With a 98% open rate vs. email’s average open rate of 18%, it’s obvious that mobile continues to change our expectations and how we want to interact with businesses. You might assume that this only impacts e-commerce retailers or even big-box chains, but the fact is the same people who are trying—and preferring—these new options are coming into local businesses every day.

Unfortunately, only a fraction of local businesses uses text as a marketing tool, even though local businesses are uniquely situated to connect with customers in a way digital companies can’t compete with.

Join experts from Podium as they unveil findings from more than 1,000 consumers who shared their sentiment and familiarity with texting local businesses and how ripe the opportunity is for those businesses who leverage it.

Register today for “The Next Step in Local Marketing: Increase Customer Engagement, Create Trust and Convert Customers for Life,“ presented by Podium.

The post The future of local marketing: Promote your business and convert customers for life appeared first on Search Engine Land.

Investing in high-quality customer relationship management (CRM) software is vital for modern mortgage brokers. However, many loan officers do not get the most out of their new tech because they fail to lay out a clear adoption and implementation strategy. The end result is that many of the exciting features of their platform go unused.

Unsurprisingly, most CRM adoption issues are related directly to your loan officers. Fortunately, you can overcome these problems with a great game plan. 

With that in mind, the team at BNTouch has created this helpful guide. Below, we’ll outline several best practices to get the most out of your mortgage CRM.

How to Maximize the ROI of Your New CRM

If you want to maximize the ROI of your new software, we recommend that you:

Prioritize Adoption

The first step in the process is to prioritize adoption. This is accomplished by focusing on two key factors: developing a plan and offering training.

Your plan of action should outline when and how you will implement the CRM software. You should address long-term goals and the ways that you are going to optimize efficiency. Every aspect of the adoption process should be documented and thought out. This will improve employee buy-in and simplify the transition.

Prioritizing the adoption of new software requires a comprehensive onboarding program. Take the time to train your loan officers on the basics of the CRM platform.

During the training process, make sure to demonstrate how the software will make your team’s lives easier. Once they understand the value, they will be more receptive to onboarding. 

You should also offer ongoing education so that employees remain current on the latest features.

Keep Your Associates Committed

A great CRM will not just help your mortgage brokers. It will also improve the mortgage process for:

• Realtors
• Assistants
• Processors
• Buyers
• Support staff

If you want to maximize the ROI on your new CRM, you need buy-in from these individuals, too. In order to do so, it is important to keep everyone in the loop.

Let your top realtors know that you are rolling out a new system. Emphasize the benefits and encourage them to participate. Use this same approach when interacting with other staff members. Discuss the ways that it will help them meet their professional ideals and goals.

Generating commitment among your client base is also vital. When you are working with a new client, ask them to download the CRM app. Explain that this will give them more control over the mortgage buying process. Also, make sure to let them know that the CRM reduces wait times and helps them close on their loan sooner.

Integrate Existing Workflows

With the right CRM, you will have the power to integrate existing workflows. Doing so streamlines the adoption process and makes the transition smoother. Your loan officers will be able to continue using their favorite lead generation tools while also leveraging the latest CRM.

Without systems integration, your team will have to piece together data from multiple platforms. This drastically hinders productivity and diminishes the customer experience.

Before you settle on a new CRM platform, make sure that it works well with existing tech. The software should be able to integrate with both proprietary and mainstream programs. This ensures that the CRM will communicate with any type of lead provider that you are currently using.  

Input Accurate Lead Data

During the transition, your loan officers will have to manually input quite a bit of data. It is essential that this information is entered correctly. This will save you a lot of headaches because you will not need to spend hours troubleshooting errors. When leads are accurately entered, the CRM technology will function optimally.

Perhaps the biggest appeal of CRM software is that it allows you to automate various processes. However, these automations use the data that your team provides. If the information is inaccurate, then you will diminish the long-term ROI of your new platform.

When you adhere to this best practice, your company can get the most out of the analytics data generated by CRM software. You can track metrics such as:

• Conversion rates
• Leads generated
• ROI
• Total revenue
• Individual loan officer performance

These key performance indicators (KPIs) will offer valuable insights about your business.

Leverage Automation

The true value of mortgage CRM software lies in its marketing automation capabilities. Loan officers that leverage automation workflows get the most value out of their CRM platform. 

