Social Media Marketing for Mortgage Loan Officers

For the last twenty years, social media has slowly grown from fun, personal platforms like MySpace to revolutionary experiences. These experiences have allowed businesses to engage and interact with their target audience and inform a lead-generation strategy.

Social media marketing for mortgage loan officers is no different. It is a pivotal component of a comprehensive marketing strategy in our industry. After all, social media has been around long enough to be a preferred medium by some generations, and different types of audiences prefer specific platforms. For example, an older user might prefer Facebook, while a younger user might prefer YouTube or TikTok.

Utilizing social media effectively and tailoring your content to each platform can build brand visibility, connect with potential buyers, and generate high-quality leads.

This article can be your guide to social media marketing for loan officers.

Identifying the Right Social Media Platforms

As we’ve alluded to, different social media platforms offer unique messages, content, and visibility opportunities. To use a more traditional example, you wouldn’t use the same advertisement on a billboard as you would for a newspaper article. Social media should have the same approach.

Choosing the right social media platform(s) is essential in social media marketing for mortgage loan officers. Since we’re in the mortgage origination industry, researching the ideal home-buying audience and determining which platforms they use is an excellent place to start. Let’s review the primary social media platforms and their general tendencies.

Facebook: Facebook is ideal for reaching a broad audience. With detailed targeting options, Facebook groups, and an incredibly robust advertising platform, Facebook is a great way to boost your brand’s visibility. Many advertisers use Facebook for “top-of-funnel” advertising, encouraging users to sign up for an e-newsletter or book a free consultation.
Instagram: Owned by Facebook, Instagram is a visually-driven platform known for its photo and video capabilities and 24-hour stories at the top of the user’s dashboard. It also offers a robust advertising dashboard and can be a great way to show potential customers testimonial videos or case studies from your portfolio.
LinkedIn: Most commonly used as a professional network, LinkedIn is ideal for B2B interactions, networking with real estate professionals, and sharing industry insights. LinkedIn might not be the best platform for the loan origination business, considering that much of our audience base is outside the business sphere. However, it’s still important to have a presence. It’s also an excellent platform for following industry leaders and experts to learn more about the industry and upcoming conferences and webinars.
X (Formerly Twitter): X has undergone significant changes recently through its acquisition by Elon Musk. However, it still maintains a primary use for real-time updates and breaking news. X offers an advertising platform ideal for compelling, quick interactions that deliver timely content.
YouTube: An industry giant owned by Google, YouTube can be leveraged by businesses to create how-to videos, industry updates, and more. Furthermore, YouTube offers search engine optimization opportunities, meaning you can grow an organic audience seeking information in your industry. Compared to the other platforms, YouTube favors longer-form content and is exclusively a video-based medium.
TikTok: Most prevalent among younger generations, TikTok also offers organic and paid marketing opportunities. Users can create profiles and reach potential audiences with shorter, punchier content.

We won’t discuss other lesser-known or politically slanted platforms in this blog, as most Americans have some version of the social media channels outlined above. Any of these aforementioned platforms is a great starting point for launching a lead-generation strategy with social media.

Setting Up Your Social Media Profiles

Think of social media profiles as digital window shopping. Accordingly, ensuring your digital window shop is branded, curated, and relevant to your audience is important. Let’s review a few tips and tricks for creating professional and engaging profiles.*

*Each social platform offers different features for creating a profile, so we recommend going through each profile’s setup thoroughly and completely.

Profile Picture: Select a high-quality, non-pixelated photo for your cover or profile picture. For a business, it might make sense to use your logo. Remember that specific platforms like Facebook allow you to have a profile picture and a banner image, so think through how best to use both spaces.
Biography: After your profile picture, the first thing people will see will be your bio. Make it short, sweet, and concise while engaging enough for people to remember you. We also recommend providing a link or call to action in the bio so it’s easy for users to contact you immediately.
Create a baseline: For some profiles, especially Facebook and Instagram, it might be a good idea to have a few posts in your profile before going out and growing your audience. Audiences will find your profile more credible with existing content vs. an empty profile.
Optimization: Keywords and hashtags in your bio and posts can improve searchability. Research which keywords are trending for your industry and apply them to relevant posts.

Content Creation and Sharing Strategies

Visual and written content is the backbone of social media marketing for loan originators. Let’s review the four content value pillars for social media.

Commerce: If you’re selling a product or offering a promotion, discount, or incentive, a social media post may be a good way to boost visibility to your existing audience base.
Education: Your audience might rely on you for information to grow their knowledge of the loan origination industry. When you have their attention, social media can be a great way to deliver a critical message.
Information: Perhaps you want to inform new and existing audiences about your company. Whether you’re opening a new office, expanding your service lines, or just highlighting and featuring the great work done by your employees, social media is a perfect way to distribute that information.
Entertainment: Sometimes, social media can be pure entertainment. If your budget allows, consider ways to entertain your audience while staying true to your brand’s standards and principles.

It’s also important to consider the frequency and timing of your posts. We suggest that you post regularly but not overwhelm your audience. Certain social media management platforms like Sprout Social can offer analytics on the most effective time to post based on your audience’s prior engagement statistics.

Lastly, avoid becoming repetitive. Post because you have something interesting to offer, not because you think you have to. If you oversaturate your audience with content, they may develop scroll fatigue and skip over your posts.

Engaging With Your Audience

Building your audience is half the battle. Engaging your audience is the next step to developing a loyal and active following. Making your audience feel seen and heard can reinforce their commitment to following you and keep you at the top of their minds. Let’s go over a few engagement tactics.

Respond to Comments: Always reply to comments and messages to show that you value your followers and appreciate them for leaving a message. The sooner you can do this, the better, as time is of the essence in social media engagement. If a user tags you in a post on platforms like Instagram, share it if the post is appropriate and positive.
Participate in Discussions: Engage in relevant discussions and share your thought leadership. If a stakeholder in your company writes an industry article, share it with your base as a free resource to make them feel like you provide value to them as a brand.
Answer Queries: If a user has questions about an article or post you created, be proactive in answering them. Remember that these are public forums, so your answer will also help others reading these comments.

Leverage Paid Advertising

We’ve touched on the paid advertising component of different social media platforms, but discussing specific strategies around paid social media is important. After all, you’re investing money into every click on a paid social ad, so ensure you’re thorough, intentional, and thoughtful about your paid posts.

Ad Options: Platforms like Facebook and LinkedIn offer various ad formats, including sponsored posts, display ads, and video ads. Each has specific parameters around length, format, and cost, so plan accordingly.
Targeting: Most platforms offer detailed targeting options to filter segments based on demographics, household income, location, age, etc. Remember when we said to research your core audience before starting a social media campaign? It’s imperative in paid media.
Budget: Most social media platforms operate on a monthly budget that works as a “not to exceed” number. We suggest starting with a small budget and scaling up based on performance. Platforms like Facebook often assign a service representative if you spend a lot. This representative can help you optimize your campaigns and make budgetary suggestions.
Ad Copy and Media: Create succinct, compelling ad copy to accompany your visual media (if applicable). The copy should highlight the benefits of your services and include a call to action.
Tracking and Measuring: Use the platform’s proprietary or third-party analytics tools to assess your ad performance and make necessary adjustments. We suggest doing this monthly.

Start Posting Today!

When leveraged and strategized correctly, social media marketing for mortgage loan officers can effectively grow an audience base. Not every post needs to be a sales message, but remembering that the tool can help you stay relevant and top-of-mind can open up many creative opportunities for your brand. Let’s review the essential steps.