Latest / Mortgage Marketing Radio / How to Get 145 Leads from Just Three Referral Sources

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How to Get 145 Leads from Just Three Referral Sources · Mortgage Marketing Radio

• 0:00
  In today's highly competitive mortgage industry, building profitable relationships with
• 0:04
  real estate agents is essential for success.
• 0:06
  However, finding effective ways to secure agent relationships can be a challenge.
• 0:11
  With so many mortgage loan originators vying for the attention of real estate agents,
• 0:15
  it can be difficult to stand out and establish meaningful connections.
• 0:20
  Our new case study featuring loan officer Chris Cogill is a must-read.
• 0:25
  Chris has closed a remarkable 36 million in funded loans from agent referrals.
• 0:31
  And in this case study, he shares his proven strategies for building strong relationships
• 0:35
  with real estate agents and leveraging those relationships to drive more business.
• 0:39
  To get your hands on this resource, head over to LOKestudy.com and download your free copy
• 0:45
  of the case study today.
• 0:47
  You'll find actionable insights and practical tips that Chris used to close 36 million
• 0:52
  in funded loans from agent referrals and how you can, too.
• 0:56
  Don't miss out.
• 0:57
  Go check it out right now, visit LOKestudy.com and download your free copy today.
• 1:17
  Welcome to Mortgage Marketing Radio.
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  Brought to you by the Mortgage Marketing Institute, your number one source for truth
• 1:24
  in Mortgage Marketing.
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  Hey, listeners, what's up?
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  It's Jeff Zimper and welcome back to another episode of Mortgage Marketing Radio
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  podcast.
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  Hey, heads up.
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  If you guys don't know it and you want to connect with me more, you want to get access
• 1:41
  to more of the type of content you've been listening to or watching on video and enjoying.
• 1:46
  Make sure you've joined our private Facebook group over on Facebook at the Mortgage Marketing
• 1:50
  Radio podcast, private group.
• 1:52
  You can go to Facebook, search it in the top search bar, search for Mortgage Marketing
• 1:56
  Radio podcast and then the group will come up just for quest to join.
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  And there'll be a couple of questions to ask you before you come in and love to have
• 2:04
  you as we do some additional training, some content and things like that in there just
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  for you guys as Mortgage loan officers, we've got some downloads and all that just.
• 2:11
  So that's kind of a way to extend the relationship, go a little bit deeper.
• 2:15
  Secondly, if you at all are interested in teaching agent classes, you may or may not
• 2:19
  know that I've got a free download over on my website, the main website, the umbrella
• 2:25
  company for all that I do called Mortgage Marketing Institute dot com.
• 2:29
  What you'll see on there is the ultimate guide to teaching agent classes.
• 2:34
  It's free, download it.
• 2:36
  It's basically a mini course in how to succeed in teaching agent classes.
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  If you've been following me for any time, you know, we've got tons of success stories
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  and results. It's probably one of the top one or two ways for you to effectively and
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  quickly get in front of real estate agents that convert to referrals.
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  So go check that out, mortgagemarketinginstitute.com right there on the homepage, the ultimate
• 2:56
  guide to teaching agent classes, I think you'll like it.
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  So that said, my special guest this week really honored to talk to industry veterans when
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  I get the chance and I find that sometimes when you interview people, right, there's some
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  kindred spirit kind of soul match happening.
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  And so for me, this is just a really great refreshing conversation that felt like that
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  sort of for me and I hope you guys enjoy listening to this.
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  But my special guest is Greg Cowert and he is with NFM lending.
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  He's been in the business 18 years and in 2019, he did 220 units for 58 million and
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  it's been running pretty consistently at that for about eight years in a row.
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  And so I love the depth and breadth, if you will, but mostly the depth of conversation
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  that Greg brings to the conversation.
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  We talk a lot about how less is actually more and that's so much of like our culture
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  or less, like just grow loan volume, let's add more units and look, that might be relevant
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  for where you are in your business, depending on how seasoned or new you are.
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  But remember that sometimes less is more sometimes less referral partners is more sometimes
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  less quote leads is more sometimes less staff is more less overhead is more really depends
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  on what do you want?
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  What are you going to get clear on in your business in your life?
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  How do you want to design your business in your life?
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  And I thought the conversation with Greg was very interesting because he has six core
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  realtors that he works with and his business, the sources of business are broken up like
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  a 30 30 30.
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  So realtors past client database and then builders.
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  And so he shares some pretty frank opinions about pursuing the builder market and to know
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  that 30% of his business primarily comes from working with just six key referral partners.
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  We talk about the kind of the customer pyramid and moving people up or down or off the pyramid
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  and how his ability to you've heard maybe you've heard me say go deep versus wide has created
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  a lot of freedom in his business less stress, we talk about his team setup and he's got a
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  loan office or on his team who's now handling 50% of his business and just a great conversation
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  around oh by the way Greg's also a veteran user of bomb bomb eight years he's been using
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  bomb bomb.
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  So whether you've used bomb bomb you've heard things you don't know I hear all kinds of
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  things about it.
