Mortgage broker marketing covers everything you do to get in front of borrowers before they pick someone else: referral relationships, your database, your website, search, paid ads, social and bought leads. Most brokers do a bit of all of it, badly, because nobody ever told them which two matter at the size of business they are running.
This page is a plain survey of the options. For each channel you get what it costs, how long it takes before the phone rings, and when it is the wrong choice. We sell leads, so read the section on buying them with that in mind. It also lists the cases where you should not buy any.
By Andreas, PrimeLeads founder · Last updated 16 August 2026
Lender access stopped being the problem years ago. Brokers wrote a record 81.0% of new residential home loans in the March 2026 quarter, up from 55.3% in March 2018. The channel won. The trouble is that every other broker is standing in the same queue, and the MFAA counted 22,265 brokers as at September 2024, 12% more than a year earlier.
So marketing for mortgage brokers is now about being chosen, not being available. The brokers who grow fastest usually have a named specialty: first home buyers in one council area, self employed borrowers, medicos, expats, construction lending. A specialty makes referral partners remember you and gives your website something to rank for. Being available for everything ranks for nothing.
Real estate agents, buyer's agents, accountants, conveyancers and financial planners all sit in front of people who are about to need finance. A referred borrower arrives already trusting you, so they close at rates no paid channel matches.
The catch is time. A partner network takes a year or more to build, and the best local relationships are usually already taken. Build this channel constantly, but do not count on it for this quarter's settlements.
Every past client and every enquiry that went cold is a future refinance or upgrade. Borrowers rarely think about their loan until something makes them. A short email that answers one real question keeps you the first call when they do.
That is one quarter and owner occupiers only, before you count investors. An annual repayment review, sent by you before a competitor sends theirs, is the best return a broker can get for the price of an email tool.
Someone typing "mortgage broker near me" has the highest intent of any audience you can reach. SEO for mortgage brokers is mostly the work of turning up in that moment, and most of it is unglamorous.
Be realistic about timing. In a quiet suburb you can be visible within a few months. In a capital city, cracking the map results can take a year, and there is no way to pay your way past it. Treat digital marketing for mortgage brokers as an asset you compound while something faster funds the pipeline.
Paid search puts you in front of a borrower at the moment they are looking. That is why it costs what it costs, and why the sums are worth doing before you switch anything on.
Source: WordStream 2026 Google Ads benchmarks. US figures in US dollars; Australian finance clicks in the capitals commonly run higher.
Run those numbers against a ten dollar a day budget. Ten dollars buys about three clicks. At a 2.64% conversion rate, three clicks a day is roughly one enquiry a fortnight, and that assumes your landing page is as good as the average one. Finance also carries one of the lowest conversion rates of any category, well under the 8.18% average across all industries. A token budget here does not give you a slow trickle. It gives you almost nothing while you pay for the clicks.
Google Ads works for brokers who can fund a real test and send clicks to a page built for one loan purpose rather than a homepage. If that is not you this quarter, buying the output of somebody else's ad account is usually cheaper than learning on your own.
Instagram, Facebook and LinkedIn do one job well. They make sure a borrower already knows your name when the time comes. They are poor at catching someone who is ready today, because nobody opens Instagram to find a broker.
Post the things only you can post. A settlement you got over the line after the first lender said no. What the last rate decision does to a $700,000 loan. Generic rate graphics get scrolled past.
Paid social is a different thing again. Instant form ads are cheap and prefilled, which puts volume and weak intent in the same box. We compared the two in Facebook lead ads vs verified leads.
Lead generation for mortgage brokers has a shortcut. Pay somebody else to run the ads and buy the enquiries they produce. PrimeLeads does exactly this, so read the next few paragraphs as an interested party explaining its own model.
What we sell is a fixed price per lead, agreed before you start, with no retainer and no lock in. Every enquiry is exclusive to one client, phone verified by SMS, checked for duplicates, and delivered live into your CRM. Campaigns are tuned weekly. If a lead is invalid we review it within five business days and replace or credit it. It is built in Brisbane and the data stays in Australia. The full sequence is on our verification page.
Verification matters more in finance than in most categories, because a borrower who cannot get finance is not a client. Across our property enquiries, 51.8% of high income enquirers fail on finance grounds. On leads cleared through our PrimeProof checks, which use up to 98 data points, that failure rate drops below 5%.
Now the part most lead sellers leave out. Five situations make buying leads the wrong call.
Where it does fit is narrower than most ads suggest. You have call capacity now, a gap in the pipeline this quarter, and the discipline to work every enquiry that lands. The mechanics are on mortgage refinance leads and pay per lead.
Whatever channel you pick, the ad itself is regulated. ASIC Regulatory Guide 234 covers advertising financial products and services including credit, and it exists to help promoters comply with their obligations not to make false or misleading representations or engage in misleading or deceptive conduct. ASIC updated the guide in 2026 after consulting industry.
This catches brokers most often on social, where a graphic gets reposted without the qualifications that sat on the original ad. If a compliance person would not sign it off, do not post it.
Nobody runs six channels well. Pick one that compounds and one that produces enquiries this month.
Typical for a single broker or a small brokerage. Not guarantees.
Most brokers should keep the database and referral work running permanently, because both are close to free, then add one paid channel while the free ones mature. Which paid channel depends on whether you would rather own an ad account or own your calendar. The same ground from the client acquisition side is in how mortgage brokers get more clients.
Start where intent already exists: a complete Google Business Profile with recent reviews, then Google Ads on loan purpose terms or bought exclusive leads. Social builds recall but rarely produces enquiries on its own. Every ad has to meet ASIC's guidance on advertising credit, so qualifications sit alongside any rate or savings claim.
Referral partners plus a nurtured database beat everything else on cost and close rate, and both take months to a year to pay. Run them permanently, then add one paid channel while they mature. Most brokers fail by running six channels at half effort instead of two properly.
Work the trail book. An annual repayment review to every past client, a re-contact of old enquiries and a review request after every settlement will beat most beginner ad accounts. In the June 2026 quarter alone, 66,449 owner occupier borrowers refinanced with a new lender (ABS).
Not really. At the finance and insurance benchmark cost per click of $3.39, ten dollars buys about three clicks a day, and at a 2.64% conversion rate that is roughly one enquiry a fortnight (WordStream, 2026). Budget enough to read results within a few weeks, or use a channel that bills per enquiry instead of per click.
Yes, and slowly. Local search carries the highest intent of any channel, but ranking in the map results takes a few months in a quiet suburb and can take a year in a capital city. Build it while a faster channel funds the pipeline.
Only if you can call back within minutes, someone owns the follow up, you have appointment capacity, and you can fund a test large enough to read. If any of those is missing, the money does better spent on reviews, referral partners and your database.
Get a fixed price per lead and start within a week. Pay only for verified enquiries that match your brief.
Get a price per leadWe will build the campaign, deliver your first leads, and show you the quality before you scale.
Prefer to talk? Mention a good time to call in your message and we will phone you.
We only take on clients we can genuinely deliver for, so we ask a little more than most. Every enquiry is verified by SMS.
No lock in. No retainer. No shared leads.