Comprehensive Guide to Email Marketing for Rental Loan Brokers

Posted by Hannah Lapin on Mar 17, 2022 2:31:55 PM

tablet with email icons

Email marketing is an affordable way for brokers to establish themselves as industry authorities and to keep their clients in the loop with product offerings, rate drops, closed loans, etc. The data on the positive effects of email marketing is astounding. We pulled the latest statistics from Constant Contact to show the power of email marketing:

 

 

 

statistics why brokers need email marketing

 

 

 

In this guide, we are going to take a closer look at:

 

When Brokers Need Email Marketing

The data for using email marketing is powerful, but not necessarily ideal for every business communication. For instance, content marketing is best for examples of loan scenarios and FAQs, and social media marketing is best to share news articles and connect with other industry leaders. Here is when email marketing makes the most sense:

 

Nurture Leads

Lead nurturing emails are designed to build relationships with your contacts and database. These emails should be:

  • Customer-focused: Rather than talking about yourself and your accomplishments, talk about how you can help your customers.
  • Personalized and targeted: Marketing emails should only be sent to contacts they are relevant to. Owner occupiers do not want to hear about investor loans, and vice-versa.
  • Educational: Only send emails that provide value to your clients. Otherwise, people will unsubscribe or ignore them.

For additional guidance, see our relationship-building templates.

 

Share Product Updates

Brokers should use email marketing to share a new loan product or feature, such as lower rates, new rate structures, etc. Here are some tips for product email marketing success:

  • Be consistent with your messaging and language: If you talk about rental loans, do not switch the terminology to loans for buy and hold investors.
  • Add an image: Emails with images tend to get higher engagement.
  • Keep the content short and sweet: Focus on what is important and leave everything else out. Bullet points can be a great tool as well.

 

 

Promote Your Content

For brokers with blogs, sharing your content provides industry authority and establishes credibility. The content you send in the emails should be:

  • Relevant: Do not send tips on improving your credit score to contacts with 800+ credit scores.
  • Highly researched: Make sure all your content is accurate and credible.
  • Grammatically correct: Poor grammar and spelling will lower the authority you are trying to build as an industry expert.

 

 

Getting Started with Email Marketing

Many brokers have large databases that they like to keep in touch with via email. However, it is hard to stay in touch with everyone regularly or bulk mail your clientele through an email account such as Gmail or Yahoo. That’s where the concept of an email marketing platform comes into play. A good platform will store all your clients, let you create and send emails, and track data on how well your emails did. Let’s take a closer look at the benefits of an email marketing platform and some of your options.

 

Why Brokers Need Email Marketing Platforms

An email marketing platform has the features small businesses need to manage a contact list, create engaging email campaigns, and report on their performance.

 

Contact Management

In your basic mail group service, you have a contact list that you can email or organize into groups. With an email marketing platform, you can more thoroughly manage your contacts. One key feature of an email marketing platform is the ability to segment your lists. This is important because it enables you to target your emails to those most interested. You can break down your emails potentially by:

  • Age
  • Geography
  • Gender
  • Past behaviors and engagement (for example, someone that opened or did not open your last email)

Another key benefit to a good contact management system is it will enable your contacts to opt-in or out of your emails without contacting you.

 

Email Campaign Optimization

Most email marketing services offer branded templates and tools to create interactive emails. This could include:

  • Calls-to-Action (CTAs): CTAs are buttons or links in your email telling your contacts what to do next. It could be “Learn more,” “Call Now,” “Contact Us,” etc.
  • Landing Pages: Good email marketing platforms enable you to link your email CTAs to a landing page or a page with a form your contacts can fill out to show interest. This will keep you organized and looking professional.
  • A/B Testing Abilities: If you are wondering what time of day is best to send out an email or which subject line will perform better, an email marketing platform can help you find out. You can simply use A/B testing functionalities to split your email into two groups and see which one is most effective.