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  I think the way Greg uses it is probably the most successful way to use it.
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  And right now Greg's got 145 leads in the hopper from his three main referral sources.
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  This isn't paid leads paid ads none of that kind of stuff.
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  It's all from his fear of influence referrals past client database.
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  So I think this is a great kind of crash course in designing a mortgage origination practice
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  that supports you and doesn't destroy you.
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  So I hope you enjoyed this episode and without further ado let's get into this week's show.
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  Greg welcome to the show.
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  Thank you so much Jeff happy to be here.
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  Happy to have you.
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  I know you're busy trying to enjoy we're recording this on a Friday and this time in the
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  market though you know you and I talked about lifestyle how's that work and man it's pretty
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  busy market right?
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  Yeah I think the nature of the mortgage business is change is constant I think it's true in
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  every business but in here we are and we've had interest rates dip here in the past seven
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  to ten days and yeah it's busy.
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  Yeah for sure so real quick give me the refresher where in the where in the country again
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  are you?
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  Yeah I'm talking to you at a Richmond Virginia right capital of Virginia about two hours
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  south of DC and two hours away from Virginia Beach right in the middle of Virginia.
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  Okay so last time we talked I wrote down a couple of just like you know high points bullet
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  points and things like that things that stood out to me that that's you know kind of unique
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  to you for our conversation and for the listeners one thing that jumps out let's just get
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  right after this right now it's bomb bomb you're a bomb bomb user for eight years yeah
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  did you get an award from from them about like the longest user or yeah yeah I would we
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  were at like a Keller Williams convention I think they were there at the convention and
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  I said well can mortgage people use this and it was it was one of those if you catch it
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  early enough it's cheap and they have since taken over but yeah it's a great vehicle
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  I still Jeff probably don't use it to talk to macro enough people I mostly use it like
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  after you and I finished this conversation I might record a video and send it to you
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  just saying thank you so I'm almost using it like thank you cards or to explain a more
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  complex process to a customer where it just doesn't work through email yeah are you using
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  that to go over like explain mortgage scenarios closing costs anything like that yeah
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  that's an example yeah it also could be some complex guideline they run into regarding
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  you know perhaps we talk about the fact that the VA just changed its funding fee and I might
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  record a video that then sits in our outlook that I then am ready to go whenever that question
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  comes rather than composing along email I can just send the client a general a general explanation
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  of what's happened and how do you find the open and watch rates with the bomb bomb video emails
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  you know I'm it's good and bad I don't I have no idea I'm not someone who's sending them out
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  to a hundred and therefore I'm curious to see how many I've looked I think it's probably pretty
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  close to 100% because I'm only sending them out in a targeted way I see that in bomb bomb but
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  I've never looked at it no I bring that up it's interesting because you know I've talked to a number
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  of people over the years about bomb bomb and I hear different things and it's and whenever I hear
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  people say that you know they're not getting the open rates or the watch rates it's more often
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  than not that I find people are trying to use it as a broadcast tool instead of a one-to-one
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  communication that's right that's right and again I think I'm driving a Ferrari in first year
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  and not turning the wheel with bomb bomb I'm not using it to what it can do but you know for
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  the subscription price it's pretty reasonable even the way I'm using it yeah and I think the
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  real takeaway at least for the context of what we're talking about here is that that facilitates you
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  to build some more deeper connection and trust with people because of the video it's like you're
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  almost there with them yeah I'll give you an example I recently have had two people who said to me
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  hey I'm trying to get Jeff to call you but he won't and I have said well what's his email address
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  I'll send them a video so I would just like we're doing right now say hey Jeff I'm Greg
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  and you know love to meet with you there's no charge for doing this and here's where we be
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  sitting I find it really it's just such a more personal video so wonderful as you know from your show
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  what a great mechanism and that clients a lot more likely to come hang out with me and talk about
