Fall Back into Good Marketing Habits

Ah yes: Fall.

The time of year when temperatures dip, football season gets into full swing (unfortunately for those of us who are Philadelphia Eagles fans), and the worldwide pumpkin spice cabal asserts its influence over every walk of life. No one is safe, I tell you.

While fall has some downsides, like being a prequel to a long, cold winter and introducing the crushing realization that your favorite football team might not be as good as you expected (are you sensing a pattern here?), there are many benefits that go along with our most under-appreciated season. Chief among them for advisors is clients getting more serious about their financial plans after a long summer of vacations and leisure. That also means more and more potential clients looking for advisors to get them back on track financially. By ramping up your marketing efforts, you can position yourself as just the right person for the job. Follow our tips to put your marketing a step ahead of your competition’s.

Revamp your website.

Your website should offer more than just a picture of your office and phone number. After all, it’s the first (and arguably most important) point of contact you’ll probably have with many of your future clients. This fall, make improving your website a priority so that your business has a more professional, polished edge. Another thing to keep in mind as you update your site? Mobile compatibility isn’t just a passing fad for web developers—it’s become a necessity.

Evaluate your social media presence.

We take social media really seriously here at eMoney—heck, we even wrote a book on it—so it should come as no surprise to readers of this blog that I’d mention it here. Take the opportunity to re-evaluate your social media presence this fall. Treat it like more than just a medium for short advertisements for your business. Engage potential and current clients, participate in conversations on the industry, and react to the trends and hot-button issues that are concerning advisors today. And if you want to make sure your social media presence is secure no matter what channel you’re using, check out this article.

Remember the “Five P’s.”

It might surprise you that “pumpkin spice” is not one of the five P’s I had in mind. But the P’s that are on the list are far more helpful, if not quite as good in coffee or muffins. By keeping those five P’s at the core of your decision making while planning your marketing strategy, you’re sure to be more effective.

Here they are:

1. Product. What are you selling?
2. Place. Where do you provide your services?
3. Price. What is your fee structure?
4. Promotion. What sets you apart from others?
5. Public Relations. What are you doing to relate to the rest of the world?

Check out our full article on the five P’s for full descriptions of how keeping these five points in mind will improve your marketing. We even have this helpful worksheet to help you implement them in your own marketing plan!

Schedule a client appreciation event.

Given how important client referrals are to any advisory business, you need to make your clients want to recommend you to their friends and colleagues. That’s why you should consider hosting a client appreciation event to which your clients are encouraged to bring a friend, coworker, or family member. You can easily make new connections this way, and if you provide good service your clients will want to help their guests by recommending you to them.

While nearly all advisors have techniques that have been effective in attracting new clients, this list provides you with an excellent starting point for growing your business. So get to it—this is going to be a busy fall. But with hard work your marketing will be a huge success, completely unlike my favorite football team.