- Following the latest marketing fad without understanding marketing fundamentals
The answer to getting more clients is not going to be found in the latest media — be it the internet, Facebook, Twitter, podcasts or in the future when everyone is walking around wearing virtual reality headsets or have Wi-Fi connected directly to their brains. If you are an early adopter of a new media you can do well for a period of time, but if it works for you it will work for others and they will take it up in direct competition to yourself.
Yes, it’s important to keep up with the times and ensure you are marketing across all channels relevant to where your clients are. Don’t get me wrong, the latest social media can be great, but only If you are using it properly.
If your marketing wasn’t working in traditional channels then it’s still unlikely to work in the latest media. Media is just one part of marketing, which requires coherently sending the right Message, through the right Media, to the corresponding Market. If your message is wrong or you are speaking to the wrong market, it doesn’t matter what media you are using.
- Not offering additional products and services
“Never depend on a single income. Make investments to create a second source.” – Warren Buffet
Most Brokers are cautious about offering additional services and products to their clients. They feel it is being pushy, ‘salesy’ and overstaying their welcome – and if you are offering people things they don’t need, then yes, it is.
But if your client does need additional services, even if they don’t know it yet themselves, and you believe that you have a great solution for them, you are doing them a disservice by running out the door as soon as they sign the loan application forms.
Take, as an example, a young man who walks into a menswear store to buy a new suit. He has just graduated from university and has a job interview lined up. As the sales assistant you help him pick out the right kind of suit, which he buys. But you also know he will probably need a belt, tie, shoes and shirt, which he may not be aware that you also sell.
Are you doing the right thing by him if you take his money for the suit without letting him know you can also help him select these items, which you have versions of that complement the suit he has just bought? He is going to buy these additional items, just from somewhere else, and will have to spend more time and effort finding other places to get them.
Do you trust others to look after him as well as you will?
Or worse, what if he has forgotten he will need a belt and finds himself without one on the morning of his interview?
As Mortgage Brokers we know there are a range of other products and services a client will need related to the home loan they are getting. Some we can provide, for other needs we can recommend them to other service providers that we trust.
If you can’t offer additional services to your clients, you aren’t making them ‘your clients’. Instead, you are telling them that they are just people you’ve happened to do a loan for. You are definitely not becoming their Trusted Advisor who is always looking out for them.
Whether it is insurances, investment properties, removalists, settlement agents, tradespeople — it doesn’t matter. What matters is that you find good people, worthy of your recommendation, to help your clients.
The first step is of course identifying the potential range of needs of clients you do loans for. Then either finding the best services and products to meet those needs, either offered by yourself (earning additional revenue per client) or via referral to other businesses that you trust (generating outgoing referrals). Whether you ultimately provide the service or someone else does, you still win, because you are building a stronger relationship with your client and protecting that relationship.