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  buying a house okay so give me a sense of we just talked right before we hit record for 2019
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  220 units 58 million right by the way congratulations yeah how does how does that I'm getting this
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  is where we go naturally curious and organic in our conversation how does that rank for you like
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  compared to 2018 for example is that like a a ban or year for you or is that you're pretty consistent
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  at that level yeah you know when we talk last time we talked about the beauty of this profession is
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  that you set your own goals you set you create your own income and not all jobs allow that I have
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  flatlined at 200 units and 60 million I think I have done it since 2012 2013 so in some ways you
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  could say well wow that really is terrible it sounds like you're just stuck and I think there's
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  some truth there but in the another thing is I'm just really what I'm doing is pretty consistent
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  and it's real simple so yeah thanks I I think where I'm headed here at year 18 of doing this it's how
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  can I do 200 units a year with less drama with fewer hours and I this is I've made some big changes
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  in my mortgage branch here in the past year and this is what I'm excited about for 2020 is I'm almost
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  whatever I've done in the past I'm I'm not going to do that anymore I'm going to try some new
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  things what do you mean many examples um well I have struggled with I have struggled with control
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  I think that that's really common our names on the boilerplate here you know it's Greg power
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  and therefore the client must have me and no one can do it as well as me I've been coached heavily
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  that if someone does something 80% as well as you you should let them do it that's a great
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  easy to understand phrase but I think my implementation was poor so I have a great team member I
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  wouldn't be here without her name Jesse and just starting in 2020 she's taking half of our client
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  appointments um and it sounds crazy but when you know we had 15 clients come in last week and
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  these loan appointments take at least an hour that's a lot of time that I would have been sitting
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  in front of a customer now she's taking half of those so that's just one example of me trying to
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  not be afraid and move forward and make some progress here yeah so let me let me ask you a couple
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  questions about Jesse then um she's licensed yeah Jesse's license definitely started with me
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  probably at age 21 and she's 29 now so um what was she doing before yeah it's a funny story my boss
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  she had waited on my boss for a long time at a restaurant and they said come on in and interview
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  with us and here she is I kind of uh wow it's all that she had a spark one of my other great
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  10 members kind of pulled her in and she's kind of grown up in the business so it's it's so fun to
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  watch her grow and help her make a great income and watch her skills improve uh probably this is
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  that's probably my favorite part of this job is watching my staff grow um I'm somebody who is
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  always hired young people always I just generally don't hire experienced employees well so what is
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  her role titled and I don't know if she's junior or support specialist or what do you how do you
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  identify her yeah so we're running for the first time ever a two loan officer team
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  so she would be a loan officer on the coward mortgage team and um is no is not inferior to me uh
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  maybe a little bit more internal loan officer than me because I tend to be in charge of the
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  relationships but she we're encouraged and her to go ahead and continue to reach and make
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  relationships as well so this is uh she's a commission employee uh so she would be paid a
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  percentage of the bips available so I would decrease my bips and she would take a percentage so
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  it's a pretty traditional setup yeah and so right now she's handling about 50% then of your
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  business that's correct that's a change and uh it is weird to think that there's clients in fact
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  just recently I walked into a loan appointment and I I just wanted to say hi because my name's on
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  the door and they not only did not know who I was they didn't want me in the room and uh even though
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  all of the materials say the coward mortgage team just sees their person and I find that so true
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  that whether you work at well or you work at Joe mortgage they just want to know who their
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  mortgage person is yeah who their loan officer is and uh I think sometimes first of all I think
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  that's good news for someone who works at well because they probably don't care that they're
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  well at least I find that and that's also good news if you're no named mortgage company they just
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  want their person yeah people want a guide for sure um but was there any kind of um
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  scripting articulation or like you know introduce a process for introducing Jesse
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  uh on your team and what I just give you some context is you know I've heard in the past where
