Loan Officer Websites: Your Marketing Hub to Magnetize Realtors

Too many loan officer websites look like congested intersections, information running every which way. Fancy gadgets, like calculators, online application submission forms and loan programs filled with jargon that customers don't understand.

You can't tell the difference from one loan officer web site to the next. Take any two sites and swap logos with each one. Still, you can't tell any difference between them. It's no wonder real estate agents get flustered trying to glean something from your loan office website, when it's designed to service customers.

The Internet has become a safe haven for Agents. Protected from confrontation and reliable for first impressions. Agents have become more net-savvy quickly to keep up with the onslaught of available information to homeowners considering the sale of their homes. Yet, loan officers neglect to capitalize on the increasing searches done by Agents, anxious to secure a new preferred mortgage partner.

Your Marketing Hub

Winning more agent-referred business begins with marketing. And good marketing includes a website as your hub. But just not any loan officer website - an agent-focused website. It's specifically designed for real estate agents to learn about you, what you stand for and how you conduct business.

An agent-focused website serves as your hub that all other marketing strategies are executed. It can connect all your marketing efforts geared toward Agents. Your objective is for Agents to visit your site and learn about your services, to be educated on how you conduct business and to shape their perception of you as an expert.

It has many added benefits:

- Instant Visibility - The Internet gives you credibility and makes you appear professional and established.

- Develops Familiarity - Skeptical Agents can, from reading your site, become more comfortable.

- Shortens the Cycle - If an Agent can learn about you more quickly, when you meet they're already comfortable, and relationships materialize faster.

- Marketing Collateral - It helps your agent-clients refer other Agents to you more easily. It gives other Agents a place to learn about you before they call.

Construction

An agent-focused website is an interactive brochure. You can communicate more information in a site than you can on paper. That means it can save you time and money.

Too often, loan officers eagerly take Agents out to lunch before they really know if it's an investment or an expense. It isn't until after the cost of a few lunches and several phone call attempts that they discover the Agent isn't serious about a relationship with them.

Your site should be the first step in your marketing, by directing Agents to it first, you can delineate between serious and curious Agents.

Design

It's about simplicity. This means you don't need a large bank account to fund it. In fact, each page of your site follows suit. The simpler you make it, the more they'll visit and read other pages.

Think of each page design like that of a newspaper's leading article. You have a bold, attention-grabbing headline, a sub heading, the body and a graphic visually communicating the essence of the article.

Content

Your site is a chance to state for the record; who you are, who you work with, how you conduct business, your guiding beliefs, and how you're different. Your content acts as a resource to inform and educate.

Home Page - This is where you communicate precisely who you are, what you stand for and how you're different, so the visitor can know instantly if your services are well-matched for them.

Who You Work With Page - This page is for those who think they need your services, but aren't sure. It describes in problem-based scenarios, which Agents relate to best.

How You Work Page - This page tells the visitor what it might be like to work with you. Here you can educate them about your guiding beliefs and values, you can describe the type of results they can expect, or you can describe your uniqueness.

Case Studies Page - If you want to cement their perception of you as an expert, back up your claims with actual client case studies.

Testimonials Page - Although these don't replace case studies, it can demonstrate that others were happy using your services.

Articles Archive - The mark of an expert is that they've written something on their subject matter.

About You Page - It's the equivalent of your resume, but connects on an emotional and personal level.

About Your Team Page - This page is to introduce your internal team. Agents know many hands are involved in each transaction and you can comfort them by showing that there's more to your team than just you.

Additional Resources Page - This is an extension of your internal team. Strategic alliances can prove to be valuable to an Agent.

Contact Us Page - This is where you tell visitors how to contact you and how you begin working with clients.

Sign Up Form - If someone visits your site, reads your content and decides they like you, you want to capture that visitor's email address before they leave your site.

Most Wanted Response

To get an Agent to take action you have to actively engage them into thinking about how your service can help solve their problems. The better you can do that, the more likely you'll get your most wanted response (MWR).

Follow these four steps to design your MWR:

- Be personable and personalized. Write informally as if you were having a conversation.

- Address their problems and needs. An Agent will take action the more they can relate to you. The better you describe their problems the more they can see that you understand.

- Give them a sense of hope. Describe the benefits they'll enjoy once their problem is fixed.

- Tell them what they need to do to enjoy those benefits.

An agent-focused website is your interactive brochure for magnetizing more agent-referred business, whether it come to you as free traffic delivered by Search Engines or by prospects directed from your offline promotions, i.e. postcards, flyers, newsletters, etc., as the first step in your marketing process.

Jeff Nelson helps mortgage companies and loan officers increase loan originations by developing customized relationship-building strategies that secure quality relationships with real estate agents.

Click here to get a free copy of the Marketing Planning Guide, a 20-page workbook designed to help you outline a strategy to becoming an Agent Magnet.

Visit us at http://www.loan-officer-marketing.com