Ep #110: Going Digital + Local to Reach Consumers First and Win More Agent Referrals

In today's highly competitive mortgage industry, building profitable relationships with the real estate agents is essential for success. However, finding effective ways to secure agent relationships can be a challenge. With so many mortgage loan originators vying for the attention of real estate agents, it can be difficult to stand out and establish meaningful connections. Our new case study featuring loan officer Chris Cogill is a must-read. Chris has closed a remarkable 36 million in funded loans from agent referrals. And in this case study, he shares his proven strategies for building strong relationships with real estate agents and leveraging those relationships to drive more business. To get your hands on this resource, head over to LOKestudy.com and download your free copy of the case study today. You'll find actionable insights and practical tips that Chris used to close 36 million in funded loans from agent referrals and how you can too. Don't miss out. Go check it out right now, visit LOKestudy.com and download your free copy today. Hey listeners, what up, this is Jeff Zinfur. Once again, your humble host for another edition of the mortgage marketing radio podcast coming at you somewhere deep inside the speakeasy of Las Vegas, Nevada. Well okay, not quite yet. I'm working there. Maybe that'll be my new studio this year. If any speakeasy's in Vegas are listening, I'd love for you to be the host and sponsor of the mortgage marketing radio podcast. Imagine that we bring in special guests and we talk maybe bourbon and prohibition for a period of time on the podcast and drive eyeballs, drive people to attend to get to your speakeasy. That'd be really cool if that actually happened, I don't know, I just popped in my head randomly out of nowhere. Alright, so let's talk about what's happening on this episode. First of all, as always, this episode is I want to acknowledge two different entities if you will. That first one is of course our growing membership over at the mortgage marketing.pro membership. Whenever anybody comes into my podcast community on Facebook, if you haven't yet joined the Facebook page for the mortgage marketing radio podcast, please do so. Go there. If you want to go deeper with us, that's the place to do it. Mortgage marketing radio podcast on Facebook. Now, but what's interesting is what happens in there as we have people share different content and stuff, I'll get some stories and success stories bubbling up of people that are, you know, I'll ask them, what's your number one focus for 2019 and 95% of the time, one of the two biggest focuses for most loan officers is how to succeed with the real estate agents, how to have more engagement, get more relationships, drive more referrals, bottom line succeed. Right? And there's a whole conversation that we can unpack around that, but here's what I know and you've guys been listening to be long enough. One of the things we do for our mortgage marketing.pro members is we provide a turnkey system. I say a system because that's what it is, a system to get you in front of maximum agents in minimum time and leverage teaching agent classes to get butts in the seats and loans in your pipeline. And I've been doing it for over 10 years, both personally myself, professionally for various companies that I work for and then helping other loan officers like you listening right now do that because realtors are hungry to learn. And if we teach them how to fish and help them, you know, do better in their business, then they're going to be inclined to be drawn to work with us compared to other value propositions out there, which might be the usual rates and service and I work weekends blah, right? So what? So if you want to learn more about how to succeed with real estate agents, grow your brand online with social media, run Facebook ads, hey, check out mortgage marketing dot pro to learn more there in a quick shout out this week to one of our members there, Shannon Brock Miller. She is actually from Alaska, wow, this teaching agent classes work in Alaska, you bet. And it works for Shannon Brock Miller on one of the coaching calls we just had, you know, she was feeling a little bit frustrated and her attendance was small yet the good news out of that small attendance, she got two loan apps, immediately following the class. Folks, if you, you know, how many times a month or a week would you do that? And if every time you did a class, let's just say all you got was two loan apps with every class. How many times would you do that in a month or a week, okay? So don't take my word for it. That's why I'm starting to share some of the success stories of our members like Shannon and some of the others you've heard about. So if you want to learn more, go check out mortgage marketing dot pro, I posted an eight minute video that gives you an overview of what it's all about. All right, we got that business out of the way. Then let's also give you a friendly reminder of my friends over at the industry syndicate industry syndicate.com. If you're looking for more good content podcast flash briefings, Facebook live video shows access to other thought leaders in mortgage and real estate, check out industry syndicate.com. I'm a proud member of theirs, they've got pretty much every podcast and, you know, good content provider under their roof makes it easy for you to gain access and check out that content. So that's that. Okay. And let's move on now to this week's episode, my very special guest, president and CEO of housing wire Clayton Collins. Now some of you may know that I was recently blessed to have a article published in housing wire. They have a part of their, there's news letter. Their website is called pulse and it is the pulse of what's happening in mortgage. And this is real world, no fluff, right, no BS stuff about how to succeed as a mortgage originator today, articles, special guests, features and things like that. I was in there recently and my article topic was what I've learned from interviewing over 100 of America's most successful low and originators. So if you want to check that article out, I'm going to put links in the show notes. Of