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  loan officers are trying to build teams and um you know they have somebody like Jesse whatever
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  now start to interface with agents for example and some agents get their mortgage ruffled so
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  did you have to address that at all um because she's been with me for eight years they already
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  knew her but I will say we have not done a great job of rolling out hey now that's not quite true
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  I don't have a lot of account and I have met with a lot of them and said hey I am trying to change
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  this year and just to heads up some of your customers will be meeting with Jesse I'm 47
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  Jesse's 29 I'm male she's female I've found that actually it's a benefit because I will actually
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  have agents say I think this person is a better match for Jesse they should go to Jesse um
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  and so you know let's say that they had a client that someone with my personality wasn't a good fit
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  for I think having a second loan officer rather than sending it to a young female somewhere else
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  they're able to still keep it within our team and Jesse can help the customer so far it has been a
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  great decision that's awesome good for you man and then of course kind of the idea behind that is
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  this frees you up right give you some breathing room and I mean what do you do with the extra time
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  are you yeah well I mean talk about that that was the idea Jeff that was the idea I think I just
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  for the listeners we had chatted before we talked and we normally helped about 75 customers
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  will call us a month and that's not internet leads that's not yellow that's true organic you know
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  Jeff gave me your name I'd like to talk to you about a mortgage and we're up to I think we just hit
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  145 this month so we uh it's it's been warm enrichment and so we didn't get the winter law
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  we always get a bump right at the beginning of the year with New Year's resolutions and then
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  with the drop in interest rates um it it has not worked out that way where we're all holding on
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  by the seat just trying to return phone calls so I will let you know what it looks like in a normal
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  month but so far yeah I'm really glad she's here otherwise I don't know how we'd be doing it
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  okay cool well good good for you demand to have the courage uh to do that um let's talk about the
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  referral partner situation for a moment because I don't see it written down but something tells me
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  tell me how many uh re-realtors you have as far as referral partners goes yeah I was a um
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  core uh loan officer for about five to six years so I really love that training program it's made
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  me who I am um they have a great graph called the account pyramid where basically you start people at a
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  very young relationship and you move them and I'm or graduated uh um relationship over time and
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  therefore you get more referrals from those accounts sadly my pyramid is just up at the top I uh
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  I think I probably have six big referral partners that are re-letters uh maybe four
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  bit refer sometimes and then just from doing this in this town for 18 years I have a lot of people
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  that just occasionally will send me somebody and then I now have two builders I work with as well
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  so that's it okay of the 145 organic referral partner driven leads coming into your pipeline
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  can you give us kind of an assessment of like where they come from based on that pyramid like
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  how many from that top six etc yeah you know through that training program I learned to know my
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  metrics I know that very well it's 30% builder it's going to be about 30 to 35%
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  realtor and then the remainders are going to be a mix of past clients past client referrals or what
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  I call kind of business fear this could be fear of influence this could be uh divorce attorneys or
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  networking groups um that sort of thing so it's it's very close to a 30 30 30 if you will model
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  Jeff that I'm running with builder third realtor third and then um past client fear of influence and
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  business of relationships that sounds like a nice diversification right no risk exposure to not
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  too many eggs in one basket that's it that's the exact idea the the challenge can be if you choose
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  to enter the builder space which is I mean I would if anyone is listening wants to talk about why not
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  to go into builder space I would love them to call me I'll tell you many reasons but it can take
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  you over and I've seen a lot of lenders be overreliant on builder business because it's the loud
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  chicken the nest it's screaming the loudest and you keep feeding it to the detriment of the other
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  items that if that's a real risk a real risk in our business yeah and so my style is I don't want
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  to just leave that there I want to like unpack that just a little bit um yeah I talked to a
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  little officer just the other day if she's in Orange County California and she has experience in
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  the builder sector she did it for quite a long time but then got out and now coming back in and
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  that's like her number one focus so for those that are listening and thinking like the the builders
