“Hi Guys, Wanted to let you know that I got two new loans from your TOM email that went out yesterday.  I know you guys know that you totally rock – but I wanted to take a moment to fully appreciate you!

Thank you so much for the beautiful system you keep in place that continues to prosper all of us “automatically”

Jasmine, thank you for the kind words.  We at Top of Mind are working on making our Surefire System better and more powerful every single day.  By the way, I just noticed that you earned Loan Officer of the First and Second Quarters of 2010.  Congratulations!

This is what we work for at Top of Mind, and feedback like yours today never gets old.  Stay tuned for some very big news from Top of Mind in the next 48 hours.  I’ll be breaking it right here on the Top of Mind Blog.

Before even running the numbers, cutting the upfront MIP which is arguably when they need the money the most, wouldn’t seem to make sense. So when in doubt, I always fire up a new spreadsheet. Not surprisingly, my suspicions were confirmed. Want to see exactly how bad it could get? Here’s a very short video to demonstrate  how it works out.

If you’d like a copy of the spreadsheet shown in the video for your own use or to engage your clients and partners, you can download it here.

So which is it?  Is the FHA just saying one thing and doing another? Don’t they have accountants that work there? Are they purposefully trying to seal their fate?

Or, for you conspiracy theorists, was this all a well concocted plan to run up the stock prices of the regular PMI companies (check the recent price action)? When you boil it all down, that’s about the only beneficial thing for at least somebody that’s coming out of this…..

My guess is that this is just another well intentioned but very poorly thought out plan by yet another government agency that fails to seek advice from those that are perhaps in the best position to offer it. If this bothers you, please check out www.immaag.com  This is run by Bill Kidwell. Bill is an esteemed broker from CO and is leading the fight against this and other proposals which are only harming the public and making it more difficult and expensive for all involved.

In the meantime, if you have any FHA/fence sitters waiting for things to get better, use the spreadsheet to show them how much more expensive their payment will be or how much less house they’re going to be able to afford once the MI costs go up.

In the meantime, here’s a quick video from David Orsini illustrating how to use our new Lenderama Mortgage Website Platform (which is 100% FREE for all Surefire clients) to build a nice, clean and easy “single property website” in less than 10 minutes.  If you are a Surefire client and you’d like to be able to do this, your first step is to fill out this form.  More of these videos – and some big time innovations – are on the way so stay tuned!

Top of Mind Networks

Creative Director – All we’re looking for here is the most polished graphic designer on the planet… a highly creative and deadline oriented superhero that is ready to make a huge impact right away.  Highly desirable skills:  Photoshop (of course), Wordpress, MS Office Suite (especially Word and Powerpoint), and the ability to walk on water.

 Account Manager- This is perhaps the most important job in the village.  Our Account Managers are responsible for ensuring that all Top of Mind clients are getting the very most from their marketing investment.  Hugely important attributes include:  ultra-friendly and cheerful attitude, highly organized, internet savvy, and most importantly… a team player in every sense of the word.  Experience within the mortgage marketing industry a huge plus.

Top of Mind Networks is an Equal Opportunity Employer!  Salaries are commensurate with experience and skill set.

I was on a conference call with Rene Rodriguez and David Childers this afternoon when I received a call on my cell phone.  The incoming caller ID showed my home phone number.  So I muted Rene and Childers and answered the phone assuming it was my wife.  The voice on the other end of the phone asked me in a masked voice if I knew if my family was safe.

Hello?

“Do you know if your family is safe?”

Who is this?

“Do you know if your family is safe?”

Okay, now I’m freaking out.  I hang up both the cell and office lines and run into David Orsini’s office and tell him what is going on.  We both jump in David’s car and speed like crazy toward my condo – about a 5 minute drive.  Meanwhile I’m on the phone with 911 telling them what had just happened.  Along the way, we pass a policeman who we flag down and who follows us back to my condo.  While I was on the phone with 911, David called my wife Abby who was at work and safe.  Abby immediately called our daughter’s day camp and determined that she was also safe.  So – the dreaded and unimaginable had been averted – thank you God.

Me, David and the policeman got to my condo and looked around – everything looked as we left it when Abby and I had left for work this morning.  Now here is the complicating factor – the condo we’ve been renting was just listed for sale.  The only request we’ve made of the listing agent was that she give us 24 hours notice before a showing.  Wouldn’t you know it, around 10:30am the listing agent received a request to show our place from another agent.  Reluctantly, my wife accommodated the request even though we hadn’t anticipated today’s showing and hadn’t locked up access to our valuables or tidied up.

