April 30, 2014
Dear Abby,
I often hear that regular communications are necessary to stay front of mind, but I don’t know how to go about doing that. I see some weekly market commentaries that I know I could use, but I’m not sure that’s the right direction since I outsource the asset management for my clients to my broker-dealer. I also am a single advisor with one admin so the bandwidth to do anything robust is not there. Do you have any suggestions for me?
Thank you,
Dana
Pittsburgh, PA
Hi Dana,
Great question and many answers! You absolutely should, and could, be sending out a regular communication to your clients and prospects without adding a huge burden to you or your admin. There are so many wonderful turn-key solutions for newsletters and content these days that you should have a fairly easy time determining the direction to go. First, ask your broker-dealer if they have any vendor discounts with marketing services firms who provide this type of deliverable. I know LPL Financial, our broker-dealer and custodian, has a plethora of options available to the advisors like Forefield, Emerald Connect, and FMG Suite, plus more. These firms will provide you with the option of choosing compliance approved content on a myriad of topics to fit the needs of your clients. You can even segment out your clients based on a number of criteria (age, life stage, asset level, etc) to really provide content that will be meaningful to them.
Another consideration for you would be to also make sure you have a social presence and your clients and prospects are connected to you socially. This way, in addition to the monthly newsletter you deliver, you can also go online and find articles that you think your followers would be interested in reading and share with them a few times a month to stay connected. There are services you can use that will actually deliver this for you if you are so inclined like Summly. And even newer firms, like Vestorly, that will pull the content into your website so when you share content, viewers are driven to your website to read it.
With so many options available, there is little excuse for not communicating. Research has proven that engagement increases client satisfaction, loyalty, and referrals ---- so get to it.
Sincerely,
Abby