It is important advisers get involved in social media.

Social media continues to grow in importance as a communication channel, driven by the widespread use of mobile devices and the ease with which content can be created and shared. And contrary to popular belief, social media usage continues to grow strongly across all age groups.

2014 is likely to see us reach that tipping point, where more online content is accessed via mobile devices than traditional desktop/laptop browsers, making the role for social in your communications mix even more important. (According to our own research, more than one third of advisers already use social media with their clients, and more than half connect to their insurance partner via social.

As the foundation sponsor of the FS Smileys Award and the FS Power 50, Zurich has been at the forefront of recognising those advisers who are already demonstrating best practice in the use of social across their business. A collection of case studies – available from your Zurich BDM – showcases all the ways advisers are making social a mainstream communication channel, and includes examples spanning:

• Prospecting – making new connections and advertising their business
• Sharing breaking news with clients
• Publishing written pieces to show expertise in a niche
• Networking with and learning from peers
• Seeking and publishing client testimonials
• Boosting Google search ranking
• Personalised videos for clients
• Conducting surveys

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This is an extract from a collection of business improvement tips for advisers, launched at Zurich’s Trax2Success national roadshow, featuring the 2013 AFA Adviser of the year Jenny Brown.

Click here to read Hot business tip number 1: Look after yourself and your staff

Click here to read Hot business tip number 2: Survey your clients

Click here to read Hot business tip number 3: Place a higher value on your time

Click here to read Hot business tip number 4: Review your client onboarding process

Click here to read Hot business tip number 5: Adopt an estate planning methodology across your business

Click here to read Hot business tip number 6: Tailor your communication strategy by client generation

Click here to read Hot business tip no number 7: Change your approach to review meetings

Click here to read Hot business tip number 8: Create a differentiated service offering (segment your client base)

Click here to read Hot business tip number 9: Set up a Board of Advice

Click here to read Hot business tip number10: Develop a client retention strategy

Click here to read Hot business tip number 11: Run a program where staff drive improvements

Click here to read Hot business tip number. 12: Build your emotional intelligence

Click here to read Hot business tip number. 14: Get better at handling objections

Click here to read Hot business tip number. 15: Create stronger referral sources

Click here to read Hot business tip number. 16: Set up a Google account

Click here to read Hot business tip number. 17: Learn from leading advisers

Click here to read Hot business tip number. 18: Make better use of technology in your business

Click here to read Hot business tip number 19: Improve your office environment

Click here to read Hot business tip number 20: Develop a great value proposition

Click here to read Hot business tip number 21: Make more use of video in your business

Click here to read Hot business tip number 22: Optimise your website for mobile

Click here to read Hot business tip number 23: Have a marketing plan

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Paul Resnik

Australians are downloading more data on their mobile phones and are accessing the internet at faster speeds, which will benefit all businesses using the internet, according to FinaMetrica, an Australian business selling its online risk-profiling solution globally.

Data released today from the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) reveal mobile wireless is now the most prevalent internet technology in Australia, accounting for half of all internet connections.

Australia’s 20.6 million mobile handset subscribers downloaded 38,734 Terabytes for the three months ended 30 June 2014, a 40% increase from the three months ended 31 December 2013. This equates to 0.6 GB of data downloaded per mobile subscriber per month, the ABS data shows.

The advertised download speed range that recorded the highest number of subscribers at 30 June 2014 was the 8Mbps to less than 24Mbps range, with 6.3 million subscribers, a 26% increase from the end of June 2013, while 2.03 million subscribers accessed the internet at an advertised internet access speed of 24Mbps or greater, the ABS data reveals. The number of subscribers that accessed the internet at an advertised download speed of 1.5Mbps to less than 8Mbps fell 24% to 3.8 million subscribers.

“The improvements we are seeing in both internet speeds and the broader usage of the internet on mobile devices will demand innovation from businesses that must adapt to changing consumer patterns. It is up to businesses to cater to these changing internet usage trends,” said FinaMetrica co-founder Paul Resnik.

“FinaMetrica, for example, provides an online test which enables financial advisors to measure the financial risk tolerance of their clients. Improving internet speeds means our solution can work more quickly and efficiently as browsing, downloading, uploading and other functions become quicker,” Mr Resnik said.

