- 4 days ago
In this episode of Power House, host Zeb Lowe sits down with mortgage marketing strategist Bri Lees to tackle one of the industry’s biggest tensions: how to create marketing that’s authentic, effective, and still compliant.
Bri argues that bland mortgage marketing isn’t a creativity problem; it’s a leadership problem. When executive teams fail to define their compliance philosophy or brand identity, loan officers default to “safe” messaging that feels forgettable. With clear guardrails and alignment, she explains, companies can build marketing that feels human and differentiated without crossing regulatory lines.
The conversation reframes compliance not as a creativity killer, but as a strategic constraint that, when clearly defined, can sharpen a brand’s message and strengthen trust.
Related to this episode:
Zeb’s LinkedIn
https://www.linkedin.com/in/zebulon-lowe-a02353a4/
Bri’s LinkedIn
https://www.linkedin.com/in/brilees/
The Power House podcast brings the biggest names in housing to answer hard-hitting questions about industry trends, operational and growth strategy, and leadership. Join HousingWire’s Zeb Lowe every Thursday morning for candid conversations with industry leaders to learn how they’re differentiating themselves from the competition. Hosted and produced by the HousingWire Content Studio.
Bri argues that bland mortgage marketing isn’t a creativity problem; it’s a leadership problem. When executive teams fail to define their compliance philosophy or brand identity, loan officers default to “safe” messaging that feels forgettable. With clear guardrails and alignment, she explains, companies can build marketing that feels human and differentiated without crossing regulatory lines.
The conversation reframes compliance not as a creativity killer, but as a strategic constraint that, when clearly defined, can sharpen a brand’s message and strengthen trust.
Related to this episode:
Zeb’s LinkedIn
https://www.linkedin.com/in/zebulon-lowe-a02353a4/
Bri’s LinkedIn
https://www.linkedin.com/in/brilees/
The Power House podcast brings the biggest names in housing to answer hard-hitting questions about industry trends, operational and growth strategy, and leadership. Join HousingWire’s Zeb Lowe every Thursday morning for candid conversations with industry leaders to learn how they’re differentiating themselves from the competition. Hosted and produced by the HousingWire Content Studio.
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NewsTranscript
00:00Welcome back to Powerhouse. I'm your host, Zeb Lowe. Today, I'm joined by mortgage marketing powerhouse, Bree Lees. Bree and
00:07I are going to unpack how to make mortgage marketing that is authentic, effective, and, wait for it, compliant.
00:14There is a way to build a brand that feels human and differentiated while still respecting guidelines, approvals, and those
00:21shadowy figures who shall not be named, regulators.
00:24Bree has helped shape growth strategies across mortgage and fintech, and her frameworks are already being used by executive teams
00:31and field advisors across the industry.
00:42All right, Bree, thank you for joining me.
00:44Thanks for having me, Zeb.
00:45I had you come onto the podcast because we were going to talk about compliant marketing, and fun is not
00:53necessarily correlating to compliance most of the time in most people's minds, but that is a major obstacle, I think,
01:03that most, not just most marketing departments feel, but also loan originators on the ground wanting to get their hands
01:10on good, effective, authentic marketing.
01:14So, when you look across mortgage companies today, what do you see as the real problem behind weak marketing, poor
01:21adoption, and compliance friction?
01:23That's a good question because I think a lot of us look at marketing and see it as the fun,
01:29exciting thing when really there's a lot of strategy involved.
01:32And one of the biggest bottlenecks that I see is like a company that I recently audited where they thought
01:36they were being super compliant, they were doing the right thing,
01:39but when it actually came to their marketing, everything that they were putting out there was so boring, and the
01:45reason why it was boring was because they never really decided what they stood for in compliance.
01:50Like, loan officers were really willing to be, you know, up in the air with whatever we're posting.
01:55Like, they're not going to be getting a fine, but the company wanted to be really, really safe, and so
02:00that's one of the biggest bottlenecks that I see is like,
02:02what do you stand for, and are your loan officers on the same page with that?
02:05You would say that's a leadership issue, right?
