Loan Officer Sales Training 04/03/24: How to Get Over The Fear of Calling

In this episode of "Loan Officer Sales Training," we tackle a common challenge faced by many professionals: the fear of making phone calls. Hosted by Kyle Hiersche, this episode provides practical strategies and techniques to help loan officers overcome call anxiety and excel in their sales efforts.

Join us as we delve into the root causes of call reluctance, explore the psychological barriers that contribute to fear of calling, and discuss proven methods to build confidence and motivation. Our expert guests share their personal experiences and offer actionable tips for overcoming fear and making effective sales calls.

Tune in to "Loan Officer Sales Training" and discover how to transform phone calls from a source of anxiety into a powerful tool for success. Whether you're new to sales or looking to refine your skills, this episode will empower you to conquer your fears and achieve your goals as a loan officer.

For more episodes visit:
https://themortgagecalculator.com/Page/Loan-Officer-Sales-Training-Podcast

About The Mortgage Calculator:

The Mortgage Calculator is a licensed Mortgage Lender (NMLS #2377459) that specializes in using technology to enable borrowers to access Conventional, FHA, VA, and USDA Programs, as well as over 5,000 Non-QM mortgage loan programs using alternative income documentation! 

Using The Mortgage Calculator proprietary technology, borrowers can instantly price and quote thousands of mortgage loan programs in just a few clicks. The Mortgage Calculator technology also enables borrowers to instantly complete a full loan application and upload documents to our AI powered software to get qualified in just minutes!

Our team of over 350 licensed Mortgage Loan Originators can assist our customers with Conventional, FHA, VA and USDA mortgages as well as access thousands of mortgage programs using Alternative Income Documentation such as Bank Statement Mortgages, P&L Mortgages, Asset Based Mortgage Programs, No Ratio CDFI Loan Programs, DSCR Investor Mortgages, Commercial Mortgages, Fix and Flip Mortgages and thousands more!

Our Mortgage Loan Originators are trained to be loan consultants to guide borrowers throughout the entire loan process. A licensed Loan Officer is only a phone call or zoom meeting away and always available to assist borrowers throughout the loan a

The Mortgage Calculator is a licensed Mortgage Lender (NMLS #2377459) that specializes in using technology to enable borrowers to access Conventional, FHA, VA, and USDA Programs, as well as thousands of Non-QM mortgage loan program variations using alternative income documentation!

Using The Mortgage Calculator proprietary technology, borrowers can instantly price and quote thousands of mortgage loan programs in just a few clicks. The Mortgage Calculator technology also enables borrowers to instantly complete a full loan application and upload documents to our AI powered software to get qualified in just minutes!

Our team of licensed Mortgage Loan Originators can assist our customers with Conventional, FHA, VA and USDA mortgages as well as access thousands of mortgage programs using Alternative Income Documentation such as Bank Statement Mortgages...

