By focusing on the right financial advisor website content, you will make it easier for investors to find the service providers and information they are searching for on the Internet. We refer to the modern era as the “information age” for a reason. An absolute avalanche of information is accessible on the Internet and it is expanding on a daily basis.
Whether an individual is interested in finance, sports, video games, or any other subject matter, he or she can find a seemingly infinite amount of information about that specific subject matter. Financial advisors should recognize the abundance of information and modify their website content accordingly. The clear and cogent presentation of information is one of the tenets of digital marketing and greatly enhances your visitor conversion rates.
Narrow Your Website’s Scope
Many financial advisory firms are overflowing with information about the merits of their firms, however, that may not be what investors are looking for when they visit financial advisor websites. At the top of the list are investors who visit websites to learn more about particular financial advisors usually in their communities. Their goal is to find advisors who work clients like them and provide the services they are seeking.
On the other hand, investors could also be seeking general information about financial advisors or information about specific financial topics. Financial advisor websites should be designed to accommodate all of these needs.
The typical investor will spend three minutes on a financial advisor’s website. This gives advisors a small amount of time to convince investors to give-up their anonymity and contact them.
Keep in mind, investors will do most of their learning when they are interacting with advisors virtually or in face-to-face situations. The initial visit to a financial advisor’s website is part of their screening processes. If they like what they see, they initiate contact. If they don’t like what they see they move on to the next website.
When in doubt, follow the rule “less is more” for your financial advisor website. Assume your typical visitor will spend three minutes on your website. Then put yourself in the investor’s shoes. What is the most important information on your website? How do you present that information in a clear, intuitive manner? Present that information in sound-bites so it is easy to read, understand, and retain. Consider the use of video to convey information that illustrates the personality and values of your firm.
What is Important to Your Key Personas?
Prospective clients have varying interests, goals, and needs. Some are looking for assistance with retirement planning. Others seek guidance for saving for a child’s college education. Some prospective clients are interested in multiple services.
Most financial advisors lead with planning because every investor needs a financial plan. However, most advisors make most of their money from investment management. They charge asset-based fees that may include the cost of their planning advice and services.
Instead of trying to present solutions to each of these problems on your website, it is better to pinpoint the information that is most important to your target audience. Shine a spotlight on the key concerns that are expressed by the majority of your current clients. Then describe solutions without being too specific. This way investors have to contact you to obtain the solutions they are seeking for financial pain points.
What Matters Most When You Present Information on Your Website
Simply describing your financial advisory firm’s key features is not enough. You also have to present the benefits that your clients derive from those benefits. The manner in which this information is presented to the online audience is just as important as the information itself. If the path to insightful information and descriptions of your services is not intuitive, your prospective clients will digress from your website in favor of financial advisor firm sites with comparably easy user experience designs.
Success on the web is centered on intuitive navigation. Make it easy for your online visitors to find what they are looking for, pivot to other sections of your website, and contact your office to learn more. Each page should load quickly and cleanly on desktop computers as well as mobile devices.
Menus, embedded videos, links, and contact forms must be easily accessible, easy to identify, and function without flaw. If there is even the slightest problem with any of these website design components, online visitors might make a beeline to one of your competitor’s websites that can be navigated with comparable ease.
Sweat the Small Stuff of Your Website’s Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
Take some time to identify the keywords and key phrases your target audience is most likely to search for on the web. These are the words and phrases you should key in on when creating online content. The best digital marketing for financial advisors includes SEO content that uses these important keywords strategically positioned throughout your website’s top-level pages.
In other words, the homepage and service pages that detail your value proposition should contain these keywords. Alternatively, content that is laden with long-tail keywords that are not as important as the primary keywords searched for by your target audience should also be used within the content on your website.
Take your time when conducting keyword research as you will be using these keywords and key phrases throughout the entirety of your online footprint in the weeks, months and years ahead. Above all, consider users’ search intent. Think about whether users will be on the prowl for information when entering a keyword in the form of a search term. Once you have a good sense of the search intent that underlies your target audience’s searches, you can optimize your content appropriately.
Focus on Rich Content
There is no sense investing your time and effort building a financial advisor website that can be found in the search engines and navigated with ease unless its content is rich in terms of quality. Your content should establish your financial advisor firm as a top authority that provides legitimate value worthy of clients’ hard-earned money. Establish authority in your industry with high-quality content and those who visit your financial advisor firm website will take your value proposition seriously.
The best website content will be high-quality and inspire your audience to share the link to your site or social media page(s) to friends, colleagues, family, and others. Your best online content from informative blog posts to white papers, webinars, and podcasts should be easily found on your website. Be sure to link your online audience to this information through your social media platforms to steer that much more traffic to your site across posterity.
A Small Investment in Your Website Will Pay Large Dividends
There is no shame in admitting you do not have the time, energy, knowledge, or writing skill to present information in an artful manner on your financial advisor firm website. After all, content creation probably is not your forte.
Do not hesitate to outsource content creation to professional writers. Resist the temptation to auto-generate content or rehash content from competitors’ sites. Instead, lean on the content specialists to present your financial advisor firm’s services and value proposition in a clear and cogent manner.
Even if you are not that concerned with presenting your services and value offering in a truly artful manner, doing so is worth the minor investment as search engines reward websites with unique content. Let the wordsmiths craft your online content in an idiosyncratic manner and it will pass analysis for duplicate content and achieve a high ranking in the all-important Google search engine results pages (SERPs).
