Do you know what others in the affiliate marketing world are doing? If not, you might want to pay attention to all those in your industry so you can keep abreast of what is going on. Knowing what others are doing is a great tool for you to be fully informed of your industry for your publishers, but it is also great to know if there is maybe something you or your company are not doing and needs to possibly look at doing. Knowledge is power when keeping up with this industry. Don’t be the one left in the dust……

Mortgage leads are basically contain mortgage related information that is furnished by the debtor to service providers or to dedicated third party agencies. Some of the actionable information that can be enacted upon by financial service providers includes – name, contact information of prospective debtor, mortgage amount sought out for, his or her current liabilities and other income sources related information. These cues are enough to be acted upon by service providers. They can easily get in touch with the prospective debtor and offer dedicated solutions to meet their financial needs.
How to Generate Mortgage Leads

Mortgage leads can be generated through multi channel framework. Some of the popular means of generating mortgage leads include – online channels, mass media marketing, affiliate marketing and by direct sales or cross sell opportunities. At time, service providers might even consider cold calling options in order to reach out to customers in an effective manner. Dedicated call centers or outsourced contact centers can be utilized to accomplish the task of generating mortgage leads and qualifying them based on the given criteria. Mortgage leads generation is essentially a continuous and evolving activity.

How Many Are Too Many
Financial services providers should ascertain their strengths and weaknesses in order to serve their prospective customer base. Dedicated mortgage lead generation campaign might generate too many leads. However, leads should essentially be qualified based on various parameters such as risk profile, monthly income, asset base, current liabilities and other risk factors. Service providers should only offer services which come under their gamut of offerings. Over committing or under committing might lead to detrimental effects in just about no time at all. Therefore, newer service providers should benchmark their services with the best in business in order to make an impression in mainstream business.
Leaning Possibilities While Generating Mortgage Leads
Financial services providers can get to learn enormously from mortgage lead campaigns on the go. Some of the best learning’s that a service provider can capitalize upon include – most profitable channel for lead generation such as online/Mailer marketing/ Mass media marketing etc. they can also get to understand the pulse of customer in better manner. With the changing trends and lifestyles, mortgage service providers can get to understand what exactly is needed by customers. Tailor made mortgage solutions can power through financial portfolios of one and all in no time. Mortgage lead generation is an art which can be mastered gradually with experience.

You better stay on your toes when it comes to keeping up with social media and it’s newest players.
This could be great for restaurants, stores, local hangouts and bars if this sort of next generation social media emerges successfully. Businessweek.com broke it down on what this new social media “service” is all about. “Foursquare, a 20-person company that operates out of a crowded loft in New York’s East Village, adds a game-like twist. Its 1 million-plus users earn badges by “checking in” at certain bars, restaurants, and other venues by pressing a button on the app upon arrival. A user can earn a “mayor” icon from a bar if he or she has checked in more than anyone else during the previous 60 days. The business model is simple: Generate as big a user base as possible and sell national brands and local merchants on the possibilities of marketing to people as they congregate—ready to eat, shop, or spend.”
The next thing we know we will have sales people cold calling to these establishments trying to get as many businesses on their “route” for people to go to. This is a great idea and I don’t think I have heard of anything else like it. Negatives to it? If you are someone that does not like people to track your every move…. IE things such as Twitter (as some call legalized stalking), this might not be the thing for you.
Pat on the back to those over at Foursquare for coming up with something truly innovative, and we will see what the next BIG THING will be in this wonderful internet world!

California is seeing an increase in home remodeling projects, something this economy hasn’t seen since 2007. Home owners are feeling more confident about the economy and 62% of homeowners surveyed indicated they plan to spend an average of $6,200 on enhancements. California saw consumer spending decrease 27% in 2007, but 2010 shows an estimated 5% growth. This could potentially be the first year of growth for this sector since 2006.

