Research reveals how broker customers react to marketing

In the report Home Loan Study What Drives Borrower Loyalty After Settlement?, which studied the behavioural patterns of 25 broker customers and 15 direct-to-lender customers when it came to post-settlement marketing, ActivePipe discovered that certain types of communication work better between the two channel customers than others.

The study sought to understand what sort of experience borrowers have with their broker or lender after settlement, as well as how email marketing can strengthen (or undermine) trust with that consumer.

As well as being asked a series of questions, consumers were also asked to review a monitored email account for 15 minutes and read the emails that most interested them. 

The results

Answers to the questions were fairly similar for the two channel streams for the majority of questions.

For example, very few consumers found emails about the official cash rate staying the same to be either useful or interesting (only 12 per cent of broker clients said so, and 15 per cent of lender customers), and an even smaller proportion were interested in competition emails from their broker or lender (with most wary of it leading to some sort of sales ploy). In fact, none of the 25 broker clients said they would enter into one. 

Further, while a quarter of broker customers and 35 per cent of lender customers said they would download a free property report, they weren’t valued particularly highly, as most respondents said they regularly received mails like this and could easily get a free report if they wanted one.

However, while these were some of the similarities, there were marked differences in behaviours when it came to certain messaging.

For example, broker clients were more likely to have a sense of loyalty than direct-to-lender clients.

Borrowers who received regular calls or emails from their broker were more likely to use the same broker in future. 

In fact, 95 per cent of broker customers said they would enjoy getting a monthly email from their broker with lots of images and short copy – and suggested that it would help them remember their broker and feel connected to them.

Moreover, borrower clients who receive regular calls from their mortgage broker were found to have the highest level of trust with their broker, were less likely to open rate-based emails from rival brokers or lenders, and were more likely to show rival offers to their broker.

Unsurprisingly, borrowers who didn’t hear from their broker after settlement, even the ones who had an outstanding experience, said they would be open to shopping around for their next loan. 

On the flip side, 95 per cent of direct-to-lender borrowers said their bank had not stayed in touch with them other than transactional emails after settlement.

Only 10 per cent of this channel felt some form of loyalty to their lender.

Interestingly, 90 per cent of lender customers were interested in emails about interest rate comparisons, but only 35 per cent of broker customers were. 

This rate-centric motivation could perhaps account for the fact that 95 per cent of proprietary channel customers said they planned to visit a comparison site to first research rates. 

Overall, ActivePipe found that lender customers were much more focused on emails that promised lower rates or special offers.

Meanwhile, broker customers were more interested in emails with news, property data and helpful tips than banking customers. 

Given the findings, ActivePipe offered the following tips to brokers to help gain better cut-through with their email marketing:

1. Ensure your clients know you/your email address (as familiarity increases click-through).
2. If clients don’t know you, make sure they know the company you are writing from (as clients are more likely to read emails from an unknown company than an unknown person).
3. Reduce the ‘sales’ pitch in emails, “People respond poorly to emails that make sensationalist claims and include too many calls-to-action,” ActivePipe said.
4. Create good ‘landmarks’ in newsletters (as people tend to scan emails, short sentences and headlines are best).
5. Include enticing offers (such as lower interest rates, refinancing deals, techniques to save money) in the body of the email (not in a click-through).
6. Remind customers that mortgages are not all about the cheapest rate (as many are rate-driven)
7. Ensure you keep in contact with your client at least once a month and include personal information (which helps create loyalty).

[Related: Aggregator signs new partnership agreement]