course, you can go over to housing wire.com, look for the pulse, do a search for my name or something, check it out, it's good stuff in there. And now onto my special guest Clayton, who's just a really an awesome guy who's got his heart where I think my heart is with you, with us as mortgage loan originators helping us succeed, survive versus just thrive. And so he and I have kind of a candid conversation in this episode about going digital plus local, the combination of the two to reach consumers first and to win more agent referrals. And that's really the game of the future folks. If you want to compete against the news lately about Zelo and so forth and they're growing bite out of the market, look, Zelo is going to fragment the market even more as well as some of these other disruptors who also have mortgage companies. But the difference that Zelo can't compete with is you being local in your local community and the combination of online and offline, digital plus local to engage and reach your local consumers, it's going hyper local folks to win the attention of consumer direct, but also to leverage that attention and your audience to better engage with agents, perhaps maybe provide them with some leads. How about that for an idea, but also as we mentioned earlier teach them the fish help educate them to do the same. And that's what Clayton and I talk about. And I want to make sure you also make a note of and check out their upcoming event engage. Marketing. Okay. It's a killer event. It's their second year doing it. So they've really got this thing nailed down. It's going to be let's see here June 13th through the 14th and it's going to be in Charlotte North Carolina. The website for that we'll put in the show notes links, but it's also engage housing wire.com. I plan on being there. I missed out on last year and I missed out on some incredible content. But this 2019 summit is focused on mortgage marketing and a purchase market, specifically focusing around how you can leverage technology, build referral relationships, leverage your past customer client database experience, and of course your online reputation. Folks, if you're not learning how to do those things in today's market, well, I'm sorry to say that maybe you won't be here next year. So do yourself a favor and get to one of the most relevant, current, topical mortgage events. That's not just a bunch of, you know, fluff and hype and people cheering and jumping on their chairs and touting how great a top producer I am, but actual, right, tactical ideas and implementation from people living and breathing it every day. So it comes with my highest endorsement, plus it's wicked, affordable, right? It's like five, 600 bucks, maybe max, depending on when you're checking it out. So go to engage.housingwire.com and, you know, register, I'm going to be there. Our fellow industry syndicate members are going to be there. You should be there too. So let's get into this week's show. Hey Clayton, welcome to the show. Good morning. Thank you very much, Jeff. You bet. You bet. Good morning. I love the connect with you. Finally, it's for me. It's been a long time coming because I've been watching with you guys have been doing out there. And I love the fact that, you know, you, from what I see are trying to add value, which is I'm trying to do, add value to the loan originators life, right, and all they have to deal with. So I'll allow you to give your intro. Who are you? What's housing? Why are all about? Yeah, absolutely. So at housing wire, our primary mission is moving markets forward. We serve one market, and that is the housing economy covering everything from real estate, housing finance and all of the services and technology and trends and regulatory happenings in between. So we cover a first and foremost news. And then we do data and analysis and other media formats like podcasts and video. So we're really trying to serve our audience of mortgage and real estate professionals where they are with the information they want, when they need it. And with the primary goal of furthering the entire housing economy and moving markets forward. So I'm Clayton Collins. I'm the CEO of housing wire. I've been leading the business for about three years now and couldn't be more excited about our growth and audience and engagement and better serving this mortgage industry every single year. Yeah, that's awesome. Thank you. And I'm on your website. So I'm going to be looking to that to pull out some questions for you. Of course, we'll put links in the show notes, housing wire.com. For those who want to go there, we're going to talk about resources for you listeners right now during the podcast and we'll give you links to those. All right. So here we are. When listeners are probably listening hearing this, it's 2019 already. You get exposed to a lot of different information. What do you, like if you had to, I'm a loan officer, okay? If you had to advise me in 2019, what do you see coming as big shifts or changes for the mortgage industry? Yeah, I think that a lot of the trends that we saw building in 2017 took place in 2018 or continued through in 2019 and that is we're not going to see a massive change in inventory. So it's a competitive market. People are fighting for market share, not just at the lender level, but the LOs and realtors every day, fighting for that borrower, fighting for that homeowner. And that's a really real dynamic that comes through in the way you manage your business, the way you market yourself, the technology you adopt. And I think the kind of the mentality you have to have to be successful in the long term. So if I was advising you as a loan officer, I'd say don't only think about what you want to accomplish in 2019, think about where you want to be in 2021, 2025 and know that a lot of the decisions you make about how you position yourself, your personal brand, your corporate brand, the tools you adopt are going to influence your success this year, but also are going to be more impactful in future years. And that means to be successful now, you have to be successful in purchase. But there's going to be a time when the rates are in the right place for re-ify again. So be thinking about that long term strategy of what