I recently have gotten loans from non traditional lenders that are easier to qualify for.

It is easier to get hurt. - There are always deals to be found, if you look hard enough. 

Partner with wholesalers in your target out of state market, market for end buyers.

Easier and maybe a higher LTV on the duplex they're living in. 

I didn't know how to respond and was torn between going for the highest paying W2 possible for easier financing of deals, and between going with some real estate related career (mortgage lender, RE agent, working for property management company, etc).

Obviously, throughout this process, you are performing best practices to get that CTR rate up through ad testing and different target testing.A good practice to keep the campaign in line is to map out the whole funnel and know hat KPIs you should be hitting.What do I mean by this?

and to understand how they fit together in your toolbox, as none will give you everything (e.g, insurance is required and it will cover you for many situations, but not always; asset protection (LLC) is litigation insurance and complements regular insurance, by minimizing the target and making it unappealing).If you are a new investor, probably you will not have a lot of assets and/or equity to worry about (but even that is relative and subjective to each person tolerance to risk) so I would not worry about that till you pass that risk threshold (in my opinion 100K+ in equity, maybe 50K if you are really risk adverse) and you should be primarily concerned with finding good deals and growing your business first.

So my target goal is toe get them close to market rent within 2 years.

Granted our target was smaller than resi houses.. as the amount of viable timber ground was less but we were also working an area from the Oregon border to just south of Tacoma so about 100 miles by 400 miles  was our data base.. 

Blanket your target market with direct mail to non owner occupied property.