Stay Connected, Stay Social, Stay Relevant with your Leads

By | Mortgage Business Tips | No Comments

buildingtrustNobody will refute that a lot of blood, sweat and tears goes into gaining leads from Realtors, past customers, your website, Zillow and other lead-generating sites.

At first, each lead is treated like a sudden jackpot and you pour plenty of excited energy into each one and this produces results. Then you get busy. Then you get choosy. Then you even get a little bit annoyed at those, “not-so-hot” leads…you know the ones with overly complicated financial scenarios, the ones you called once or twice and never heard back from, the ones you pre-qual who go totally M.I.A. These leads just hurt your brain and so you conveniently leave their contact info and some scribbled notes in a drawer or folder some place and they never hear or see your name again.

The key nowadays to converting more leads is to stay connected and to stay social. And, even if that lead never becomes ready to buy or refinance for whatever reasons, drawing these leads closer to you out of the gates will gain their referrals to their very-ready friends, family and co-workers and why will they do that?… because they will feel like they know, like and trust you.

P.S. you cannot achieve the, “know, like and trust you factor” just with an email drip campaign.

Here are three tools to easily stay connected and social (And, RELEVANT, by the way)with every lead you gain:

Let’s say all you’ve got is a cell number and a name, you can always take that info and upload it to SlyBroadcast.com, which is a great time savings tool, and then send out pre-recorded messages to that entire group of long lost leads so they can hear your voice. A quick tip about leaving messages and using SlyBroadcast type messaging-Always keep your messages brief, very upbeat and speak like you’re already well-acquainted. Again, you want to bridge that, “know, like and trust factor.”

Always immediately look for your leads on LinkedIn and Facebook and connect there so you become familiar to them on a regular basis through your own postings. Again, this draws them closer to you on a more personal and social level, helps to build-up the trust factor and creates no extra work for you.

Lastly, rather than emailing, try mass texting tools like Mighty Text for Androids (there are apps for iPhone, too!) where you can send one general message out to an entire group from your smart phone. The message will look like an individual, personal text to your receivers. Texting is an immediate communication avenue, much more so than email and absolutely will gain more response.

Voice broadcast tools like, SlyBroadcast.com, connecting via social media avenues and utilizing mass texting services are all superior time-savings tools to bringing the leads you’ve worked so hard to get, closer to you (with much less effort/time) and will absolutely increase referrals, as well as your lead to close conversion ratio.

Are you Behaving in Ways that Lead to Success?

By | Mortgage Business Tips | No Comments

successleaderI have been coaching mortgage professionals for over 10 years now and I can tell you there are 3 telltale signs of a person which indicate to me a very strong probability that they will hit their stated goals and then-some…

The most successful Mortgage Professionals tend to be:

1.   Self-disciplined

2.   Action-oriented

3.   Risk takers

Self-discipline is at the top of the list because without it, most sales folks will fall victim to inconsistent lead generation, revolving door relationships and wasting time constantly recreating the wheel so to speak.

Some characteristics of a self-disciplined mortgage professional:

  • Writes and reviews goals
  • Adheres to positive habits and when they fall off the wagon, they’re fast at getting back on it
  • Plans out their weeks ahead of time
  • Creates systems
  • Gets fueled-up by completing task lists

Some characteristics of action-oriented mortgage professionals:

  • Asks a lot of questions about how to get things done
  • Engages in a fair amount of networking
  • Doesn’t have a tendency to get caught up in details
  • Rallies others to help them implement tasks
  • Produces a variety of opportunities from week to week

Some characteristics of risk-taker mortgage professionals:

  • Significant income growth
  • Creates various streams of income
  • Involved in community/strong public identity
  • Speaker/Presentations
  • Manages a significant support staff

The Most Common Mistakes of Struggling, Producing Mortgage Managers

By | Mortgage Business Tips | No Comments

overwhelmedmanagerOk, for all you thick-skinned producing mortgage managers struggling to juggle it all and feeling like you’re the only one who can’t seem to handle the competing work load in front of you, such as:

  • Originating loans
  • Recruiting
  • Managing
  • Networking
  • Marketing
  • Trouble shooting
  • Training
  • Corporate meetings
  • Sales meetings
  • PNLs, Expense Reports, Tracking overhead and all other Corporate-related documentation, surveys and reports you are required to submit…

YOU ARE NOT ALONE!

Reality is that when you opted to have your cake and eat it too, you knowingly or unknowingly accepted the fact that being an A+ Sales Professional and an A+ Manager at the same time, would be a near impossible feat to achieve.

