Social media and marketing go hand in hand, especially when it comes to real estate.  The following is meant to help get you started in using Twitter to build your database of potential clients and ultimately close more loans, by using a contest strategy.

You need to do a few things prior to launching your contest:  1) be sure you have a Twitter account already created 2) try to give the Twitter account a name that reflects your mortgage business, rather than some random name 3) begin posting “tweets,” which are short one-line bits of information 4) follow some people that are posting tweets on interesting topics – these people will often follow you back!

The next step is to determine a prize for your contest and the rules for entry, award and eligibility.  Possible prizes could range from a Home Depot gift card to a 3-month Netflix subscription or anything else of value to the general public.  Choose something easy to purchase and deliver, if you want to minimize the time requirement of actually running the contest.

As for contest entry, most successful Twitter contests require people to reply to or “retweet” your contest tweet to be officially entered.  Retweeting is when one of your “followers” likes what you have to say and re-broadcasts your message to their entire list of followers.  If you get 100 people retweeting your message, who each have 100 followers, and if any of those people want to enter your contest and retweet as well… you get the idea.  Your message can be broadcast to tens of thousands very quickly.

Generally, you want to give people time to find and retweet your contest before awarding the prize, so consider something like “50th person to retweet wins”.  If you choose relatively inexpensive prizes, you can run several contests and experiment to find out what works best for you.   You will probably also want to limit eligibility to areas of the world where you can do business.

Once you have your contest outlined with prize, entry and award stipulated, consider running it past legal just to make sure you won’t be violating local law.  And finally, let ‘er rip and enjoy!

Facebook has become more and more attractive for advertising campaigns and those trying to market any type of product or service because of the huge traffic and the way the public uses the site. As one of the fastest growing websites out there, Facebook has successfully found a way to harness the interests of both those looking for a reliable social media outlet, as well as a place to go for information about products and places. This mixture of brand placement and social sharing is the perfect place for you to introduce mortgage services to interested individuals.

Advertising your services on Facebook is very easy, taking just a few minutes depending on how involved you want your page and advertisements to be. To start, simply register for a Facebook account and then create a business page to include all the information and links back to your website. You can include pictures, graphics, contact information to start, and make sure you have correctly categorized your business page.

Once you have set up your Facebook account, you will be offered the chance to advertise your mortgages services on the site and put your business in front of hundreds of thousands of users everyday. There are several different options ranging from simple block ads to full size banners to cross promotion opportunities among users. How much you want to advertise is your decision. However, once you do decide to register a page and advertise, it is important that you continue to update your page regularly, adding content that continues to bring interested individuals to your page and then your website. Remember, your advertising is only as good as your follow through, so be sure to follow through with each and every contact on Facebook.

Smart mortgage professionals are now realizing that a Wordpress mortgage blog is a vital marketing tool. Here are 10 reasons to start your Wordpress mortgage blog:

1. Wordpress blogs are free, professional in design and easy to use. No need for an expensive web designer or website. Anyone can start a Wordpress mortgage blog today for free and start generating readers and prospective customers instantly.

2. Your Wordpress mortgage blog will provide you with the ability to keep your clients current on your new offerings and products.

3. Prospective clients can subscribe to your blog feeds or receive them by email, which will allow you to develop a deeper customer base.

4. With your Wordpress mortgage blog, you can develop a conversation with your clients, whereby they can comment on your blog posts, ask questions, and have you answer back. This is open for other readers and potential customers to see and benefit from the information you provide.

5. Customers like the ability to have a conversation that blogs allow. It becomes a two way street where information flows back and forth between those seeking a product or service and those providing the product or service.

6. Successful blogs develop trust with their readers and trust translates into sales.

7. Wordpress blogs provide you with statistics that allow you to see where your readers are coming from and what sources or search engines are driving traffic your way.

8. Your Wordpress mortgage blog can be easily linked and automatically updated to all your social media sites such as LinkedIn, Twitter and Facebook.

9. Your Wordpress mortgage blog is a fast way to build your personal brand and be recognizable in the marketplace.

10. Your Wordpress mortgage blog will allow you to develop a community of readers, customers and peers.

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MBL extends a warm welcome to Doren Aldana from PowerOfChoiceCoaching.com, a new Sponsor!

One of the nation’s leading Mortgage Marketing Coaches, Doren Aldana, is giving away 300 copies of his Brand new DVD/CD set titled, “7 Secrets to Attract a Steady Flow of Pre-Sold Mortgage Referrals on Autopilot!” as a special free gift for members of MortgageBrokerLand.com! It comes with one DVD and two audio CDs revealing seven unusual strategies Top Producers use for attracting red-hot mortgage referrals on demand – without asking, begging or bribing.

Doren’s currently looking for progressive mortgage professionals – who’d like to become his next “success story” and use his proven systems, tools and coaching to…

…quickly and easily attract a flood of red-hot mortgage referrals and a full pipeline of closed deals – regardless of market conditions!

There are absolutely NO commitments or hassles involved in getting his brand new DVD/CD set for FREE. (All he asks is that you cover a portion of shipping costs).

Here’s just part of what you’ll discover…

• The strangest marketing secret Top Producers use to bring in a consistent stream of repeat business and unsolicited referrals without asking, begging or bribing!
• How to build a 100% “By Referral” business at blinding speed (from both clients and referral partners)!
• Why just providing “excellent service”… isn’t enough to stimulate referrals… and what to do instead!
• The seven most common (and embarrassing) referral marketing sins most mortgage professionals make and how to avoid them!
• How to get Realtors and Financial Planners begging to partner with you and send you all of their coveted referrals for life!
• And so much more!