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  are yet because they're tired of realtors and all that stuff right what advice would you have
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  for anybody like eyeballing the builders thinking like man if I could just get that to that's the
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  sweet spot fishing the barrel right yeah great question well first of all know that I run
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  the company I work with I love my company it's NFM lending and they run more of what we call
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  like a P&L branch model so I have control over profitability I really care about pricing and
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  how we price and the profitability of our loans so I probably feel it more than a company where
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  you're just a loan officer the truth is the builders want a piece of your pie and we're having to
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  surrender money to builders to help towards closing costs so the client will even call us now if you
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  could find a builder that would pay for all of the closing costs incentives and not ask you to
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  contribute then this whole piece of what I'm going to say wouldn't matter but it's a low revenue
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  now the loan officer of me loves it because I get a commission on it which is consistent per you
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  know dot frank but from a company standpoint when you're giving away money to these builders
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  consistently you do need to know this is a low revenue um relationship so that's one warning I
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  think the other problem I have is the sense of competition uh the site reps tend to think that
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  they own you and tend to think that they can do or say whatever they want to say to you because
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  if you don't answer I have two other people that will and I've always called the relationship very
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  much like an abusive alcoholic relationship where I'm never quick enough I'm never low enough I'm
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  never good enough I often have found that sometimes I'll even just get blamed for stuff that I didn't
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  really it fell apart but it wasn't because of the mortgage so you got to have tough skin if
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  you're going to work with builder and I've been doing builder now for probably ten of my eighteen
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  well probably more than that and our saying is water off the ducts back you just can't let your
• 22:35
  feelings get hurt because it is a um it's a real punch counter punch world working with builders if
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  you had to choose between giving one business source out builder or realtor great which one what
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  it would be builder builder and and my team is saying to me and I don't know this you got to remember
• 22:55
  the loan officer needs to remember that behind them there's so many people who touch the file but
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  these files I'm being told are taking two x sometimes three the amount of time of a traditional
• 23:08
  purchase while one because they happen over six to nine months two because you have to double
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  process them you have to double underwrite them and candidly you have to double originate them
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  and I'm being told that even though builders are 30% of what we do that my team believes it's
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  taking 60% of our time so when you combine that with the low revenue generated by having to
• 23:31
  contribute to the closing cost I just really question that I think my model works which is that
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  30 30 30 keys it's spread yeah um so I can still because look the other thing that happens Jeff
• 23:45
  is a lot of those clients may be introduced to you but not buy with that builder yeah that happens
• 23:50
  all the time or decide they want resale so the builder knows that too and they know and that's why
• 23:57
  they want you to pitch in that these are introductions you wouldn't get and so at the end of the day I'm
• 24:02
  I'm glad to have builder I plan on keeping it but these loan officers we all need to be real careful
• 24:06
  because that can take over your business and look one one owner of a company changes his mind
• 24:14
  and you're you're gone yeah I just see some parallels right to the agent relationships uh but um
• 24:23
  okay that's good to give us on the builder stuff um okay so let me ask you let's go back to
• 24:29
  the leads the referrals and all the cost of 145 in your pipe right generated from from past clients
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  fear of influence realtors all that uh let's take realtors for a second because right I do
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  these various informal polls and I ask the audience and you know whoever else say hey you know
• 24:44
  what's your one focus for this year and I will tell you that over 80% of the responses come back
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  like I want to get better worth agents I want deeper relationships so you know what I'm saying
• 24:53
  what did you say oh no no I said yeah I was talking to one of my co-workers and he's like
• 24:59
  I'm gonna talk to 60 realtors this month I said that sounds terrible you know I can't believe
• 25:05
  you want to do that yeah yeah okay so go on what's the further advice why is that what would you
• 25:11
  how would you advise him and how you got a team member sneaking in right behind us
• 25:16
  hi guy or whoever that was okay let's have a meeting one of the things one of the things we talked
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  about um these these two ladies have picked up the phone with these 145 leads that have come
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  and this is Brianna on your left and Mary Margaret on the right uh these I'm proud to tell you
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  where you had it they're going to yoga I'm jealous now what what time to come in the office this morning
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  they were here before seven so but one of the things we're doing this year is really trying to
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  have accountability within our team to use the mortgage lifestyle to our advantage which is
• 25:52
  we're not in a formal corporate setting you know you can wear yoga clothes and if you want to come
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  in at six and kick out at four then that's fine with me as long as customers are happy and we close
• 26:01