Now of course everyone’s definition of what it means to be A+ at something is going to vary and at the end of the day what really matters is that you go home from work feeling accomplished, satisfied with your efforts, up for tackling tomorrow’s challenges and fully expecting victories.

But what do you do if you don’t feel that way much of the time and after some introspection and a thorough review of your business numbers you find that you’re not setting the world on fire in your origination and your team seems to be sucking wind, too?

First, read through the following most common mistakes of struggling, producing mortgage managers and jot down everything that you can honestly admit that you are guilty of and willing to change.

Next, set a goal to focus on 3 of the items for the remainder of the year and certainly feel free to reach out to me for a complimentary session as the solutions to each of these issues are abundant and I’m happy to share my insights on what would work best for YOU and your particular set of circumstances.

Top 3 Most Common Mistakes of Struggling, Producing Mortgage Managers:

Poor hiring practices: Does not cast a big enough net to locate candidates-Lacks a standard interviewing process-Does little to no background investigation of ability to produce/sell-Hires based on personality vs. sales abilities-Hires friends/family members- Hiring out of desperation to fill seats, rather than waiting for the, “right” team players to fill roles.

Poor management style: Acts as a crutch, a motherly/fatherly figure rather than empowering team players and teaching them how to find their own solutions-No set on-boarding & training schedule for new hires-No set scheduled time for employee concerns, questions, suggestions, loan challenges, etc.-Brings personal issues/shares personal issues at work-Leans towards wanting to be liked more than wanting to lead- Blames Corporate for challenges-Passes the buck-No accountability measures-No formal progress reviews-Does not walk their talk-No communication regarding goals & vision, expectations & boundaries.

Poor planning/poor time-management: Does not engage in daily planning-Does not review and reset goals on a weekly basis-Does not review business numbers consistently-Lacks a Business Plan-Lacks a proper project management system-Does not fully utilize/embrace tools & technology-Does not properly delegate-No set work hours-Allows too many personal/family interruptions.

How to Pin-Point Opportunities with Potential Referral Partners

By | Mortgage Business Tips | No Comments

coffeemeetingtodayGetting comfortable with facilitating VALUABLE face to face meetings with potential referral partners such as, Realtors, Financial Planners, CPAs, Attorneys & Insurance Agents is the key to opening up opportunities and quickly identifying if the person with whom you are meeting, is a good target for you for cross-referral purposes or not.

It’s important to have a set of open-ended questions prepared that will allow the other person to be in the spot light and share their business growth goals, hopes, ideas and challenges with you so that you can pin-point ways in which you can help them and vice versa.

Here are two sets of questions that I hope will aid you in this extremely important endeavor, which is a key pillar to growing your business…

Questions for Financial Planners, CPAs & Insurance Agents

  1. What types of marketing methods or lead-generating type activities are you engaging in this year to grow your business?
  2. How are you hoping to separate yourself from the competition, your brand, your special services, tools or systems you offer, etc?
  3. Where do you network or what groups or memberships or associations are you a part of that helps you to meet people and add them to your database?
  4. Do you ever give presentation or, “Lunch-n-Learns” for your clients or for the general public?
  5. If you felt zero fear, what would you do in order to build-up your business?

Questions for Realtors

  1. What types of marketing methods or lead-generating type activities are you engaging in this year to grow your business?
  1. How are you hoping to separate yourself from the competition, your brand, your special services, tools or systems you offer, etc?
  2. Where do you network or what groups or memberships or associations are you a part of that helps you to meet people and add them to your database?
  3. What do you feel are some of the biggest mistakes you’ve seen Realtors make, that you want to make sure to avoid?
  4. What types of scenarios have been creating hiccups for you and your clients in terms of closing deals and working within today’s mortgage loan processing environment? (This is how we get them to open up about “complaints” “gripes” “mishaps/disappointments” with other Lenders)
  5. Is there any type of home buyer situation that has been tripping up your team, such as condos, 203K, VA buyers, buyers from overseas, down payment assistance issues, etc.?

Come prepared to your face to face meetings, ready to facilitate, ready to inquire, ready to listen!

Will YOU Benefit from Hiring a Coach?

By | Mortgage Business Tips | No Comments

CoachsCornerclearfearNot everyone is ready or in the right frame of mind to truly benefit from engaging with a partner whose whole purpose, drive, expertise and mission in life is to help you achieve exactly what you really, really want!

