To grow your mortgage lending business, you must constantly build your client roster. Getting the best mortgage leads is essential for any lender aiming for success, but the question is–how do you do it? There are several ways to generate mortgage loan leads, including creating valuable content, investing in search engine optimization (SEO) and paid ads, and leveraging referral programs and lead sales. In this guide, we’ll break down how to get–and nurture–leads for mortgage loans.
Understanding the Mortgage Sales Funnel
To effectively generate mortgage leads, it’s important to understand the mortgage sales funnel or the journey that potential borrowers take to get a mortgage loan. Being able to determine at which point a client is in their buying journey allows you to better target their needs and push them towards purchasing your services!
Here’s a breakdown of the mortgage sales funnel:
Awareness and Interest
Awareness sits at the top of the funnel. At this stage, potential leads learn about what mortgages are, why they need them, and what mortgage services they need. The goal here is to capture this audience and encourage their interest.
The best way to spread awareness is through marketing efforts, such as digital advertising, content marketing, and events. These strategies help you reach a large audience and expand your network, all while promoting your services to possible buyers.
Engagement and Consideration
At the next part of the funnel, potential clients begin to consider taking out a mortgage loan. Here, engagement is key as prospects start to evaluate their options, consider different vendors, and dive deep into available services.
It’s critical that you position yourself as the best choice–the one that will provide them with the solutions they need. You must pinpoint their concerns and effectively communicate how you can address their unique circumstances.
Conversion or Sale
The bottom of the funnel is conversion, which is making the sale. At this stage, you have already gained your lead’s trust, having proven yourself as a credible seller. As your prospective customer decides whether or not to take out a mortgage loan with you, the measures you took in the previous stages of the funnel are tested.
Providing them with guides, how-to’s, and tips that could provide them with valuable insight into the benefits of mortgage loans not only makes them more aware–it also establishes you as a trustworthy and helpful source, thus giving them more confidence in doing business with you.
How to Generate Mortgage Loan Leads
Where do mortgage leads come from? Mortgage leads can originate from multiple sources: word-of-mouth recommendations, organic online traffic, paid leads, etc. Here are some ways to maximize these sources and get leads for mortgage loans:
Engage in Content Marketing
Many of today’s mortgage customers are young people who aren’t always well-informed about the ins and outs of home buying and mortgages. Giving them engaging educational content on the topic is a great way to catch their attention and possibly gain them as clients.
Keep Track of Performance
Gain valuable insights into your lead generation measures with detailed reports and performance reviews. This doesn’t just give you a look into the effectiveness of your efforts–it also provides you with information on your target market. By tracking overall productivity, you can determine where to segment your strategies and adjust your campaigns to be more efficient.
Invest in SEO
SEO is one of the most effective methods to get organic leads for mortgage loans. By optimizing your website, creating a Google My Business presence, and playing around with local SEO, you can acquire leads that have the potential to turn into loyal customers.
SEO is one of the most effective methods to get organic leads for mortgage loans. It allows you to reach people who have the potential to turn into loyal customers. You can optimize your website so that it appears higher on search engine results, making your services more accessible to people who are interested in them.
SEO practices also recommend creating a Google My Business presence and playing around with local SEO. Through these strategies, you can more easily acquire leads who are close to you and who are looking for mortgage lenders in the area they’re buying property in.
Leverage Referrals
Referral programs, such as Insurance Pro Agencies’ Free Mortgage Leads, help you acquire high-quality leads in exchange for referrals to a brand’s products or services. For example, our mortgage lead generation system can provide you with one to three exclusive mortgage loan leads weekly after your first referred client gets a homeowners’ insurance quote.
Run Advertising Campaigns
If you’re in a rush and need to capitalize on a large quantity of leads, paid advertising may work for you. When you run advertising campaigns, either as pay-per-click advertising (PPA) or social media ads, you can define the audience you want to reach and for what purpose you’re engaging them. Plus, you can determine the type of content and information you distribute through your chosen channels.
