If you’re running a mortgage broker business, chances are you want to grow and scale the business, possibly even to a point where you could sell it as an asset in years to come.
But, if you’re not focused on some key areas in your business it will make scaling (and selling) your business harder than it needs to be.
Here are my 5 top tips for anyone wanting to scale their mortgage broker business:
1. Outsource as many tasks as possible
Stop trying to do everything yourself!
Sooner or later, as your business expands, you’ll run out of hours in the day to handle all the work, so instead of waiting for the burnout to hit you, get comfortable with outsourcing now. Whether it’s someone to manage your calendar and emails, or a full support crew to do all the mortgage broker applications and document work, outsourcing tasks will be one of your greatest business moves!
Building your support team might look like:
- VA – to handle your admin
- Loan writer – to prepare and manage loan applications
- BDM – to contact prospects, old clients, and potential referral partners
- Marketing professional – to do blogs, emails, social media posts, and Google Ads
- Accountant – to do your bookkeeping
- Business coach to help you set goals and keep you accountable
Building a support team will ultimately allow you to serve more clients sooner.
2. Document every process
Why you need to document your entire business
Everything you (and your team) do needs to be documented, including how you win clients, how you nurture and communicate with them, how you manage loan applications, and everything in between.
Why?
- Simply by documenting the process you will naturally refine it
- You will be better set up to offer a consistent service (and this is key if you want repeat business)
- It makes onboarding new employees so much easier (as well as retaining them!)
- Potential buyers will love the ease and simplicity of the business (making it a saleable asset)
3. Communicate with your customers
Make content marketing your friend
There’s no getting around this, content marketing is vital in any business. If you’re simply relying on word-of-mouth referrals you’re playing a risky game. Sure, it’s great to have a constant stream of inbound clients, but what happens if that suddenly dries up? Or you want to branch out to a different specialty or region?
And, if you want to create a saleable asset, word-of-mouth referrals are no match for a proven content marketing strategy bringing in reliable streams of ideal clients.
But, see point #1. If the thought of creating regular content for social media, blogs, and LinkedIn is not your thing – outsource it!
The main point is to ensure you have a simple but effective system to consistently publish quality content.
4. Automate repeatable processes
Why you need to automate as much as you can
If you’re manually doing any of the following tasks in your business, stop now and make a commitment that you will learn how to automate them (or contact me and I will do it for you).
- Lead generation
- Prospecting new contacts
- Onboarding new clients
- Customer communications during the loan application process
- Email marketing to your database
- Admin and bookkeeping
To succeed with automation, you need to embrace your CRM – find out everything it can do and then actually use those features. You also need to embrace other digital tools, like DocuSign, Calendly, and ActivePipe.
Again, if this all seems too much, me and my team can help.
5. Leverage your database
Why your database is a gold mine
Your database can provide you with repeat business for decades to come, why would you leave money on the table?
Today’s home loan client is tomorrow’s refinance / upgrade/investment loan/car loan/business loan client etc. so if you’re not retaining contact with a client once their loan goes through you are losing out on years of potential income.
And remember that staying top of mind for those clients also means they’re more likely to refer you to their friends, colleagues, and family.
But, this does depend on your business having a reliable way to capture and store client’s contact details (i.e. your CRM) and a way to send them regular and quality content (i.e. your content marketing strategy).
Do you see what we left off this list? Working harder, longer hours!
That’s because to scale your mortgage broker business does NOT need this from you. To scale needs you to think smarter, not work harder.
This is what the top 1% of mortgage brokers do so well – they know the value of outsourcing, documenting, automating, communicating, and leveraging. They know that when it comes time to sell their business, they have created a very attractive saleable asset that is run to maximum efficiency.
If you have any questions about how scaling could look for your business, reach out and book a time to chat by clicking the image below or filling in this online form for more information.