02:08Absolutely.
02:09It all dials back to a leadership issue because at the end of the day, if your leadership team doesn't
02:13know what you stand for, what are you supposed to do?
02:15I think that's something that's consistent across the industry.
02:19I audited a company, and they were launching a new awards program, and when I launched the new awards program
02:29with them,
02:30one of the first things that I did was like, let's check out and see if any of your competitors
02:33have something similar or what they're doing, right?
02:37And come to find out that their competitor had the same exact name for one of their programs that they
02:43were launching for that same exact program on the certifications,
02:46and they didn't take the due diligence to actually understand, is anybody else doing this?
02:51And when I presented it, the thing that came up was, well, we've been doing this for five years.
02:56We don't care if anybody else is.
02:57And it wasn't so much an issue of somebody else is doing it.
03:01The issue is more so the ego that was involved in making that decision and the failure that that meant
03:06if they were to say no,
03:07because they had been doing it for such a long time, like, what are the implications for everybody else if
03:12they're to say no,
03:13they're not going to keep doing this thing because the competitor is doing it?
03:17Yeah.
03:17And from my experience, I mean, I've got quite a few years of, I guess,
03:23seeing how the sauce is just made from a marketing perspective and they're working with compliance, leadership issues.
03:28And it's an evolution or maybe like a devolution, I guess, in a company.
03:34I mean, there's a ripple effect that happens.
03:36And so from your experience, what happens when leadership, you know, they, it all starts at what you talked about
03:43earlier,
03:43like defining what the company actually stands for, right?
03:46And so when leadership avoids doing that, what begins to happen?
03:52Like what are the, what stages or what does that ripple effect look like from your experience?
03:57The ripple effect is that what leadership thinks it stands for is what the field stands for and top producers
04:05stand for.
04:05And that can change by the snap of a finger, right?
04:09If your leadership team at the end of the day is completely, you know, bowing down to whatever loan officers
04:15want to do or say,
04:17what you stand for is going to fluctuate too.
04:20So a really great example is like going back to the story that I told earlier,
04:24like I see that consistently across companies that I audit where they don't know what they stand for.
04:28And maybe they decide what they stand for, right?
04:30So, and then what happens is a loan officer will say, I don't like this.
04:35And it's a top producer.
04:36And then all of a sudden they're like, whoa, we're not sure if we like this either because the top
04:39producer isn't sure.
04:40So it's so important that that leadership team collectively decides, hey,
04:46we are really willing to be risky when it comes to two and one buy downs or X, Y, and
04:51Z,
04:52but we're not willing to take a risk in these states.
04:54Like for example, New York is a state that really a lot of people have troubles with.
04:59And sitting down and deciding what that is,
05:01because if your leadership team doesn't know what they stand for,
05:04compliance doesn't know what you stand for,
05:06marketing doesn't know what you stand for,
05:07and it's all going to end up in the hands of loan officers.
05:09And then you have a company that's running by loan officers as most of us do in the industry.
05:13And as I often see.
05:16Yeah.
05:16You're giving me flashbacks of PTSD right now.
05:21Yeah.
05:21A little bit where there would be quite a bit of effort and resources spent on any given marketing strategy
05:27or I don't know,
05:28suite of assets or whatever.
05:29And then one top producer out of the top 10 said that they weren't going to use it.
05:34And then just all hands go up and, you know, everything is abandoned.
05:37And I think that, again, this could be anecdotal to hear your perspective on this.
05:42From my experience, when leadership, when they don't make those calls,
05:48a lot of times compliance doesn't have much of a choice but to kind of step in and fill the
05:55vacuum from a marketing perspective
05:57because it's always better to err on the side of like, let's not get fined.
06:02And so how do you view that shift in the changing role in compliance and the way that teams should
06:13experience?
06:14Sure.
06:14I mean, compliance right now, think about it.
06:16If you're, you know, CEO listening to this call, if you're a compliance department or if you're in marketing
06:20and you're listening to this podcast, who's really making the decision?
06:24Most of the time it is compliance, like you said.
