14 Steps to a Robust Marketing Plan in 2023

2. Make sure your website looks like you know it’s 2023.

If your website was designed five or 10 years ago, it may look boring and out of date. Flat colors and long blocks of text will fail to engage clients and prospects. The look and feel of your online presence convey your identity, and you don’t want clients to be left with the impression that you or your firm are dull or out of sync with the times.

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3. Trash the hackneyed stock photography.

If your website or any firm brochures have pictures of lighthouses or compasses, or couples walking on a beach, sailing, or sitting with children and grandchildren at a picnic table, you have only established that your marketing efforts are as mundane as the rest of the industry.

Working with a talented designer will help you find graphics and photos that convey distinctive visual imagery for your firm.

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4. Ensure your communications address client needs first.

It’s an age-old maxim of marketing copywriting that you should first discuss benefits, not features. Still, that insight is often overlooked. If your website and other communications lead with your credentials and the capabilities of your firm, turn those messages around.

Address typical client needs first — everything from retirement and college savings to business succession and estate planning. Your experience and training and the capabilities of your firm are the secondary-level proof points you can cite to demonstrate how you and your team meet a diverse array of client needs.

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5. Use up-to-date and casual photos of yourself, as appropriate.

Be sure to avoid the equivalent of “catfishing” new clients. When someone meets you for the first time, you don’t want them to be surprised that you don’t look anything like the person in the professional headshot you had taken years ago.

The extended period during COVID-19 when advisors met with clients by video-conferencing also introduced a casual atmosphere for planning discussions. Few, if any, clients were shocked to see their male advisors, for example, out of ties and jackets as they sat in their home offices for an online meeting.

You’ll know what is appropriate for your clientele and community, but whenever possible, use photographs of yourself that show your casual side. Relaxed portraits convey a level of humanity that the typically stiff formal portraits simply don’t.

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6. Take advantage of the new SEC marketing rule wisely.

Financial advisors can finally use testimonials from clients to promote their services. Don’t seize this new opportunity too hastily, though. Take the time to consider and develop testimonials that will resonate with the market niches you’re looking to attract.

Generic quotes that insist you’re the best advisor ever probably won’t inspire anyone to contact your office. Humans connect to stories. Testimonials that share anecdotes and provide a glimpse into a specific client need that you addressed are far more likely to gain attention and motivate people to email or call you.

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7. Use each social media channel appropriately.

When promoting a professional service, the natural temptation is to present your capabilities in a formal manner. That may be appropriate for business-oriented social media sites like LinkedIn, but other sites demand more personal content. Facebook is a good place to share your personal side with posts that display your outside-of-work interests. Taking pride in a child’s school accomplishments or sharing a personal feat, like setting a new personal best finishing time in a 10k road race, could open doors that enable people to identify and connect with you.

Posting photos on Instagram of you and your staff having fun at work or partaking in a volunteer activity will demonstrate who you are and provide useful glimpses into the values of your firm. These informal posts and pictures often generate much higher engagement than formal pronouncements of a firm’s capabilities do.

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8. Remember you’re always promoting two brands: your firm’s and your own.

The idea of promoting a “personal brand” has become the object of easy ridicule, but that doesn’t mean it’s any less important. Today, many advisors are deciding to stop being stock-pickers and are outsourcing investment decision-making so they can focus more on being a holistic advisor to help clients address their broad financial and life needs.

In such an environment, the personal attributes an advisor possesses are even more critical. To demonstrate you’re a trustworthy person with whom clients will enjoy working, you’ll have to develop strategies that promote — in social media particularly — your personal brand. Beyond referrals from existing clients, such promotions are the only way to convey those qualities to prospective clients who don’t know you.

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9. Diversify your marketing strategies.

Diversification is another valuable strategy that advisors regularly promote but then don’t apply to their marketing efforts. Today, there are so many channels you can use to get your messaging out — everything from automated emails to digital advertising. Diversify across the mix of them so you can determine which marketing channels work best for your firm and the client and prospect profiles you’re targeting.

You don’t need to commit a big budget to your efforts at experimenting with different marketing channels. For example, you can shoot videos of yourself talking about the latest financial markets news or the best year-end tax planning strategies simply with your smartphone. There is no need to hire an expensive video production team. Following tips that you can find online about how to ensure a steady shot, a flattering angle and good audio quality may be all you need to connect with those clients who would rather watch a short video than read an article.

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10. Plan activities according to the calendar.

People’s attention to certain issues will peak at various times of the year. You can also piggyback on all the interest that gets generated on social media for milestone dates throughout the year. The seasonal opportunities go beyond tax planning before April 15 or year-end planning in December. For example, Pi Day on March 14 (3/14) is a good time to promote any resources you have that support math and financial literacy. Similarly, May 29 (5/29) is a good time to promote the value of saving for college with tax-favored vehicles like 529 plans.

Mapping these opportunities at the start of the year and planning how you’ll respond to each of them will help ensure that you have a steady stream of new messages to communicate throughout the year.

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11. Develop a robust approach to connect with centers of influence.

Most advisors take pride in having good connections with other professionals like accountants, estate planning attorneys or insurance agents when they don’t offer insurance products themselves. But if those connections are merely contacts on your phone whom you work with infrequently, you can build stronger connections by developing a robust plan to regularly market to them.

Co-hosting seasonally appropriate lunch-and-learn sessions or evening seminars, or offering training workshops that grant continuing education credits will help you develop more consistent and reliable connections with these other professionals.

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12. Consider your client demographics.

While auditing your marketing efforts, also take time to audit your book of business. Take a look at the gender breakdown and average age of your existing clients. The results could reveal that you need to attract more women clients or a greater number of Gen Xers, millennials or even Gen Zers.

Diversifying your client base will enhance the longevity of your practice. To serve these clients, you and your team must fully recognize and be able to address the unique needs of each group. With millennials, for example, your firm must stand ready to deliver a mix of digital and in-person services, as well as investment strategies that focus on value-oriented investing.

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13. Extend your geographic reach.

Remember, too, that you no longer need to limit your marketing to people who live within the distance of an easy drive to your office. COVID-19 made everyone comfortable with virtual meetings. Now your outreach to prospective clients can be geographically expansive. As an example of that, you could use LinkedIn to connect with, and promote your firm’s services to, fellow alumni of your college who live anywhere in the country.

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14. Take your wise counsel and stick to a plan.

The guidance that advisors offer clients about a financial plan is usually a two-parter: first make one and then stick to it. After devising your 2023 marketing plan, be sure that you and your team remain committed to it. If you don’t let your new marketing strategy suffer the fate of most New Year’s resolutions, which usually fall by the wayside before January ends, you’ll have a coordinated strategy that can bring more business to your practice throughout the year.

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