your client makes looks like, what your referral makes looks like. Your marketing mix looks like to position you for success in future years, not just in 2019. So it's interesting you say that there's going to be a re-ify opportunity down the road. I've heard that a couple of times. You have some data that supports that, did you want to touch on? We know the factors that influence interest rates. And we're probably going to not kind of test market bottoms again in terms of venture rates, but we're also not going to see an upward, I continued upward trajectory. We've seen a recent, and by the time this podcast airs, we'll see where rates are, but we've seen in recent weeks here in early December, have seen a slight dip in rates and borrowers, especially in the jumbo category, there actually is a little bit of a re-ify opportunity right now. And in everything's relative, right? So first time homebuyers coming into the market in 2018, who did a 30 year fix with a high four or five handle on it, their re-ify opportunity might look very different than my re-ify opportunity because I purchased it in 2016 and have a rate that's going to be pretty hard to beat. So that's a, I think it's all relative, right? What do you, and I'm just going to throw some questions at you because you do have access to a lot of information and data and things like that. So then what do you see happening, all right, so use your example of when you bought, right? You may recall, so I moved to Vegas, now it'll be a year in January, I moved to Vegas from Orange County, right? Sold the house, took some chips off the table, and I haven't bought yet, right? I'm renting here, and so I just actually upped for another year in this wonderful house. But I go back and forth a lot on that because, you know, we're both closely tied to the industry and I'm eyeballing markets and overheated markets and things like that. So what's your take on pricing, you know, for housing coming in 2019, 2020? Yeah, I mean, coming like on the initial, like kind of lead in on that question, like the vision to buy, I'm firmly of the belief that consumers need to make smart financial decisions, but housing has a lot more influences than purely financial. And there are situations in people's lives and their families that were home ownership just makes more sense, and home ownership does provide a lot of intrinsic value to communities and the grounding of families that I think people have to take into account when making that rent versus buy decisions. It's not always just an interest rate decision, though please don't let me discount the importance of making like smart financial decisions, like if you can't afford it, you can't afford it. That's the first and foremost. But thinking about pricing and affordability coming into 2019, that's largely going to be driven by demand of first time home buyers. And I don't want to get into the whole like millennial conversation, but there's still a massive wave of wage earning, income earning, single and dual income families that haven't purchased yet. That's coming up the pipe, and we saw data this week that housing wire published, I believe it was 10 million millennials purchasing homes in the next 10 years, that's a wave that you can ignore. And that's certainly not going to be equally distributed across the country. I think there's going to be pockets that are much more impacted by that first time home buyer boom than others. Millennial generation is aging to a point where our home ownership makes more sense, and that's not the last generation to come, that's going to value home ownership. So I'm in the firmly of the belief that it's going to be a demand based affordability equation, and unless new home starts can catch up, then we kind of face a continued competitive market where affordability becomes a major part of the decision making process for first time home buyers, and for people who have growing families or want to relocate, we're seeing a lot less job relocation in this market right now than we saw in prior decades, and largely because of affordability, because there's great job opportunities in San Francisco, but I think you have a little bit of a grasp of what the wages have to be to even afford to step foot on the peninsula or anywhere close to it. I was talking to somebody, I think it was yesterday in Palo Alto, of course, the center, the hub of tech. I think the median price for a house there is like 1.3 I think. That's crazy, man. Even if you have an amazing job at Facebook, it's still not going to be like, it's an age or small part. Yeah, exactly. So clearly, then you are bullish on the housing market, moving forward. I'm bullish on the stability and continued growth of the housing market. I think there's some headwinds, there's some challenges, we'll fight through them. Inventory affordability rates margin on lending, competitiveness in the realtor space and technology coming in, there's going to be disruption, there's going to be competitiveness, people are fighting for market share, there's going to be losers, but when you kind of go up the level, I think we're in a, there's some parts of this market that are very healthy and that there's a competitive nature, a competitive healthiness that will support a growing housing economy for years and decades to come. All right. Transition a bit and talk about winners and losers, if you will, in the coming year because you know, market, compression, margin, all that kind of stuff, we've heard in all the buzzwords and I'm seeing it, you know, on a real front of my face every single day, you know, the struggle, if you will, on the street, loan officers, like you said, you keep using that word, competitive market and I'm seeing and feeling it every single day. So, who's going to survive, whether it's company or loan officer, I, you know, think I want to address for the listeners is this, there's a lot of fear going around, there's a lot of sky is falling and maybe you could maybe set us, readjust us a little bit in that the sky isn't falling and so how do we then, how should we be best prepared? What should we do as individual loan officers, let's say, to be best prepared and less fearful? Yeah, and I think there's definitely some, some