It’s About Ethical Customer Service NOT ‘Sales’
As our industry has begun to heat up, I’ve found looking ‘back to the basics’ to help guide our students during these challenging times is worthwhile. Many of you know there is a significant philosophical difference between my approach to the business vs. the other residential mortgage industry educators & trainers.
As I think through the differences I have with many, I have been able to break it down fairly clearly in my own head. It appears the preponderance of those I interact with, whether they are potential students, folks inside an industry discussion board, those that I speak with who author industry publications – it looks almost like everybody started in our business since the cycle ‘correction’ of August 1998. I see that as a serious problem as we try to rebuild the industry on a more solid footing!
It appears to me, the generation of people that started during this post-98 cycle/correction, entered the industry for the ‘big easy money’ that was at hand via the new ‘big-commission’ business notion that developed back then. It’s been self-evident for the most part, that compassion toward the customer, has been substituted for ’selling & closing’ clients with this latest bunch.
In my lifetime I have seen too many sales pros use various props, scripts, and tricks of all sorts, to ‘close’ people. Even after all these years in the biz, I’m still idealistic about our industry. So this philosophical aversion to ‘sales’ which I have – as evidenced by most of my writings which highlight an increased need for Integrity and Ethical behavior – I think many actually want to have faith in my approach … yet our competition in the training and education niche, all seem to market themselves as ’sales’ guru’s and promise to show their seminar attendees how to earn the big bucks! And, considering those attendees came to the industry for the ‘big bucks’ and ‘easy money’ in the first place, those motivational speaker types – who prey on pumping up everyone’s ego – looks like the sort of industry education and training they are attracted to vs. the more wide-ranging career minded approach we offer through Secret! University.
And I know why this is; back when I started as a trainee it was salary and small bonuses, and all face to face with customers – not websites, cyberspace, text messages, & e-mails like now days – more personal. As a newbie, we were never promised the opportunity to earn enough income in a year or two, to purchase a house outright, so the ‘big-bucks’ wasn’t the draw like it has been lately – it was a ‘career’ I entered. We signed-up customers, hundreds and even thousands of loan customers face to face; often seeing their fears, desperation … relief and joy when approved. All of which made a lasting impression on me from my early days in training. I believe these two major differences are why I think so much like I still do. I can still see many of their faces in my mind.
I believe a move for everybody ‘back to the basics’ of providing Ethical Customer Service to customers, instead of “putting them together” is at hand during this defining period in our noble industry’s history. I hope you’ll join with me in this old-fashioned approach … it works!
