Mortgage websites are just a part of a mortgage originator’s digital marketing strategy.
In 2011 and beyond, having a web site without a presence in mobile, local, apps, social media and email is like playing a baseball game fielding only three players.
The first step for mortgage web site planning is to determine your main goal. Most mortgage originators are looking for a mortgage web site to generate new leads. However, mortgage web sites can also help convert existing leads into actual mortgage applicants. You can also use mortgage web sites to support your referral channel partners such as Realtors.
If you just want the equivalent of an on-line brochure for a web site, you can probably create your own with just a little help. Content management systems such as Joomla or WordPress have made making simple web sites easier than in the past. Of course, the most important step if you go this route is to create the content that will go on the pages on your web site.
Mortgage Web Sites That Generate Mortgage Leads
If you are like most mortgage originators then you are looking to generate mortgage leads. To accomplish that goal your web site cannot be a project you work on once and leave alone. Instead, you have to treat your web site like a living breathing being that needs to be fed and nurtured on a continuous basis. Specifically, every mortgage web site needs the following three key parts:
1. Sales Funnels. You need a pathway for visitors to follow when they get to your web site and you need one for every type of mortgage borrower you are targeting. On mortgage web sites a sales funnel is a series of pages that visitors click on until they finally get to a page to request your services. For example, you might have one sales funnel for home buyers and one for refinancing home owners.
2. Fresh Content. This is the living breathing part – the more content that you have on your mortgage web site that is meaningful and relevant
3. Keyword Strategy. Once you have content and sales funnels, you need to select relevant keywords for each content page designed to attract your specific target market. This involves keyword research, selection and modification of your content to optimize your page to reach the highest possible search engine ranking. You will never see the top ranking for “mortgage refinance” but there are thousands of keyword combinations where you can be on the first page of search results.
4. External Linking Strategy. The more links to related sites that you have, the higher your ranking will be in Google and other search engines. Any mortgage web site strategy must inclue a plan to connect your web site to other sites.
Unless you are prepared to put these four key pieces into place, you probably will not see the kind of lead generation results you want.
Finally, do not forget about lead conversion. Getting a lot of leads is great but is of no help if you can not convert them to mortgage applications and closed loans. At least one third of your marketing resources should be devoted to mortgage lead conversion efforts on-line with the other two thirds going toward mortgage lead generation.