Transcript

0:00

So welcome everyone. My name is Kyle Hiersche. I am the COO of the mortgage calculator. And this is our loan officer sales training that we do every weekday at 12 PM. Eastern where we go over the front end and the sales and of mortgages. Today, we're going to be talking about getting over the fear of calling. Now, there are plenty of sales trainings out there you know, about this type of stuff, right? I'm not the, the, the foremost expert in the world. So there's all kinds of videos you can read. It sounds like Michael there in the chat is recommending a book that's applicable to this. So, you know, there's all kinds of other resources as well, but we'll go through here today. And talk about how this kind of applies to us specifically as well. So first off, the fear of calling is something very real, right? And I know for a lot of you probably watching if you're new loan officers, This is probably the number one thing holding you up, right? Is the fear of calling. Even people who know about loans have a fear of calling just because people don't like to do sales calls, right? Especially like cold calls and stuff like that or anything close to cold calls. And so it's a very real thing and hopefully what we talk about here today can loosen some of you up to be able to start making those calls and get over that hump. So, The fear of calling. Here's the thing about it. We have to come to grips of reality that in this business, we must pick up the phone, right? There is no choice here. We do not have the option to not pick up our phone, right? That's just how this business is. And not only when we're dialing out, when I say pick up the phone, I mean, obviously pick up the phone and start calling people, right? But not only Is it? About dialing out, but it's also about answering your incoming calls almost even more. So, right? Because if you're not answering all your incoming calls, then you're going to end up having issues because incoming calls are not just people calling back and leads, but they're also people that are. you know, in the midst of doing deals, right? And you got loans going on and clients calling you and realtors and all these different things coordinating closings and stuff. So at the end of the day, it's not just about picking up the phone to make the calls. It's about answering your phone. So the first two bullet points here, I put these here to just say that this is just what we have to come to terms with. If we're going to be loan officers, right? There's not going to be any way around it. You're not going to be able to cheat it. You're not going to be able to mostly text people and not actually have to get on the phone. And so it's just something we've got to come. To terms with come to grips with if we are going to be. Loan officers, there's just no way around it. So that's the 1st, 2 bullet points. There is. We just have to accept it. And that is going to help us get over the fear of calling because we know that it just has to be done or this just isn't the right business for us not to try to discourage anyone from this business, but, you know, it's, it's just something where. I don't want you to kid yourself thinking you can just get away with texting and emailing people and things like that, right? It's going to take picking up the phone, both dialing out and answering the phone when it comes in. Now, if it's not something you're used to, it's going to be a lifestyle change to have to answer your phone 24 seven when calls are coming in, because that's what this business 24 seven business deals are falling apart. Things are happening. You're going to war with underwriters, whatever the case is, that's the nature of this business. And so it's the type of business that you need to be readily available at all times. And so you're going to have to get used to answering the phone every time it rains, right? You're going to have to get used to calling hundreds of people in a day in order to generate those calls back. So we got to accept it, right? That's the first and foremost thing that we can, you know, start doing to get over the fear of calling. Now, notice here, I put cold calls because cold calls are great practice. Cold calls you know, at the end of the day, every lead costs money, but they're obviously much cheaper to call cold calls, right? So we are able to provide you with unlimited calls in the dialer at the mortgage calculator, right? As far as cold calls go. And just remember that I think the biggest thing of getting over the fear of calling Is that you'll never speak to the person again, if they're, you know, a lot of people are worried about the, you know, the person being like rude and, you know, angry at them yelling at them or you know, hanging up on them, whatever it is, but you know, you'll never speak to that person again. Right. There's no reason to be embarrassed or to be afraid at the end of the day. If they're not interested, if they, you know, especially we're talking about cold calls here, if they're not interested, then there's no worries. You just move right on to The next one, right? We talk about this in the law of averages training that we do. I've done a few trainings on the law of averages where you don't care whether they do it or not. You're just working the law of averages. You just know if you do 200 cold calls a day, you'll get A few people interested in the rest are just going through them to find the people who are interested. So, you know, every time you call 200, you get 2 or whatever the case may be. So you don't care if that person is 1 of those 2. They're 1 of the if they're 1 of the 198 that you call that day that don't do it. It doesn't matter to you. Right? You're just playing the numbers. You're playing the numbers game there. So. You know, just know that it, you know, don't take it harshly. Don't, you know, worry about it. If they're not the one, then they're not. The one just move on. You don't have to be bitter at them or upset that they hung up or embarrassed that they're yelling at you or whatever. You're never going to see them in your life. You're never going to speak to them again. So just