“Our website is mobile device friendly. Users of iPads or Windows tablets can go through the entire process of registering a client on the FinaMetrica website, completing a risk tolerance questionnaire, viewing reports and performing all other functions that they could do on a desktop computer,” he said.

“Moreover, we use the internet and networking websites to build our brand, sell our product and get our messages out there to clients and the financial services community globally about the importance of assessing risk tolerance in giving suitable financial advice.”

Mr Resnik said small businesses in particular needed to boost their internet presence and their use of social media to build their brands.

“Now that social media is so prominent, businesses needed to use websites such as LinkedIn and Twitter and other relevant sites to expand their presence in the marketplace. This is a way of using the internet to level the playing field with bigger companies, using innovations in online communications to spread the word about a company’s products and services.

“This can give small businesses a big competitive advantage over larger businesses because they can respond both more immediately online and through a personal face,” said Mr Resnik.

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The aim of the SLICE survey, which runs 3 times a year (each time on a different theme) is to provide financial planning practices with an opportunity to share their views and insights with their peers and build an understanding of the most effective approaches to a broad range of hot button topics that challenge practices’ efficiency, profitability and viability. The latest SLICE survey focuses on financial planners marketing strategies.

Survey authors, Peter Dawson of The Dawson Partnership and Susan Rochester of Balance at Work, say the latest survey provides data to confirm what they have observed among financial planning practices.

The vast majority of financial planners surveyed have a marketing plan (83%) with 73% of those with a plan saying they put the plan together either on their own or with their business partner(s) and 47% drawing on the resources of a practice development manager. 33% had input from a business coach.

‘Up until a few years ago our marketing plan was pretty rudimentary but as time has gone by we have adopted a more structured approach with regular marketing planning and review meetings that we hold each quarter. This has helped us keep a focus on our marketing campaign making sure it remains relevant to our business and helps us achieve our goals.’
Principal SME financial planning practice

Of those businesses with a marketing plan 53% said that having a plan in place has opened up new opportunities with 40% saying that they were unsure if having a marketing plan was responsible for new opportunities that arose for their businesses.

While most respondents don’t use an external source to assist them put together their marketing plan 50% said that they would be open to doing so as they felt that someone with the knowledge and experience could add value to their marketing planning.

‘I suppose it’s too easy to get bogged down in the day to day work in a one man practice and my approach to marketing is a bit hit and miss but I do recognize the value of having a marketing plan and would be willing to hire a marketing consultant.’
Sole practitioner

The main marketing strategy used by the most respondents was utilising formal business partnerships (33%) followed by direct referrals from existing clients (28%), while 11% use networking as their primary strategy.

‘We have traditionally gained most of our business from our clients but it got to the stage where we realised that to grow to where we wanted to be we would need to look at other means of growing the business. We had some relationships with local accounting firms and worked towards developing these. This strategy has led to an increase in revenue of 22% each year over the last three years.’
CEO SME Financial Planning group.

‘Although the majority of respondents say they track the effectiveness of their marketing via a range of means, there was a surprisingly wide variation in the sophistication of their processes. While some follow a process where all leads are tracked, monitored and the source identified, then report on results regularly to see what is working and what is a waste of time, others have very little in place.’
Susan Rochester

According to our respondents social media is not a major strategy in their current marketing plans and a number of respondents made comments including ‘Social media is just a lot of noise,’ ‘Social media maybe ok for an on line business but our firm is a people to people business and nothing can replace that’ and ‘My kids use Facebook and I just don’t get it’.

‘We expected to find one or two respondents reporting social media as their main marketing strategy. This was not the case in this sample, although comments indicated that practices are using social media to support other strategies, for example by sharing newsletter articles via social platforms.’
Peter Dawson

However social media wasn’t without some support with one respondent stating that she was open to using social media as ‘it’s all about connectivity and if I can interact with people at a professional level on social media that can only be good for my business’.

The practices that responded to this survey were mostly more than 10 years old (78%), with 17% who had been in business 6-10 years and only 6% for 5 years or less. The majority had fewer than 10 staff (72%) although 28% of respondents were from firms with 21 or more staff.