Home Depot and Lowe’s are projecting an average 2% same-store sales growth for 2010, a great sign of an economic recovery. Contractors are experiencing an increase of inbound calls for new jobs.  While it’s still nowhere near it use to be, business is picking up.

In anticipation of the rebound of the Home Services sector, Leadpile is launching it’s new home improvement website.  Watch for the website to be available in the coming weeks where you can find a certified contractor near you.

Working in lead generation it is really important to know who your client is and who you are are trying to target. Unfortunately, what happens with many networks/agencies is that they are wrapped up in generating as many leads as they can, they are not focusing on who they are targeting. Knowing the consumer that you are targeting, does it really matter that you don’t know the ins and outs of what the consumer is you are marketing to? Many would say it is not totally important, but I feel knowing as much as you can about your target market/consumer can make or break the effectiveness of your marketing campaign.
APNews seems to agree. “The independent Marketing Tracking & Maximisation Specialist also found that Marketers around the world classify ad agencies into three groups: (1) the Result-Drivers who truly believe that the primary purpose of a campaign is to deliver the bottom line results of their clients, and do whatever they can for that (35%); (2) the Result-Pretenders who claim they believe in making campaigns that deliver results, but are internally not prepared to put in place the relevant systems and processes to do so (43%); and (3) the Dreamers who still live in old “Adland” (22%).” There were also 3 weaknesses identified in those that are not truly focusing on the actual result of their consumers:
1. The customer insight is not deep enough
2. Too award driven and not enough customer focused
3. Not effectively tracking to know what is working with each media campaign

Bottom line: know your customer and what advertising is working effectively. This applies to lead generation or any other marketing techniques where you are trying to target consumers.

Leadpile is very much familiar with email marketing and works with a lot of publishers that are generating traffic through this source of marketing. Because it has become so popular with companies trying to monetize data, and publishers trying to have a less expensive way to generate traffic, reading up on any new email marketing trends is important. DMNews brought up some key points about email marketing:
1. Permission and privacy: Various states are making rulings on cases that involve consumer’s information, so keeping up with not only CAN-SPAM but other legislation involving consumers privacy, is key to keeping your nose clean with the law.

2. Video in email: The next biggest thing is utilizing video in emails. If you are not someone that is utilizing this yet, you better start reading up now.

3. Partnership of email marketing and social media: Incorporating links to social media in emails is something that marketers picked up on last year, however the future of these two is going to be big. Perfecting the use of social media in email is something that all emailers will have to learn more about, because this is going to be something that is going to continue to emerge and you will need to learn to keep up with it.

“Nineteen percent of online marketing budgets are now allocated to e-mail, according MarketingSherpa, and 54% of marketers plan to increase their e-mail budgets this year, based on research from Econsultancy and ExactTarget.” If you are not a company that is looking at increasing your email marketing budget, trends show you might want to reconsider this!

No really? The social networking site Facebook has hit it BIG because it passed Google in the number of visitors coming to their site. Information Week stated, “For the week ending March 13, Facebook accounted for 7.07% of all U.S. Internet visits, while Google accounted for 7.03%, according to Hitwise. It was the first time Facebook had held the No. 1 spot for a week.” This is great news for Facebook, because this sort of ranking could potentially help them out financially. So, who will benefit besides Facebook themselves on this sort of increased ranking?
In the lead generation space I wish there was maybe some additional opportunity for this mega social networking site to be able to truly produce some great lead generation results. I have yet so see a publisher we work with at Leadpile that is effectively using Facebook to generate leads. What needs to happen in order for Affiliate Marketing to truly be able to capitalize on this site, or are there publishers that are showing success with monetizing Facebook traffic? I would like to speak with them if it is happening!
Great job Facebook… keep doing what you are doing, because it’s working!