This showing was supposed to be at 1pm.  The dreaded phone call I received happened at 3:38pm.  Could the person have visited our condo, run to Home Depot, and made a duplicate key?  There is a lot more to this story than you probably want or need to know… but after researching this all night here’s what I’m pretty sure happened…

There is such a thing as “Caller ID Spoofing”.  Apparently, anyone in the world can make a phone call using a simple application and make it look like they are calling from any number they choose.  And yes, if you have an iPhone, there’s an app for that too.  In this case, someone had both my mobile and home phone numbers – ironically I don’t even know my home phone number by heart… it just shows up on my cell phone as Mark Green (H).  Very few people have my home phone number – and I almost never even answer the home phone… which made it all the more scary.

I am not sure, but I think Caller ID Spoofing is illegal in some instances and not in others.  Here are a few things I wanted to get across to you by sharing this story:

1)  I thought to myself, how did someone get my home number AND my cell phone.  It wasn’t too difficult to figure out, unfortunately.  I googled my home phone number and my name and home address came up instantly.  How effed up is that?  I am sure my mobile phone is out there on the Internet too.

a)  Your action item:  Google your phone number using the following format xxx-xxx-xxxx.  Hopefully your number is not listed, but if is, click on the link that says “Phonebook results for xxx-xxx-xxxx.  Below your listing, you should see a link that says “Request to have your name removed from this list”.  Click that and fill out their form.  Google says that you showed up on their site because you have a listed number.  So the next step after that is to make your phone number unlisted with your phone company.

2)  Obviously, if you get a mysterious phone call from a Caller ID you recognize, I hope my experience helps you think clearly.  There are all kinds of nasty ways this Caller ID Spoofing can be used.  Someone can do what they did to me, obviously, but they can also call you from the same phone number as the local branch of your bank and begin asking you personal questions about your account.  Someone can do the same thing during the mortgage process to provide a phony Proof of Employment.  Nasty stuff.

3)  Never, ever, ever take anything you love for granted.  For just a few minutes, I lived the nightmare every human being dreads.  But I know that some good has already come out of it… and more good will continue to come out of it.  I’ve always tried to keep proper perspective and understand how lucky… and truly blessed… I am.  The past five hours, I hope, will help me remember to always cherish and appreciate the things it would be easy to take for granted.  I have a great wife.  A great kid.  Loving parents and siblings.  A great job.  Fantastic friends.  And a life I wouldn’t trade with anybody in the world.

For me, this is a very compelling story for two major reasons:

1.  It once again proves the power of social media and video marketing.  The fact this video went viral is surely costing HP tens of millions of dollars – and remember it’s only half of the story.  Most people won’t take the extra step to figure out the other side… but here it is.  There is plenty of wrong to go around here and the purpose of this article is not to debate who is most out of line…

2.  The main purpose of this article is to illustrate how difficult it is for companies to support their product line.  Companies like HP operate in the ultra-competitive technology space – and battle for literally billions of dollars.  The stakes don’t get much higher.  In this case, we’re talking about a piece of crap $100 all-in-one machine they might have made $20 per unit selling.  And I’m being generous with that $20.

The more piece of crap $100 printers HP puts out there, the more calls they’re going to receive at their help desk.  Then HP is faced with another decision – a decision all technology companies must face – how do they best… and most profitably… support their product line?  Clearly, HP must have upset this soldier in Iraq with a lack of support somewhere down the line.

We in the Mortgage CRM space also face the “build it” – “support it” dilemma.  And I am quite proud of Top of Mind’s decision to invest in the often invisible and unappreciated customer support function.  When you call Top of Mind Networks during business hours, an actual human being answers the phone – hopefully before the third ring.  We have a sense of urgency to help you solve whatever problem you’re having – not tomorrow and not next week, but now.  There is no such thing as the perfect product or the perfect software solution.  So the difference between vendors often comes down to support.

I’m extremely proud of our team led by Maggie Reames, David Orsini, Sherwood Lawrence, Stacey Garner, Dante Jones and even yours truly.  I’m also proud to announce that Top of Mind Networks just enjoyed its best month in our 7-year history.  To celebrate our accomplishment, we’re making another significant investment back into the company – in the form of even better customer service.  Videos like the one above strongly reinforce the fact that no matter how great your product might be, you’re going to fail if you cannot support it.

I’d like to also give a shout out to my friend and unofficial mentor Mike Gulitz of Mortgage Planner CRM.  The friendship Mike and I have forged over the past several years really inspires me.  And speaking of customer support – wow, Mike’s company sets an extremely high bar.  Just ask Jeremy Forcier - one of our mutual clients.

In closing, I hope everyone enjoys their Fourth of July holiday.  Thanks again to everyone for helping Top of Mind Networks enjoy its best month ever.  We are going to keep reinvesting into our business, so please stay tuned for more news right here on the Top of Mind Blog.

Carolyn Capalbo

Those of you who have seen me speak over the past couple years know how passionate I’ve become about becoming “Googleable”.  Here’s a classic, and not as rare as you might think, case of one Realtor’s battle against Page 1 of Google.