CRM software like the one from BNTouch allows you to automate:

Lead Nourishment Messaging

The average consumer expects a rapid response when they request information about mortgages. However, your loan officers already have a full workload. This means that they cannot respond to all leads in a timely manner.

With CRM software, you can create an automated email response campaign. When a lead requests information, they will receive one of these preset messages. This will draw them deeper into the sales funnel and prevent you from missing out on a high-quality lead.

You can even program a series of messages so that clients periodically receive additional correspondence. This will keep your business at the forefront of their mind and improve your conversion rates.

Client Updates

Fully integrated CRM software gives you the power to provide automated client updates. When a particular step is completed, the buyer will receive an email and/or push notification. This keeps them in the loop and improves the overall buying experience.

By providing clients with automated updates, you will further improve your conversion rates. Clients will also be less likely to get frustrated during the buying process because they will always have access to the latest information about their loan.

Refinance Alerts

What is better than closing a mortgage with a client? How about selling multiple mortgages to the same client! Generally, the mortgage buying process is considered to be a single conversion sale. However, it does not have to be this way.

Through the power of CRM automation software, you can earn repeat business and generate more revenue. You can keep in contact with past clients in the post-funding phase. You can set up automatic birthday and refinance alerts. 

When it comes time to refi, that satisfied customer will be eager to partner with your business again.

Lead Distribution

Distributing leads manually is time-consuming and inefficient. Mortgage CRM software allows you to automate this process, as well. Once the CRM is integrated with your lead provider, it will connect these prospects with loan officers.

You can also track each team member’s performance over time. This allows you to adjust the lead distribution protocols and optimize conversion rates. Automating lead distribution gives you total control over your organization.

Benefits of Mortgage CRM Software

When you utilize the five mortgage CRM best practices outlined above, you can get the most out of your new software. Some of the benefits of CRM software include:

Easy Lead Follow-Up

Following up with leads is one of the most tedious processes that your loan officers participate in. CRM software with marketing automation tools makes this task far easier. You can stay connected with prospective clients, current buyers, and post-funded customers.

Follow-up emails and text messages are essential if you want to obtain high conversion rates. Most leaks in the sales funnel occur somewhere between the initial contact and starting the loan buying process. Automated lead follow-up plugs many of these leaks.

Digital Document Management

Keeping up with paper loan documents is a hassle. Mortgage CRM software offers digital document management solutions. This means that your clients can submit key forms online and submit them electronically. Your loan officers can review these documents from anywhere.

Digital document management reduces mortgage processing times. It also results in a better buyer experience. That’s what we call a “win-win.”

Automated Email Marketing

Despite the fact that most digital advertising occurs on social and search engines, email marketing is still a valuable tool. Email marketing is extremely cost-effective, and it resonates with buyers. However, keeping up with all those emails can be a hassle.

Great mortgage CRM software will include several features that make managing your email marketing campaign all too easy. BNTouch’s CRM will allow you to:

• Segment emails
• Tag emails
• Track your open rates
• Send mass emails to specific contacts
• Schedule automated email campaigns

These capabilities will help you get the most out of your email marketing efforts while also saving time.

Upgrade Your Tech with BNTouch

Are you ready to implement the latest technology at your mortgage brokerage? Would you like to implement a scalable CRM platform? Want a flexible software suite that is user-friendly and affordable?

If so, then BNTouch can help. Our team has developed an award-winning mortgage CRM. We have solutions for enterprises, mortgage teams, and individual loan officers. Our cutting-edge tools offer a great ROI and will streamline the mortgage processing experience.

Contact our team today and schedule a no-obligation demo. Once you have interacted with our platform, you will know that it is a great fit for your organization! 

The post Best Practices for Using Your Mortgage CRM appeared first on .

Santa Ana, Sept 1, 2021 – LenderHomePage today announced a new enterprising integration with loan origination software developer Integra. The powerful partnership between LenderHomePage and Integra furthers their commitment to creating a lending ecosystem that elevates the customer experience and enables mortgage companies to simplify and accelerate the administrative processes of origination.

LenderHomePage, one of the country’s fastest-growing digital mortgage platforms, has been helping mortgage companies adapt quickly to the digital era since 2003. Their family of digital mortgage software products, including the innovative Loanzify POS and Loanzify Mortgage Mobile App, enable mortgage companies of all sizes to create a connected omnichannel experience for mortgage consumers.

