(Nasdaq) - When the pandemic hit the global stage in March 2020, every profession had to evolve, and that included financial advisors. Forget the obvious moving onto Zoom/Teams, there have been a lot of changes for the industry, and after so much investment, creativity and time went into thinking about these changes, some of them might not be so temporary after all.
The financial and banking industry is sometimes seen as a slow moving and antiquated profession with the rise of retail traders and new online banks.
However, the pandemic showed that financial advisors can move quickly to adapt to the needs of their customers and the changing conditions of the world at large.
Advertising can make or break even the most established financial advisors or institutions and the ways that worked before the pandemic may not be the most effective in this new era.
Below you will find 6 top marketing trends that will shape the financial advisor landscape in 2022 and beyond.
1. Subscriptions are good for cashflow
Every household now likely has some sort of subscription service flowing out of their bank account monthly in 2021. The usual model of X% per year or a flat fee of a few hundred dollars doesn’t sit right with a lot of younger people.
However, get them to think about it like Disney+ or a coffee subscription for, say $20 a month and you will find a lot of customers are more willing to give it a go.
If you manage to keep your churn rate sustainably low it also means you have a consistent monthly income that is great for the cash flow of your business.
Customers can also pay depending on what they need. If they want a basic package, they can pay a smaller amount or maybe a higher amount for meetings with themselves. Lastly, you’re able to target these customers again and again through cross selling and upselling other products and services.
2. Lean into the memes
If you want to ride the wave of new retail traders and catch the attention of younger investors you’re going to have to invest in the memes.
I’m not saying to go and dump your portfolio into GameStop. However, if you can cater towards the idea that investing in these ‘meme companies’ isn’t blasphemy, younger investors might feel more inclined to use your services as they can relate to you a little bit more.
Memes are also good for social reach, getting many shares and higher overall social engagement scores than most other posts, especially in the financial space.
A lot of older people don’t understand memes or the culture behind it. Consider consulting a younger relative or friend about the most relevant memes you can transform to be relatable to your audiences.
3. Give people your time
I’m sure everyone has cleared out their email inbox at some point and hit ‘Unsubscribe’ from all those annoying marketing emails.
Research has found that on average, these types of emails get an opening rate of about 18%, and that is considered good.
If you can personalize your emails, give time to your clients and hit a good note with any automated emails – think catchy subject lines and suitable timings – then you can smash the competition from an area that many financial advisors are lacking in.
Have one clear objective with each email you send (don’t bombard customers with multiple options or things they must think about).
And more importantly, you need to nail the call to action.
You need to tell them what they should do next – not ask them.
It’s a tell not an ask.
4. Virtual events will become crucial
Even with the country opening and COVID looking like it may be past it’s peak, virtual events will not be returning to a thing that is reserved for international meetings.
Now the more important thing here is to make sure you don’t put on a boring event with little to no audience engagement. Pre-event polling can make your potential customers feel that the content you’re about to present will be tailored to their needs.
Hiring entertainers, such as comedians to do a short set, magicians to do a small routine or even a musician to perform a few songs, is a great strategy for both small and large virtual events.
Gamification always works well to engage audiences. Whether it’s in-person or virtual events, such things as prizes or challenges work well to turn a dull event into a memorable one.
You should become familiar with the platform that you’re using, there is nothing worse than people not knowing how to unmute, share screens or other simple technical problems. You may consider adding a producer into the event to ensure all runs smoothly while you focus on the hosting.
5. Being local pays
If you don’t have your business set up with ‘Google My Business,’ then you are missing out on one of the easiest digital marketing strategies that doesn’t cost a penny.
Someone searching for a financial advisor in their area will automatically get results that are closer to their address.
If you’re registered with ‘Google My Business’ you may be able to catch their eye if you’re the only or one of a few financial advisors in the customer's specific search area.
There are many tips and tricks to using ‘Google My Business’ to your advantage but simply being on there is the first step to allowing potential customers to know that you are in their local community.
Optimising your listing can be as simple as adding complete data to your listing and processes such as updating the keywords within your listing can provide a big boost.
6. Video is king
Being a financial advisor, you will already have a whole heap of knowledge and insight that people want to pay you to know. Another way of distributing this information is through video content.
Financial channels on YouTube have millions of subscribers and some turnover millions of dollars per month. You don’t have to limit yourself to YouTube either.
With so many social media sites paying out for good video content, you can use all of them or choose your favorite as most of them offer cash for view-generating content.
If you’re not sure how to make great content or how to edit videos you can always defer to an expert and outsource this part to them.
The most important thing, however, is consistency and not getting disheartened when you don’t instantly go viral and make a lot of money from your video content.
It’s not just about the ad revenue here either, think of the potential customers that could potentially see your face and what you could offer them.
Why go digital now?
As you can see from the trends outlined above, the future is digital, and if you’re not going digital now, when will you?
With the fall of cable to subscription services and taxi firms to Uber, you need to be constantly adapting to the new waves that hit your industry or be left behind.
You’ll notice these trends getting strong momentum towards the end of 2021 and advisors will be charging full speed ahead with them throughout 2022.
The world is becoming interconnected and digital every day. If you do not choose to adopt a digital strategy sooner rather than later, you risk being on the bottom rung of a very hard ladder to climb.
Just like the markets, the longer you’re in, the more success that you can expect to have.
Moving toward 2022 and beyond
To recap, the main trends you want to focus on going into next year fall mainly within the realm of social media and content.
Learn some basic editing skills and film the next viral ‘What I spend in a week as a financial advisor’ video and create some memes about Jerome Powell’s infinite money printer.
If you can adjust your tone to fit the younger generations mindset and cater social content towards what they like to see, you will get their business, and their friends, as younger people like to share things and talk amongst each other.
Other than that, focus on new revenue streams such as the subscription service idea and learn how to boost your SEO by getting on top of optimising your ‘Google My Business’ listing.
The main thing is that you don’t stay stuck in your old ways and think that the things you’ve always been doing will continue to work and pay off in the long run in this digital age.
It is an ever-changing landscape in the marketing world and financial advisors need to adapt to these changes as fast as they do to changing market conditions.
Following the trends in this article should help any advisor stay on track to meet their goals for the next year and going forwards.
By Jeremiah Desmarais
OCT 4, 2021
The views and opinions expressed herein are the views and opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of Nasdaq, Inc.