Concluding remarks

The Slice 3 survey has revealed a strong focus on financial planners developing structured marketing plans and that these are far from static documents as most reviewed their marketing plans on a regular basis. Respondents were focused on building their business by drawing on their relationships with their clients and through formal business relationships. Many are yet to embrace social media as a major part of their marketing plan, although this may change in time as attitudes shift.

For more information about the SLICE survey, contact Peter Dawson directly on 0418 601 245 or email peter@dawsonpartnership.com.au

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Make sure they can walk the talk…

It is true: the easiest people to sell to are the people who sell. For some time I have been watching with great interest, and finding myself shaking my head in amazement with increasing vigor, as more professionals begin to switch on to digital marketing and social media use in particular.   The truly amazing thing is who they are turning to for advice….

There is a heck of a lot of “trust me, I am a guru” from people who are only half a step ahead of you.

Professional advisers know how important their own credibility is….but seem to be neglecting to check the credibility of the “experts” they are taking advice from.

About two dozen advisers & accountants have asked me in recent months about a particular expert they were considering hiring to help them crack the digital marketing issues for their own business, usually after attending a conference or workshop and listening to these experts tout their wares.

My response?

“Google them. See if they are actually doing what you want done.

Can they walk the talk?”

So we Googled the particular experts to see whether they do…we Googled them to determine their credibility on the very issue they were holding out as an area of expertise.  It might seem a very simplistic way of assessing whether someone is worth talking to, but I figure that if someone is going to hold themselves out as an expert in digital media then they should be able to use it pretty well to promote their own business.

This is what we found:

1.  A specialty “social media” outsourcing firm for professional services.  Actively promoting their expertise  and “training” people in how to use social media.

Principal’s public stats.

LinkedIn contacts: 219.  Max endorsements in any category: 25

The Firms public stats.

LinkedIn company page followers: 6

Blog: 1 article – actually a re-post of someone else’s writing – in last 5 months.

Twitter: Principal has 831 followers

Facebook: 807 page fans

There appears to be zero Video, Pinterest or other social media channels being used….and I suspect that is not a deliberate strategy.

….I’ve seen enough to make my mind up regarding the professional credibility of getting this firm, or person, to give me advice on how to use social media.

CREDIBILITY?

2.  A digital marketing all-in-one solutions provider.  Specialist in being seen and found apparently.

Principal’s public stats.

Twitter: 1557 followers.  Appears to post about once a day on average.

LinkedIn: 500+ connections.  Regular posting.  Gets a big tick.

Firms public stats.

Facebook Page: 925 Likes.  Regular posting.

Blog: produce targeted content weekly of good quality. Gets a big tick.

LinkedIn company page: 6 followers.

Youtube: 4 subscribers.

No other apparent social media channels in use, though that may be a deliberate strategy.

CREDIBILITY?

3.  (My personal favourite!) A specialist Social Media Consultant for professionals. Providing full blog management including content creation, social media platform creation and management.  Experts in LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook and Google+.  (partly a personal fave as this lot do the most trash-talking that I’ve come across….)

Principal’s public stats.

LinkedIn contacts: 82.  Max endorsements in any category: 5

Twitter:  87 followers.  Note: doesn’t follow his own company on Twitter.

The Firms public stats.

LinkedIn company page: doesn’t have one

Website:  All links from social sites lead to a “cannot be found”. Further digging reveals a domain name change…get to the site and find ZERO social media connection capability or links on their own website to their own social media channels.  Complete lack of content apart from the blog…

Blog: Inactive.  Last post was November 2013

Twitter: 44 followers

Facebook: Page down (has been for months). Zero Facebook presence.

Google +: 64 followers and active posting schedule

 CREDIBILITY?

It really is all about credibility isn’t it?  Exactly the same as it is for you as a professional when any potential client does their research on you….you expect them to be doing that, and you prepare for that.  That’s why so many are now looking more deeply into how to use social media and other digital marketing methods better…to enhance professional credibility.

So when the next guru tosses up a pitch at a conference with a special deal to make all your pain go away, rather than spend hours wondering and canvassing opinion as to whether they are the Chosen One, hit Google instead.  That will be good enough to determine whether you should even consider them in the first place.

