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When volatility spikes, the ideal response is to call or, at best, meet in-person with your clients. But the advisors with whom I work have found that webinars are a far more cost-effective tool to allay clients’ fears about unsteady markets.
Here’s a recent conversation with an advisor that illustrated the power of webinars:
Me: How many clients have contacted you about the recent market volatility?
Advisor: Only a few.
Me: What are you doing to communicate with clients and prospects in these unsettling times?
Advisor: Sending a few extra newsletters.
Me: Do they reveal your personal point of view about what’s happening in the markets?
Advisor: Nope.
Me: I’ve seen data that says roughly a third of advisory clients who feel ignored during market turmoil consider switching advisors.
Isn’t this an opportunity for you make sure clients are assuaged and to get your message out to your prospects?
Advisor: Hmmmm . . .
Me: Have you thought of doing webinars?
Let’s throw light on webinars
Video is one of the top ways of engaging clients, prospects and centers-of-influence (COIs).
Advisors are adopting short-form video vignettes for their website and social media. Let’s look at short-form video from the perspective of listeners. The old adage from top sales and marketing professionals declares, “The more you tell, the more you sell.”
Enter webinars Webinars are live or virtual-live video broadcasts, and they can also take the form of on-demand video.
They can place your expertise and educational message directly in front of your target prospects and clients.
What’s more, this can happen at just the right time – when they are ready to hear your message.
Those selling and servicing advisors have long made webinars a core communications strategy, but too often viewers feel disengaged from the presentation.
Be Aware: Any webinar can be strong or weak.
That’s why I am including to the “7 Best Practices for Winning Webinars” at the end of this article.
Consider this list of results from other advisors who called on webinars in volatile markets: gaining more wallet share, generating new clients, engaging B, C and D clients for more AUM, and reaching the family and consultants of A clients along with saving hundreds of hours in the process.
Webinars in volatile markets
Example 1 – Making the case for your long-term investing philosophy
With a value investing strategy, this advisor had a tough time attracting new prospects at historically high market valuations and during volatile markets.
He used a 45-minute webinar to new prospects where he made a case for value investing.
The advisor pre-recorded the presentation and broadcast it twice on the same day as a “virtual-live” event – both to increase attendance and to avoid presentation missteps.
The outcome: The firm attracted 187 prospects through a promotion to an outside email list and identified $3 million in new assets in seven days.
The advisor also turned the transcription of the webinar into a white paper as a lead magnet for the firm that he could use for many months.
Example 2 – Leveraging an outside speaker or expert to make your case for you
What is a relatively inexpensive and easy way to enlist experts to add value to your clients, prospects, and COIs alike?
Leverage an outside speaker, someone who complements your expertise and can connect his or her knowledge with your clients’ situation.
This expert could be a wealth-management professional, economics expert, or investment thought leader.
An advisor, for example, called on an economist to help keep the last meltdown in perspective for clients, both as a live webinar and on-demand presentation.
He attracted almost all his clients and influencers to watch the presentation.
The outcome: He was able to retain all but one client. In addition, the webinar freed hundreds of hours of his own time.
With momentum from the webinar he was able to double assets under management in a few years.
Example 3 – Speaking to a COI list or to a group of prospects
Recently, another advisor wanted to take advantage of the vacuum in advisor prospecting during volatile markets to attract new clients.
He did not have a big marketing budget or a large email marketing list.
His solution: He partnered on a webinar with one of his COIs, a complementary wealth management professional, to invite the COI client list and his own small email marketing list. And he recorded his presentation to add to his website.
While this event is too recent to share the number of new clients gained, the advisor reports that the webinar was his “best marketing campaign of the year.”
Finally, I’ve heard from many advisors who admitted that they tried webinars, but met with limited success.
Consider: Even five to 10 attendees, who are the right clients or prospects for you, can turn your next webinar into a winner.
Here are seven quick-hit best practices advisors can call on to multiply their ROI with webinars during volatile markets
- Employ targeted and timely topics and titles for your webinar (recent topics are “volatile markets” and “elections”)
- Pre-record the presentation for a virtual-live broadcast
- Utilize dedicated webinar registration or landing pages
- Reach beyond your client list to include sponsor or third-party opt-in email lists
- Hire a producer to avoid mistakes and, possibly, a moderator for a more professional presentation
- After the broadcast date, promote the on-demand video of your webinar on your website as gated content
- Take advantage of “long-tail” promotions such as social shares, newsletters and blogs, turning transcriptions into articles and White Papers, and sharing individual videos with COIs, prospects, and family members of clients.
Big results are waiting when advisors turn ordinary webinars into extraordinary winners.
Volatile markets can be an advisor’s entry into the webinar winner’s circle.
Bob Hanson is a fractional marketer and author of Marketing Power for Financial Advisors. Get his checklist, Nine Questions Advisors Must Ask Before They Hire a Marketing Agency, Fractional or Full-Time Marketer, click here.
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