The digitization of business systems established new standards for an agile, seamless intake and client management process. These expectations have now migrated to the lending industry, where competitiveness relies heavily on the enterprise’s level of digital transformation.

Recent data shows a strong correlation between improving business-to-business partnerships with technology translate to a 10% to 20% reduction in cost-to-serve, 10% to 15% increase in revenue growth, and an overall increase in employee satisfaction—the integration of Integra with Loanzify POS capitalizes on this phenomenon by enabling a fast-track digital transformation solution. 

Integra offers a complete browser-based LOS system for facilitating the mortgage operation from origination to closing. Integra’s intelligent document management and eligibility engine seamlessly drive data, making origination and fulfillment functions a breeze. Combined with Integra’s sophisticated rule management system, the bi-directional integration with Loanzify POS helps lenders configure and customize their front- and back-end operation, increase their intake capacity, expedite the loan life-cycle, make better-informed underwriting decisions, and increase transparency for all stakeholders. 

“Growing our partner ecosystem and helping our clients adapt to today’s technological demands quickly is one of the keys to our success,” states Rocky Foroutan, CEO of LenderHomePage. “Working with partners like Integra makes deploying intelligent, automated workflows with Loanzify POS simple and swift, thereby improving performance, productivity, and helping mortgage companies deliver an outstanding digital customer experience.”

About Integra:
EPIC LOS by Integra combines over 25 years of lending technology experience to provide lenders with automated compliance across every channel in the mortgage industry, including retail, wholesale, and correspondent. 

About LenderHomePage:
Since 2003, LenderHomePage.com is the leading provider of a secure and compliant cloud-based digital mortgage platform that powers lender websites, mobile apps, and mortgage POS solutions. Mortgage lenders of all sizes use LenderHomePage.com’s customizable and scalable solutions to enhance borrower experience, streamline the mortgage process, and increase Loan Officer productivity and efficiency.

About Loanzify:
Loanzify POS by LenderHomePage is part of a suite of innovative productivity solutions developed for the modern mortgage professional.

When it comes to creating ads that convert searchers into customers, many advertisers dive in to structure, testing, and more, and gloss over one of the most important elements of any campaign: copy. Your ad copy is the very basic building block of your advertising. Getting it right can be the difference between a milquetoast conversion rate and driving huge value for your clients and stakeholders.

In her session at SMX Convert, Alyssa Altman did a deep dive into writing ad copy that actually converts including understanding search engines, funnels, intent and more. Check out our recap of her popular session below:

The evolution of search engines

“Google, Microsoft, and other search engines have reversed engineered their search algorithms over time (and re-engineered them) to make sure that they are giving someone the best answer to their ‘question’ as humanly possible,” started Altman. Many pieces of information that used to exist solely on websites are being pulled directly into the search engine results (things like weather, mortgage rates, math problem answers, etc.). That means there’s a lot of competition for clicks in SERPs as a result.

The key to effective ad copy, said Altman, is to understand what your PPC copy is answering in the first place:

Questions to ask yourself about any given topic include the following: “Is someone looking for general company information? Are they doing company comparisons? Are they doing some window shopping?” said Altman. For micro-moments, “people are telling us exactly what they want, so our copy should match that request.” And, of course, some people are just ready to convert, so the ad’s copy should reflect that intent.

This is all easier said than done, right? This is why she focuses on how marketing funnels actually work and figuring out how to align intent.

The reality of funnels and intent

Ad copy that converts starts with narrowing down the funnel, instructed Altman. The traditional notion of the marketing funnel assumes the user does a search to gain awareness of solutions to a problem. From there they consider a company/solution, and then they convert.

But most paid search marketers know it’s not that simple. The conversion process is not as linear for most customers, especially given how cross-channel marketing works. “Our searches don’t actually connote what we are looking for,” said Altman. “There’s this assumption that Google or Microsoft knows what we’re thinking before we think it… but someone could type in a company name and they could be thinking two completely different things.” One person could be looking for a website while another might be looking for a contact form, for example. 

The key to remember is that there are awareness and consideration searches that happen throughout the funnel. Plus, conversion searches might happen on queries that we may not normally consider “bottom-of-the-funnel” type of searches.

”When we’re looking at the reality [of the funnel] it presents the case as to why testing needs to happen or we need to take a deep dive into why a search is happening. Not every search is created equal!” shared Altman in her session. You can have two searchers using the exact same query with completely different intent. That’s where writing PPC copy gets tricky. To determine what people actually mean when they search for something, advertisers have to test.

