Those Awful “Meet the Team” Pages are Torture

Teams are the inspiring energy!

In your marketing, advisors ramble on and on about the service, process, and their expertise. But you kill the energy of the team experience. It’s not that I want my life savings handled by the 24-year-old intern, but the energy of the collective unit that I am about to become a part of matters to me as the client.

Inspire me!

You need to convey:

• What you are all about;
• What you care about;
• How you gel, harmonize, and flow with each other; and
• How you, as a team, address problems we see in our clients’ lives and in the world around us.

If not, you are doing yourselves a competitive disservice relative to the next advisor. Without inspiring energy, it comes down to the mechanics – how strong is the presentation of the advisor’s background, licenses, regulatory history, experience, fees, etc.

Those are inanimate characteristics; nobody can feel their energy.

The mechanics play a big part, but they aren’t what is delivered. The experience and the energy is what is delivered, and the people at the firm are the ones who are the deliverers.

Look at this team value statement from Etsy:

Now that’s more like it!

Who knows whether that is 100% true, but as someone who has ordered crafting junk for my kids from this website, I can say it reflects my experience.

Use the force, Luke

And can we get a team picture? Not one of everyone standing like a brick outside the building?

How about this?

One with arrows pointing to each person and saying something interesting or funny, like how long they have been at the firm or how many cups of coffee they drink in the morning.

Just gimme some sign of life, a pulse, okay? Help me Obi-Wan Kenobi, you are my only hope!

More exciting biographies

Instead of the typical, why don’t you have people answer these questions:

• Why do you love going to work every day?
• What is your most meaningful relationship with a client and why?
• How did working here turn out to be different than what you thought?
• What one word would you use to summarize the values of this firm?
• What is the #1 characteristic that someone needs to succeed in their role at the company?

Try a three-picture approach

Wealth management is a serious business. I would never suggest portraying yourself as the class clown. But there is a way to present more dimensionality and show the experiences you have had, and what defines your values as a person.

Do this through a three-picture series where your picture flips sequentially. It goes like this:

• Serious,
• Less serious,
• Non-serious

Example of a sequence:

Serious

Less serious

Non-serious

See?

You get the impression of professionalism and credibility, but at the same time there is something more, another dimension of personality. That’s what makes people real to others.

A non-boring team video

Before you tell me you have a “great” video already on your website, let me knock that idea out of your head. The video of you standing in the conference room writing something on the whiteboard – that’s the same as 100% of advisors have.

Or you explaining something to your team sitting around a conference room table, and everyone marveling at you awe-struck like you just discovered life on Pluto (the SECURE 2.0 updates are not that earth shattering, okay?)

Honey, please.

I’d rather have you give me a fun tour of your office. Or do something fun like having each team member hold up a sign with a word printed on it that reflects the funnest thing about working there.

Nobody in history has ever died of a small dose of humor, have they?

Maybe throw in some special effects?

This will cost you more money, but for those of you hawking IUL for 5% commission, I am sure you can afford it. Why not include some special effects on your team page?

Look at this team page for Lateral. They are all looking at the person whose picture you hover over which shows unity.

Sooooo cool.

Make it accessible

Advisors say you’re there for the client 24/7.

So why is it that on the team-bio page, you never see anybody’s:

• LinkedIn page;
• Email; or
• Direct phone number?

Kind of contradictory, no?

Make some excuse about how you want to avoid spammers. Okay, well here is how people do that:

• Don’t answer your phone unless it is someone whose number you recognize.
• Use email filtering so spam messages go to the Spam folder.

And don’t make it a downloadable v-card. How annoying – nobody likes downloading.

Sara’s upshot

I have to go eat my kids’ Easter candy while they’re still asleep.

Thanks for putting up with me and I’ll see you next month.

• I have an e-book and a membership where you can learn some creative, non-sleazy social media tactics.

• I’m a consultant who helps people infuse creativity in their marketing. If you’re interested, please contact me.

• If you are a flat fee advisor, advice-only planner, or just a believer in transparency, join our next Transparent Advisor Movement meetup.

Sara Grillo, CFA, is a marketing consultant who helps investment management, financial planning, and RIA firms fight the tendency to scatter meaningless clichés on their prospects and bore them as a result. Prior to launching her own firm, she was a financial advisor.

Read more articles by Sara Grillo