"A relatively new and effective way of getting customers is social media. Places like Facebook, Instagram and LinkedIn provide an excellent way to reach new target audences."
FR: Tell us a bit about yourself and how you got into the property industry?
I've been managing director of The Mortgage Hut since December having been in the business for around four years. I started out my career in financial services - retail and commercial banking - working predominantly in the branch sector on a multitude of products including mortgages. Previous to The Mortgage Hut, I worked at British Airways as a cabin service manager where I was responsible for product quality and the onboard customer service. The knowledge gained at BA has helped us cement The Mortgage Hut as one of the highest rated mortgage service providers due to the attention to detail we pay when it comes to the customer experience. My main passion is delivering great customer service, something we pride ourselves on at the company.
FR: What do you think makes a good mortgage business?
For us it is happy customers. In our industry, customers hold a lot of weight in determining which opportunities come through our doors, from word of mouth to online customer reviews. Ensuring the service we provide is excellent means we can then showcase our product in its best light. Having a great product is nothing without a good customer base.
FR: Talking about customers, what is the most effective way to get them?
Since we began in 2011, there has been a huge shift in the financial services sector especially in how consumers interact with service providers. For instance, back when the business started with Chris Schutrups, our Founder, at the helm there were very few online review sites, and more importantly they did not really affect the business. Nowadays, the industry lives and dies by online reviews as they have become so important in a customer’s decision making process - you can lose potential customers before you're even aware of them, most will start the buying process online before they even submit an enquiry.
We gain around 70% of our new customers from our website, so having a really strong site is important, to do this you have to understand exactly who your customer is, what they will be searching for and the problems they are trying to solve.
We also pay significant attention to the traditional route of gaining customers i.e. developing key relationships with introducers including estate agents, new build developers, solicitors and accountants.
A relatively new and effective way of getting customers is social media. Places like Facebook, Instagram and LinkedIn provide an excellent way to reach new target audences. It’s all about knowing where your customer base is and finding how to interact with them. In fact, there’s the recent story of a housebuilder using Snapchat to generate 4000 leads in one week regarding home ownership.
So going back to my British Airways days, having excellent customer service coupled with a great product will undoubtedly help increase business. That's what we try and do at The Mortgage Hut.
FR: What is your take on the opportunities for women in leadership roles in financial services?
I think that the financial services industry has become a trailblazer when it comes to providing leadership opportunities for women. Many organisations are finding that having a balanced board, management team and overall team makes them more resilient and utilise skills that they wouldn’t otherwise have. Our team at The Mortgage Hut is a perfect illustration of this as we have a larger proportion of women in the workplace in comparison to other businesses. Beyond providing employment opportunities, we provide additional support including flexible working for parents, staged maternity leave, keep in touch days and providing leadership and development training to help the workforce drive their careers forward.
FR: What challenges do you foresee in the next 12 months?
The main challenge as we all know is Brexit. My personal opinion on whether Brexit is good or bad for the country doesn’t matter now as we, as a business have to deal with its implications and prepare as best we can. We have taken many steps to ensure that we’re in the best place possible to deal with any eventuality. Crucial to this is maintaining our exceptional levels of service so that we can advise our customers appropriately and provide them with the best products for their needs. So although there is potential for business to slow down, we envisage becoming stronger as we’ve - over the past 12 months - invested heavily in continual staff development, our academy scheme in conjunction with the Mortgage Advice Bureau, as well as strenghtening how we acquire customers and simplify the customer journey.