06:26But is that the right call?
06:27My answer would be no, because compliance is just following the rules.
06:31And if you say to somebody in compliance, like you get to make the call, of course,
06:34they are going to make the safest decision.
06:35Like their job is to protect the company.
06:37What I found to be really successful is when marketing and compliance partner together
06:42and then go to the leadership team and say, we're really willing to walk the line on these issues.
06:47Like everybody has, if you're an IMB, we all have the same exact rules.
06:50They're all going to have a change for 10 years.
06:53So you have to decide where are you willing to be lenient on it?
06:58And can you partner as a marketing department with compliance?
07:01And I believe that the most success will come when marketing gets the final decision.
07:06Compliance gets to put those guardrails in place and say, these are things we can't budge on.
07:10If we're creating a marketing asset, we absolutely need these disclaimers.
07:14We need, we cannot say this in every state is different, but those rules haven't changed in so long.
07:20It's really about building the right framework as opposed to just saying, this is what we see and from what
07:26we don't.
07:26It's putting like puzzle pieces together.
07:29And that's when the most success is going to be seen.
07:31And I've seen that time and time again with audits that I've done are working with fractional clients too.
07:36So what, so the, for the clients where it's actually working from a, from a structural perspective,
07:40like what, what do those guardrails look like from the inception of like the marketing strategy,
07:48through working with compliance, to testing it in the field with the LOs,
07:51or feeding up, receiving LO feedback.
07:54At what point do they receive LO feedback from a structural perspective and a process perspective, I guess?
08:00What does that look like?
08:01From a process perspective, the first thing that you should always be doing is sitting down with the compliance department,
08:08with marketing, with leadership and deciding we either are going to be really safe
08:13and nobody's going to care about our marketing,
08:15or we're willing to teeter the line a little bit on these topics or walk the line where we're pretty
08:21safe,
08:21but there might be a little bit of a gray area here.
08:24And that first meeting is really where you decide what risk factor you're willing to take.
08:29And then from there, you need buy-in from the field.
08:32You need the buy-in from loan officers.
08:34You can't just, we've seen this time and time with adoption,
08:37like you can't just say, this is what we're doing, loan officers.
08:40This is what you're going to do now.
08:41No, like they need to feel like they're part of that process.
08:43Otherwise there is going to be rebellion and there is going to be the wild west
08:48and people going completely rogue.
08:49So once you have the buy-in from your leadership team and your executive team,
08:54as well as compliance, next step is buy-in from the actual loan officers.
08:59Once you have that and you know, maybe you have a beta test that you're going to,
09:03you know, pilot in, in a few different states,
09:05then start actually building that framework and what that looks like.
09:08So instead of templates and assets, which is what most companies do,
09:11most companies say, here's your flyer, here's your social post.
09:15Instead of doing that, give them framework that they can work within
09:18to create the content that they want.
09:20So whether that is, you know, some kind of program that you have at your company,
09:24or let's say, you know, it's like no down payment, whatever it might be,
09:31build the framework so they know that they can do this,
09:33but this is the compliance disclaimer that they need on it.
09:36This is what they can't say, what they can't say, and give the flexibility.
09:38It's almost like locking down certain parts of it and keeping other parts of it flexible.
09:45Yeah, I think like failure to do that, you talk about is vanilla.
09:51I think it's a phrase that you used in the past, like that's how marketing becomes vanilla.
09:56So you spoke a little bit to this in that last answer, like what LOs end up doing.
10:01But so when LOs, when it makes their way, when the content makes their way to the LOs,
10:05what does that look like?
10:07The vanilla marketing, I guess, the vanilla content.
10:09What does that look like, right?
10:10And I think you kind of have, you mentioned kind of two camps, like the LOs just kind of ignore
10:14it,
10:14don't use it, and or kind of go rogue and do their own thing,
10:20which is largely probably not compliant or definitely wandering in a more dangerous area.
10:26From your experience, what does that look like?
10:30Look, I've done this the right way and I've done this the wrong way.