Other warning signs:

• Excessive and protracted claims of superiority or originality
• Use of the words “guru”, “ninja”, “change agent”….or anything just as silly.
• Exaggerated performance and future revenue promises
• Lack of actual performance figures, client testimonials, or real case studies.
• Inability to create relevant content to demonstrate their expertise.

http://financialadvisercoach.com/

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Mark Cleaver

While small and medium sized businesses (SMEs) are turning to social media to help grow their brands, many are reluctant to invest in technology generally, according to the latest SME survey from small business finance specialist Bibby Financial Services.

Conducted by CoreData in February, the Bibby Financial Services Small Business Barometer revealed Facebook is the most popular social media tool for SMEs – with more than two in five respondents (43%) using it for their business.  Other common social media channels include LinkedIn (23%), Twitter (19%) and Google+ (16%).

Moreover, 22% of SMEs expect sales growth to come from social media, highlighting its potential to boost revenues.

The survey also revealed close to two in five (38%) small businesses believe websites are the most valuable type of technology. Other technology mediums seen as advantageous include social media (35%), high-speed broadband (31%) and smart phones (31%).

However, despite the perceived benefits of technology, the majority of SMEs do not currently have plans for increasing their technology investment. Fewer than one in three respondents (31%) expect to increase or significantly increase their investment on technology in the next year. A small proportion (5%) intend to reduce their technology spend while a further 12% are unsure.

Mark Cleaver, Managing Director, Australia and New Zealand, said: “Technology can equalise the playing field between big and small business. Whether this involves spending more on faster computers, social media or on software that makes a business’ operations more efficient, technology investment is crucial for keeping up with competitors and the needs of customers.

“Despite this, our survey revealed three in 10 SMEs (29%) don’t believe that technology will offer any advantage over bigger businesses. Moreover, two in five SMEs (40%) don’t currently use mainstream social media tools to promote their business.

“SMEs need to use all the tools that they have available to build their businesses and brands in a highly competitive landscape. Social media is an effective and low-cost marketing tool that can help SMEs keep up with the efforts of bigger businesses,” Mr Cleaver said.

The survey found that more than 62% or three in five small businesses have a website. Of these, 45% use it mainly to share information and promote their brand. Close to three in 10 SMEs (28%) use their websites to funnel potential clients to call, email or visit in person in order to make a sale.  Just one in four SMEs (27%) take it one step further and use their websites to sell products and services.

“E-commerce is becoming more important in the economy. SMEs can score goals against big business by making sure they have online transaction facilities to sell products or services rather than relying on physical transactions,” Mr Cleaver said.

In terms of social media usage, the survey found Facebook is most popular with respondents who have businesses in the accommodation and food services industries, with 77% using it for their businesses. It is also popular with those from arts and recreational services (70%) and the retail trade sector (56%).

The industries where businesses are least likely to utilise any social media are household and personal services (73%), construction (62%), and agriculture forestry and fishing (60%).

The Bibby Barometer SME survey is conducted bi-annually on over 850 small and medium sized businesses, Australia-wide, on business sentiment towards economic conditions, cash flow management, financing and key business challenges. Each year, SMEs are asked about their hopes for the Federal Budget.

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Charmian Holmes

The Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC) has recently cracked down on a number of financial services and credit businesses whose websites contain misleading content, according to The Fold Legal (the Fold).

The Fold’s Charmian Holmes said ASIC has been particularly proactive about information that incorrectly states the interest rates for loans and savings accounts, makes ‘outlandish’ claims about self managed super or tries to induce investors without presenting all of the risks.

In order to ensure they do not attract ASIC’s attention for all the wrong reasons, Ms Holmes said financial services and credit businesses websites and social media activities need to abide by print and TV media laws and regulations.

“The main thing to be aware of is that you must represent your business and its services honestly and accurately,” Ms Holmes said. “If what you say about your products and services on your website or social media pages is likely to mislead or deceive, fines, penalties, corrective advertising, refunds and other sanctions can apply.

The Fold has provided the following general guidelines designed to help financial services and credit businesses meet their website content and social media obligations:

• Keep website information up-to-date at all times
• Don’t ‘stretch’ the truth – ever
• Don’t make promises you can’t keep
• Tell your customers the good and the not so good
• Clearly identify the service or product provider
• Avoid comparisons
• Only use genuine customer testimonials

“In a nutshell, ASIC expects you to honestly and accurately describe your products and services,” Ms Holmes said. “Everything you do and say about your business, your services and your products on your websites and on your social media accounts should therefore be a true reflection of your offering.”