bifurcation there of people that are embracing the competitive market and people who have a rightfully fearful, but the competitive, the success, the most successful LOs and realtors that we're talking to now, you think about a way to double down on their strengths and in a purchase market, it is incredibly important to know where your business is coming from, how do you double down on that channel while also continuing to test out different, the marketing referral channels to be prepared if there is a shift in the market, so you're not kind of left with your main business or some drying up. So, in this purchase market, I think it comes back and I'm certainly not going to say that this is my quote, but nobody wants a mortgage, people want a house, so that means that more than ever, the realtor and lender relationship is incredibly impactful. You have to think of this entire housing economy as a business that is trying to put people in houses and that comes down to not pushing credit, not only talking about your rate and pricing, how are you better partner for your realtors and referral sources? How are you not just like being there and being ready when they say new business, how are you sending them business? And that's where we start to see the major bifurcation of successful purchase LOs and the LOs who are kind of just getting by. Are you valuable to your referral sources and are you sending them business? Are you reliable? Are you closing loans on the timeline that you promise? And I think those are the factors that we're hearing from top performing LOs and realtors who work with top performing LOs that are really helping top great A producers continue to stay in that bucket and not fall to the bottom in the competitive market. There's a lot in there, a lot of different questions. The first one that comes up for me is then are you saying that the smart loan officer should instead of just looking at the realtor as a place to get leads or get referrals, start looking at how the loan officers can self-gen. Start generating your own leads online. Absolutely. We're seeing top performing loan officers create their own brands and social presence and marketing campaigns. You see that every single day in the institution that you work for and that's really powerful. If you have borrowers coming to you for that pre-qual and it seems to be an increasing trend of prospective home buyers understanding that they need to note that they can finance or can afford to buy a property before they start going and looking at 30 homes with a realtor. I think it's an increasingly common that the lender is the first point of contact. I'm not saying it's the majority yet but it's increasingly common and taking those initial touch points and partnering those borrowers with real estate professionals that you trust and have a relationship with can increase the probability of close on those initial touch points but also hopefully when that realtor is the initial touch point on a future transaction you're the first call because you're not only a reliable partner you're also someone who brings them business and it becomes more of a partnership is what we kind of keep consistently hearing. So can we I'd love to get a little bit more specific in terms of what L.O. should be doing to fulfill that. Wrote down from our last conversation in the notes here. Digital plus local equals I think enablement if I could read my own notes. Adopting tools and things like that. So any kind of recommended whether you see like hey people are doing x, y and z on this social platform or whatever any kind of a coaching moment for you here. Yeah I mean I'm certainly I run a media company and I have a unique vantage point and gets to talk to a lot of smart people but I'm certainly not the the one who's out on the street lending or speaking to clients every day. So take take take that for for what it is but on the digital plus local kind of idea it's very different by the type of lending institution we're talking to. I mean we have the fortune of having relationships with with small brokers or small broker owners who don't have the support of a corporate technology branding or marketing team and then top producing L.O.s at a top five top ten non-banks with massive technology but budgets and marketing strategies behind them. But when it comes to the digital plus local kind of empowerment theory we're seeing that the most successful L.O.s are focused on what differentiates them and that personally so that that's the local side that's that's the relationships with your referral sources with your past clients with realtors with everybody in your community that is that when when you're having a a bar where a lead that's coming through a referral source you're you're there you're in the community you know them you know the you know the the neighborhoods you know the the properties you know how to serve that client best the digital side is this is the support that either you're putting in place in advance as an independent broker owner or as a or or if you're joining a large non-bank and looking for somebody who can support you in areas you need we don't expect that every L.O. has the time or experience to implement a thoughtful digital mortgage platform even even kind of the easier front end tools to drive leads from a website but we know that infrastructure is really important so we're the digital plus local ethos is that that digital presence in the tools and the the backbones of a initial digital application or full digital mortgage are incredibly important but that alone is not going to displace the power of loan originators in communities working with past clients and referral sources and the the most successful lenders and the most successful originators will be the ones who understand the the power of not only having that digital infrastructure but also having a a market facing presence and know how to serve a particular community and referral base yeah you know it's very interesting so it really it really comes back to the things we've been saying all along I was just you know the the old cliche high-tech high-touch right just popped in my head and that this is is proving to be true as well personal branding as well as as important as