Before Cary Carbonaro, senior vice president and director of women and wealth at Advisor Capital Management, answered how she best communicated with clients, she asked if any compliance workers were in the audience.
When no hands went up, she said she would meet clients anywhere they wanted, be it via Instagram direct messages, Facebook or other means.
Carbonaro, speaking at WealthStack, part of Wealth Management EDGE at The Diplomat Beach Resort in Hollywood Beach, Fla., discussed the idea of meeting clients where they're at with Matt Halloran, co-founder and chief relationship manager of ProudMouth; Domenick D'Andrea, co-founder and financial advisor with Dandarah Wealth Management; and Homer Smith, a private wealth advisor with Konvergent Wealth Partners.
Halloran said the idea of “unapologetically being yourself” was crucial for connecting with clients during these online interactions.
“Most of what you do is entirely commoditized,” he said. "They want you.”
To make those relationships work, advisors must meet the clients where they already are.
“Marketing has fundamentally changed,” said Halloran. “You have to communicate in the medium they prefer with your voice.”
D’Andrea, for example, said he was attempting to market in virtual reality settings once or twice per month.
Although this sort of marketing may require an investment in equipment, Halloran said the payoff would make it worth it.
“A lot of you half-ass it on social media,” he said. “You have to full-ass it. You can’t have poor-quality audio or video.”
The panel agreed that not every attempt would work, though. Carbonaro said she failed to gain traction on TikTok, YouTube and X (formerly Twitter).
“I’ve had success in a hundred different areas, but I can’t get those three things,” she said.
Making social media work for advisors requires consistency and dedication, said D’Andrea. He blocks his calendar each day from 8 a.m. to 8:30 a.m. for commenting and posting on his various social media channels. If you are sporadic in their postings, he explained, no one will think to check for them.
“Try doing it twice a week and build on it,” he said. “If you’re posting once a month, you don’t exist on social media.”