More information on The Fold’s website and social media guidelines is available on The Fold’s blog, Frankology.

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Social media tips for advisers

One of the most frequent frustrations expressed by financial advisers to President and Founder of US Based i-Impact Group Mr. Claudio O. Pannunzio during his social media and communication workshops relates to perceived lack or minimal ROI on social media effort.

In his response Pannunzio points out that social media should not be considered as the ultimate marketing tool or the panacea for prospecting challenges.  The benefits advisers can derive from social media are too important to ignore.

During his presentations, Pannunzio emphasizes that social media needs to be fully incorporated into a financial practitioner’s marketing mix and activities must follow specific rules and approaches.

In his workshops, Pannunzio offers four basic tips to help advisers maximize social media ROI:

1. Quality over quantity

“Firstly, focus on quality over quantity for although there is a plethora of social media sites available, advisers should refrain from joining as many as possible”, said Pannunzio.

“Instead, pick one or two platforms where clients and prospects go to get information about their investments and focus on those.”

After an adviser has established a presence there, they should not obsess with metrics, such as number of followers or re-tweets.  The adviser’s goal is to position themselves as a trusted source and provider of high-quality information, actionable ideas and tips that motivate prospects to seek their services.

If followers do not find value in what the adviser offers, the odds they will seek their services or provide them with leads will be minimal.

2. Delegation

Don’t Delegate and keep social media in-house is the second tip Pannunzio offers advisers.

If an adviser cannot find the time for social media interaction then the task should be assigned to an employee. He or she not only knows the adviser’s business and what they’re looking to accomplish on social media, but more importantly will articulate it using the language of the practice.

In Pannunzio’s opinion, the cons of outsourcing social media activities far outweigh the pros:

Pros

• The adviser will have the ability to free up time
• An outside specialist knows social media better than the adviser
• A specialist can help the adviser to build his/her brand 

Cons

• Loss of company’s “voice”
• The adviser has relinquished control of what is posted/tweeted
• Potential exposure to greater risk that the delegated person may say something wrong that could lead to a social media nightmare
• The adviser will have to pay the specialist

3. Be social

The third tip is to ‘be social’.  The interaction by the adviser with his/her network on social media is more important than building that network.

Pannunzio added, “Social media, as the name infers, is social in nature; it should be used to identify common social denominators that associate the adviser with the audiences they want to reach”.

“A Facebook page that shows the adviser’s involvement with family, community, university or philanthropic activities, enables them to share with clients and prospects the personal side of their life. Ultimately, this will empower the adviser to establish a stronger bond with the target audience/s”.

4. Be engaged

The fourth tip offered by Pannunzio is to be actively engaged.  An adviser’s mere presence on social media does not guarantee new business.

An adviser’s followers can perceive inactivity of their social media accounts as they have nothing meaningful to share and consequently become of no value.

Claudio Pannunzio concluded, “The secret to social media success is active and enduring engagement.  Study the audience to attain an intimate understanding of the financial issues they face and the type of information they seek.  Create content suitable for the audience’s key interests in easy-to-understand language and appeal to their emotions”.

“Seek to be active at least once a day, possibly at the same time, so followers will look for the posts.  Be selective on the content posted.  Ultimately, actively interacting with followers will convey the notion that the adviser cares about them, their issues and challenges”.

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Understanding your personal social media evolution.

Back in the beginning of my personal social media evolution, about 3 years ago, a friend sent me a LinkedIn connection request…and I had no idea what LinkedIn was, or why I should bother using it.

So being a brilliant technology user, I rang him to find out why he had sent this stupid email.

In just a couple of years it has gone from being something that I was begrudgingly accepting in order to do my friend a favour, to something which is one of my key marketing platforms. It has changed how professional services marketing is done.

Like most I began by doing little more than establishing a basic profile and connecting with a few colleagues.  In time, I put up a profile picture.  When I was thinking about moving on from the job I’d taken after selling my business I began to fill in the employment history and wrote a bit of a blurb about my background. I put in a hotmail address.  This from someone who was supposed to be pretty good at sales and marketing.  Unbelievable, right?

But it has been an evolution, rather than a revolution.