Seems odd to think that someone might not be ready or willing to receive everything that they really, really want, right? However, to get those things that we set our sights on, that seem challenging at the least and impossible at the worst, we have to be willing to change and possibly, change a whole lot!

Obviously there is something keeping us from getting what we want and if nothing needed to change, well…we’d already be living the life we envision or in possession of the things we covet, right?

Change is the most difficult experience to embrace and enact. Hence the reason why there are a million different varieties of coaching: business coaching, life coaching, executive coaching, relationship coaching, creativity coaching, wellness coaching and the niches go on and on…

But at the very core of each coaching discipline, you find one person or persons helping another person or persons to change in some capacity.

Here are four questions to ask yourself prior to reaching out to a Coach:

  1. Do you know what you want to change?
  2. Are you passionate about what you want to change?
  3. Are you willing to do things differently in order to bring about change?
  4. Is the change you seek, something worth failing to achieve at, over and over again until the change happens?

If you can answer Yes to all four questions, then you’re ready to investigate coaching.

If you answered No to any of the questions, then the return on investment you hope to gain from a coaching relationship will likely take A LOT LONGER to achieve as you and your Coach whittle away at deeper issues that may be better suited to discuss with a licensed therapist or clinical psychiatrist skilled at deeper-rooted challenges.

If this is something you suspect you might need, it’s important to ask the Coaches you interview if they have those credentials.

Please don’t misinterpret what I’m saying here, just because you don’t get everything done on your to-do list in a day and you feel fear at the thought of calling on prospects sometimes or speaking in front of a group, or you get down in the dumps because the industry can be challenging, does not mean you need a shrink necessarily.

My point is simply that there’s a difference between everyday challenges vs. chronic stalemates and there are the right professionals for each situation so just make sure you align yourself with the proper expert for your situation.

Every Coach has their own unique methods to assisting their clients to achieve MORE from their business and/or personal lives.

In my particular mortgage-specific, business coaching platform, I help my clients to…

  1. turn wishes into goals and goals into calendar-driven action plans
  2. consider alternate perspectives/stretch out of one’s comfort zones
  3. embrace already-proven business growth strategies that fit your personality type
  4. hone-in on your strong points as a sales person and leverage those strong points
  5. incorporate your passions/interests into your business
  6. balance competing priorities between home and work
  7. remain focused on high pay-off activities
  8. determine business growth strategies that fit your current capacity
  9. use solution-based thinking as you approach challenges and make decisions.
  10. identify and eliminate “time-sucking & energy-draining” activities, tasks, people and mindsets from your daily experiences.

To aid you in uncovering the best Coach match for YOU, please download my Coach Interview Questionnaire Knowing the right questions to ask will save you time, money and oodles of frustration and disappointment.

Rise Up and Tackle Today!

By | Mortgage Business Tips | No Comments

catinmirroWe all only get one spin around this amazing lifetime and just as our parents would annoyingly tell us, “Time only goes by faster as you get older, so you better enjoy it.” Don’t you just hate how so many of those parental nuggets of truth are dead-on? Darn it!

What’s truer still, though we don’t hear it as often as would be helpful, is that our happiness stems from our choices.

If you think about all your happiest memories, best victories, times when you, “slayed the dragon” so to speak, weren’t they all colored by your choices? And didn’t they feel brilliant because you had somehow risen to the occasion, rose above the challenges, climbed that mountain or pushed that enormous bolder up hill?

It’s no coincidence that our very own cliché’s for happiness and victory involve, rising.

Today is a new day and THANK GOD you made it. Look for one thing you’ve been avoiding in your business and tackle it with gusto and gratitude. Remember, if you weren’t presented with challenges how could you ever know the joy of rising?

Three Near & Clear Ways to Grow your Business

By | Mortgage Business Tips | No Comments

getoclasswithcoachvDo you know how to harness the power of the low hanging fruit that is available to you to drive in more business?

Learn the strategies to steer your business towards the top 3 near and clear ways that immediately drive in additional production from an experienced mortgage professionals business coach. Then learn how to actually execute these strategies in a database /CRM tool from a mortgage industry database management and marketing expert.

If you are a mortgage professional, or manage a team of mortgage professionals, this webinar will provide you with the blueprint and the tools that make an immediate upswing to your revenue stream.

SIGN UP HERE for your free limited time access to the webinar

Is Your Business Truly Customer Centric?

By | Mortgage Business Tips | No Comments

customercentricMortgage Professionals must keep a keen focus on their customers at all times. If they don’t, the outcome has a direct and immediate effect on their pocket books.