Leadpile is excited to be a part of the upcoming Affiliate Summit West in Las Vegas, NV. If you are an affiliate that will be attending this weekend’s upcoming show, please make sure and stop by our Meet Market booth on Sunday January 17th. This show is a great opportunity for us to see some past, present and new partners all in one place. We would love to talk about lead generation, publisher opportunities, advertisers opportunities, affiliate marketing, traffic and anything else related to affiliate marketing. If you are not attending the show, make sure and reach out to us so we can discuss how we can potentially work together (mari@leadpile.com).

Believe it or not Wi-Fi is going to be available in cars in the near future (2010 to be exact). Many of us need to go to coffee shops or other public places that allow us the convenience of getting internet access, however it seems that Ford cars are going to be starting to install WI-FI capabilities in next years models. This will be possible with the SYNC system who is partnering up with Microsoft. Consumers will then be able to utilize their laptops in their cars wherever they want!
The advancement of technology is so amazing. Not only can people use their cell phones to access the internet, now they are going to be able to sit in their cars and be on an actual laptop when needed. So will something like this maybe impact the lead generation world, where more people can potentially fill out online forms such as Leadpile’s Microclick form on a website? I think so!

Payday loans get a bad name, but are a necessary option for many individuals. Recently there has been a lot of bad press about payday loans and the high interest rates that are associated with them, however not all is bad about these loans. Payday loans help many people in tough times, times when they have no other option or places to turn.

According to Online PR News , a recent study shows that people living in states that currently have banned payday loans, turn to more desperate measures having far worse long term effects on the individuals financial standing. Over drafting accounts and bouncing checks is not a better option.

The benefits that payday loans can bring are enormous, allowing people to get help in times of need. At LeadPile, we generate thousands of payday loan leads and match these leads up with payday loan companies able to help them get through what they are dealing with. Payday loans are an asset, and are necessary in today’s economy.

Seeking services (lead generation) online, communicating with others (social networking), and reading the top news stories, is now all being conducted through everything EXCEPT our nation’s newspapers. In recent years, many newspapers realized this need for immediate information, therefore created an online version of their newspaper. Unfortunately, this scrambling did not prevent the potential elimination of alot of the newspapers. It’s a sad day in the newspaper world when NPR reports the fact that our nation’s newspaper circulation has dropped 10%, just in the past 6 months. Newspaper’s loss of revenue is largely caused by a decline in advertising dollars.
What does this mean to all of us? In many ways, it takes away an old tradition that many of our parents and grandparents have experienced their whole lives. More importantly, it takes away a source for all of us looking for reading material, jobs, coupons, store ads, obituaries, local and national news. The question is, where on the internet can we go to now for this sort of resource? This is something very difficult for one “website” to be able to provide, so I am not sure how we are all going to potentially survive without the irreplaceable newspaper?

This week Google launched a test for the ‘Wave”, a new interface for communication that allows group discussions, email, instant messaging, picture and video editing and posting, blogging… there really is not much that this new communication tool does not do! A selected 100,000 people were invited by Google to use this new tool during it’s testing phase, and then to supply feedback and suggestions.
The Wave is set up in a real time format allowing conversations to transition from email to live conversation such as instant messaging. According to wave.google.com, the definition of a Wave is as follows:

• A wave is equal parts conversation and document. People can communicate and work together with richly formatted text, photos, videos, maps, and more.
• A Wave is shared. Any participant can reply anywhere in the message, edit the content and add participants at any point in the process. Then playback lets anyone rewind the wave to see who said what and when.
• A Wave is live. With live transmission as you type, participants on a Wave can have faster conversations, see edits and interact with extensions in real-time.

If the Wave is able to combine all of the forms of conversation that are currently available, how will this change an industry such as Lead Generation? Will this replace the need for topic specific forums, and blogs? If a demand for lead types is posted, and instantly a supplier is able to respond and make a connection and discuss in an open format for others to see, it could be a huge thing for brand recognition! Being able to edit content and rewind to see where posts are coming from, could be an asset when the need for “damage control” arises.
I have signed up to be on the list of hopefuls in the next rounds of invitations sent out, I can’t wait to get on this wave!