try to keep that in mind. And that should give you a little more of the not caring attitude. Now, cold calls are also great to build up your armor, right? So if you're new. Maybe you're a little shaky on calling experienced investors and talking to them about loan programs that you don't necessarily know much about. So when we're, when, when the live leads come in, the 1st, to claim leads that we give you, those might be a little intimidating because it's an experienced investor with 10 properties. Trying to have you find the best loan programs for them. Well, that can be daunting as a brand new loan officer. Right. And so, you know, cold calls are a nice way to build your armor up by making calls that you can do. You're just fielding, trying to get people interested. You're not getting a live lead of, you know, this really big responsibility of somebody who's in a, you Sophisticated investor that you are not ready to deal with yet. Right? So use cold calls to your advantage. Most people fear cold calls the most. That's why I also talk about this because at the end of the day, if you can do cold calls, then you can do any of the other calls. Right? So I would actually recommend a lot of people want to avoid them at all costs, especially newer people. They're like, oh, I don't want to do cold calls. But let me tell you, if you do them, it's going to build your armor up. And if you can do cold calls, you can do any calls, right? And again, don't a lot of people are stressed to make cold calls. Cause they're like, oh, I don't know how to handle it yet. Well, most of you that are new loan officers, I'm talking to new loan officers right now. Most of you that are new loan officers what you're not ready for is the real leads. Right. You know, you're afraid to not know how to handle a cold call. Well, what you're really not ready to handle is a sophisticated investor lead, right? That's that's ready to go. That's asking you about programs that you have no idea about yet. Right? So, you know, a lot of people just kind of have a backwards, right? Just do the cold calls. You'd rather kind of stumble or fumble or just be, you know, all the stuff that happens when you're a beginner, which is totally fine. You'd rather do that on a bunch of cold calls than on some serious, important leads that cost a bunch of money that have deals that are ready to be there that you might screw up because you're not you know, experienced enough, right? So use the cold calls to your advantage. And again, for those of you that are new, If you can do cold calls, you can do any calls. So, you know, build up that now, when you do the initial call here, remember that confidence is key, right? So even if you don't, even if you're newer, you just need to be confident. You know, that you're here, you have help, you have. Your team leader that can help you with a file. If it's too complicated you know, you know, that we have the best programs, the most programs, amazing pricing. So just be confident when you're doing the initial call and here's a big one to match the client's energy. A lot of people don't do this enough. I talk about it on a few trainings. Remember, we want to be confident. We want to be a upbeat, right? We want to be positive. But if the client is way down here saying, Oh, I don't know. I request info. You don't want to keep yelling them. Yeah, you did request info. We're ready. You know, I mean, you got to kind of, you don't want to go all the way down, but, you know, a lot, you got to meet your client halfway to where they're at, at least to where you're not yelling and screaming at them. But you also don't want to be a downer either. You're trying to keep that conversation in the middle there. And when it comes to doing follow up calls, a lot of people also fear this. Right. Just like they fear cold calls because they feel that the person's going to be annoyed or that they're going to say, stop calling them or whatever, because they figure if I'm calling again, you know, now I'm being a pest or I'm being annoying. Well, just remember you don't have to be pushy. When you're doing this, you're calling the client for their sake, right? To make sure that they know about the programs that could help them there. And especially when they're, the leads we're giving you that are opted in leads that clicked on ads, requesting info. You're trying to get them that information. They have a need that you're trying to fulfill just because they didn't answer the first question. Phone the first time doesn't mean that they're not actually interested. Most people don't answer the phone at all to numbers that they don't know. Right. But you may get answers via text or email, or even if not, people are busy, but there's a reason why they're clicking on these ads, double opting in to be contacted, right? It's, it's just people are busy. Circumstances change. People are also lazy. A lot of people just don't want to deal with it or they're at work right then and can't deal with it. I mean, somebody can click on an ad and ask to be contacted while they're sitting at work and not be able to answer the phone when you call them, right? So don't feel like you're being annoying or too pushy. You need to follow up and don't think of it as. I'm being pushy because I want to make a sale and it's just me being greedy. And I kind of feel nervous about somebody thinking that remember you're checking in for their sake. They're the one that needs something that you can provide. Right. So you always want to also just make sure like, Hey, I just want to make sure. That you have the information that you requested, right? You don't have to be super salesy or pushy, but we all know this last bullet point here, the fortune is in the follow up, right? It's not going to happen without following up. So just like I said on the first slide, where it's not going to happen without making calls, it's also not going to happen without making follow up calls, right? You're just not going to be able to survive in this business if you're not answering your phone, right? Every time it rings, making calls every day, and then doing follow up calls, even if