The assurance of a regularly generated paycheck, is simply not part of the Loan Officer package. Every dollar derived is in direct correlation to the Loan Officer’s individual efforts with their customers.

Your answers to the following, highly-specific, customer related questions may be a tough pill to swallow if you’re not ready to tell yourself the 100% truth. However, I believe, if you’re up for the challenge, your answers to these questions will lead you to take actions that will surely have a positive impact on your pocket book in 2017 and beyond.

If you happen to be a Manager, this is a GREAT list of questions to share with your sales team and ask them to submit their answers anonymously (encourages more real, candid answers). The answers will help you to pin-point training, tools and other resource needs you can develop to help your team to improve their performance.

For example if you discover that the majority of your team could not adequately answer question #24, you could conduct a sales call or meeting on how to write a Unique Value Proposition.

  1. Do you do what you say your going to do BEFORE you say you are going to do it?
  2. Do you take a complete application, ask your clients the right questions and get the appropriate information/documentation up front?
  3. Do you know your program underwriting guidelines?
  4. Do your underwriters think you know your underwriting guidelines?
  5. Do your processors respect you?
  6. Do the processors in your office refer their family and friends to YOU?
  7. Do the title/escrow reps think highly of you?
  8. Do you go ahead and do a loan for a client even though you know it is not the best thing for them?
  9. Do you return ALL your phone calls?
  10. Do you return all your emails?
  11. Do you do the things you least want to do first?
  12. Do you complete your “things-to-do” list for the next day before going to sleep?
  13. Do you prioritize your tasks and work on them in their order of importance?
  14. Do you surf the web when you still have calls or tasks to complete?
  15. Do you complain about not having enough business?
  16. Do you keep in contact with all your clients?
  17. Do you have all your clients, prospects and referral partners in a database (ACT, etc…)?
  18. Do you make customer acquisition a priority?
  19. Do you have systems in place to optimize your clients’ mortgage experience?
  20. Do your clients always know where they stand and what they need to close their loan?
  21. Do you withhold information from your clients and let them know “the real story” towards the end of the transaction?
  22. Do you read at least one book a quarter on business development, communication, ethics or the mortgage industry?
  23. Do your clients refer people to you?
  24. Do you have a compelling reason for someone to do business with you?
  25. Do your referral partners and clients think of you as an expert?

Are You Sure You’re Hiring Sales-Capable Loan Officers?

By | Mortgage Business Tips | No Comments

Are you tired of filling the seats with warm bodies instead of filling the seats with actual topsalespersonSales-capable Loan Officers?

If you aren’t necessarily focused on recruiting top producers whose production is obvious but instead are willing to bring on individuals whose work history may show gaps of time where they weren’t originating, or who are not as seasoned or come from a different industry, than you need to make sure that you are asking questions that will unearth whether your candidates actually have what it takes to make it in Sales or not!

The fact is that charisma and charm or someone vivacious, honest and good natured cannot be the predominant reasons why you hire them to be a Loan Officer on your team.

Of course we want these positive characteristic in our employees, but my point is just because someone’s personality type seems to fits the mold of what most believe to be a, “good sales person,” does not mean they will succeed in Sales.

Succeeding in Sales has A LOT to do with the following:

  • Discipline
  • Communication
  • Creativity

To uncover if your candidates are actually disciplined in their work lives, communicate their needs and can identify and create opportunities, integrate the following set of open-ended questions into your interview process. You may even want to send these questions ahead of time in order to give your candidates a chance to really think through them prior to the interview.

Discipline questions:

  1. Describe your daily work routine and work schedule.
  2. Explain how you use your calendar and what type of calendar system you use.
  3. What other types of tools or systems or resources do you rely on to stay on task?
  4. Describe the goals you set for yourself at the beginning of this year or last year.
  5. What do you feel are your biggest challenges as a Loan Officer?

Communication questions:

  1. How do you entice new referral partners to meet with you?
  2. When and how do you ask for referrals from your clients?
  3. Describe what you said to a borrower the last time you had to communicate, “bad news.”
  4. Have you ever had to confront a referral partner or discontinue a working relationship with a referral partner? What did you say?
  5. What do you say to a customer who tells you they are going with another Lender?

Creativity questions:

  1. What types of marketing efforts have you engaged in with potential referral partners?
  2. Where and how often do you show up to meet new potential referral partners?
  3. What are some of the ways you have attempted to market yourself?
  4. What groups, associations, charities or organizations do you belong to?
  5. Describe how you go above and beyond for your customers after the transaction is closed.