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A few years ago, I visited a small boutique hotel on a business trip to Boston. It wasn’t flashy—no rooftop pool or Michelin-starred restaurant—but from the moment I checked in, I felt like a VIP. The front desk agent greeted me by name and remembered where I’d flown in from. The room was spotless, with a handwritten welcome note. When a minor issue popped up with my Wi-Fi, the staff resolved it in minutes—and sent up complimentary cookies “for the inconvenience.” By the time I checked out, I found myself telling three different people that they had to stay there if they were ever in town.
What struck me later was this: the hotel hadn’t just given me a good stay—they’d built a culture, a process, and a set of habits that ensured every guest left feeling that way.
Our question this month: What do great CX leaders do differently—and how can mortgage lenders follow their lead?
There’s a reason some companies consistently outperform their peers in loyalty and growth: they’ve figured out how to translate vision into behavior.
Harvard Business Review found that companies with strong cultures focused on the customer grow revenues 4–8% above their market each year. Bain & Company’s loyalty research shows that increasing customer retention by just 5% can lift profits between 25–95%. And STRATMOR’s own MortgageCX data confirms that borrowers who experience a process with no miscues generate Net Promoter Scores (NPS) in the high 90s—creating raving fans who return and refer at far higher rates.
But none of this happens by accident. Vision statements and posters on the wall have little effect on actual outcomes. What changes outcomes are daily habits—employees consistently doing the small things right, guided by standardized expectations, measured feedback, and a culture that celebrates doing the unexpected for customers. Behavioral science reinforces this: when people have clear norms, consistent feedback, and visible accountability, their likelihood of following through rises exponentially. In other words, vision only becomes revenue when it becomes embedded in behavior.
And that’s where hospitality comes in, because at its core, hospitality is the sum of the small, consistent ways we make people feel cared for, respected, and valued. We often think of hospitality in terms of hotels or restaurants, but it’s even more critical in mortgage, where borrowers are navigating one of the most stressful, high-stakes journeys of their lives.
The leaders who excel here don’t stop at talking about vision. They operationalize hospitality by embedding culture into daily routines, aligning measurement with coaching, and hardwiring loyalty moments into the loan process.
Let’s look more closely at each of these three traits.
1) They Weave Culture into the Fabric of Operations.
Think of how Disney treats “magic”—not as a happy accident, but as a discipline. Every cast member, from costumed characters to custodial staff, follows specific habits, rules, and rituals designed to create consistent delight.
Top lenders don’t rely on a handful of exceptional LOs to “carry” the customer experience. They codify best practices—how to greet, how to handle a miscue, how to surprise borrowers—so that delight is the default, not the exception.
When culture is embedded, it stops being a poster on the wall and starts being “just how we do things here.”
2) They Measure Deeply and Personalize Feedback.
Collecting post-close reviews is fine. But if you want advocacy, you have to measure what drives loyalty, not just overall satisfaction.
Great leaders use detailed scorecards, peer benchmarks, and role-specific reporting. This means every LO, processor, and manager sees their own CX impact and knows the exact behaviors needed to improve. That visibility fuels pride, competition, and accountability.
STRATMOR’s MortgageCX data shows that lenders who combine deep measurement with personalized coaching see both higher NPS and a measurable lift in referral business.
3) They Design for Loyalty by Eliminating Friction and Delivering Unexpected Value.
Most lenders focus on the “big moments” in the borrower journey. CX leaders obsess over every moment—especially the ones where miscues can quickly erode trust.
They respond quickly when something goes wrong, own the issue without excuses, and recover with empathy. They also train teams to deliver “above and beyond” touches—those small, personal gestures that borrowers share with friends unprompted.
Over time, these moments hardwire loyalty into the process, creating a steady flow of repeat and referral business.
Here are three practical steps you can take today to embed these traits in your mortgage business:
Looking for a bit more hands-on assistance? STRATMOR created the Experience Advisory Program—the first and only Systematized Hospitality framework built specifically for the mortgage industry—to do just that. In eight high-impact sessions, our team helps you eliminate borrower pain points, embed new habits, and design unforgettable “signature moments” that drive loyalty, trust, and conversion.
Curious what that looks like in practice? Get the details here.
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