Traditional advertising has been an important marketing strategy for large financial advisors - at least $500mm of AUM. It may seem like a necessary evil or even a chore at times. Admittedly, advertising used to be more mysterious and complex some decades ago (Think Mad Med, etc.) But that is no longer the case.
The internet and digital marketing have presented many “DIY” opportunities for financial advisors to advertise their financial advisory services on their own, or at least with minimal outside support. This is especially true for tech-savvy financial advisors who are beginning to branch out and open their own financial advisory firms.
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But with the availability of so many tools, platforms, and information on advertising, it can get overwhelming for financial advisors to know where to start. The solution to this? Go back to basics. Because while technology has changed, the basics of a financial advisor advertising campaign have remained the same.
Types of Financial Advisor Advertising
With people spending more and more time on their computers, phones, tablets, and even watches, it’s impossible to deny the importance of digital marketing for financial advisors. However, some “traditional” forms of marketing are still alive and well.
These include TV, radio, print, and display (i.e. billboards and other signage). The key is to strike the right balance and know which channels are right for your audience, messaging, and budget.
Components of a Successful Financial Advisor Advertising Campaign
Regardless of the advertising channel, the basic parts of an advertising campaign are the same:
Goal/Objective
Before starting any financial advisor marketing campaign, you should first establish the goal or objective of the campaign. With this goal in mind, you can establish the other components of the campaign effectively.
For example, if the goal of the advertising campaign is to promote a specific event, such as a live financial advisory seminar or webinar, then the goal is to increase signups for that event. You can also establish the length of the campaign based on the event data, which then helps establish the budget.
In short, without establishing a campaign goal for your financial advisor advertising efforts, you’re risking both time and money on wasted efforts.
Budget
Another crucial piece of the financial advisor advertising campaign puzzle is the budget.
Setting a budget not only helps keep an eye on your bottom line, but it also can help determine the other factors of a campaign. Advertising costs vary from channel to channel, and some offer more flexibility than others.
The more traditional advertising channels such as T.V., print, and radio are fixed costs on a per-run basis. This is because, unlike digital advertising, they are run on a predetermined schedule based on programming or editorial content.
With digital advertising, your financial advisor advertising campaigns can be started and stopped in real-time, should your budget deem it necessary. And because you can see reporting and analytics almost immediately, you can preserve some of that budget by adjusting when something isn’t working.
Audience and Channel
Who do you want your message to reach? And you may find that the answer varies based on the advertising channel. For example, if you’re looking to reach a younger demographic, you aren’t likely going to find much success placing an ad in the print version of a newspaper or magazine. Instead, you could use that advertising budget to place digital ads on TikTok.
Pro Tip: Do your homework. While it seems logical to make assumptions about where your target audience spends their time and how to reach them there, always rely on facts rather than opinions. Trends are constantly changing, and what was once a popular channel for a specific demographic can become passe in no time at all.
Messaging
With both your audience and objective mapped out, you now know what you want to say and who you want to say it to. The next step is to determine how you’re going to say it with your messaging. While the message should be crafted specifically for that audience, all your financial advisor advertising content should have a consistent tone.
Tone is an important part of your financial advisor branding, and should clearly communicate your experience, trustworthiness, and knowledge about financial services and investments. The key for your financial advisor advertising messaging is to be consistent across all channels to create synergy and brand recognition. Also, keep in mind that some forms of advertising, such as radio, don’t have a visual component that places all the value in the message itself.
Design
As with the messaging, consistency is also an important part of your financial advisor advertising campaigns. While this doesn’t mean all your ads should look identical, it does mean that there should be shared colors and elements throughout all assets of the financial advisor ad campaign. This also includes visual elements such as photos, and even the fonts used.
Pro Tip: Create a brand guide. A brand guide is a resource of all the branding and design elements used in your financial advisor marketing and advertising. Not only will the brand guide help facilitate consistent branding, but it’s also helpful to have for any marketing agencies you may partner with in the future.
CTA (Call to Action)
Once someone has seen your ad content, what do you want them to do next? Without a call to action (CTA) in your financial advisor ads, you could be missing opportunities to convert interested people into prospects. Depending on the advertising channel, CTAs can be a “click here” button leading to your financial advisor website, a phone number on a newspaper ad, or a link that opens a registration page for an upcoming webinar. Regardless of the action, without CTAs, your financial advisor advertising campaigns won’t be as effective.
Bonus: Don’t Forget to Measure
If you don’t know how your financial advisor advertising campaign performed, it will be difficult to know what to do next. Once you’ve seen how well your ads did (or didn’t) perform, you can adjust and make tweaks moving forward. This is especially easy to do with digital marketing efforts, where your success can be measured in clicks and views, along with all the other data available in the analytics dashboard.