  on time so uh hmm have a great day I'm gonna turn off my phone I can do that and make sure you look
• 26:08
  at your email catalog I will I will see you later bye guy that's awesome okay okay thank you
• 26:16
  well so um yeah no I um you know I would rather go deep with big realtor partners I have a team
• 26:26
  I've six so I'm the six or six of us two fronts you just met them yep two front loan partners
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  there's two loan officers we talked about me and Jesse and then I have two full time processors
• 26:36
  we have gone old school processing and Jeff what that means is when I give you that loan
• 26:41
  I don't want it back you know unless it's on fire this is your relationship you update the
• 26:47
  realtors you you talk to the clients and but I'm designed to do 20 loans a month so that has
• 26:54
  they can handle it's 10 loans per so uh so versus a processor who does 25 30 a month but has to
• 27:02
  depend upon the originator to do this do that we've got I just feel like it's not efficient we've
• 27:07
  gone to a old old style processing this year but yeah I have fewer realtor accounts their teams
• 27:14
  I think teams appreciate teams some of my good individual realtors don't like my team because
• 27:20
  they don't get me right a team appreciates that each person does a little piece of it so I would if
• 27:27
  I was a single loan officer I would go with things after single realtors and if you're a loan
• 27:32
  officer who's a team of three I would go after a realtor who's a team of three I'm a loan officer
• 27:37
  who's a team of six I tend to look for bigger realtor teams and really pour in they actually don't
• 27:42
  have a choice they're gonna work with me it's just win um because I'm just gonna keep talking to
• 27:47
  them and keep calling them and keep sending them a video and but I you know you don't need many
• 27:53
  I think you need five good realtor teams in your role and uh so so of the five agents let's just
• 27:59
  call these elephants or whales whatever um I'm trying to get a sense of like their volume are they
• 28:07
  with the mix of listings versus buy sides do you tend to work more with the buyer's agents are you
• 28:14
  and I'm gonna throw a lot at you and are you entering the discussion if you're marketing or
• 28:18
  prospecting to a team are you starting with the listing agent because they tend to be the the
• 28:22
  chief you know yeah I think yes everything you just said uh my relationships usually with the
• 28:29
  chief who usually does the listing um I am making sure that all six of us meet with all six of them
• 28:38
  I think that's a key tip they're like hey yeah hey Greg come come meet with our team I'm gonna roll in
• 28:44
  with all six of us um we just had an issue where one of our realtor partners struggled with
• 28:50
  addendums and my processor came in and said hey I've designed an email to show them how to do
• 28:56
  addendums and I was like no you're not sending that you're going over tomorrow morning with coffee
• 29:01
  and you're gonna sit down you know because my team's great and the more I can leverage how great they
• 29:08
  are by getting them in front of the realtor partners they're not even they don't really care about
• 29:13
  me they care about Brianna and Mary Margaret so um so yeah so I generally will go after the listing
• 29:20
  agent keep that relationship but when we're picking up the phone you're right it's the buyer's agent
• 29:24
  who are calling me they're often more of a beginner okay so so a common um issue I hear from
• 29:30
  my listeners and I know you've dealt with us in your career is the when you are pursuing these
• 29:35
  teams or listing agents per se or you're trying to cross sell listing agents that's the usual
• 29:40
  knee jerk reaction is hey I'm just a listing agent right so any advice for how you market to a
• 29:46
  listing agent be it be be it on the other end of a transaction because you know they I mean
• 29:51
  their sellers need to buy right or you know how any general advice in terms of is it a different
• 29:57
  approach to listing agents um well I think you know if you're unhappy with your realtor number the
• 30:04
  first thing that loan officers miss is they think that all realtors are the same and they're not
• 30:09
  the 80-20 rule applies so you know whether it I can't remember which one we're using the name of it
• 30:15
  but you've got to research these people ahead of time don't just call on somebody because they're
• 30:20
  on the other side look them up I mean how many transactions have they done where they buy where
• 30:25
  they sell do they have a team stalk them on the internet but really and what we're doing is I'm
• 30:30
  asking those two women you just met and the processors we get together once a month who did we
• 30:35
  work with this month that we liked mm-hmm because you get a feel for these agents they're either
• 30:41
  bossy some of them really know their stuff and so we'll get together and say all right we did 20
• 30:47
  fields boy these two we really like let's let's let's research them and this is where I'm going
• 30:52
  that it's much more contrived that we're gonna go after them right so I'm doing the gifts
• 30:59
  I'm doing the would love to get an appointment but also you know I think what we miss is the human
• 31:06
  condition that we're all habitual creatures and so I think if you as the loan officer like
• 31:11
  myself will just call and not call an ask for business but just call hey Jeff it's Greg hey
• 31:19
  you know I'm interested in working with you I just call and do you have any mortgage questions
• 31:22
  I can help you with right now cool awesome and you know what I find so often they'll say no
• 31:28
  and then I'm like getting ready to hang up and like wait wait there's the one thing going on
• 31:31
  and one deal what do you think about this and now we're in conversation cool I may call from time
• 31:36
  to time see you later chick and so I don't even like ask them to dance with me I just
• 31:42
  do you service that's right that's right do you service yeah um and I may have Mary Margaret go
• 31:49
  deliver them um Chinese lunch for no reason one day I mean you just assume that we're gonna work
• 31:55
  together it's just win well I have people let's not forget there's a certain amount of
• 32:01
  courting that has to happen no doubt you know and people tend to like overlook that or forget it
• 32:08
  or or in today's world of like short attention span and everything's rushed you know they skip that
• 32:14
  that's that's right and here's what the truth is we're all horrible at follow through so the more
• 32:20
  you can qualify the realtor partner ahead of time and only have fewer you're targeting the higher
• 32:26
  the chance to follow through because we're all so short attention span that we think that I can
• 32:31
  make a call it's gonna turn into referrals no these are these are three six months look if Jeff
• 32:37
  if you go after someone it's great as you are in six months they will be referring you it's a
• 32:42
  given yeah so now it's just who you're gonna go after now that feels a lot better god day
• 32:49
  yeah more like your instant role yeah to have certainty yeah and that's a that's a mindset
• 32:54
  why by the way that you have not everybody is there yet although they could be however that's
• 33:00
  the right mindset to have do you utilize like bomb bomb or anything like that during a transaction
• 33:06
