Social media marketing is vital to gathering leads, showing up in searches, and staying top of mind with potential borrowers. Mortgage professionals need to have a strong online presence and, specifically, a social media presence. But you may not have the budget to hire someone to manage it all for you. That’s where mortgage social media marketing tools come in.
We wanted to find the mortgage social media marketing tools that have proven helpful for professionals who use them every day, so we turned to our own Maddie Hughes. As Top of Mind’s marketing coordinator, she is not only familiar with how loan officers use social media, but she also manages our firm’s social media strategies on Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn and YouTube.
We asked Maddie some questions about the do-it-yourself mortgage social media marketing tools she uses herself and recommends to maximize time and investment.
Q: What is the number one tool you would suggest to mortgage professionals for mortgage social media marketing?
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A: Mortgage marketing professionals need a strong mortgage CRM system with mortgage marketing automation capabilities to optimize their social media presence.
A great mortgage CRM allows you to post immediately and schedule posts for a later date. It should have an extensive content library with graphics representing your brand well, giving you back hours of designing the perfect graphic every day.
The right mortgage marketing software must also keep you compliant and give you intuitive insight into how well your audience responds to your social media content.
Q: What do you use for the overall management and planning of your social media posts?
A: I use Google Sheets as a social media planning calendar. It’s collaborative and organized, and you can find free templates by doing a quick Google search.
I plan out all of my social posts at least one week in advance, and I made a sheet with unused content and another with a layout of our re-engagement process.
As a marketer, you have to understand that you don’t need fresh content every single day. So much of what we produce is evergreen, and we want to re-post the things that perform really well with our audience.
The spreadsheet keeps everyone informed about what’s going on in the next week and gives them content to use for their personal social media posts.
Q: What do you use to ensure your social media posts are working and measure engagement with potential clients?
A: Where would we be without Google Analytics?
Before this holy grail tool, I had no idea who was clicking on the links in my posts or which social media platform brought in the most leads. Now, we can see the customer’s journey once they click on the link in the social post. This is possible because Google Analytics has a URL tracking tool that creates a custom link for every social post.
For example, we noticed that the Mortgage Marketing University eBook re-release got us a lot of downloads, so I rearranged the social media schedule to accommodate a re-post later in the week.
Q: What’s an easy tool for building out graphics, including mortgage memes?
A: Most mortgage industry professionals aren’t content creators, and that’s perfectly fine. Free tools like Canva are the perfect place to whip up mortgage memes in a handful of minutes.
Canva is full of pre-made designs for inspiration, but you can also start from scratch and make your own graphics. There’s no need to Google the dimensions you need for your social media graphics because Canva has that for you. If they don’t have the size you’re looking for, you have the option to create your own specs.
If the basic, free version isn’t enough, it’s only $12/month to subscribe. With a subscription, you can upload your branding into your Canva profile, which is important when you make original mortgage memes—if it’s a winner, you want the credit when people share it!
Q: As great as mortgage CRMs are, they may not reach every social media platform where loan officers want to be. What tools would you recommend to help them?
A: Sprout Social is a great tool for social media because it extends beyond the typical platforms.
One way it helps is managing your online reviews. Your company’s reputation is crucial to maintain, which is why you need to monitor your ratings on Google My Business and Glassdoor. Sprout immediately notifies you when there’s a new review so you can provide a timely response. It’s best practice to respond to reviews promptly, meaning no more than three business days after the review is posted.
Come up with a template for both positive and negative reviews. No one wants to hear back from a robot, so avoid sounding the same in every reply. Showing that you care enough to take the time to respond to reviews will encourage more customers to leave them and can help re-build bridges with unhappy customers. When you have happy customers, ask them to leave feedback on your Google My Business page.
A lot of the content I post links back to our website (and so should yours!), which is why I use later.com when posting to Instagram.
Instagram isn’t link-friendly, but a tool such as later.com gives you a unique link to post in your bio that contains all of your linked Instagram posts. When your followers click on the link in your bio, they can click on a picture, as if it were an Instagram feed, and they’ll be redirected to the linked web page. It’s free, and there’s a subscription option as well.
Q: Do you have any unexpected helpers in your social media toolbox?
A: Grammarly is truly my best friend! I think we all know how it feels to brainstorm really hard and produce a really good caption. Instead of just sending it off because your eyes are tired of looking at it, make sure you run it through Grammarly. It’s a free tool, but you can also subscribe for more concise feedback.
Your audience members are likely to notice any mistakes you make, no matter how small. Save yourself and your company the embarrassment and double-check your spelling!
To learn more about Maddie’s number one mortgage social media marketing tool, check out the mortgage industry’s most used and best CRM platform, Surefire CRM. Whether you’re a full-time mortgage marketer managing social media for a group of loan officers or a full-time loan officer yourself, Surefire’s full content library and automation tools can help you fill your social media calendar with engaging, compliant posts. Schedule a demo to see it in action!