The 52: Go Ahead and Ask

Go Ahead and Ask

I’ve recently moved and have been surprised by how often I’ve been asked for referrals or reviews as part of the process. My mortgage broker asked three times—by email and text—if I would post a review about him. The movers asked me to give them a five-star review after they unloaded my furniture. And my new dentist encouraged me to refer my friends and family as I left my new-patient consultation.

If it is so easy for other professionals to ask for reviews and referrals, why is it hard for financial advisors? It’s almost a ubiquitous request at this point when doing business. In all three instances, the requests appeared to be part of the standard business practice.

So go ahead and ask for those reviews or referrals at the end of each client meeting. Build it into your business practice. The request has become so common in society that your clients probably won’t think twice.

The 52: Start with the Top of the Funnel

Start with the Top of the Funnel

I have noticed that many highly analytical advisors prioritize bottom-of-the-funnel (BoFu) marketing activities, such as client testimonials and website tools like calculators or assessments (e.g., Riskalyze), to convert leads into clients. These are important parts of the funnel, but if you are anxious to get new clients, I recommend starting with top-of-the-funnel (ToFu) marketing instead. This type of marketing focuses on attracting and educating potential clients and includes presentations, content distribution (e.g., blogs, videos) across various channels, and SEO strategies.

The logic is simple: You need to first attract visitors to your website. Only then can you improve your marketing process by focusing on BoFu activities that will convert them into clients. When you concentrate on BoFu activities first, you may have a great system for converting prospects, but there may be no prospects visiting your website to convert.

Written in collaboration with artificial intelligence (ChatGPT). Edited by humans.

The 52: Unlocking the Power of Naming: The Benefits of Hiring a Naming Company

Unlocking the Power of Naming: The Benefits of Hiring a Naming Company

I often receive requests to help advisors come up with a new name for their company or a new service offering. Despite appearing simple at first, naming can be a complex and challenging task that takes months. If you are serious about naming a company or service, I recommend hiring a company that specializes in naming. They can help you with:

1. Strategy development: The company will collaborate with you to create a comprehensive naming strategy that reflects your brand values, vision, and target audience.

2. Creative name generation: They will generate a list of potential names that are memorable, meaningful, and suitable for your brand.

3. Trademark research: The company will conduct a thorough investigation to ensure the desired name is available and doesn’t infringe on anyone else’s rights.

4. Linguistic and cultural analysis: They will analyze the name for linguistic and cultural appropriateness, ensuring it is appealing in different markets and regions.

5. Brand positioning: The company will help position your brand by creating names that evoke specific emotions, values, or benefits.

6. Domain name availability: They will check the availability of domain names for your website and suggest alternatives if your first choice is unavailable.

7. Trademark and legal support: They will provide help with trademark registration and other legal considerations related to naming your brand.

At Kaleido, we don’t offer naming services, so we recommend Tungsten.

Written in collaboration with artificial intelligence (ChatGPT). Edited by humans.

Everything, Everywhere, All at Once

Everything, Everywhere, All at Once

With its 11 Oscar nominations, Everything Everywhere All at Once has been on my mind. Not so much the movie since I found it hard to understand—the title is what caught my attention. This phrase is a fitting description of many financial advisors’ marketing strategy. The idea is that you can maximize your chances of reaching potential clients by being present in multiple places and in multiple ways. However, this scattershot approach can be problematic for several reasons:

1. It can be costly and time-consuming to implement a variety of marketing tactics. If not executed effectively, you will end up wasting time and money.

2. You may find it difficult to measure the effectiveness of marketing efforts when you spread your resources too thin. You’ll find it hard to make informed decisions on how to allocate resources.

3. You may not effectively target your ideal clients by trying to be everywhere and appealing to everyone. This can lead to a low conversion rate and a lack of return on investment.

Instead of trying to do everything, everywhere, all at once, consider doing a few things, in a few places, consistently well.

Written in collaboration with artificial intelligence (ChatGPT). Edited by a human.

An Uncommon Approach to Implementing Multiple Niches

An Uncommon Approach to Implementing Multiple Niches

If you follow my writing, you know that I generally recommend that RIAs focus on just one niche. However, for some firms, that approach can hinder growth. An RIA managing more than $1 billion in AUM may find it too limiting to market to a single niche. While being a generalist firm is one option, a second solution is to adopt a multiple-niche approach.

A multiple-niche approach can take several forms. The most common strategy is for an RIA to look at its book of business and categorize its client base. For example, here are some common niches I’ve seen when firms pursue a multiple-niche approach: business owners, executives, women in transition, and the health care industry. The firm then begins executing marketing tactics for each niche.

While this approach certainly can work, it is challenging to weave one compelling company message through all the different niches without resorting to something cliché like “Helping Affluent Individuals and Families Achieve Peace of Mind” or “Helping You Achieve the Retirement of Your Dreams.”

A second, less common approach is for the firm to focus on multiple niches that have a throughline connecting them. Let’s say the common theme is helping executives manage their equity compensation. One advisor team can focus on executives in the biotech industry, another may focus on the oil and gas industry, and a third may focus on the telecommunications industry.

Let’s see how you would implement this second approach.

Step 1: Pick a Common Throughline

The first step is to pick a throughline connecting the different niches you will serve. What is the one problem that you want to solve for all your niches? Do you want to help executives navigate the complexities of their equity compensation? Do you want to help professionals with pension plans maximize their benefits as they retire? Or do you want to help people in high-stress careers become financially independent and retire early? You will use this common throughline as the core company message that ties all the niches together.

