Digital Marketing Today
Most marketing specialists agree that online marketing requires a somewhat different approach than marketing in person. Marketing in person allows advisors to quickly establish trustworthy relationships with prospects through a handshake, eye contact and countless other body language cues.
When people are marketing online, those trust-building factors are entirely absent. Not only that, but prospects tend to be more cautious online, in order to avoid being scammed or hacked. So, from the outset, online marketing is an uphill struggle.
The digital age has, for the most part, sped up how people connect with each other and do business – except in the realm of digital marketing. In fact, this trust deficit is exactly why digital marketing takes considerably longer to bear fruit than in-person marketing.
Patience Will Bear Fruit
Advisors have to be more patient with an online lead, nurturing it and cultivating it before it converts and generates revenue. This does not mean that it is not a quality lead. It just means that, in terms of approach, persistence is key.
If you use the same approach with in-person and digital marketing, then you’ll likely reach the false conclusion that digital marketing leads are bad leads. You might think that they’re not as good as the referrals you’ve got.
Of course they’re not. When a client refers someone else to you, it means that a client likes your work and trusts you enough to tell someone else. If you have a choice between a referral lead and a digital lead, you will certainly choose the referral lead.
But it’s not a one-for-one. Digital leads exponentially outnumber leads from referrals.
Sooner or later, you’ll run out of referrals. You can’t only grow your firm through referrals — especially if you want to build a large firm. If you want to grow aggressively, you’ve got to get many more leads than it is possible to do via referrals.
Building an Online Marketing System
To build a predictable marketing system in online marketing financial advisors should use a similar approach to that of marketing in person. The consequent steps of such an approach could be as follows:
First, you have to get noticed. You need to do it predictably and successfully in your digital marketing efforts. In order to get that result you have to be unique, that is, easily recognizable among a large number of advisors. Prospects want to be interested in new things and want to explore them. The same style and templates as everyone else has won’t make the majority of people want to explore what you’re offering. They’ve seen it before and they know what they’ll find, so there’s no need to check it out. But if you manage to attract prospects’ attention with something they have never seen before, they will remember you and your offer.
Another important thing, you have to stand out among your competitors, you have to be different, to offer something important and worthy of their attention. Your material, all your marketing efforts being different from those of the majority of financial advisors, your offer might catch the eye of your prospects, make them interested and willing to learn more about you and your services.
Also, advisors should always keep in mind the purpose of their marketing efforts. The message should be clear and appropriate to the target audience. The importance of the place where the message has been put and will be seen by prospects should not be underestimated. To maximize the impact on your audience you need to know your framework, understand the context and design strategically. Standing out from the crowd varies depending on the platform. Whether you are on Instagram, Facebook or LinkedIn you need to strategize accordingly to get noticed.
Finally, once advisors take the necessary steps, they should start making new contacts. This can be done via social media, for example business contacts are often found and established on LinkedIn.
Building credibility is another important point in creating long lasting relations with your prospects. Only if your potential clients find you trustworthy will they be ready to start conversations with you, and give you some of their precious time and attention. Starting a conversation with a prospect could result in winning a new client if financial advisors show real expertise and good will.
Winning a client is great but financial advisors should never forget that they are not the only professionals in their field and competition is never far away. So, they should seek to make deeper connections with their newly acquired clients.
So, whether you meet a prospect face-to-face or on social media, you still have to go through the same steps. The difference between traditional marketing and digital marketing is that in-person marketing moves much faster than digital, so the latter requires more patience and a more methodical approach.
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