it feels like the seventh time you called them, you were being too pushy. I mean, think about this. I talk about the success story all the time of Mike Vasquez, when he closed the millions of dollars in production 90 days. And he had to call the person eight times before the person gave him the loan. I mean, a lot of you out there would say, The third time, fourth time, fifth time, sixth time, seventh time, you're calling them say, this is crazy. This person must be, you know, they're not interested or they're not the right person to talk to. Or they you know, I don't want to be too annoying to them. This is crazy. I've called seven times, but guess what? The eighth time he called, he ended up getting a few multi million dollar loans. And the person owns like, you know, A bunch of very large valued rental properties, 12 of them or something that are worth multi million. So, I mean, that should just let you know right there, like seven times following up is not enough. So don't think you're being too pushy, too annoying. That person needed Mike's service, but guess what? He didn't need it until the eighth time. Because he had somebody else working on the loan, but the eighth time I called him, the lender had just fell out that same day. And he said, Hey, another lender just denied me. They just fell out. I'm going to give you a shot. So it was the fact that he called eight times that that gentleman, it's solved his problem that had just arose. Right. So Mike wasn't being annoying. Mike was getting him the information that he needed calling him until he got the information. And again, he, the guy obviously picked up that day because of what happened right that day. So you never know just because they don't answer the first 7 times doesn't mean that they're not interested. Doesn't mean that you're being too pushy or salesy by calling them again, because the eighth time you call them, they might be in the exact need of your exact services. And you might end up making what 40, commission in his pocket from making that eight call instead of stopping at seven. Right? So use that as an example, it's never too much to keep calling people, especially these opted in leads that we give you. They are real people who actually requested the info. So some of you may have gotten that lead and said, Oh, this person didn't answer after three times. I called them. They're obviously not an investor. I don't know why they clicked on our ad wrong. That gentleman was not only an investor, one of the largest investors out there that owns 12 multimillion dollar pro each one multimillion dollar property, Airbnb. So while one person might say, Oh, this lead that that the mortgage calculator gave me, they, I called them three times. They didn't answer the phone. What a waste. Or you would call them eight times and make 60, 000 commission in your pocket. Right. And so a big difference there and the difference was following up. So do not be afraid to follow up. Do not feel like you're being pushy. You need to do your job to help the client, which is calling them. texting them, emailing them until you are able to get them the information. All right. So let's talk about how this applies to us specifically at the mortgage calculator as well for loan officers at the mortgage calculator. Remember those first to claim leads that I was talking about. We always call those immediately, right? We must call them within the first minute. As you all know, you get texts every day. Comes through claim the lead, you get it, you need to call them right away, but you should also be calling recycled leads in the auto dialer. Remember the recycled leads. These are leads that either hadn't been followed up with properly by other loan officers. So they got recycled so somebody else can pick it up and follow up properly. Or there are leads that we gave to somebody who left the company and somebody needs to follow up with our company leads. Right? And so those recycled leads, Those were first to claim leads. So I want to make sure everybody understands that too. Right? The first to claim leads come in, right? If they're not being worked properly, or if they were assigned to somebody who, you know, quit being a loan officer, left the company, whatever it may be, they're a recycled lead because somebody has to contact them off of our company. And now they're a recycled lead. So the recycled leads are actual real people who opted in. We're a first to claim lead, but now need to be followed up with. So the, the recycled lead list, some people think like, Oh, recycle. That sounds like they're not good leads. Absolutely. They're good leads. They're the best possible leads that there would be. So guess what would have happened if Mike had not called him that lead we're talking about. If Mike had not called him the second time or the third time, it would have recycled the lead. Right. Because as you know, our system's going to do it automatically. If you don't have, if you're not contacting them and have your follow up tasks set properly, then it's going to recycle the lead. Right. And so if Mike had just not you know, called him those extra times and kept setting tasks for him to keep calling him in the future, that lead would have been recycled and somebody else would have made the 60, 000 in commission or whatever it was. Right? So big difference there. So those are the type of leads that, that are sitting in the recycled leads list because a lot of loan officers are not calling eight times like Mike did and setting follow up tasks each time to call them eight times. Right? So you have leads just like Mike got sitting in the recycled leads. They're in there. There's enough recycled leads for you to call every single day in the auto dialer for all of those of you listening at the mortgage calculator. And so I recommend doing it daily. You can call hundreds of them in a single day if you really sit down to do it. I have a training on how to use a auto dialer. And, you know, well there's trainings inside of our system on how to use our auto dialer, but I have a, a public training about how to use auto dialers in general. Make sure to check