it's ever been perhaps even more important today so all right let me pivot for a little bit because all right I think we've got with the issue of what does a loan officer need to do to stay relevant you know you've got to you know you've got to be present you got to show up in your local market you have to engage with your referral partners realtors etc even deeper go deep versus why let's say become more valuable it's not as we know the old it's not about rates and service and can you close on time all that jazz what's your take then I'm just I'm just in through a question at you zillow mortgage you know I had I had a clever privilege of interviewing Tom Perry on on Monday and I asked him you know does he believe zillow wants to displace realtors and I thought that Tom's response that like any somewhat intellectual person will look at their their multiples that the that the zillow stock trades on and look at the multiples that really trades at and say that it would be completely irresponsible for for Spencer ask off to go to his board and say like we should become a realtor because we're going to see our multiple cut in half um I tried to draw a parallel to their recent acquisition of a mortgage bank and was trying to think through well with that mindset of hey digital media companies are digital information companies trade it higher multiples than lenders and realtors that seems to be relatively true in the public markets why would how do you justify how do you rationalize that acquisition well one the market didn't receive that acquisition extremely well it wasn't like there was a pop in the stock remember correctly it's actually yeah slight tank um so what's what's the play there um and I don't know yet um I just know maybe they know or don't know maybe they're just rolling the dice you know yeah I uh I don't know the play um I do think that there are it's not as apples and oranges as saying that digital media and information services companies trade it x multiple and and uh loan origination and real estate companies trade it why I think there isn't I think in a zilo type scenario there is an arbitrage opportunity where a a fully digital mortgage or real estate company which trade out of multiple that's closer to a digital business than a than a traditional brick and mortar business um so I think there's a few uh I would um I'd love to have a long conversation with Tom about that um I'm a former investment banker so like the the thoughts on talking about uh we're businesses trade and the kind of corporate strategy to influence um even dot multiples is narrowing into my heart we're getting out of finance man but um that that's one that uh I think there's a little there's some gray area there well let's roll it back to you know be aware I mean should should a loan officer feel feel threatened let me put it this way um you know you see all these other people talking about um uh you know realtors you're funding your demise by paying zilo what's your take on that because my my here's my thought that I actually answered this on on a Facebook page what you're like you know this this loan officer was commenting that you know he's got these realtors that are paying you know zilo a couple thousand bucks and whatever it is the number it's like if they're paying zilo big bucks if it's a smart realtor it's because they're getting an ROI yeah right and let's face it zilo is the internet when it comes to real estate by and large safe would you agree with that assertion yeah okay I mean 180 million visitors a month right for me and mls yeah they're they're it yeah um so so how do do loan officers need to be quote you know I don't even want to use the book just to awake aware uh but I want to stop the like the fear and the margaring because it's like everybody's like you know yeah the anti-Christ zilo it's like we don't know yet for real quick and I'll let you respond for instance you probably know this as well the zilo ibuyers right um instant offers and now they're competing with open door what what people perhaps aren't talking about much yet is this could be an opportunity for people now we don't know about the mortgage piece yet but the agents clearly with the ibuyers and the open doors they're only listing back about 1.5% of those properties that they take in as you heard Tom's example he has a realtor who got 300 leads and listed 15 properties so maybe it's okay to wear the zilo badge and take a little bit more money for the lead flow which is the hardest part of this job yeah I think as a business owner I don't like the idea of putting all your eggs in any one basket back from a from a sit from sales channels from leads for marketing strategy I think that you have to do lenders originators anybody selling anything has to do the same thing zilos doing and I it appears that zilos testing right now they are they're testing the waters in the mortgage market they're testing the ibuyer market they're they're playing with things so you have like just like we're talking about disruption innovation in the mortgage industry they are they are testing innovation they are testing strategies and I think that's what realtor person fellows must do as well and it um I think of the uh there's like a there's a cartoon that shows like a a manager on the edge of a cliff um on like a plank and he's holding a gun and his top salesperson is on the other side and like like he's gonna shoot the top salesperson and clearly fall off the cliff zilo directly attacking um their core revenue source is bad business so until there's like a the market completely shifts um they're they're driving their revenue from realtors and lenders you can't directly attack your client base unless you have a so you don't feel they are directly attacking your client base right now I think they're testing strategies that that have some that that could be threatening but they're haven't done anything yet yeah that like completely like takes the legs out from underneath the the realtor market and so if if I were a realtor today I would certainly be working with all all of the sources of of leads and business and um and testimonials and reviews that that I could find I think that putting all your eggs in one basket um is is dangerous