As far as I could tell at the time most people I knew who actually had a profile on LinkedIn had maybe 50 connections – 30 of whom work at the same company as them.  Gee…I had over 1,000 contacts stored in my phone, so LinkedIn was cheap beer you know?

Then I learned a little bit about how search works, and being a sales & marketing guy I was getting very interested in digital marketing and the use of the internet and social media in light of rising consumerism.  Suddenly the light bulb went on, and I got it.  As far as I can see in financial services though, many still really don’t get it.  There is quite a bit of LinkedIn-denial to this day.

However I got serious about it and started actively trying to turn my heap of industry contacts and the people on my phone into an organised network that was part of my business marketing.  If nothing else I would suggest advisers consider using it as a VERY effective network database. One of the things that makes it very effective is that the people in your network do the database updating for you…THEY will keep their phone numbers, email addresses, employment details current.  Cool, I now have some 1,300 PA’s out there updating my contacts files!

So here’s a tip: in your contacts (wherever you keep them in your phone or PDA) include the contacts LinkedIn profile URL.  You’ve got an immediate quick link in your contacts file to what is most likely to be their most current information.

Now I would have probably 5 people each week asking if I can help them use LinkedIn…which is sort of amusing as I don’t consider myself an expert at it by any means.  I am however an avid user, and have worked out a process that has been very effective and is now a core part of my business. LinkedIn have a little diagram on my profile page that suggests I am nearly an “All Star” – though I have no idea what that really means or how one gets it….but then I don’t care either.

What I do care about is that once I understood how LinkedIn fitted in with search, and understood the power of organised networking, I did some work and it has paid off.  It has paid off in several ways:

1.  Google now finds me first, as opposed to the other much more famous Tony Vidler who is a renowned academic.  Which I am clearly not.  It has had the added benefit of demoting another Tony Vidler who is, or was, an enthusiastic cross-dresser in the UK who liked sharing photo’s of saturday night outings. THAT one is now relegated much further down the Google search functions, which is excellent for the famous Tony Vidler and myself.

2. Much more importantly though is that I am known, looked for, and contacted via LinkedIn by my target market.

I could go on with many more benefits….but these two points alone are enough I would suggest to make it totally worthwhile.  It gets me found, and it gets me business.  And it can for anyone else who uses it wisely.  Below are the most important action points I’ve found for anyone wanting to get found by their target market, and then be asked to do business.

Profile:  apart all the obvious points that everyone suggests, think about including some video.  You’d be surprised at how many clickthroughs to my website, blog and youtube channel come via LinkedIN. Video engages folk.

I am a fan of recommendations and endorsements.  Give them out (where warranted), and ask for them in the areas that you want to be known as an expert.  It is amazing…if you ask people for endorsements or recommendations in areas of genuine strength, they will almost inevitably provide you with online testimonials that are better than you would have provided to yourself.  But don’t forget to be generous with others too – but genuine!

Connect people with each other.  One of the greatest favours you can do for your business colleagues is help them network with each other.  Be the trusted gatekeeper, only introducing folk to each other where there is a genuine synergy and probable mutual benefit.  You want to be thought well of by both of them don’t you?  You know what happens next…that law of reciprocity kicks in and people begin feeling that they owe you favours.  Personal networking has always been the way of business…and this is an incredibly efficient way to do it.

Work really hard on getting your headline description as right as you can.  It is searchable content area, so you key branding position, or value proposition needs to be captured there.  Dare to be different.  But be pertinent.  Don’t be like everyone else…just because you are a chartered accountant it doesn’t make you stand out from 30,000 other chartered accountants in NZ.  That sort of detail is important in your summary, but not in the headline.

In your summary section give readers a feel for you as a person.  Everyone gets fed up with reading bog standard CV’s.  For example, the first 5 words of my summary are carefully chosen, and each stands alone.  Each word is its own sentence.  People tell me that the impression they get immediately is “precise…direct…confident….you know what you stand for and can do….”  Fabulous…they get a sense of what I want them to have a sense of.

Final point for now on the profile section: work on it regularly.  Tweak it, find slightly better wording that conveys exactly what you want to be known for, and known as.  Update pictures, add extra material, complete more of your bio and history….You don’t have to master it in a day….spend 5 minutes once a week tweaking…

….and if you make a mistake or are not entirely happy with how you’ve got it…go back and tweak again in a few days.  You are not building the Pyramids here…it doesn’t have to last 5,000 years…keep working on it.

