Mortgage Marketing Online Vs. Offline

Many mortgage originators debate whether to market on-line or off. But the
real question should be which marketing methods and strategies work best
on-line, and which work best offline? Let's take a closer look.

Direct Mail & Telemarketing

Direct mail campaigns can be expensive with all the printing and postage
costs, so use a combination on-line / offline promotion with these.

Begin by fine-tuning your postal mailing lists, then use targeted mailings
to borrowers for special promotions over mass mailing everyone general
reminders; smaller mailing can reduce your costs. Then for your larger mass
mailing, use postcards, black/white printing or other less expensive means.
While you are designing your direct mail, make sure to add your web site's
address (URL) so your prospects can go on-line for even more marketing and
sales opportunities.

Then on-line, market with interactive devices like forums or blogs, asking
for comments/feedback from your readers.
Offer downloads: reports, ebooks, etc to build relationships with your
potential mortgage customers. These can either both be free to entice
visitors to your site, or carry price tag and develop additional revenue
beyond the mortgage transaction.

Establish telemarketers to get more leads for your on-line and offline
marketing. Don't' worry about "getting the application" necessarily. Just
get lead information for follow up, then put the prospects in a system where
they will receive regular mailings.

Websites and Email Marketing

Websites today cannot be static HTML sites. The days to set it and forget
it are over for all practical purposes.
Sites that are gaining readership and converting to leads are ones that are
interactive and constantly changing, like blogs.

Whatever you have, make sure to set up an auto-responder form to capture
leads for an on-line mailing list. (This form can do double duty and ask for
postal mailing addresses, too). Then conduct regular email marketing
campaigns targeting particular mortgage needs in conjunction with your
offline promotions.

Benefits and Disadvantages

Benefits of on-line marketing - Get more for your marketing $$! Ability to
update your content instantly and change your target market overnight.

Disadvantages of on-line marketing - Email spamming is not allowed & many
forget they sign up and report you as a spammer; keeping up with SEO (search
engine optimization) is an art, as the search engines change their
algorithms and requirements daily at times; technology - what work today
may not tomorrow, so you need to keep up - not always easy time-wise or
money-wise with software and learning systems.

Benefits of offline marketing - People get to "keep"
something and often do, refer to it years later and showing their friends,
etc.

Disadvantages of offline marketing - Higher printing and postage costs.

So the next time you are debating whether to market your origination
business on-line or off, ask yourself which marketing methods and strategies
would work best on-line, and which would work best offline for your
particular items for sale. Then nix and match accordingly.

----------------------------------------------------
Doug Frye is a Mortgage Consultant who mentors mortgage professionals to
career success throughout the US. Follow Doug's business ideas, strategies,
and recommendations at Origination Club..."Marketing, Training, and
Origination Solutions for Mortgage Professionals." Click Here =>
http://www.OriginationClub.com .