and uh and I think that they take some diversification and and um and lead sourcing and and marketing effort to to properly build a business that's sustainable for the long term and different market conditions and uh if you're driving all of your leads and putting all of your buck all of your budget into a a single business source then yeah I'd be nervous whether that's zilo or somebody else but uh if you build a properly diversified funnel then uh then you should be able to kind of tweak and pour gas on certain sources when the time is right but pull back um if somebody's threatening your business model um or not or not delivering returns um so uh do you think zilo is trying to make a play for being a national mortgage player I don't know the answer to that yeah that's something we uh I mean our editorial team um our editorial team uh Jacob Gaffney and our reporters have definitely uh researched and talked to sources and speculated on um but there's um if uh I'll tell you right now I don't know if uh zilo is going to become a national mortgage player and I don't know how amazon is going to enter the mortgage market but um I know everybody is very curious about both of this and with that said even that all that noise um my my suggestion is I'd love to hear your two cents on this what are you going to do about it and it rolls back to what you just talked about earlier which is double down on your local presence your local brand and your referral partners right I mean control what you can control control you can control and know your strengths um yeah like technology can disrupts like technology can be very disruptive but technology has its strengths and has its weaknesses um there if if you're putting your whole income into a uh like doing a job or a process that can easily be replicated by technology yeah I wouldn't sleep that well at night but um if your business if you're value that you bring to your ultimate client no matter what you're selling or what service you're offering um if you add any value through expertise or personal relationships double down on on that because uh that that's the hardest part that's the hardest thing for technology to disrupt and uh I'm I'm firmly I'm I'm much I enjoy talking about enablement much more than than disruption right now anyway I'm a I'm an early adopter of technology I know I know you are as well and if you are willing to to test solutions and um figure out how new tools whether that's um marketing channels or or loan operation agencies whatever whatever it is like if you can test new tools of your how those tools make you better um you can win market share in the near term and set yourself up for a better position um for for future market um turn disruption or change whatever you want to call it yeah so what I'm what I'm hearing you say is um and for those listening this is the time to listen up pay attention is so so know your strengths double down on the local uh business local meeting your referral partners community get involved the whole personal brand thing we talked about content marketing but then also look at those tools or platforms by which you can um make some small bets maybe it's Facebook ads for example right make some small bets to get to the consumer first because everything I'm reading and presentations I'm doing it's all about whoever gets to the consumer first is really who wins yeah yeah that's uh in a I mean I think the other the other thing we're hearing from our our clients that are our marketing um to to potential home buyers and from our clients who are providing services and solutions to folks that are uh marketing to potential home buyers is that there are um that value-based messaging is really working right now and uh and that it's not I'm not talking about like the um love thy neighbor kind of like values I'm talking about what does your client value do they value speed do they value technology do they value a handshake do they value um breakfast and lunch or bagels since their office I don't know but figure out what they value and that's what and that's what drives the messaging and um and I think from uh there's a little more like on the b2b side but there's it's never been easier in like in history of the world to just start a company or we want to technology um and having a local or a national voice um and I think that buyers are starting to become aware of that so some brand and consistency start to become some of the values that that people do care about and uh know that you're gonna be there um and I guess this lesson kind of applies to both the the homeowner and the the b2b side of our industry is your clients want a partner um they want they're not buying a software they're not buying a loan once they want someone that's going to grow with them and um I know when I sign a technology contract I'm not just looking at the the tool that's in place today but what's the roadmap like where are we going together like I don't want to buy your sign of five year um deal with you today and then like come back to this relationship in 2022 and say like oh we're still using the same exact platform like no I want to know that you're investing in your technology in your tools and we're growing and evolving together uh and I am of the belief that homeowners home buyers have that same value or value that as well and they're looking for a realtor and lender partners that will be there when they're ready to re-fi so um come back to the beginning of our conversation you get a first time home buyer today there's gonna be a time when the market is different when their family or their um people staying home longer too that that's that's a re-fi um that's a re-fi opportunity so like someone that will grow with them and build that relationship and and not just um and not just answer the phone they call but maybe every now and then send a proactive um email or phone call or at least see see a kind of a friendly face in the community is something that um something that home buyers and and clients of all shapes and sizes um yeah top of mine top of mine to your point about people staying in homes longer they're not they're not you know moving as often as they used to and really that's just this that goes back to you as a