Testing in action

How to test ambiguous intent. When you’re not sure if your searcher is ready to purchase or just looking, you can test ad copy in a single campaign with dual ad groups and matching keyword terms. Altman also recommends using the same audience for this test. “Starting with a question or a concern that someone may have has the potential to convert at a higher rate,” recommended Altman.

The measure of which ad is doing best for this intent test is click-through rate and conversion rate. “If you’re running this test and noticing that you’re getting more downloads than form submissions than you can estimate that this query might be in the form of more general research,” she instructs. “If you’re getting way more form submissions in this split test, you can shift your messaging to be more primarily geared toward sales.”

How to test obvious intent. When you can tell that the intent is obvious, you can hone in even more and change one variable in an ad. “This testing works well when a user is explicitly telling you what that want to do. ‘I want to purchase this vehicle near me,’” said Altman. The test setup is the same except you’re doing ad variation testing within Google Ads with a 50% split. 

This can give us information about a potential customer. In this example, our lead forms can tell us, “if they’re trying to haggle another deal or they don’t understand a pricing” which we can then use as data to inform our copy, said Altman. “Understanding the content of a submission or a lead is just as important as writing the copy itself.”

Copy mistakes to avoid

If you’ve done your research, created tests to determine intent and then narrow down the messaging when you do know the intent — there still may be some hiccups in your ad copy. Here’s how to avoid them:

Mistake 1: Forgetting the power of your headlines

Your headlines are prime real estate! Use them for unique identifiers, not duplicate information. For example, this ad from a university duplicates the URL in the headline. This is a waste of potential ad copy that could catch a searcher’s eye or convince them to click through on your ad versus a competitor.

Mistake 2: Obvious keyword stuffing

It can be tempting to repeat your main keyword(s) multiple times in your headlines, descriptions and extensions. Altman recommends only doing this if it makes sense in the context of the ad. Quality Score takes your keywords into account as a diagnostic tool for recommendations for improvement. Its three main components are: 

1. Expected CTR
2. Ad Relevance
3. Landing Page Experience

A headline like this doesn’t make sense for this query and likely won’t lead to a conversion — just a wasted click.

Mistake 3: Inconsistency from search > ad > landing page

Ensure that not only the search term is included in your ad and landing page content, but it addresses the larger picture. If you’re paying for a search term, make sure your process is setup for success. In Altman’s example below, we can see that when people search for “primary care doctor near me” a relevant headline is key, but so is a customized landing page experience. 

Taking this searcher to a page that highlights services related to that query will be more likely to lead to a conversion than just taking them to the home page and letting them figure it out on their own.

Next steps

Altman recommended ​​understanding what you are specifically testing before looking to set up an experiment. Testing intent vs. the winning messaging are two very different paths to go down. Clearly identifying what your end goal is will help to drive your upfront testing strategy. 

When testing copy, make it worth testing. Use power words like “free, special offer, now available, in stock, etc.” or emotional calls-to-action such as “explore with us, speak to a person, etc.” to really analyze what messaging has a stronger appeal and why.

Finally, Altman said that advertisers should make sure they have enough data to run a proper test when it comes to copy. Timeframes for testing mean nothing if an activity doesn’t occur during that predetermined frame. For example, if a 50% split test is occurring, aim for 100-200 clicks before starting to analyze your data.

Want to see the full session? Check out all of SMX Convert here on demand.

The post How to write ad copy that actually converts (and 3 major mistakes to avoid) appeared first on Search Engine Land.

Your final chance for industry-wide recognition, awesome social buzz, and a hefty boost to company morale is fast approaching: The 2021 Search Engine Awards entry period closes at the end of this week — Friday, September 3 at 11:59pm PT to be exact!

There’s still time for you to submit your application — especially because the submission process is faster and easier than ever. But before you begin that entry, take a moment to meet the judges, a fabulous panel of seasoned pros across the SEO and PPC spectrum, led by Search Engine Land’s own editorial experts…

… and look over their first-hand advice for what makes a winning SEO or PPC campaign, and thus, a winning Search Engine Land Awards application.

Azeem Ahmad

For me, a successful campaign starts at the end. Yes, you read that right. What I meant by that statement is that for any campaign to be a success, you have to absolutely decide what the measure of success is, and what success looks like for you. Jumping in without clarity often leads to more harm than good for the business.