Updates:  Share content that is pertinent to your network.  Think about it like you might want to borrow money one day…you have to make deposits for a while before anyone will let you borrow anything right?  It is the same here…contribute first.

Like other people’s stuff.  If you like content that other people are sharing, then tell them.  LinkedIn make it really easy, you just click a button.  That is a form of engagement with other professionals, which is one of the ways that relationships are developed.

Finding the balance of how much to share can be difficult, and it is an area that I don’t think I have right myself.  You just have to be mindful of who your audience is, take your best guess at how much is enough to get attention and be helpful, without moving into the realms of harassment. Then be prepared to adjust as you go.  If people give you a bit of stick and say “too much”…then listen to it, and respond accordingly.  Criticism is useful feedback.

Groups: Start a group for your target market. My own preference is to run a group that focusses on providing engaging and useful information for the audience.  The focus (for me) is not on creating conversations, but staying in touch with low to no-pressure content delivery.

However, for many others there is a desire to have a very high level of engagement with group members and generate a lot of conversation and discussion.  It doesn’t matter which style you prefer, but it does matter that you are clear about what you are trying to achieve and then run the group accordingly.  Be consistent in your approach, but no matter what your own objective, encourage group members to interact and contribute.  If they want to post articles or comments that are in keeping with your groups stated objective, then let them contribute.

Groups are another excellent method for establishing expertise, or being seen as a source of valuable ideas.  Who doesn’t want that as part of their own business reputation?

Connecting: about once a week scroll through the list of “who you might know” as new people are joining LinkedIn all the time. Invariably someone arrives on LinkedIn each week that I have done business with, or know, and ti has been a great way of reconnecting with a heap of people that I may not have spoken to for some years.

If you go with a Pro version (paid account) you have the ability to send emails via LinkedIn to people who are not part of your network (those who are not 1st degree connections).  Use sparingly – I have never used all of my inmail allowance.  When there is someone you want to approach that you are not connected to, you have the ability to do so with a Pro account.  But all the etiquette rules that might apply to cold calling (for example) apply here too: be nice; have something genuine to talk about; don’t be pushy or assumptive….and so on.

Check your connections new connections.  It takes only a few seconds on your mobile app on the phone…do it while waiting at the traffic lights.  The people you are connected to will often know folk you want to know…or sometimes who they are connecting with will give you some good ideas for new business opportunities…if  you see an accountant you know has just connected with a lawyer you know, then there may well be an opportunity for your professional skillset…it might be time to arrange a lunch!

Reach out to those you do know in business and invite them to connect with you.  Try and avoid using the template connection request that LinkedIn generate…which is pretty bland.  It is hard to avoid using it if you hit the “connect” button from a mobile app, but from the full online version you can personalise the invitation request.  Personalised invitations are always better – there is no debate on that.

Send a thank you to those you connect with.  In the thank you give them a couple of other ways of staying in touch, or getting some value from the relationship.  It is a small thing, but it goes down extremely well.  Good old fashioned courtesy works a treat.

Conclusion:

LinkedIn has for me become second in importance only to my own company website for very simple reasons.  It is effective and organised professional networking.  It enables me to broaden my network well beyond just those I can keep in touch with face to face or via the telephone….and it opens up all sorts of new opportunities that I had not previously considered or foreseen.

It gets you found.  You get known for what you want to be known for (if you’ve done your profile right!).  For many professionals it provides daily profiling with their target market.

So I have to thank my mate who harassed me 3 years ago with the “stupid” LinkedIn connection request.

He changed how I market my professional services.  LinkedIn has changed how we all market professional services.

www.financialadvisercoach.com

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Instreet launches it’s new-look website.

Boutique structured products investment manager, Instreet Investment, has launched a new- look company website.

The website is an upgraded version of its previous website, but with adviser focused content and social media functionality. It can be accessed at www.instreet.com.au.

George Lucas, managing director, Instreet says: “The revised website has been developed based on feedback from advisers, the functionality they require and the information they wanted to access online. It has a clearer and more user friendly layout with improved access to investment performance information, more reference material and better search capabilities.”

