Why IFAs need more than occasional marketing

Your expertise needs to be visible

Most advisers can explain exactly why a client should choose them once they are sitting across the table.

The harder part is communicating that value before the conversation begins.

A prospective client researching financial advice may visit several firms. At first glance, many will appear to offer similar services: retirement planning, investment advice, pensions, protection and ongoing financial planning.

Your marketing therefore needs to answer the question a list of services cannot.

Perhaps you specialise in working with business owners. Maybe your approach to retirement planning is particularly personal. Your advisers may have decades of experience, or your firm might provide an exceptionally high level of ongoing support.

Whatever makes the business valuable needs to be visible throughout your marketing.

Good marketing does not manufacture differentiation. It identifies what is already different about your firm and communicates it more effectively.

A professional brand does more than look good

Branding is sometimes treated as a visual exercise. Choose a logo, select some colours and update the website.

A strong financial services brand goes much further.

It should create a consistent impression of the business wherever somebody encounters it, from your website and LinkedIn page to presentations, reports, brochures and other client-facing material.

Professional presentation alone will never create trust. But poor, dated or inconsistent presentation can certainly undermine it.

Your brand should support the credibility your advisers have already earned.

Content gives clients a reason to notice you

Branding creates the foundation. Content keeps the business visible.

This is where many financial adviser marketing strategies start to struggle.

An article is published occasionally. LinkedIn activity happens when somebody finds the time. A market update appears after something significant happens. Then client work becomes busy, and marketing disappears again.

The result is a stop-start presence.

A better approach is to develop content around the questions, decisions and concerns your ideal clients already have.

Over time, your content becomes more than something to post on social media.

It becomes evidence of your expertise.

The problem with piecemeal marketing

It is common for growing advisory firms to tackle marketing one requirement at a time.

A designer creates a brochure. Someone internally writes a few LinkedIn posts. Another supplier updates the website. An adviser writes an article when time allows.

Individually, each piece may be perfectly good. Collectively, however, they do not always build towards the same position.

Eventually, marketing becomes another job competing with client work.

A more structured branding and content approach removes much of that friction.

Branding and content work better together

Branding without content can leave a business looking polished but quiet.

Content without strong branding can produce useful information that nobody remembers came from you.

Bringing the two together creates something much stronger.

You establish how the firm should look, sound and position itself. Then you reinforce that identity through useful, relevant content.

• Articles can become LinkedIn posts.
• Research can become branded graphics.
• Adviser insight can become thought leadership.
• Client questions can become educational content.
• One strong idea can support several marketing channels.

Instead of continuously starting from scratch, each new piece of marketing begins to support everything around it.

Financial services content needs greater care

Marketing a financial advice business is not the same as marketing an ordinary consumer brand.

Financial promotions and communications operate within a regulated environment, and firms need to consider the clarity, balance and appropriateness of what they communicate.

That should not mean producing bland content.

It means the people creating your marketing need to understand the environment in which advisers operate.

Good financial services content should still be engaging, accessible and commercially useful while giving appropriate consideration to compliance and consumer understanding.

Working with a marketing partner that already understands financial services can also remove much of the explanation normally required when briefing an outside supplier.

Your marketing should become an asset

One of the biggest advantages of a joined-up approach is that your marketing begins to accumulate rather than disappear.

You are no longer commissioning isolated pieces of work.

Each new piece strengthens what already exists.

After several months, the difference can be significant. Rather than appearing only when the firm launches a campaign, your expertise is visible whenever prospective clients encounter the business.

A better approach for growing IFAs

Most independent financial advice firms do not need a huge internal marketing department.

They need the right foundations, a clear direction and a reliable way of maintaining their presence.

That is the thinking behind Goldmine Media’s branding and content bundles.

We help financial advice firms bring their branding and ongoing content together, creating a more consistent marketing presence without advisers having to manage every element themselves.

Instead of commissioning disconnected pieces of marketing whenever something is needed, your firm can build around one brand, one direction and an ongoing supply of content designed to support your wider growth strategy.