 

Reporting & Email Metrics

Since you have all the optimization features, you need a way to measure your success. While many mail groups allow you to send a read receipt to see if your contacts opened your email, an email marketing platform will actually tell you who opened the email, how much time they spent reading it, and where they clicked. Here are some of the key metrics to look for:

  • Open Rate: The percentage of recipients who opened your email.
  • Click-through-rate: The percentage of recipients who opened your email AND clicked.
  • Unsubscribes: The percentage of people who received your email and opted out.

These metrics can help you gauge audience interest and improve upon your emails. While it may seem complicated, with a solid marketing platform it will only take you minutes instead of hours on a mail group. We’ll take a closer look at metrics later in this post.

 

Email Marketing Platforms

There are countless email marketing platforms available, and more seem to pop up every day. If you have one you like — that’s fantastic, and you are ahead of the curve. If you have no idea where to start, we evaluated platforms and narrowed them down to our top two that we think are very user-friendly and easy to quickly get started on.

 

Constant Contact

  • Features: User-friendly and customizable email templates, contact management, tracking tools on email marketing statistics, triggered emails such as a welcome to email to new subscribers, image library, pop-up forms, and ability to send unlimited emails.
  • Pricing: Varied based on the features and number of contacts, starts at $9.99 per month for the Core Plan.
  • What it’s best for: Beginner email marketers looking for a simple, user-friendly, and reliable platform.

Click here for a 60-day free trial of Constant Contact

 

Mailchimp

  • Features: User-friendly and customizable email templates, contact management, tracking tools on email marketing statistics, email campaign organization, pop-up forms, landing pages, automated emails.
  • Pricing: Varied based on the features and number of contacts, start FREE with the ability to send 10,000 emails per month.
  • What it’s best for: Comprehensive marketing all-in-one solution at incredibly affordable pricing.

 

Email Marketing Metrics for Brokers

As we discussed, one of the key differentiating factors between an email marketing platform and a mail group like Gmail is the access to comprehensive marketing metrics. Email metrics can be a powerful tool to help businesses gauge audience interest in their emails and help identify opportunities for improvement. We know these metrics can seem complicated at first, but we’re here to guide you and make them easily digestible. We believe that with consistent efforts and just 30 minutes per week, you can improve your email metrics, and therefore drive business and improve your ROI. Stick with us as we dive into some of the key email marketing benchmarks, what they mean, and how they can help you acquire more business.

 

Open Rate

Let's start with open rate, which indicates how many people are opening your emails. An open rate is the percentage of recipients who open a given email. For instance, if you send an email to 200 recipients, and 50 people open the email, your email has a 25% open rate. As a standard benchmark, Constant Contact recommends aiming for a 16% open rate. Some of the factors that contribute to your email being opened are:

  • Subject line: Which would you rather open — “Here is my June Newsletter,” or “Unlock positive cash flow this June?” The more enticing the subject line, the more likely people are to open it.
  • Time of day: Are you more likely to open an email at midnight or at lunchtime? Timing can have an impact on the number of people who open your business emails.
  • Quality of your list: If your list is purchased, the contacts will not be expecting to hear from you or necessarily find your lists relevant. If your list is clients you have established relationships with, they will be more likely to engage with your content.

When improving your open rate, keep it simple and test one variable at a time. This will help you better gauge the effects. Also, note that email marketing is a process. It is unlikely that you will have your target open rate on your first email or even by your fifth email. However, do not be discouraged. If you put 30 minutes a week into improving your open rate through different factors like the ones we mentioned, you will reach the industry average open rate in no time. Plus, we’re here to guide you and provide you with the tools to build a successful email marketing strategy.