10:33And when I say that, I mean, I've tried to come into a company that I worked with and said,
10:38this isn't working, we can't do this, let's rebuild this whole thing and just hope loan officers do it.
10:43And what I learned through that experience is you cannot tell a loan officer what to do
10:50because they firmly believe that it's them against corporate and that this is their business, which it is, right?
10:56Marketing is an item on their P&L, it's a line item.
10:58And so to make it work effectively, you have to understand that you don't want to control them.
11:04You have to give them autonomy.
11:06By them, I mean loan officers, you have to give them autonomy.
11:08But at the same time, you need to put a framework in place with how to do that thing.
11:13And what that really looks like is, you know, setting them up for success with templates,
11:19with words that they can say, and also training.
11:21You can't just give a loan officer new content and say, go figure this out.
11:24You have to be willing to sit with them one-on-one and understand their problems,
11:29sit with them and understand why are they afraid of implementing this?
11:32I think every loan officer wants to know what's going to change,
11:35but they also want to do what they're comfortable with.
11:37Like nobody wants big change.
11:39So for a company to all of a sudden say, you can't do this, this is what you have to
11:42do.
11:43That's a hard thing.
11:43Like someone in Phoenix wants a pineapple on their social media flyer, somebody else doesn't.
11:48You know, that's compliant, sure.
11:49But when it comes to really getting into the nitty gritty of things, that's kind of where you have to
11:56decide.
11:56I think this would probably be a good place to, I don't know, to talk about building a brand, particularly
12:03on social.
12:05So I know it's a cliched phrase at this point because of being a brand now,
12:10like means a million different things to different people.
12:13So I know that's, you know, one of your rallying cries though.
12:17So to you, what does it mean to actually, or can you define what a brand is for an LO?
12:23Yeah, I was just recently coming back from MBA IMB and one of the speakers, he was keynote speaker was
12:29there,
12:30gave really good advice about how to build a brand.
12:32But one thing that he said was, you know, if you're a loan officer, you can go build,
12:38go to ChatGVT, type in, I'm a loan officer, where I'm located, and it'll spit out 30 prompts.
12:43That's the worst thing you can do because you just commoditize yourself in an industry where everybody else is exactly
12:48the same.
12:49So when it comes to building a brand, it isn't just what you're willing to say, what you look like,
12:54what you stand for.
12:55It's so much more than that.
12:57It's really, why do people work with you?
13:01If there are loan officers all over the country and you're in a company where they can go work with
13:04anybody,
13:05why would they work with you?
13:06So are you somebody that's focused on partnerships?
13:09Are you focused on, you know, your client?
13:13Are you focused on all of the things?
13:14You have to understand what's important to you.
13:16And that is not just, I have been in the business for 25 years and I have helped thousands of
13:23families.
13:23That is saying, this is why I'm different and how.
13:27The programs that I've put in place that I see the most success with are when there's frameworks to help
13:32an LO build their brand,
13:34go through the process of understanding what's their value proposition.
13:38What do they stand for?
13:39What do they not do?
13:41How do they help people?
13:42But again, you have to recognize that everybody in the country is doing those same exact things.
13:48So that's where it's so important to put it in place.
13:51Let's put out a hypothetical situation, which is probably, I guess a little, actually it's part hypothetical and part true.
13:57Because you and I have had conversations previously where you've kind of hammered on me really for not being my
14:06own brand or like not building a brand,
14:08which is kind of weird for a guy that is hosting a podcast, admittedly.
14:13But I naturally, I have a skepticism of people that are overly promotional.
14:18And the idea of building a brand for myself, it feels vain, I guess, and kind of exploitative.
14:24I've talked to you about this.
14:25I don't want to take things that I do for people, the time that I, you know, people talk about
14:31building a brand.
14:31They're like taking pictures with their kids at the park.
14:33Like that's because this is who I am authentically.
14:36I don't want to take the things like that or the service to the people, my service to people in
14:41the industry and my community and cheapen them or like exploit them.
14:45And I'm not, by any means, I'm not judging anyone that does those things.
