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Finance is perceived as the driest and most boring industry on the face of the earth. So it’s no surprise that financial advisors whine about their failure to get anyone’s attention on social media. Yet this creates an amazing opportunity for the wise ones. Advisors who present themselves differently, even slightly, will succeed at getting noticed by their clients and prospects.
Here are the five things advisors should avoid to get investors to pay attention to them online.
1. Boring titles
This is the #1 reason why social media fails in any industry.
Just like the subject line of emails dictates which ones you open and which ones you delete, the title of a blog or social media posting is what gets the click.
Here’s an example.
“How to choose a financial advisor” is tired and overused. Before you publish an article, do a Google search and see how many times people have written on the exact same thing. This title is also self-serving. I know that this article is just to point to all the reasons you should hire the author as your advisor.
A better option: “The Six Types of Financial Advisors and how to know which is right for you.” Now this gives more information and there aren’t as many articles on this because the author actually has to do research and leverage creativity.
Or, even better: “Five Mistakes that Affluent People Make When Hiring an Advisor.” Affluent people will read this if they are interested in learning about what their peers are doing. But again, it’s not that easy to write. You actually have to survey affluent people and find some evidence to back up what you are saying.
Another possibility: “How To Make Sure Your Advisor Isn’t the Next Bernie Madoff”
2. Irrelevant content
Many advisors feel that in order to show value they need to predict the market, pitch products, boost about past trades or discuss their firm.
In reality, this type of content should be avoided at all costs, especially if you are marketing to generations who are wary of product-pushing advisors who “don’t get them” such as the Millennials.
Plus, think about how it makes your poor compliance officer feel when you and the 100 other advisors in your office submit articles about how 2017 is the year to buy Facebook stock. You’ll never get that article through compliance because the CCO is too scared of losing his/her job if you’re wrong.
As I’ve said before in my other articles, you’ve got to serve the reader with the content you produce. Give them the gift of knowledge that truly empowers them and resolves an issue that they deal with regularly.
Another way of saying it is, “treat their symptoms, not their problems.” Here’s what I mean.
Going back to my previous example, most people don’t get grays hairs over the worry of how to select a financial advisor. But they do worry about the symptoms of not having the right one, namely:
- Not having phone calls responded to when you have an important question
- Not being a big enough client relative to the other clients in the practice to command enough attention
- Losing a great deal of money in a market crash
- Having money stolen
- Getting suckered into paying hidden fees
- Having your information stolen from the advisor’s office or file server because they didn’t have adequate protection in place
Not knowing how to pick a financial advisor is a problem. But a blog about how to pick a financial advisor serves nobody but the financial advisor writing the article.
A blog about how to make sure your advisor is following proper information security protocol would be much more relevant because it treats a symptom, a pain that the problem of an incorrect advisor selection creates. And just like the doctor with the cure for strep throat, that’s who people will respond to.
3. Jargony language
Come on, you know what I’m talking about. We’ve all done it.
Are you using terms that nobody really understands, or that are the same words on every other advisor’s website? Here are a few examples:
Customized financial solutions. Sounds good, but what does this term actually mean? It’s a “vague-o-nym.”
Proprietary investment methodology. Hate disappoint you, but financial advisors aren’t doing anything that unusual with their clients’ money. You invest according to Warren Buffett’s value strategy? You and every other advisor. Not to mention that you’re copying Buffett himself. You’re creating an asset allocation using modern portfolio theory, then investing in ETFs you select using Morningstar? How original!
See my guest article on Paladin Digital for more examples of words to avoid if you want to differentiate your financial advisor brand.
Hire a copywriter, one who either has worked in finance before as a practitioner or who specializes in writing for this industry and won’t get you in trouble by violating FINRA or SEC advertising guidelines.
4. Bad visuals
You’re not selling Ferrari or Swarovski crystals, but your visual identity is still important to a financial advisor’s brand.
Why? Because in the highly distracted world of today, people are reading from their cell phones, or if they’re on a desktop (trust me) they’re doing other things. To get attention, get visual instead of text-focused with your content.
Ditch those technical graphics, charts and diagrams and graphs – and instead include some ripe, colorful pictures of people taking actions that are engaging. Not stock photos, but real people – or even better, a quick video.
5. No distribution
This is something for which I fault the marketing industry.
Professional marketing “gurus” have convinced the world that all they need to do is set up a Facebook account and the leads will follow. “If you build it, they will come.” Not true. But the marketing community has done great to convince the world of this – and it’s put money in their pockets, no doubt!
Unless you have 5,000 or more qualified followers (meaning: would or could buy your services in the future) on your social media, you’re not going to get leads. What you will see (tell me if this sounds familiar to any of you) is your employees, friends, family and clients are going to be the ones consistently liking and sharing your posts.
You won’t get meaningful lead activity from this.
If you have a small following, you have to actively distribute the content to a new audience that is not your native following. Here are examples of ways you could do that:
- Execute a Facebook advertising campaign using a list of prospects that you upload as a customized audience.
- Execute a Facebook advertising campaign targeting your ideal prospect.
- Guest blog. Let’s say you work with architects. Contact the editor of Architectural Digest magazine and ask if you can write a post about what architects should consider when selling their practice. This puts you directly in front of your target audience, but does take some time to make connections with the publishers.
- Leverage “micro-influencer” networking relationships. Every time I publish a blog for a client, I ask them to contact three people in their network and request that the person share the blog on their social media. To refer again to the dentist example, let’s say you know someone who sells accounting software to dentists. Ask that person to share your article.
- Get into the press. You don’t need to hire a PR person to do this unless you’re aiming for Forbes or the New York Times. Most editors are starved for high-quality content. Do a Google search and find out which reporters have covered similar topics before, and then reach out with a great story idea.
The bottom line on financial advisor social media
There’s no single solution to creating a massive following on social media. By now, you may have noticed that these tactics aren’t simple. If you want to get the right attention, you’re going to have to work hard for it. And that means not only using these creative methods, but also producing out-of-the-norm, unusual content that people will notice.
It’s not easy, but it is the only way to avoid wasteful spending on digital marketing.
Sara Grillo, CFA, is a top financial writer with a focus on marketing and branding for investment management, financial planning, and RIA firms. Prior to launching her own firm, she was a financial advisor and worked at Lehman Brothers. Sara graduated from Harvard with a degree in English literature and has an MBA from NYU Stern in Quantitative Finance.
Read more articles by Sara Grillo