It’s ok to just say “we want more traffic”, but the great campaigns go a step further and say “with this campaign, we’re looking to increase leads from [x] to [y] – or a [%] YoY growth – by implementing these strategies.”

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Crystal Carter

What makes difference in for a good SEO campaign is a clear understanding of the target audience – what you have to offer and what is most genuinely of value to those users. SEO provides a wealth of user data and insights to underpin content, advertising, promotion, and technical improvements. Putting that targeting to good use makes all the difference.

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Emily Mixon

My tip for a successful PPC campaign is negative fencing, particularly when you’re in a niche product category, and with all the recent match-type updates and close variants. Crucial to maintaining, and especially improving efficiency, campaigns need to be structured in a way to maintain control of keyword targeting and exclusions in an environment where automation is taking over.

For starters, begin with a phrase match-only campaign with a select few keywords, which you know will have a breadth of search queries matching back to them. For example, if you’re selling kitchen appliances, you could target “ovens” and “ranges”, and then collect the data around all of the search queries matching to them over a period of time. It is key to set a cadence for this, and stick to it, or the amount of search queries to sift through could become unmanageable. My cadence, on a good week, is every Monday, pulling the last 7 days of data.

Next, identify the search queries that are driving significant conversion volume, and add them as exact match keywords into an exact match-only version of the campaign. Do not add them as phrase matches to your phrase match campaign. The point here is to funnel traffic to exact match keywords, for which you can tailor specific and relevant ads and landing page experiences, (ex. [double oven wall unit] or [stainless steel gas ranges]). The phrase match keywords have done their job at this point in identifying converting search queries.

Finally, and most importantly, add the new exact match keywords from your exact match campaign as negative exact match keywords in the phrase match campaign. This helps to ensure that those queries hit the exact match keyword, which should have a better Quality Score and CPC’s than phrase match, and frees up budget for the phrase match keywords to find more search query variations.

Also, while combing through the SQR, be sure to add irrelevant search queries such as, “driving ranges” or “dutch ovens” in this example, as negative keywords to the campaign to help reduce wasted spend.

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Anu Adegbola

Regarding what I think makes a successful campaign… a few things straight away come to mind: A good structure based on either site structure, performance of keywords, match types (Broad vs. Phrase vs. Exact).  Clear indication of testing being done (ad copy, bid strategies, match types, etc). Robust use of different bid strategies (but according to performance not just a one size fits all solution.

Varied use of ad copy types – expanded text ads, alongside response search ads, dynamics ads, as well as using extra functions like countdowns, IF statements etc. Indication of regular search query analysis being done. Use of automation as needed.

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Brett Bodofsky

What makes an effective PPC campaign (specifically Google Ads and Microsoft Ads) is a robust structure which allows for ads that are highly tailored to their targeting. The targeting and copy/creative work together, in unison, to help achieve a clearly defined business objective (obtaining leads, sales, customer retention, creating brand awareness). Landing page also plays an important role in the success of a PPC campaign.

A campaign with refined targeting, bids and creative can drive highly qualified traffic to a page. If the page that traffic is sent to is not what a user would expect, has poor functionality, looks unprofessional, that can severely damage the effectiveness of a PPC campaign.

One factor that gets set up outside of campaigns similar to landing pages that can impact effectiveness is the conversion action. For intelligent bidding decisions and iterations to be made campaigns need a proper conversion action to work off of.

Another factor that can make a PPC campaign effective is time. It sounds so simple, but time allows for data to come in, which helps the machine learning make more informed decisions.

• It is the sum of many aspects which create an effective campaign (settings, targeting, bids, budget, creative, messaging, proper tracking, experimentation, demand, landing page, competition, etc). One of these aspects being off in some way can damage the integrity of your campaign and make it less effective.
• A campaign might not always be effective as soon as you launch or even in the first week or 2, but in due time, with more data in the door, it could become effective through means of machine learning having more to optimize off of and any manual optimizations/iterations the practitioner makes.

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Remember: The final deadline is this Friday, September 3 at 11:59pm PT. Standard entrance fees are $595 per application — and you can submit to as many categories as you like.

What are you waiting for? You, your company, and your career deserve this. Begin your application now!

The post Meet the 2021 Search Engine Land Awards judges appeared first on Search Engine Land.