Top Marketing Tips for Loan Officers to Get Ahead

In order to succeed in today’s market, loan officers need to find ways to stand out and rise above the competition. At the end of the day, certain factors will determine whether a client or partner decides to choose you over another LO. While many things contribute to this, your marketing is one of the major keys to your success. Your marketing efforts often create the first impression of your business, and this impression can either draw people in or do just the opposite. It’s important to fine-tune how you promote yourself both in-person and through your online presence. For today’s clientele, this usually means marketing your services in a way that offers value rather than relying on more traditional advertising strategies. Here are a few ways to better promote yourself in order to market to today’s mortgage clients:

1. Embrace digital marketing methods

Digital marketing represents today’s more modern marketing strategies. It refers to how you market your services to your target audience through online means. Establishing a solid online presence and using it to market your business is so important for LOs who want to stand out in today’s digital age. Especially with the millennial demographic in prime home-buying age, taking up space in the online realm is essential to engage with them.

Online identity

Strong digital marketing begins with establishing a solid online identity. This might mean taking another look at your website and brand and checking in with the sort of impression you’re giving. This is how a lot of people first “meet” you, so making sure it represents you authentically is important.

Social-media presence

By now, LOs know that they should be using social media to grow their reach and expand their online engagement. But if you’re only utilizing one platform, you’re missing out on digital marketing opportunities and potential future business. I recommend working on building a presence on multiple social-media forms. Depending on your target audience, different platforms will better suit your needs. For example, Instagram might be your answer to better engaging potential millennial clients. When it comes to Facebook, I recommend giving promoted posts a try. This allows you to pay to turn your post into an “ad” targeted to the audience of your choice.

Content marketing / blog

Your website should certainly include lots of information about you and, of course, aim to sell your services to prospects. But it should also be about providing value to the viewer. Instead of pushy advertising, content marketing is about providing valuable or interesting information to your reader at no cost and with no commitment. Running a blog where you can regularly post this kind of content is a strategy that’s helping many LOs stand out.

Video marketing / vlog

When it comes to content marketing, video content can often make the greatest impact. It’s proven that engagement with videos is often much higher than a photo or text post alone, so it’s a powerful tool. Don’t worry about having high-quality equipment to take videos. Even a simple smartphone can allow you to take short, informative videos to share online. You might even consider incorporating videos into your email marketing, as it’s proven to increase engagement there as well.

SEO

The last digital marketing tip I’ll leave you with is to take a more active role in your SEO, or search engine optimization. This refers to how easily your name or websites come up in searches. Using certain keywords, particularly those that are trending or related to your niche, can help make you more searchable and allow the right people to find you.

2. Engage through personalization

With all of this focus on digital-marketing tools and strategies, it’s understandable that LOs start to think about efficiency. Automating certain tasks can really help save you time when it comes to things like posting on your social-media accounts or sending follow-up emails. If you automate too much, however, you’ll end up giving a cold and inauthentic impression. For this reason, I recommend making sure to personalize your marketing as much as possible. Adding a personal touch to your email templates and referring back to a past conversation can demonstrate your genuine interest and attention. Even a piece of snail mail or a handwritten note can give that personal feel you want to convey to prospects.

3. Making valuable in-person connections

Even though we’ve put a major focus on digital marketing, making personal face-to-face connections is still equally important for LOs. Connecting in person can often even lead to more valuable connections than those made online. Make yourself present in your community and look for opportunities to meet new people and market your services. Try to make more genuine connections by thinking of each as a relationship and not just a loan transaction. Connect on an emotional level with people and make an impact.

Despite the power of digital-marketing tools, many LOs aren’t utilizing them to their full potential. By implementing some of these strategies, you’ll be able to gain traction in your marketing and stand out above the competition. Remember that even with these digital marketing tools, personalization and in-person interactions are just as important.