  if you or afterwards for that listing agent let's say or any agent that you want to market too
• 33:13
  this is something we're trying to do right now the 145 leads have us a little sideways here's how
• 33:19
  I tell my team just to give you a nugget I here's my two cents any phone call
• 33:25
  with an inquiry is a is a failure and that's a little strong failure but basically it means that I
• 33:31
  haven't told you the answer Jeff and it means that you don't know what's next and so what we're
• 33:36
  trying to do is we've learned how to incorporate bomb bomb into outlook this year and we're trying to
• 33:42
  have you know here comes your appraisal and now you've got to sign an appraisal form for any lender
• 33:48
  and send it back well we're trying to do me and Jesse will sit on camera and just do a very light
• 33:54
  video hey you've just received your appraisal you're getting this video that means that everything's
• 33:59
  okay but you pay 500 bucks for it let me give you 45 seconds on what's in an appraisal you know
• 34:05
  okay we're done call with any questions and graduation your appraisals in so we're trying to
• 34:10
  I'm just starting to realize my emails aren't getting read honestly
• 34:14
  mm-hmm I feel like I've told someone something they're saying they didn't find it out
• 34:21
  and there's a disconnect there and the disconnect is I'm using a tool that's not working
• 34:25
  people aren't reading email or there's the yeah do they understand contextuality over over just
• 34:32
  a text message yeah over an email yeah yeah right that's really cool man I like that are you um
• 34:39
  actively pursuing any new agents at this time are you just sitting tight on the ones you have
• 34:46
  um you know I think for my beginning loan officers and I mentioned to you that I have made
• 34:52
  changes I used to have a branch so I used to have four or five loan officers who worked here not
• 34:56
  for me and my team just within my branch I've since decided I didn't want to do that anymore
• 35:01
  and starting about four or five months ago I'm just focusing on myself and that was a very hard
• 35:08
  decision that came a lot of um in in respect and in anyway um that's the question again I got
• 35:18
  lost are you are there any are you are you pursuing any agents right now actively marketing
• 35:23
  I am now seeing the always be selling kind of always be courting that I'm not doing it enough
• 35:31
  and I do have a couple of agent teams that have been huge contributors in the past who are
• 35:37
  falling off and when I call them and I'm like hey are there other boyfriends or girlfriends they're
• 35:42
  like no uh we're sending everything we got and I'm like oh and I'm like I guess you're just doing
• 35:49
  a lot more listings so what I am realizing is as I've gotten older in this business my agents are
• 35:55
  becoming more listing agents um I need to be I do yes we have committed to restoring the account
• 36:04
  pyramid a bit more and to start moving some folks up and so what we're talking about today I'm
• 36:09
  excited to actually go make some new relationships and what is your approach when you say go make
• 36:16
  new relationships there's like you know 50 different ways we could do this I'm just curious
• 36:19
  while we're on this thread what does that mean to you when you say go make new relationships how would
• 36:23
  that look like if I've shadowed you for a day what would that look like um well one it would look
• 36:31
  like like Friday today we did our realtor update calls so it would look like when I call the selling
• 36:36
  side I'm much more likely to um be open to relationship and really listening to Jeff and maybe asking
• 36:47
  that extra question to see if if this is one relationship so I am using the transaction to date
• 36:54
  around and then I think just the awareness that in this year we'd like to add two additional
• 37:03
  realtor teams to our our trusted group um I just was at lunch with one of the realtor teams head
• 37:12
  we went to a tie restaurant and there was a guy that I thought I wanted to court and he on his
• 37:17
  own brought him up and I learned that this is a internet guy and I've decided I don't do internet
• 37:23
  realtor I've done it I've tried it I don't do it anymore if you want someone to be your filter
• 37:30
  and call your leads and give you out of 112 that work I'm not that's not a job I'm interested in
• 37:37
  anyway I didn't know that that was the way you ran his business and now I doubt I'll be pursuing
• 37:42
  that realtor so um I think it's one awareness and then two doing the research I know the
• 37:50
  realtor's in town yeah so I will once these leads die down I'll spend some time kind of seeing
• 37:55
  it who's who's uh who's out there and who's sending what to what sure do you happen to like with
• 38:02
  your core group your top six realtors or five or six um do you intentionally you know plan on
• 38:11
  business planning meetings with them either as a group or individually quarterly something like
• 38:17
  I do I do I would take quarterly I would encourage one officers to do that not through a desk
• 38:22
  I mean I just had a good realtor partner John sitting here and um it was a funny meeting because
• 38:29
  I he he went through his 2020 business plan with me and it took like an hour and I gave a feedback
• 38:36
  it was great and I was all ready to give him mine and he like shook my hand and kissed me and walked
• 38:41
  up the door and it's like oh this one's it bad this is yeah yeah so but no I you know if it's
• 38:51
  I we'd encourage one officers to say hey let's go take a walk uh-huh let's go to parking
• 38:57
  walk let's go bike together um play tennis squash racquetball whatever the thing is yeah yeah
• 39:04
  I think that the more we can let them see us outside of this stuff yeah you know I think that's
• 39:11
  really been a breakthrough for me to make deeper relationships there's not a realtor I work with
• 39:16
  that I haven't been in their home really yeah even the ones on the lower end of the uh pyramid no
• 39:23
  no oh the top pyramid my upper pyramid yeah and for the first time this year talk about breakthroughs
• 39:29
  I have this whole thing where I keep my personal life separate from business but I actually did
• 39:34
  my first ever big party at my house and uh had all my realtors come over and that was something
• 39:40
  was really scary for me um and and it went it went all right it went well so uh we're gonna try it
• 39:45
  again next year well no you you raised such a great point there though I love how you articulated
• 39:50
  that we need to let the realtor see us outside of the business environment by the way golf is a great
• 39:55
  way to accomplish that no doubt you cannot find anyone to play I do play and I'll buy the um you
• 40:03
  know the tournaments yeah I can't find anyone to go golf really oh wow you're in return yeah I
• 40:09
  I but uh now we've got all these top golfs and these that's the easier way to do it top golf yeah
• 40:15
  it is it is that's an hour versus like five hours you know it is it is with a plate of appetizers
• 40:22
  and a glass wine yeah that's awesome well I'm glad we hung out there for a while because you
• 40:27
  know there's so much um attention around uh technology and online and internet leads and I do
• 40:34
  think it has its place but my advice to and you know you're well seasoned um my advice to
• 40:39
  loan officers is you know don't get lured in by that I tend to fall back on the stats so let me