14:48By any means, it just runs contrary to my nature.
14:51And I know a lot of folks like me.
14:55And the rub, I think, is that my brand needs to be authentic, right?
15:01It needs to be human.
15:03It needs to be who I am.
15:04So if I'm, if I know that I need to build a brand because I have to in order to
15:09be successful or more successful,
15:10but doing so is contrary to who I authentically am, like what do I do?
15:15It's kind of like I'm stuck between a rock and a hard place.
15:17And like I said, a lot of people out there like me.
15:20So like you tell me what to do, like build my, how would I, how would someone like myself build
15:25my brand?
15:27Zeb, I don't like being perceived either.
15:28I hate social media.
15:29I'm not on it except for work.
15:31And so I'm in the same exact boat as you where I don't want to post pictures of my kids,
15:37but people want to know who you are.
15:39If you want to make a name for yourself, you're doing yourself a disservice to not be posting about it,
15:43to not be building a brand.
15:44Because if you don't decide who you are, everybody else is going to, like people make assumptions about what that
15:49looks like.
15:50So the first thing I would really do is sit down and answer the core questions of what do you
15:54want to be known for?
15:56Outside of just having a podcast, what are the things about you that people need to know?
16:00And there's like a framework that you can put in place with that.
16:02You know, who are you?
16:04Not just like on a title level, but what are the things that you're willing to give up when it
16:08comes to the personal side of you?
16:10Like for me, for example, I'm willing to say that I like chicken tenders and that I hate conferences.
16:15And that's something that resonates with people because there's a lot of people who don't like conferences.
16:19But then for you, you know, looking at it, when you walk through that process, it's looking at the awareness
16:27level.
16:28How do you get people to be interested in what you have to say and stay with what you have
16:32to say and then eventually listen to your podcast?
16:35So if I were you or if I were a loan officer listening to this, the first thing I would
16:39do is really sit down and understand, look at content, like what resonates with you?
16:46Is it a post?
16:47Is it a video?
16:49And then from there, start building out that framework.
16:52You know, there's yes and no questions that you can do and there's different like brand building exercises that you
16:58can do.
16:59But I think it all boils down to outside of what you offer that everybody else has to offer.
17:03What makes you different?
17:05That was going to be a follow up question, not for me necessarily, but just in general.
17:10How does someone differentiate?
17:12Because there's quality that's involved as well.
17:14Like what is brand level quality, I guess you could say, versus like the filler, the fluff, like I'm doing
17:21this just to do it type content.
17:23And would you say that that's sitting down looking at whatever you're posting or whatever you're creating through that filter?
17:29I would create a list of five pillars that you are really passionate about.
17:36And within those five pillars that you're passionate about and that align with your brand, those are the things that
17:42you always go back to.
17:43And you always talk about.
17:45So for me, I have my list of five, but do you have your list of five?
17:49And that's not just like on a broad level podcast.
17:51But what are the specific topics that you're really passionate about that you could talk about all day long?
17:57Because you'd never want to be in a position where you're just posting to post.
18:00I personally, like I will never post a post.
18:03I advocate for my clients all the time.
18:05Like don't just post a post to put it out there because that's not going to feel genuine to you
18:09or to your audience either.
18:10If it just feels like checking a box, it's a waste of time.
18:13And that's so often what I see is that people are just putting out content that could be anybody else.
18:18If you take the logo off, if you take the headshot off, it could be anybody else that's doing that.
18:23So the most success that I found is dialing into these are my five topics.
18:27This is what I'm constantly willing to talk about.
18:29Does this post go back to one of these five topics?
18:32What are your five topics?
18:34My five topics, burning down the flyer department, talking about conferences and visibility,
18:39talking about brand strategy specifically, executive team visibility, and then the last one being compliance.
18:47Anything that I post goes back to those things.
18:50Yeah, I know.
18:51You've got a real beef with flyers in the flyer factory.
18:53I've seen.
18:54Burn it down.
18:55Yeah.
18:56All right.