as a mortgage loan professional um having a true business and that's one that's relational versus transactional um the the big technology plays they can afford to be transactional right because of the efficiencies they have in their system us the little you know independent broker loan officer out on the streets i got to be relational and i got to build a fence around my people or else yeah i'm gonna you know i i said it the other day it's like um displacement disruption it's like if you you will i was talking to realtors i think i said um unless you disrupt yourself right you you will be disrupted by market efficiencies by technology and stuff like that yep okay just knowing the importance of knowing when uh what is disruption and what is distraction and knowing how do you like when do you focus your like you have to test new things and new new marketing channels new technologies um new new relationship but um like i think it's also with like coming back to my earlier comment has there been easier to start in a business or or launch a product um know what's a distraction and know it's actually like worth like spending your time on i i know as a as a business owner most important asset i have is my time and the hardest thing to do is know when to the same no just move on and i i'm confident that is a uh a dilemma or a consideration that every loan officer should have um because the most important thing they have is time um when should they be spending time on the phone when should they be spending time in the community when should they be time sitting back in a desk their door shut thinking about their long-term strategy of how they position themselves and their business to be successful in future years um so i i i really do think that uh like focus on disruption but avoid distraction um think about the long-term um double down your strengths um i'm not alone originator but i get to talk to a lot of smart ones and that's what i'm hearing and so that's the message i would share that's awesome all right so let's talk about how housing wire can help loan officers along that journey i know you've got first of all the website housingwire.com what are some places and then we'll talk about your event uh coming up in 2019 engage but where would you direct loan officers to look um on the housing wire page to get connected and start engaging and learning yeah so so housing wire we've been around for a little over 10 years now um we're serving four and a half million annual unique visitors of our 50,000 people on our daily newsletter list historically we've done a really good job at serving the the executive side of the lending industry from from original original executive servicing secondary market it real estate executives um in the last couple of years we've really made a concert effort to better serve loan originators and and realtors and where we're putting in place um news coverage and products to really support that initiative so earlier this year we launched new newsletter called lending life um we had a group of L.O.s come into our office did a focused group ask them what they wanted how frequently they wanted it what information when to make them better at their um better their jobs more impactful for their partners and in a little bit of content they can share on social or email out to their realtor relationships took that information launched lending life so if you go to housingwire.com and in the top right corner um do the subscribe now drop down for newsletters and uh you'll see lending life there and can register it's a two day a week newsletter 100% complimentary um and uh with the sole purpose of engaging our the loan officers in the in the mortgage industry and um trying to build a real community so we're sending that email directly from our editor-in-chief so Jacob Gaffney sends sends the email if you don't like something or if you love something or if you have an idea respond it goes directly to Jacob's inbox and he gets to um to have those interactions so uh we're really trying to build a community it's this isn't some like you hit reply and you get a uh uh do not like no no response that's like we're real people here we're trying to serve real people in the in the mortgage industry and um trying to create a real community there um so that's how we're trying to serve our lives um and i think one really one reason i was really excited to come on the podcast with you today is i think we see marketing as a as a key differentiator and it like incredible um incredibly important part of overall lending strategy especially as we kind of pivot um to a more origination focused market with a few um with a few headwinds so last year we launched engaged top marketing which is a summit of the top marketing minds in the mortgage industry um we had that first event in September here in Dallas and uh it was a it was an awesome success brought out um marketers who typically spend their time at industry events um working the booth they're setting up uh dinners or coxel hours for their for their a's and then their sales team um we actually brought we said no no no like there's no expo hall like this is for the marketers we wanted marketers to like come and engage with content and come and engage with each other and build relationships and take something back and makes them more impactful at supporting the loan originators that that they essentially work for as as marketers and um it was a great success we're doing um engage dot marketing 2019 um coming up June 13th and 14th in Charlotte North Carolina and uh hope to bring out the the top marketing minds from across the mortgage industry and give them a really tightly focused um programming and content schedule that that's focused on competitive differentiation in a purchase market um uh marketing tactics that aren't based around pricing and arising rate environment um technology and tools that are helping elbows and marketing teams uh differentiate themselves and build stronger relationships not just with their um borrowers and uh and past clients but also with their referral sources um so this is all about this is four marketers um with the content advisory board so buy marketers and it's all about supporting loan origination in the