Buy Leads
Are mortgage leads worth it? This depends on your needs and your budget, but buying leads may be an ideal option for those who need a long list of names as soon as possible.
When taking this route, be sure that you’re buying leads from a source that you can trust. That way, you’re not left with an outdated roster or inaccurate information.
How to Qualify Leads
While you never want to ignore a lead, you must be able to qualify your potential clients. After all, pursuing a prospect who has no intention of taking out a mortgage loan in the near future is a waste of resources; it would mean spending time and effort that you would have otherwise used for a more probable sale.
A qualified lead is an individual who’s most likely to turn into a sale. In most cases, these are people who have a high chance of being approved when they apply for a mortgage. This can be qualified through high credit scores, low debt-to-income ratios, and steady income or revenue streams, among others.
To ensure that you’re only chasing high-quality clients, here are some tips to qualify your leads:
Determine Your Lead’s Goals
Ask your customer if they’re seeking a loan for a home, refinancing, or a second mortgage. This gives you an idea about their financial situation, particularly the likelihood of them being pre-approved for a mortgage.
Check Where Your Lead Is in the Funnel
With the mortgage sales funnel in mind, check if your lead is in the awareness, consideration, or conversion stage. You’ll want to focus on clients that are in the latter stages of the funnel; however, you also need to maintain a relationship with those that are in the first two stages so that they can return to you once they’re further along their decision.
Find Out Your Lead’s Buying Timeline
It makes more sense to nurture leads that are ready to buy a property sooner than later as these are the ones more in need of a mortgage loan. Find out where they are in their buying stage, whether they’re still just playing around with a budget, or if they are already closing in on a new home.
How to Nurture Mortgage Loan Leads
Finding mortgage loan leads is just the first step to building your mortgage lending business. To achieve success, you must also learn how to nurture your growing client list so that you can continue to provide value until clients are ready to buy. Here are some tips to help you sustain your network:
Keep in Touch
Once you have the information and consent of your leads, you can send them newsletters, emails, or notifications on available products and services, content promotions, special deals and discounts, and industry insights and news. By doing this, you offer them value while staying on top of their minds.
Use a Customer Relationship Management (CRM) System
A CRM system can help you manage your sales funnel and track where your leads are in their buying process. It will keep you organized and allow you to tap clients at different points of their journey, providing them with the most support at each step. After a couple of years, you can reconnect with old customers by looking through your CRM system and offer them better or updated deals and services.
Build Relationships
Remember that the best way to build customer loyalty is to build a relationship instead of just treating a sale like a simple transaction. Build rapport with your clientele to keep them coming back and encourage them to recommend you to others.
Score Your Leads
Assign your leads a score that corresponds to their position on your priority list. Lead scoring evaluates leads based on factors such as their interaction with your business, their likelihood to convert, or their potential long-term value to your brand. This process allows you to pinpoint which clients to focus your efforts on.
Keep Track of Performance
Gain valuable insights into your lead generation measures with detailed reports and performance reviews. This doesn’t just give you a look into the effectiveness of your efforts–it also provides you with information on your target market. By tracking overall productivity, you can determine where to segment your strategies and adjust your campaigns to be more efficient.
Free Mortgage Leads from IPA
IPA can give you quick, easy, and free mortgage leads generated by our exclusive lead generation system. You can close more deals each month than you ever did before–all you have to do is refer us to your clients who need homeowners’ insurance. Book a call now to find out how we can help!
IPA can give you quick, easy, and free mortgage leads generated by our exclusive lead generation system. Ready to get started? Our free mortgage leads program is designed for retail lenders who are currently closing three or more deals monthly and want to grow their business further!
With us, you can close more deals each month than you ever did before–all you have to do is refer us to your clients who need homeowners’ insurance, which you’ll naturally encounter in your line of work. As soon as one of your referrals gets a homeowners’ insurance quote from us, our marketing team will reach out to you and set you up with more leads.
Book a call now to find out how you can join our free mortgage leads program and instantly submit referrals!
