LinkedIn is primarily a business-focused social media platform, but it has the potential to be more than just a networking tool for financial advisors. Incorporating LinkedIn into your marketing strategy can help you build authority and attract high-quality prospects to your business. LinkedIn lead generation strategies for financial advisors are about grabbing your ideal client’s attention.
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What Can LinkedIn Do for Financial Advisors?
Social media can be a powerful way to market your advisory business, but where you choose to promote yourself matters. LinkedIn has some characteristics that set it apart from other social media platforms.
- It’s business-oriented, with users who are interested in building professional connections, searching for jobs or staying on top of industry news.
- It encourages content creation, allowing advisors opportunities to share their insights and underscore their expertise.
- Advisors have access to built-in marketing and lead-generation tools that can allow them to target specific user segments through the platform.
- The platform is designed to encourage engagement and interaction, allowing advisors to build a rapport with prospects and foster trust.
LinkedIn may be especially valuable for advisors who target young professionals, entrepreneurs or high-net-worth individuals. These are among the types of people the platform is designed to attract.
LinkedIn Lead Generation Strategies for Financial Advisors
What does lead generation on LinkedIn look like? There’s no single answer; there are several ways advisors can leverage the platform to connect with prospective clients. Let’s take a look at some of the most effective strategies for using LinkedIn to promote your firm.
Optimize Your Profile
Your LinkedIn profile may be the first thing a prospective client sees, and it’s important to ensure that you’re making a positive impression. An attention-grabbing profile includes:
- A headline that briefly summarizes what you do (but isn’t boring and goes beyond just a job title)
- A high-resolution profile photo
- A profile summary or about section that tells a story and sheds some light on your personality
- A detailed list of your experience and skills
Optimizing your profile to include keywords can help you gain more visibility in LinkedIn searches. Familiarizing yourself with LinkedIn search engine optimization (SEO) can give you an idea of which keywords you may want to include. SEO refers to strategies and techniques that are designed to increase your visibility in search results.
Create Compelling Content
LinkedIn has become increasingly content-focused and there are several ways you can use that to your advantage in generating leads.
Some of the types of content you can publish through LinkedIn include:
- Industry updates and news
- Thought leadership posts
- Infographics or images
- Videos
- Polls and surveys
The key to creating content that attracts views and engagement is knowing what your target clients are most likely to respond to. You can publish the most interesting and informative thought leadership article ever written, but it won’t matter if your audience doesn’t care about the topic.
It’s also important to include a clear call to action in your posts. For example, you might share a snippet of a case study your firm recently published and direct readers to visit your website to download the full text. This is a chance to add them to your mailing list if they need to enter their email address to access the case study.
Engage and Interact
Generating leads through LinkedIn or any other platform goes beyond content – you also need to build relationships with the people who follow you.
Prompting interaction could be as simple as asking a question on your profile. For instance, if your ideal clients are married 40-somethings with kids, you might post a question asking them about their biggest struggles in saving for college or retirement.
Responding to comments and sharing content from other LinkedIn users are also ways to drive engagement. The goal is to let prospects see the person you are behind the profile and create conversations. Those conversations are your entry point for telling a prospect more about what you do and how you can help them.
LinkedIn Ads
Digital ads can help you increase your exposure online. With LinkedIn ads, you can target a specific audience through the platform to ensure that your messaging reaches the right people.
LinkedIn offers multiple ad options, including:
- Sponsored ads
- Sponsored messaging
- Dynamic ads
- Text ads
You control your ad budget, and you can start or stop a LinkedIn ads campaign at any time. When creating an ad to generate leads, consider what you want to promote. For instance, do you want to create a generic advertisement to create awareness around your brand, or a campaign that focuses exclusively on a specific service your firm offers to clients?
Also, think about how you want to target prospects. Dynamic ads, for instance, allow you to target your campaign based on information in a prospect’s LinkedIn profile, such as where they’re employed or their job title. That’s helpful to know if you cater to a specific type of professional, such as physicians.