mortgage industry so it's just for originators no realtors um so we we'll bring it so we'll have some realtors attempt that's more for like uh so we'll have them participate on panels talk about how they're how they're how the relationships um uh really uh kind of how we can optimize the relationship between the realtor and lending community um but we're going to be tightly focused around loan origination um we we see a pretty big realtor interest in our housing wire content around loan origination so uh we'd love any realtors that that want to join but this is really for the marketers in the mortgage industry and um realtors want to come in and join us more the barrier we'd love to have them that's awesome and uh by the time people are listening to this i believe we may have a link in the show notes if we don't we'll update it when it does come out um but that's awesome so that's June 13th 14th Charlotte uh engage and of course you can always go to the website and learn more at housingwire.com subscribe to the newsletter there for sure also you guys uh quick quick mention here i see there are you now have a podcast can you tell us about that real quick yeah i think that would kind of what i mentioned in the beginning we want to serve our audience when and where they they want to consume our information and um so a few of our journalist um Jacob Gaffney Caroline Psylley um a few of our other journalists have been have been experimenting with a few hot podcasts um we've done a specialized podcast on reg tech and then we're doing like a weekly update on the top news stories so um i know uh what unfortunate part of living in Dallas i spent a lot of time in my car so i get to um get to absorb a lot of podcasts and i know a lot of our our realtor readers do that as well um and then our our corporate readers you spend a lot of time on the road or are listening to podcasts on planes so we want to provide uh content to our audience when and where they want it and uh podcast or part of that strategy yeah there's good content on there and you mean you can go right to the website listen to it download it i'm looking at episode three talking about zelo bfa tech and all that stuff so uh what i love about what you guys are doing um it's just you know we need to be educated as mortgage professionals obviously educated about our craft our business and how to how to speak intelligently and professionally but then also educated about what's going on in the market to your point our discussion here today how do we take that information that knowledge and then pivot and adjust for what's you know our sense of what's happening in the market so good stuff um and jake was being able to get some some great guests and it was had been Carson on there and oh really executive so uh it's the conversations there aren't aren't exactly about the the day-to-day challenges of loan origination but you know i know that those are the the decisions that are being made and what Ben and his team are the decisions that impact this market this year next year so we we love when our our most and foremost engaged loan officers really want that knowledge or thirsty for it so uh we'll take um industry leaders like Ben any day of the week that want to that want to talk to our audience and i'll tell you what just real quick for me as with my loan officer hat on um the reason why i listen to things like this these educational kind of sessions is those are talking points for me and realtors if i'm meeting with a realtor and then maybe the subject of zelo comes up well i want to be able to intelligently speak about that right and so that's why we we we listen to podcasts and get access to you guys like at housingware.com and all that jazz so awesome man listen um i'm gonna put links in the shown us all this as i said appreciate you being here thank you for sharing your knowledge and thank you for helping right the loan officer community rise up man and play at a higher level no it is our honor and our privilege and thank you very much for having me today you bet and as always listeners uh we appreciate you so if you like this episode you know what to do give us a little love out on the inner webs leave us a review and we appreciate you as always thank you for tuning in we'll see you on the next one thanks for listening to mortgage marketing radio one more truth in mortgage marketing get more free training and resources at mortgagemarketinginstitute.com hey guys what's up real quick uh you've heard about the mortgage marketing pro membership before and i just want to quickly remind you if that you're in a place in your business where you simply need more purchased loans you need to fill your pipeline with purchase business let's just face it agents are still a solid pillar of business and sources of purchase business for you well good news our mortgage marketing pro membership helps loan officers like you close more loans without the hassle of chasing agents or cold calling done for you agent classes expert training videos a marketing automation platform that automates the entire process for you everything you need to build your personal brand in your local market attracting convert agents into referral partners plus done for you proven marketing materials and plug and play content to make promoting your class getting agents butts and seeds partnering with affiliates real easy but that's not all you'll also get access to our weekly mastermind calls with top elbows authors speakers and coaches to learn the best strategies to grow your business right now in today's market and as an extra bonus for limited time for all new members you'll get access to a database of 200 agents in your local market that have closed anywhere to from eight to 50 transactions in the last 12 months and we'll provide that list uploaded to our platform for you so you can get off to a fast start in reaching actually productive agents so what are you waiting for you can check out more at mortgagemarketing.pro see more of the success stories there and if you feel compelled to do so book a call we'll have a chat we'll see if it's a fit don't miss out on this opportunity to take your mortgage business to the next level right now head over to mortgagemarketing.pro