Seven Ways to Reach Prospects in the New Normal

It wasn’t long ago that a MasterCard commercial celebrated splurging on expensive box seats and overpriced snacks and souvenirs, concluding, “A day at the ballpark with your son…priceless.”

The current MasterCard campaign, in the wake of the Great Recession, gathers the Gorton’s Fisherman, Charlie the Star-Kist Tuna, and Chef Boyardee around a kitchen table for an $8.52 family style meal of a casserole and crescent rolls. The punch line – “Getting everyone together for dinner...priceless” and the conclusion – “Debit MasterCard accepted at your local grocery store.”

Extravagance is out and frugality is in.  Finding happiness in what we can afford is what sells.

Getting Together

With many investors implicitly or explicitly bracing for the New Normal and lower returns from the capital markets, advisors need to rethink their marketing programs to be consistent with their clients’ tempered expectations.

Connecting with prospective clients in today’s market means shelving brochures laden with anachronistic Grecian columns and gold compasses in favor of something more tangible. “The trusted old guard is shaken and prospects want a new approach,” says Mark Dimassimo, founder, CEO, and chief creative officer of DiMassimo Goldstein (DIGO), a New York marketing strategy and business-building agency. “People have suffered the one-two punch of a financial disaster followed by a bull market. They are mourning both what they lost and what they failed to regain – and that’s creating an immediate opportunity for financial advisors.”

So how should you reach prospects in the new normal?