“The financial planning industry is embracing the use of technology and accessing a lot more content digitally than ever before. Use of social media by advisers to understand investments strategies and communicating with their clients is becoming more common. That is also one of the reasons why we have made our website mobile phone/tablet friendly. Being a B2B business, we also reach out clients via our Twitter, LinkedIn and YouTube channels, which are easily accessed on our website. ”

The new advisor portal allows advisors to access information for their clients related to Instreet products, performance and statements online without having to call Instreet.

The website supports the positions of Instreet as an expert in the structured products sector.

“This is our core capability and we make it clear on the website. Well structured product solutions provide known outcomes, so investors can successfully manage their upside and downside in the pursuit of wealth maximisation. The

Instreet suite of structured products is designed to be relevant to both financial advisors and their clients with a quality alternative to the growth and income products produced by the major houses.”

“Over the next few months we will continue to develop a strong educational section on structured products on the website,” said Lucas.

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Automation and your business.

In financial services we generally accept that it is a wise move to automate as much as possible in our processes.

The arguments for doing so largely revolve around efficiency, reliability, and risk management.  That is, automating simply makes good business sense as it frees up time, it makes sure that the right things get done when they need to, and it minimises the possibility of mistakes.

Does the same rationale apply when considering automation of your marketing?

During the last 2 years I have used, observed and learned many things about social media use. What seems an overwhelming thing at first is in reality no more overwhelming than the internet itself.  Or email.

Email can be overwhelming if you allow it to be.  So too can social media channels.  So can pretty much everything else in the information or communications world.

Gradually I have learned some techniques and tools for managing my digital marketing, though not without a lot of mistakes and wasted hours along the way.

This line of thinking was triggered by an excellent article that caught my eye, and then generated some discussion with others, about “automation” of social media.  (Should you Tweet while you sleep?)   In the article Lilach Bullock made a superbly valid point in her article on the difference between scheduling and automation, and the two are often confused or used interchangeably.  I love one….and loathe the other when it comes to social media and digital marketing.

I love to schedule.  I loathe automation.

Scheduling allows me to be organised and reliably delivering the bulk of my social media posts.  It enables me to write three blog posts in a couple of hours when I have the time and creativity…but not have to post them immediately.  It enables me to scan Twitter feeds in 20 minutes to save a lot of useful material that is worth sharing, and then drip that out over the next 24 hours.  It enables me to maintain a continual presence on LinkedIn and Facebook without actually having to be there all the time.

Scheduling works for me as a one-man business. It provides an efficient use of my time, ensures reliable delivery and initial engagement points, and minimises the risk of me losing touch with my market place.  (By the way…free plug for Hootsuite and Bundlepost: check them out if you want some efficiency tools! By the way guys, you should now be paying ME, instead of me pay you!)

It is important for me to say that scheduling of content and shared stories is fabulous, but it does NOT replace the need to personally engage with folk who do repspond or interact.  Heck, I actually get a lot of that one-on-one interaction done on my mobile phone while waiting in traffic, or filling in the 3 minutes before a meeting starts – that is the easiest part of using social media.

Social media cannot be fully scheduled though.  To use social media well you must be interacting with your potential customers or fans, and that requires some one to one engagement with other human beings. That engagement just cannot be scheduled.

Automation on the other hand….well, that sucks.

Pet social media peeves for me include pretty much all the automated things…like getting impersonal direct messages beseeching me to follow someone everywhere just because I took an interest in something on one channel.    Or suddenly receiving a continuous daily (or worse, multiple times daily) email message referring to the same article ad nauseum.  That is just Groundhog Day,and it will drive most people suicidal if they are on the receiving end.  I really hate those  automated messages telling me I need to use something as ridiculous as TrueTwit in order to validate that I am a real human being before somebody else will follow me back.

Why would anyone put up a security screen and ask you to verify that you are not a Russian mobster before they will deign to follow you?  Here’s a thought: I don’t need Twitter followers enough that I’ll go jumping through silly hoops for you….that type of thing is just a barrier to engaging with your market place in my view.

Scheduling is about efficient delivery of content to your constituents.

Automation is just an impersonal method of trying to appear personal.

One is smart business.  The other is cynical engagement at best, or deceitful behavior at worst.

www.financialadvisercoach.com

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