Understanding the Difference: Wholesale vs. Retail Lenders

Wholesale lenders and retail lenders will have very different surface-level results when identifying their audiences as part of the first step in setting up a marketing plan for a mortgage company. But you may be surprised at how much the marketing plans have in common.

Wholesale vs Retail Lenders

Wholesale lenders market their loan programs to mortgage brokers and loan officers who represent those products to their prospects and clients. Your marketing will focus on B2B tactics, including building and maintaining relationships with your direct clients.

Wholesale lenders can go a step further, too, and support their lender clients by helping them sell their products to the borrower. To meet this goal, you’ll also need B2C marketing tools and tailored content for loan originators to share.

Wholesale Lenders and Retail Lenders Have a Lot in Common

If you’re a retail lender, on the other hand, your focus will be working directly with borrowers to close loans—either loans offered directly by your own company or, if you can’t meet a borrower’s product needs, one provided through a wholesale lender. You will definitely need B2C marketing.

But chances are that loan officers in your retail lender office earn a lot of business through referrals from real estate agents or other financial professionals. To build relationships with this audience, you will also need B2B marketing tools.

Plus, you will want to share B2C tools with your referral partners just as wholesale lenders want to share B2C tools with their lender clients.

Retail and Wholesale Lenders Can Rely on the Same CRM Solutions

So, when it comes down to it, both wholesale lenders and retail lenders require both B2B and B2C marketing solutions — relationship-building messages from prospect through post-close or post-sale — along with mechanisms for contact management, message distribution and compliance oversight.

For wholesale lenders and retail lenders, an acceptable solution will answer the common needs and allow for different types of management where the two lending styles differ.

A mortgage-centered CRM like Surefire has been there and done that for wholesale lenders and retail lenders alike. We have marketing solutions you may not have even realized you need yet. Schedule a demo today so we can show you how it works.

Interested in learning more about wholesale lenders and retail lenders? Expand your knowledge with Top of Mind’s Mortgage Marketing University!