This information is absolutely PRICELESS. And that’s just the beginning…

Along with your free DVD/CD set, you’ll also receive four Power Bonuses (worth a total of $1144), including a “Roadmap to Success” 1-on-1 coaching session, over 350 downloadable “one-of-a-kind” marketing templates, a completely “Done-For-You” 52-week email campaign, and lots more!

While supplies last, you also have instant access to a keyword searchable download library, jam-packed with hundreds of killer-effective (and totally unique) marketing tools such as…

• Ads
• Postcards
• Client Letters
• Calling Scripts
• Lead Generation Reports
• Rack Cards
• Referral Cards
• And lots more!

Sound too good to be true?

You’re right! There is ONE catch.

All he asks is that you cover a portion of his shipping and handling costs to mail this BIG WHOPPER package out to you. Doren is a new sponsor at MortgageBrokerLand.com and has made this generous offer to MBL members.

Claim your referral secrets DVD/CD set now!

I can’t emphasize how easy this marketing method is, nor the effectiveness per minute spent compared to other marketing venues.  Here’s the formula… get ready because it’ll really blow your world away… it might scare you…

1. Set up a free blog for your mortgage business
2. Set up free accounts on Twitter and Facebook (at least)
3. Set up a free account on TwitterFeed
4. Within TwitterFeed, create RSS feeds for your blog to automatically post to both your Twitter and Facebook accounts
5. Blog blog blog!

The idea here is quite simple:  harness the power of modern web technology to broadcast your message from a single place that reaches three key high-traffic sources (search engines, twitter, facebook) automatically for you.

There are a TON of ways to do the actual marketing portion (i.e. post topics, etc), but if you can’t figure out what messages you want to send to people you are probably in the wrong business.

Feel free to post questions and your blog, facebook and twitter info in the comments and MBL will be glad to be friends and follow you!

MBL on Twitter

MBL on Facebook

Everything in the mortgage industry seems to be in electronic form, loan applications, closing documents, etc.  The benefits of having electronic forms can be taken even further by utilizing them beyond the loan process.  You may not realize it, but nearly every document that you work with can be converted into an electronic form.  Maybe your office still utilizes a paper form for employment applications.  Or maybe you are using post it notes to let the secretary know you need more #2 pencils.  Regardless of the task your old paper form is performing—an electronic form can do it better.

Electronic forms can also help you perform new tasks as well.  You could use a form on your website to capture information from potential customers, perhaps offering them a free appraisal for filling the form out. You could send existing customers a form to pass on to their friends, offering a reward for each form that is returned to you.  All of this can be done with a PDF.  The form can be tracked, and even an email button inserted into the form to ensure that the form comes back to you.

Regardless if you need a paper form converted or a new form designed from scratch, electronic forms are the way to go.  Get rid of the paper, post its and Word docs and utilize an electronic form.

Is there a secret formula to winning a customer “for life”?  Many say there is.  In fact, entire marketing systems have been developed with the goal of earning life-long customers.

As a mortgage professional, do you put any value in doing business today in a manner that will help you do business with the same customer a few years from today?

Let’s assume for this article’s sake, that you Mr. or Ms. Reader, work towards repeat business with each of your customers.  What specific behaviors do you engage in that increase your chances of getting a 2nd, 3rd, 9th deal from the same customer?  If you don’t immediately have a list of answers to the question, it probably means you aren’t really working towards repeat business.

So what can you do?  Here are a few simple ideas that may seem obvious, cliche or old fashioned, but they work.

• Be honest.
• Be fair to your client and to yourself.
• Put your client’s interests before your own.
• Communicate with your client.  You don’t have to be their best friend as long as you deliver information the client wants and needs in a timely manner.
• Stay in touch.  Whether you send an annual birthday card or call them every once in a while to see how life is going, just find something and do it.

What else do you purposefully do with every client that helps you earn repeat business with them in the future?

Creating “Link Bait” is what search engine marketers call the art of creating unique, compelling content that motivates other webmasters to link to your site. It often comes in the form of weird, funny or controversial and it is probably the single most effective thing loan officers can do to boost their website or blog’s search rankings and website traffic.

The reason link bait is so effective is that it plays to what search engine algorithms like the most: growth of so-called “natural” one-way links from other websites. If you put something on a page of your site that inspires other webmasters and bloggers to link to it, you have generated more positive affect to your search engine rankings than submitting your website URL to 1,000 directories or getting 1,000 reciprocal link deals with other sites BY A HUGE MARGIN.

A great example of link bait and it’s close cousin, viral marketing, is the following video posted to YouTube. You’ve probably already seen it because it is effective and people have talked about it, linked to it and generated buzz for the creator.

If you are like me, you try to automate anything you can in order to boost productivity. One great tool I’ve recently been playing with is the iMacros add-on for Firefox, which is also available for Internet Explorer if you prefer IE.

It’s a free download that plugs in to your browser and allows you to record things you do in the browser and replay them anytime you like. You can even set the “macros” to loop as many times as you want if you have a task that needs to be repeated over and over again.

The sky really is the limit in uses for this tool.  Here are a few ideas for boosting productivity, all potentially requiring only a single click:

• Pull up your favorite lender websites each morning, login and go to your preferred rate sheets.
• Pull up your personal website/blog and login to view your daily statistics.
• Pull up webmail (if you use webmail), login and go to your inbox.
• Post an ad on Craigslist.
• Run a search on your county assesor’s website for ARMs that will convert soon.  It’s even possible to set up a macro to extract data and prepare a list for you.

Have you tried this yet?  If not, here’s a nice tutorial for getting started.