Illustration by Ana Popović.

Step 2: Identify Niches

With a common theme identified, you want to pick the niches that fall into that theme. If you are helping professionals with pension plans maximize their benefits as they retire, you may work with employees in the federal, state, or local governments and publicly traded companies that still offer pensions. If you are helping people in high-stress careers become financially independent and retire early, you may choose niches such as law, health care, and tech.

Step 3: Assign a Team and a Leader

Once you have defined your niches, assign an advisor team to focus on each niche. The senior advisor on the team usually leads this effort, but it can also be led by a more junior advisor with ambitions of becoming an equity partner. The leader should have some experience with the niche and be dedicated to this marketing effort. They should also receive the time and resources needed to make the niche succeed.

Step 4: Add Niche Webpages

Before you start marketing to a particular niche, add a page to your website dedicated to the niche, and include that page in your main navigation menu. This webpage reinforces your specialty to prospective clients who research your firm. This step should be repeated for each of the niches.

Step 5: Create Tailored Marketing Campaigns

With webpages in place, build tailored marketing campaigns for each niche. This can include creating targeted content, such as blog posts or videos, addressing the specific needs and concerns of the niche. The step can also include social media, email marketing, and direct mail campaigns to reach potential clients in each niche. Finally, you may choose to have live or online marketing events for each of your niches.

Step 6: Network and Build Partnerships

The final step is for each advisor team to network and build partnerships within their niche community. This can include attending industry events and conferences, joining industry groups and associations, and building relationships with other professionals in the niche for referrals.

Final Thoughts

Pursuing a multiple-niche approach can accelerate growth for RIAs managing more than $1 billion in AUM. However, the danger is that the messaging will get watered down. Creating a throughline connecting all the niches will inspire more effective messaging. Once the connecting theme is identified, you can then give your niches the resources they need to succeed. The focused effort becomes a win for your firm as you now stand out from the competition with a profitable multi-niche approach.

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About Kristen Luke

Kristen Luke is the President of Kaleido Creative Studio, a marketing consulting firm that positions Registered Investment Advisors and their employees as experts in a niche, making them “uncomparable” to other advisors. Over the past 17 years, Kristen has consulted with hundreds of financial advisory firms and shared her marketing expertise via industry conferences and publications nationwide.

The 52: Maximize Your Marketing Efforts by Minimizing Low-Value, High-Time Activities

Maximize Your Marketing Efforts by Minimizing Low-Value, High-Time Activities

As a financial advisor, it's important to ensure that your marketing efforts produce tangible results. You don’t want to waste your time on low-impact activities that make you feel like you're doing something but, in reality, are just busy work (e.g., unfocused networking or constantly tweaking your website). Instead, focus on strategies that will drive real growth for your business.

Remember, time is a valuable commodity and should be invested wisely, just like you do with your money. By minimizing low-value, high-time marketing activities, you can maximize your return on investment and see real results in your business.

The 52: Standing Out in the AI Era: Humanize Your Educational Content

Standing Out in the AI Era: Humanize Your Educational Content

With the ease of generating educational content using artificial intelligence, it’s important to make your content stand out. One effective strategy is to humanize it by incorporating humor, opinion, and real-life examples. For example, you can add a touch of levity to your articles or videos to make them more engaging. If humor doesn’t align with your brand, consider sharing your personal opinions on a topic to add a unique perspective. Additionally, incorporating anonymous real-life stories or situations that reinforce your subject can make your content more relatable and memorable for your audience. By adding these elements, you can offer readers and viewers a more personal and engaging experience than what they can get from AI-generated content alone.

The 52: Different Roles, Different Marketing Pieces

Different Roles, Different Marketing Pieces

If you have different client types that you serve, you probably have different marketing pieces for each one. For example, you probably have a different brochure or webpage for widows than for business owners.

But do you have different pieces for the different roles in the client relationship? For example, do you have one piece for the spouse who is leading the charge and one for the spouse who is burying their head in the sand about their finances? Do you have one for the older widow who is suddenly in charge of her money and one for the child who will ultimately act as the power of attorney?

Often, there are multiple people involved in the decision to hire you. Customize your marketing materials for each role in the relationship to address their concerns or questions in advance. This will help you avoid any one person in the relationship derailing the opportunity to work with you.

The 52: Offer the Value-Adds That Actually Impact Your Niche

Offer the Value-Adds That Actually Impact Your Niche

In November, Kitces.com published the article “101 Things That Advisors Actually DO To Add Value.” Since then, I’ve been observing online conversations and having discussions with advisors who skipped over the article and jumped right to the chart of 101 services. The advisors I spoke with were enthusiastically planning to add as many of these services as they can to their practice.

The problem is many advisors missed the lesson the author was trying to convey. In his conclusion, Adam Van Deusen states: “Ultimately, the key point is that while there are more than a hundred different ways advisors can add value to their clients’ lives, advisors who are able to go deeper for their ideal target client have hundreds more ways to do so.”

He continues: “In fact, by crafting an ideal target client persona and shaping their service offering around the value adds that most apply to these clients, advisors can not only enhance their efficiency, but also better differentiate themselves from more generalist firms, potentially leading to more efficient marketing and greater client growth in the long run!”

The lesson of the article is not to offer as many of the 101 services as possible to a broad set of clients. The lesson is to offer only the most impactful services to your niche. Your operations will be more efficient, your marketing will be easier, and you will be happier.