• 40:46
  just throw this at you right you know this as well as I do so uh in the US there's roughly five
• 40:50
  million transactions a year according to the NAR home purchases well according to the NAR uh
• 40:55
  realtors are involved with 80 plus percent of those so that's a pretty huge number and yes we
• 41:03
  we want to when possible get to the customer first however I like to get in front of the flow of a
• 41:09
  wave you know what I mean and how much of that wave can I take off can I grab for me as that wave
• 41:13
  is passing by and somebody who's just sharing this with me the other day tell me if you agree with
• 41:18
  this is the referrals all the mixed emotions that come with referrals and realtors and all that
• 41:24
  kind of stuff it is still your highest profit um lowest effort air quotes I'm not saying it's easy
• 41:30
  you don't have to work for it I'm saying it's a different sale than an internet lead all that um
• 41:34
  and it's your highest ROI and probably best future referral source um the referrals versus cold
• 41:41
  business agree and my favorite like on my team we're all about past client referral we're all about
• 41:51
  past clients coming back but I got to remember every one of those probably came from a realtor
• 41:55
  in the first place yeah so to your point realtors are also giving you the gift of future business
• 42:01
  aside from just that transaction they're giving yet that's where this is at and could you be a
• 42:07
  mortgage person and not work with real estate agents most definitely um I would ask why and if
• 42:13
  you say I don't like realtors I I would say there's probably 5,000 of them in your town keep keep
• 42:19
  looking there's some real winners out there um but there are a lot of pretenders no doubt um
• 42:28
  okay we'll just leave it at that I was just gonna go time to get up that thread all right I'm
• 42:32
  looking back on my notes here see if there's any last points I want to make before I set you
• 42:35
  free because you got 145 leads to follow up on yeah yeah yeah where where are you at now let's just
• 42:43
  close it out this this at this point you're at how many years in the business 18 18 years
• 42:51
  how much longer do you want to be in the business yeah that's a really good question um
• 42:58
  you know I go through love and hate with this business I think a lot of loan officers could relate
• 43:03
  to that yeah as I'm in year 18 I I really love it um I love it for what it's able to help the people
• 43:13
  who help me do in terms of their income and their quality of life also remember Jeff we help people
• 43:19
  through a really stressful transaction that they're only gonna do four times in their life I mean
• 43:23
  I come from a counseling background they used to be a school teacher I've got a master's degree
• 43:27
  in counseling and this is my helping profession I mean this is how I see it this is how I love
• 43:33
  on people and um and I get paid really well to do it and I get to run my own business so
• 43:39
  yes it's a hard business but if you're in it I just think you got to be so grateful now be careful
• 43:46
  it will eat you up and you know I you and I have talked to touch about this year I've got to find
• 43:53
  a way to do things different and work fewer hours more is not better I if these loan officers
• 43:59
  are looking at me and saying oh he does 200 by the way there's a guy who does 600 but 200 is no
• 44:05
  better than 100 it's all the lifestyle and I think loan officers especially in the early years
• 44:11
  think that it's all gonna be so much better when they have more more units you know I would tell
• 44:17
  them not at all in fact it gets worse sometimes if you have more units pick your lifestyle and then
• 44:23
  reverse engineer how many relationships and how many transactions it takes to live that lifestyle
• 44:29
  but be careful about thinking that more is going to be more because I'm actually this year I think
• 44:37
  I'm learning that more is less and and and it less is more and I actually want less this year I
• 44:42
  want less relationships I want less employees I would say maybe you want less loans the problem
• 44:48
  with 145 leads I really want 50 yeah I want 50 leads and 100% conversion right what about 20 leads
• 44:57
  and 200% conversion I mean that's really mastery so yeah just you know I but I I want to stay
• 45:04
  in it because I think it keeps teaching me so much you know but to answer your question if I got
• 45:09
  another 10 years in me I'd be surprised this is a high burnout field but I am open to if I can
• 45:18
  learn to adjust my expectations a bit more to be much less unit driven or income driven and much more
• 45:27
  quality driven like that's one of the things I've loved about talking with you is you really take
• 45:31
  the time to connect you're a gifted listener and if I'm getting so busy that I'm not doing that
• 45:38
  I'm too busy and honestly looking back over the past couple years I've been too busy
• 45:43
  so let's slow it down in this weird world in some ways the less you do the more you'll gain so
• 45:50
  I love it that's kind of where I am yeah I love that that's great advice man thank you so much you
• 45:54
  answered that perfectly yeah thank you for the opportunity to answer you're such a good listener oh
• 46:00
  thank you this for me it's a labor of love to do this you know and I mean it's kind of a passion
• 46:04
  play it's not like I'm getting you know paid to conduct these interviews but it's it's the pass
• 46:09
  through pay it forward thing that happens you know in the industry that's the reward so
• 46:14
  it's been great meeting with you and I when I go on my walks or bike rides I love to listen to
• 46:20
  these kind of podcasts and I'm sure there's so many people that really you're changing lives by
• 46:25
  just letting us talk to each other in this weird third party way of talking through you to each other
• 46:30
  so yeah thank you for all you're doing man yeah hopefully we'll meet up in an event in the near
• 46:34
  future here um let's do this I'm gonna let you go because I know you're busy but if anybody does
• 46:38
  want to reach out to you what would be the best place to do that website email what do you suggest
• 46:42
  yeah that's great my name's Greg and my last name is coward with a T so COW like a cow and then
• 46:47
  arc class just on my website looked me up my cell phones right there you can text me or call me
• 46:52
  I'd be happy to answer any questions anybody had that is a funny thing about this business is
• 46:57
  whether it's core or you here today we're all on such an island but yet I do find the
• 47:03
  loan officer community is really good about unless it's in your backyard right because then we get
• 47:08
  a little weird it out you know it's what if a if a woman in Des Moines Iowa wants my help uh
• 47:13
  why not so uh yeah please if I can pay it for it I'd be happy too awesome we'll appreciate you
• 47:18
  and listeners if you like this interview you know what you do hop on wherever you're listening
• 47:21
  to this leave us a review please it lets us know that we're making an impact and so appreciate
• 47:26
  everybody tuning in and uh we'll see you on the next one bye for now thanks for listening to
• 47:32
  Mortgage Marketing Radio one more truth in mortgage marketing get more free training and
• 47:38
  resources at mortgagemarketinginstitute.com
• 47:57
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