that out if you sit down and, and, and do those tips that I recommend on those trainings. At the end of the day, that is going to allow you to call hundreds of recycled beans in a day. Now, here's a little fun fact I just wanted to throw in here. Cold calls can actually convert at a higher rate once they're engaged. Now, obviously, it takes calling a lot more of them to get one engaged than if somebody requested info. But once you engage them, Stats show that they actually convert at a higher rate. So again, it's more of a challenge to engage them, but don't think that cold calls don't convert because they do. Right. And some studies have shown that they actually convert higher percentages once they're actually engaged. Now, here's a tip for anybody with a fear of calling. One of the things you can do in the CRM at the mortgage calculator is call realtor lists and talk to them. Some of you may feel a little bit more comfortable calling realtors first as a business partnership, rather than talking to clients. Right. And so that's one of the ways I've seen some people kind of ease into it and say, you know what, I'm going to call some realtors, get used to like the dialer and talking to people and kind of get my confidence up and stuff, because I know how I could talk to a realtor. I could just tell them that we have all these cool loan programs and I'd love to partner with them and stuff. And it's a business to business call, right? I'm kind of proposing sending them business. So I'm not I don't feel like I'm soliciting them as much because I'm calling them to say, hey, I want to, you know, be able to refer you leads and stuff like that. So that is a way I've seen people kind of ease into it before they call clients because they might feel like they're soliciting, but when they're calling the realtors, kind of getting the hang of it. You know, they don't feel like they're soliciting as much or asking. They're more so kind of giving. And that's a great point just in general of how you should make calls and what you should do in our system all the time, which is call those realtors. And again, it's awesome because you're pitching to them. Hey, I want to partner with you to give you. So you should all be doing that anyways. And then the last thing here is call your sphere. I mean, if you are scared to call people, you do not know, then start by calling the people that you do know. Right. And at the end of the day, we talk about this all the time to work your sphere, to call people, to text people, to email people, to Facebook message people, to make sure everybody that, you know. Knows that you're a loan officer knows what you do knows that you have all these cool programs, right? So we talked about that a lot. But in this context, we're talking about the fact that you should call them. So we're not talking about you know, texting them and emailing them and stuff like that. We're talking about doing the exercise of literally calling them, meaning. Call them without telling them, right? I won't like call them like cold call, but they're your friend or family member or whatever it is, but get used to that, like talking to somebody, making sure, you know, connecting with them, even if they weren't expecting the call, that's how you have to handle it, right? That's part of it is how do I handle it? Cause they weren't expecting my call necessarily, or they might be busy or whatever it is. So these are the things you get the hang of when you're talking to people. That's it. Takes talking to people, you know, to feel more comfortable than start with the people, you know, call your whole sphere and just talk to them about it again. We've talked about this on previous trainings, ask them if you can send them practice quotes and stuff like that. But the point here is just use the people, you know. To get over that hump and to just get in the motion of being able to use the CRM to call people to you know, take notes in the CRM to be able to again, adjust to people they say they're busy or not busy or call'em back, or just having to pitch somebody that didn't know you were about to pitch them on this. Right? That's kind of the exercise that you're going through. So I don't want you to like text your friend and tell them, Hey, I'm about to call you. Today or tomorrow about, I want you to just call them so that, and that's what gets you in the, the, the you know, the mind state of being able to do it with other people. Because again, who knows if they're busy or they're not, or they want to talk about what you're talking about, or they're, you know you know, so again, just use that as practice if you have that fear, so not too much to talk about here at the end of the day, I'll go back to the 1st slide. Which at the end of the day is make sure we understand. It's just gotta be done. That's step 1, the 1st and foremost, biggest step. You can't be in this business if you're not dialing out. And if you're not answering all the incoming calls, it's a lifestyle. It's something that just has to be done. And my other big tip to leave you with would be right here, which is. Most of these people, again, I'm talking about the people who say not interested, stop calling me, hanging up on you. You're never going to speak to them again. You don't know them. You didn't see them in person. You don't know what they look like. They don't know what you look like. You're never going to see their name again or talk to them again or see them. And so you just kind of get a little, got to get a little bit of that. I don't care attitude. Right. And just, just pick up the phone. There's only one way to do it. Which is to just do it, which is to pick up the phone and get started. So I don't see any questions, so I appreciate everybody tuning in. Remember we do this 12 PM Eastern every weekday, where we go through the front end of the mortgage business. I appreciate everybody. Yeah, no questions. I don't see. So we'll wrap it up. Thank you, everybody. We'll see you tomorrow, 12 PM Eastern for the next episode of the loan officer sales training with the mortgage calculator. Have a great day, everyone. Let's get out there and