LinkedIn Sales Navigator
LinkedIn Sales Navigator is designed for prospecting, and while it’s not exclusive to financial advisors, it can be an effective way to generate leads.
Here are some of the things you can do with Sales Navigator:
- Use advanced search that incorporates 20+ features to identify prospects that fit your ideal client profile
- Organize leads based on specific criteria so you can track them more efficiently
- Utilize data analytics for a deep dive into your prospecting activity to see what’s working and what isn’t
- Expand your LinkedIn Mail messaging efforts to target more prospects each month
Sales Navigator integrates with several top customer relationship management (CRM) applications, including Salesforce. This feature is available with the Advanced Plus plan. You can request a demo to explore Sales Navigator features and get more information about plan pricing.
LinkedIn Compliance for Financial Advisors
The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) sets rules concerning the kinds of statements advisors can and cannot make in their marketing materials. When sharing content on LinkedIn (or other marketing platforms) advisors must:
- Avoid misleading, false or deceptive statements
- Present balanced and fair information about investment products and services
- Refrain from mentioning hypothetical performance that’s irrelevant to the financial situation and investment objectives of the intended audience
Running any content you create for LinkedIn past your chief compliance officer (CCO) for review can help you avoid potential violations. If you’re using compliance software for content review, it may be equipped to detect keywords or phrases that are noncompliant.
LinkedIn allows the option to post recommendations written by clients, colleagues or former employers on your profile page. Having glowing reviews or recommendations on your page can increase your credibility in the eyes of prospective clients. The SEC’s marketing rule allows registered investment advisors (RIAs) to share testimonials or endorsements; however, there are some stipulations.
RIAs must disclose:
- Whether the testimonial or endorsement is given by a current client or investor, or someone else
- Any compensation, cash or non-cash, the person offering the testimonial or endorsement received for doing so
- Conflicts of interest on the part of the person sharing the testimonial or endorsement
Bottom line? RIAs can post recommendations, but there are standards you must follow. If you’re unsure whether a recommendation meets the marketing rule standard, you may want to hide it from your profile altogether.
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)
Can Financial Advisors Use LinkedIn to Attract High-Net-Worth Clients?
If you’re interested in working with more high-net-worth investors, LinkedIn could be an outstanding place to find them. Posting content that’s likely to be top of mind for someone with a higher net worth on topics like investing, estate planning or the economy could be an excellent way to get their attention. You may also leverage your network on the platform to connect with high-net-worth leads.
Do Financial Advisors Need LinkedIn?
There’s no rule saying you have to create a LinkedIn profile for your advisory business. However, you could miss opportunities to expand your professional network and promote your firm to prospects if you don’t have a LinkedIn presence. If the type of client you’re hoping to target regularly uses the platform, it makes sense to leverage it as part of your marketing plan.
How to Get Clients on LinkedIn as a Financial Advisor?
Using LinkedIn to get more clients starts with having a profile that highlights who you are as an advisor and what you do. Creating unique and valuable content for your audience that encourages engagement can help you expand your reach. You can also take advantage of built-in platform features like LinkedIn ads or LinkedIn Sales Navigator to attract more clients to your business.
Bottom Line
If you’re not using LinkedIn for lead generation, you could be short-changing your business’s potential for growth. Knowing who you want to target can help you shape your marketing efforts. If you haven’t done so already, it’s to your advantage to spend some time creating an ideal client persona. Keeping this detailed persona in mind can ensure that your marketing is more hit than miss.
Tips for Growing Your Advisory Business
- LinkedIn is just one tool you can use to step up your lead generation game. SmartAsset AMP is an advisor marketing platform that helps you connect with leads while giving you all the tools you need to follow up. Schedule a demo today to learn how you can use it to grow your business.
- Social media compliance rules govern what you can say in your messaging and the types of records you’ll need to keep. If you’re using social media in any capacity to promote your firm, it’s important to understand what’s required to avoid running afoul of the SEC.
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