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Growing a mortgage business is challenging in any climate. Add a contracting market, increased rates, fewer HARP leads and an overabundance of all-cash deals, and it can seem nearly impossible; impossible, that is, unless you plot your growth methodically. I work for a mortgage lender that, despite the perfect storm of growth challenges in the mortgage industry, has grown its footprint, market share and volume over the past year. I would like to share a few tips that have contributed to our success, ones that lenders of all sizes can implement to enhance production and longevity, while also elevating the industry as a whole.
It’s been asked how Freedom Mortgage is managing to grow in this market. First, I’ll say that the type of growth we’re achieving takes concerted effort. You can’t expect to increase market share or volume simply by raising your goals. You need strong leadership and have to be methodical. You have to have a plan. At Freedom Mortgage, our plan focuses on achieving organic growth, as well as growth by establishing new lines of business, acquisition and hiring seasoned executives with track records of building out productive teams.
The Bigger Picture: Corporate Culture
Acquiring mortgage-lending operations and recruiting top-producing originators will prove fruitful only if you maintain the integrity of your acquisitions. If you’re going to maintain or grow production from any new acquisition, you must honor the integrity of retaining employees and customers. You’ll want to keep your team happy and fix any issues fast. Our company is privately held and our culture supports fast decisions and turnarounds. It is a concerted effort to create and maintain a positive company culture so that goals will be met.
Think about the companies you have heard of that place a huge emphasis on work environment and company culture. These companies put a lot of thought into the actual structure of the work environment, such as cubicles or offices. They consider the messages that seating arrangements convey. They have flexible work schedules, fun events, free lunches and even pet-friendly offices.
While I’m certainly not suggesting that mortgage lenders allow employees to bring their pets to work, there are certain basic tenets that can make a huge difference in overall performance. Whether you’re in growth mode, just trying to maintain or looking to get acquired, you’ll be much more successful if you create an employee-centric work environment based on collaboration and communication.
Partnership-Based Collaboration
“Collaboration” is one of those overused words, just like its cousin “teamwork.” At Freedom, we prefer the term “synergy” because we are all connected to all we do. Our mission is to foster home ownership.
For us, synergy is more than departments working together and staff pitching in and helping each other when things get busy. It means a collaborative, partnership-based approach to overseeing, directing and managing. Let me give you an example.
In many companies, when employees miss their goals, they can begin to feel uneasy, as if their job security is at stake. This can cause a reaction ranging from discomfort to out-and-out panic, whether the threat is imagined or real. Although fear of job loss is an understandable response, it is not the healthiest form of motivation.
Happy employees, on the other hand, generate happy customers. If someone is going off-track we want to know why, so that we can fix the issue and fix it fast. At Freedom Mortgage we list top performers and have weekly meetings and quarterly reviews. We also have a mentoring program.
Achieving goals is a matter of making sure everyone has the right type of support. Helping your team to thrive and allowing them to feel heard and supported creates a positive environment that gets transmitted to your customers every time they come in contact with your staff. Partnership-based collaboration between management and staff is one way to boost customer service ratings. Happy customers are repeat customers—and great referral sources, too.
The Obvious Role of Communication
Everyone knows communication is a key component to running a successful business and being a great manager. “Communication” is such a common buzzword that it’s often assumed to just happen. As you grow communication, making sure all team members are on the same page at the same time is a challenge. Our monthly newsletter supports this as do our blog and annual Leadership Conference. Our blog promotes our core values and our key messaging to both our staff and our customers. It covers news about what’s happening at Freedom Mortgage, as well as interesting articles on personal finances, home life, and mortgage market updates. The Conference provides our company with a great way to communicate a broad array of important information to a large group at the same time.
If you truly want to leverage communication, you need to encourage employees to speak up, share information with management and make suggestions. Freedom Mortgage has a suggestion mailbox and all items are reviewed. If you want those happy employees that make happy customers, you’ll need to create an environment where each staff member feels valuable and that his or her voice matters.
The same applies to the customer. At Freedom Mortgage, part of our growth plan involves building a reputation that encourages customer loyalty. We want to build a reputation that speaks for us, even when we’re not there. We stay connected to the community through Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn, which we use to further promote our message of fostering homeownership. Don’t randomly post information on social media platforms. Your company should have a clear cut message and protocol regarding the types of information to post online.
We also have a formal program for direct communication. We need to make sure that customers are receiving information not only in a compliant fashion, but also in a way that aligns with our brand and image. For us, that means being active listeners. It’s not just about providing the right answers; it’s about asking the right questions.
Any individual who has contact with borrowers should understand the company’s guidelines for customer care. They should follow processes based on listening and gathering information. In our business, the first line of contact for most customers is the loan officer. Your loan officers are essentially your ambassadors to the Realtor®, builder, and homeowner communities. If their communication is great, your reputation will follow. Loan officers play a major role in the way your company is perceived.
Stay in close and supportive contact. Make sure your loan officers are properly trained and that each projects a professional image. Teach them how to be compliant in their communications with borrowers. When borrowers feel heard, and when they’re involved in their mortgage transactions, client satisfaction increases. When client satisfaction increases, so do repeat business and referrals.
For those who think that ongoing training and reminders are a tedious waste of time, remember that repetitive actions tend to foster robotic performance. We like to remind our loan officers that each borrower is different, so we need to stay engaged as active listeners. We need to have the unique conversations that give borrowers a high quality, personalized experience.
An Inside Job
The foundation for sustained success is an inside job. In this climate of contracting volume and increasing regulations, most mortgage lenders conduct business in reactive mode. I’m not going to sugarcoat my experience: While it’s not impossible to expand while using a reactionary approach to business, it’s unlikely that you’ll achieve marked growth, if at all, particularly in today’s contracting, highly regulated market.
We have a proven formula for success. It requires a concerted effort to change an entire corporate culture to include partnership-based collaboration and dynamic, two-way communication. It is by no means a small task, but is one that yields results, produces happier employees and customers, and promotes longevity, year after year.
About The Author
Donald Hard is Senior Vice President, Retail Business Development for Freedom Mortgage, where he oversees the expansion of the company’s national retail business focusing on organic growth. A well respected industry veteran, Donald Hard has over 20 years of mortgage lending experience, which includes 15 years in executive level mortgage sales management.