for both individual loan officers, and larger offices get more than 2 or 3 visitors to their site per day.

In fact, most of these websites are all but invisible to the search engines and impossible to find by anyone interested in a mortgage. Please don’t make this mistake. It’s costly, it’s frustrating, and it’s unnecessary. A little bit of online mortgage marketing attention can go a long way!

2. Repeat after me: “Get a free quote now” is not a call to action! Well, maybe it is, but it’s not a good one. Yet I see this one phrase on the front page of nearly every mortgage website I stumble across. The call to action begins with, and ends with this one line.

This accomplishes little more than screaming to your prospects: “Hey! I’m just like every other website you’ve browsed and other than shopping for a rate and closing costs, you won’t get anything new here!” Think about it. Your website is you. As far as the prospect is concerned, this is likely the first exposure they’ve had to your business, and the only basis for judging your worth to them.

By placing a tired, overused statement on your front page as the one and only call to action, you’re telling them that you’ve got nothing else of value to offer. Not the message you would hope to communicate right? It’s an honest mistake for most, but one that should be rectified as soon as possible.

Put yourself into the shoes of a prospect visiting your website. What concerns would you have? What would grab your attention? Usable information right? Preferably offered up for free. Articles, how to, blog posts, and lead capture forms offering a report or “mini-course” that will help them avoid mistakes are all great ways to stimulate interest and capture leads.

3. Once again, most mortgage marketing I stumble across would not pass inspection when it comes to targeting prospects. Yes, it can be difficult to focus your energies and efforts on a niche market when you see so many possibilities – not wanting to let opportunities slip through the cracks.

But if you’re serious about closing more loans, and you want to give your marketing efforts a boost, then it’s time to figure out just who you are selling to and why. Most websites are a large mass of links, with no true direction. They try to be all things to all people in the hopes that whether you’re a FSBO, a first time home buyer, a move up buyer, an FHA candidate, a refi prospect, a mortgage mod prospect, a…. Well you get the point.

When you try to get 1 website to sell well to so many different prospects, all that is really accomplished is the message is severely diluted. It’s a lot like the guy trying to be the jack of all trades – ends up doing lots of things, but none of them all that well.

With all that said, I hope this is taken to heart. I may be quite gruff, or blunt at times, but I prefer to tell it how it is as opposed to beating around the bush. This is your career after all, and it’s an important topic worthy of a critical eye.

If you’d like to learn more about using your website as a mortgage marketing tool, here’s a link for you to check out: marketing online

Now… Onto the fun part. I received an email last night with pictures of cakes. That’s right, the pics below are all just flour, sugar, eggs, and frosting. (Ok, a few more ingredients – But impressive no?) – I want to eat the soda can cake…

Hope you found this interesting! Hey look, whoever made this cake even fashioned a cord and plug on the money machine! Attention to detail. Now to salvage my image as posting on topic and relevant blog posts? Well, what can we learn from this? That anything, even making a cake can be elevated to a fascinating level.

I’m stunned by the talent and creativity on display here, how about you? These images have been forwarded from email to email millions of times. They’re cakes! Did you wake up this morning thinking you’d be stunned by pictures of a cake? Point being that we as a people appreciate excellence. Put the same level of excellence into your marketing efforts.

Don’t make this an ordinary day, make it extraordinary. Ok, I’m off to go grab myself a boring and  likely very square cake from the bakery…  At least it will taste good…

CW – Online Mortgage Marketing Website Kit