But the real power of automation is that it can be applied to many different aspects of your mortgage business.
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Automation has changed the mortgage industry for good. But is it for the better?
As a mortgage originator actively closing business in 2020, you know there are some things on the backend you could probably be handling better—but who really has time to plan, execute and update their existing workflows?
For better or worse, automation does take time… at least, in the beginning. But there is good news, with the right systems in place, you can multiply the number of clients you serve, raise the quality of your services, and close loans faster without hiring additional staff.
And the best part? Setting up just one effective automation process today, will continue to help grow your business for years to come.
But there is a catch: the mortgage business is a zero-sum game. If someone closes more loans with automation, someone else closes less.
That’s why it’s paramount to invest in the mortgage automation workflows that are truly the best fit for your business—and it’s critical to do it now, before the competition catches on.
In this article, we’ll cover the main benefits of automating your mortgage processes, as well as the specific workflows you can use to 10X your mortgage business.
In a nutshell, mortgage automation allows you to run parts of your mortgage business on autopilot. Using the right combination of automated tools, workflows and software, you can process more loans in less time.
But the real power of automation is that it can be applied to many different aspects of your mortgage business.
And that’s just the beginning. Let’s take a closer look at some of the core benefits of automating your mortgage business, piece by piece.
According to the Harvard Business Review, chances of qualifying a lead when responding within the first five minutes are 21 times higher than when responding within 30 minutes. Yet only 26% of companies manage to respond within 5 minutes.
You can easily outpace the competition by setting up simple automated onboarding emails and texts to instantly greet every new lead as soon as they share their contact details.
If you have a team, automation will also help you distribute incoming leads between your agents so that the ones that are the most qualified are aligned with the right prospects.
The money is in the follow up. In fact, some studies suggest that 80% of sales occur after at least five follow-ups with a prospect.
The good news is, almost every follow-up can be automated. For example, you can send highly-personalized email and text drips to your leads with a predefined cadence. This allows you to nurture relationships and build trust with prospects, even before they decide to do business with you.
Automation helps you easily segment leads based on their location, last action, or areas of interest so with the right system you can follow up with the best offer for a particular client.
Automation lets you process loans faster. According to the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, lendersreduced loan processing timeby around 10 days with a little help from technology. And with the rise of online loan applications, borrowers expect loan processing times to decrease even more.
To supercharge your loan processing speed, you can integrate your CRM system with loan origination software and automatically trigger actions and notifications whenever loan status updates.
Additionally, automation allows you to reduce room for error when processing loans and potentially save thousands of dollars in compliance fines and penalties.
But when you focus on closing as many loans as you can in the moment, keeping in touch with past clients often becomes an afterthought.
It’s pretty difficult to scale a mortgage business that has many manual workflows—and the last thing you want to do is scale your messy and chaotic systems. People make mistakes, and unfortunately, without the right system in place these mistakes will only multiply as your lead count grows.
In other words, when there are cracks in your systems, you can expect at least some of your leads to slip through them.
On the flip side, when critical aspects of your business are automated, there’s really no limit to how many leads you can work with at the same time.
Even if you decide to invest in new marketing channels or lead databases, you can rest easy knowing that smart automation has your back. If you want to turn your lead flow on full blast, you can easily and automatically qualify and nurture every lead.
Ever thought about how much time you spend punching a dial pad?
With an automated dialer, you and your loan officers can automatically run through a large database of leads in much less time,increasing productivity by 200% to 300%compared to manual dialling.
But how can an automated system possibly know who to call when?
Glad you asked. Some sales platforms (Shape included) offer a smart lead prioritization system, which ensures that every call the system makes for you will be targeted to the most promising lead, at the most optimal time.
At Shape, we use a lead prioritization algorithm that analyzes each lead in your database based on a list of 27 key criteria to instantly connect loan officers with the leads most likely to convert.
According to a Gartner survey, SMS open rates can be as high as 98%, compared to a mere 20% for emails. Additionally, the majority of people respond to SMS within just 90 seconds.
When it comes to ROI, not many marketing channels beat email. In fact, research shows that every dollar spent on email marketing can yield as much as $42 in return.
But achieving the highest possible ROI is only doable if you send the right email to the right person at the right time. Thankfully, this is something automation can help you achieve.
According to Hubspot, the majority of businesses use call recording mainly as a way to increase customer quality service or dispute controversial events. But there are other benefits that call recording provides for mortgage businesses.
According to Fannie Mae, 66% of homebuyers would prefer to handle their mortgages entirely online.
No wonder the number of eSignature transactions has increased tenfold within just five years.
The mortgage industry is changing fast. Loan officers are no longer competing based on who has the best offers or personalities.
These days, it’s all about the system and service.
Clearly, the role of automation in separating the best from the rest will be crucial. And yes, automation does take time and effort upfront. But after you set your processes in place, it’s only a matter of making small adjustments that make a very big impact for your clients and your business as an expert loan originator.
Ready to see for yourself? Find out how an automated mortgage marketing and sales platform can remove the bottlenecks from your transaction pipeline and help you consistently generate more leads.
Sign up for your free trial of Shape today!