18:56So another topic that I wanted to talk to you about, which kind of underlies everything that we've discussed so
19:03far,
19:04is working with the LOs or managing expectations of the LOs.
19:10Talking to LOs about, you know, marketing is not necessarily a win-lose game.
19:16It's a constant, it's an evolving testing strategy, basically, right?
19:20So it's just always evolving, getting better, testing out what works, what doesn't work.
19:25And, you know, like we were talking about earlier, like loan originators, that's their business, right?
19:30And so there's an understandable resistance to kind of being tested on, right?
19:39Because that could, you know, easily you could have the perception that you're messing with my business or my lead
19:45gen or, you know, any number of factors.
19:47And as we discussed earlier, like initiatives can die because one influential loan originator just doesn't like what the company
19:56is doing.
19:56How would you advise leadership to think about balancing that top producer influence with long-term health of the brand,
20:04with, you know, the testing strategies?
20:09And like understanding that some initiatives actually do fail.
20:11And then getting the loan, getting loan originators, especially top producers, to roll with an evolving strategy.
20:19And again, some things just don't work.
20:21Some things don't work.
20:23But one thing that always is consistent is that your brand belongs to whoever leadership is afraid to lose.
20:30If that's a top producer, they're afraid to lose them.
20:33Or if that's somebody on the executive team, they're afraid to lose them.
20:36They're never afraid to lose marketing, right?
20:38And so when you're a marketing team trying to align with an executive or loan officers, you have to understand
20:45that, like, somebody could replace you at any point in time.
20:48And it's all relationship-based.
20:49It's understanding.
20:50It's coming from their perspective and sitting in their shoes.
20:53If your company has 500 loan officers, there are 500 opinions.
20:58So everybody has a different perspective.
21:00How do you appease everybody?
21:02And what I found to be really successful in that process, and I would give anybody advice to do, if
21:07you're sitting in a marketing team, is looking at it from that perspective is like, is this an initiative that
21:12we're just checking off to do it because we think it's going to be really successful?
21:15Or are there actually going to be leads coming from this or brand awareness coming from this?
21:20And if there is an outcome and a KPI that's coming from it, then that's what you need to share
21:25with the field team because they want to see success too.
21:28Like, loan officers don't just want to do something because corporate is telling them to.
21:32But if you're saying you're going to generate more leads from this activity, let me show you.
21:36Let's A-B test it.
21:37Let's do an A-B test, one, the way that you're already doing it, and then B, the way that
21:41I'm suggesting you do it, and help them see that outcome.
21:43You need to have buy-in in order to make any change at a company, and in order to make
21:48change, you have to show the results before you can really fully take over.
21:53And that's the route that I would take is instead of forcing anything, I would get the buy-in because
21:58I've tried the forceful way, and it doesn't work.
22:01So zooming all the way out, let's say, so if mortgage leaders fixed just one thing tomorrow to make better
22:09marketing, stronger strategies, healthy relationships with compliance, what's the one thing that you could or would advise people in ag
22:17change?
22:18I would set up a risk tolerance document.
22:22Define in writing what you will and won't say as a company where you're willing to take risk because that
22:29will deter the complete success of your marketing department.
22:32That's going to determine whether your content is really vanilla and if that could be replaced with any other company,
22:39or if you're going to be the company that's challenging the status quo and creating something new and successful.
22:44I just recently did this with a company, and we launched, they had one brand, but we gave their loan
22:51officers flexibility to have multiple brands under their umbrella that look different.
22:56By that, I mean it had different colors, different fonts and typography, different kind of catchphrases, and a loan officer
23:03who joined the company could come in and build it and say, like, I really like these things and I
23:07hate these things.
23:07Because otherwise you're in a situation where everybody hates everything or, you know, you're willing to accommodate everybody just to
23:14make a top producer happy.
23:15So to go back to your question of what would I do, I would create that risk tolerance document with
23:19what are we willing to take a risk on, both on the compliance side, but also the company side.
23:25That is going to determine your success and also help marketing not get killed by just really vague rejections.
23:32All right, well, Bree, thank you so much for joining me. It was a pleasure.
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