Carolyn Capalbo is a Realtor in Northern Virginia.  Unfortunately, she shares the same name as Elliot Spitzer’s call girl’s mom.  This unfortunate coincidence is causing Carolyn to have difficult and tiresome initial conversations with potential clients.

Our good friend Mark Madsen wrote an article on Wanna Network explaining what’s happened and every single little blog article is going to help Carolyn gain her online reputation back.  Search engine optimization is a team sport… so if you are game for some good karma, you might just write an article of your own.  I’m sure Carolyn Capalbo would appreciate it!

By the way, this entire effort took me less than 15 minutes from start to finish.  So if you’re still intimidated by blogging, it just goes to show that it gets a lot easier over time.  Get in the game!

1)  The Education:  At MRev, you’ll see Todd Duncan like you’ve never seen him before – and with a message that will change you forever.  I can tell you this from personal experience.  This is not the “same old Todd Duncan” not that there is anything wrong with the old TD.  But what makes MRev special is not just your keynote speaker(s).  In my opinion, the true stars of the show are… well, YOU.  Not people who haven’t taken a 1003 in fifteen years.  That’s what you asked us for.  Come on down to Orlando and find out how your peers are succeeding in a challenging market.

2)  The Community:  MRev is an event where you’ll immerse yourself in the business.  It’s almost surreal to see top producers openly share their secret ingredients with people they’d just met.  But it’s the norm at MRev, not the exception.  If you’re not willing to share with your peers, MRev might not be for you.

3)  The Charities:  Our focus on philanthropyis the glue that brings MRev together.  We started this movement when everyone thought it was folly to try and put on a mortgage seminar.  In hindsight, I guess it was a pretty crazy idea!  But our first two events have raised over $41,000 for local charities.  It feels damn good about being a part of something that is going to help us our industry’s good name again.

I could write for hours about Mortgage Revolution.  Perhaps what says it best is our Orlando Agenda.  If you make the trip and don’t walk away with some fresh perspective and ideas, call me upon your return and I will personally stroke you a check for your MRev ticket.  I’ll be looking forward to seeing you there!

1. Adding New Contacts – Data entry has been simplified. We got rid of the multi-page data entry model for adding a new contact. Now all contact info is on a single page and the only data required is the first and last name. So now if you meet someone at the grocery store and want to add them to your Surefire database, all you need is a name. although an email address would certainly be nice so you can send them emails.
2. Notes – You can now add notes under each contact in your database. This will allow you to keep a conversation log each time you talk to someone. You can also view all recent notes for your whole database on the notes summary page, just to keep tabs on what you have done lately.
3. Activities – You can schedule calls or meetings with your contacts. You select the time and date and it will add the task to your “My to do list” for that day. You can mark these activities as done once completed to remove them from your list.
4. Static Groups – Very simply functionality; you create a group, then scroll through your contact list to add contacts to the group.
5. Dynamic Groups – With a static group, you add and remove people from it. A dynamic group adds and removes contacts based on a specific criteria. So you can create a dynamic group for all VA closings you did in 2009. And based on their loan criteria, past clients will be added or taken out of this group.

Most of this is very basic functionality, but still a huge step above what we had before. The next step is to take this functionality a step further. Very soon you will be able to take those groups you have segmented out and send email blasts to the contacts in those groups. We will do another update once that is done… estimated dev time 2 weeks.

If you are having trouble viewing this video or would like to see a larger version so it
is easier to see please click here.

There a couple of flees with this video I am going to go ahead and call myself out on, I promise the next one will be better:

1. My microphone is awful so the volume is kind of low, you may need to turn your speakers up to hear it.
2. I accidentally selected 2007 as the ‘end closing date’ instead of 2006 in the dynamic groups demo. I saw it at the last minute after all video editing had been completed and I didn’t think that was worth going back and starting over for.

Our original thought last year (seems like a lifetime ago) was to free up Davids time by getting him out of development by rewriting his current system.  Unfortunately, that turned out to be a colossal monster of an undertaking and started to have no end in sight.  As that decision started to make less and less sense, we finally decided to stop the madness and rethink our whole strategy.  So now we’ve freed up David in other ways so he can do more development work and “extend” his current system to get the new functionality we need.  Sounds like a no-brainer, right?  Well, most things do in hindsight.  But anyway, no use crying over that spilled milk. 

Development along our 6/1 deadline is progressing and we see no current roadblocks.  And with that status update appropriately blogged, I’ll be handing over the release update/blog responsibilities to David.  Please be on the lookout for David’s updates on our development efforts.  I don’t know if he’ll be as wordy and lengthy and verbose as me, but I’m sure he’ll do his darned best.

Sherwood