 

Click-Through Rate

Once you've mastered open rate, you can move onto click-through rate, which indicates the actual engagement of recipients who opened your email. The click-through rate, or CTR, is the percentage of people who clicked a link or button in the email from the total that opened it. So, in our previous example, if 200 people received the email, 50 people opened the email, and 10 people clicked on the email, your email has a 20% CTR. HubSpot Marketing Software says to use 7.8% as a benchmark. While open rate is a reflection on your list and subject line, CTR is a reflection on the actual body of the email. Here are some factors that can impact your click-through rate:

  • Inclusion of an image in your email: Email marketing platform Mailchimp found that email campaigns with pictures had 42% higher CTRs than email campaigns without images. However, if your email has over ten images, it will negatively impact your CTR.
  • Inclusion and placement of CTAs: CTAs or Calls-to-Action are buttons that tell the reader what to do next, such as “Read More,” “Contact Us,” or “Get Started.” Including a CTA and placing it visibly and strategically within your email will improve your click-through rate.
  • Quality of your email: This is the biggest factor and the hardest to fix. We will include more guides on creating high-quality emails, but for now, a key thing to keep in mind is the relevance of content to your audience.

Like open rate, improving your click-through rates require consistent efforts. However, we think you can spend less than half an hour per week on improving your click-through rate and see substantial results within one month.

 

Unsubscribe Rate

The unsubscribe rate indicates how many email recipients do not want to receive your emails and is calculated as the percentage of email recipients who receive your email and indicate they do not wish to receive further communications from you. So, if one person out of your 200 recipients unsubscribes, you have a 0.5% unsubscribe rate. As a benchmark, HubSpot Marketing Software says to aim for 0.48% or less. The unsubscribe rate is a tool to keep your email list healthy (this is important to make sure email service providers do not block your emails from going through), and make sure you are targeting the right audience. Do not worry if your unsubscribe rate is high. There are many reasons people unsubscribe from emails including:

  • The provider sent too many emails: This is okay if the majority of your email list is engaged with your emails, but can become annoying if they aren’t.
  • The content is no longer relevant: This is to be expected if a client no longer needs information regarding loans or financing.
  • The recipient never signed up for your email in the first place: This is why we always recommend organically engaging your contacts, instead of purchasing lists.

The more you whittle out your email list to the people who want to hear from you, the higher your open rates and CTRs will be.

Essentially, open rate, CTR, and unsubscribe work together to give you a clear picture of how your emails are performing. The more you improve all three, the better your emails will become, and the more business you will draw.

 

Proven Broker Email Templates

As we said, we’re here to guide you, and we happen to have a lot of experience engaging real estate investors via email. Here are some tried and true templates for you to use.

 

The Buy-and-Hold Rental Email Template

Subject Line: Grow Your Rental Portfolio with 30-Yr Loans

Preview Text (the short summary text that follows the subject line): I’ve partnered with the nation's leader in rental loans to offer you 30-yr terms, no balloons, & simple pricing based on property cash flow.

Hi XXX,

As a broker, I strive to provide you with the best deals and the most reliable lenders. If you are looking to grow your rental portfolio, I would love to help you get financing that includes:

  • Full 30-year terms
  • No DTI or personal income qualification
  • No tax return or 4506 requirements
  • Cash-outs to buy more properties

Want to learn more and get started with your loan? Contact me anytime via phone XXX-XXX-XXXX or via email [insert your email address]. Looking forward to working with you and helping you achieve your investment goals.

Sincerely,

[Insert Your Name and Email Signature]

 

The Vacation Rental Email Template

Subject Line: Did you know I help finance short-term rentals?

Preview Text: I’ve partnered with the nation’s leader in vacation rental loans to make sense of short-term rents and help you grow your vacation portfolio.

Hi XXX,

As a broker, I strive to provide you with the best deals and the most reliable lenders. If you are looking for a vacation rental loan (short-term rental), I would love to help you get financing that includes:

  • Common sense underwriting of your short-term rents
  • Full 30-year term (no balloons) for your peace of mind
  • No tax return requirements
  • The ability to finance in an LLC

Want to learn more and get started with your loan? Contact me anytime via phone XXX-XXX-XXXX or via email [insert your email address]. Looking forward to working with you and helping you achieve your vacation rental investment goals.

Sincerely,

[Insert Your Name and Email Signature]

 

 

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