Proactive advisors understand the importance of a strong referral marketing strategy. Referrals are a good indicator of trust and a mark of how well you’re doing your job in serving your clients. Getting your existing clients to refer friends, family members or colleagues to you is a cost-effective way to acquire new leads. Let’s look at how to make referral marketing for financial advisors work for you.
Do you want to simplify your marketing efforts? SmartAsset AMP uses a holistic approach to help you fuel growth.
5 Effective Referral Marketing Ideas for Financial Advisors
Your referral marketing plan may look different from another advisor’s. But what matters most is choosing to incorporate the strategies that are the most effective for you and your firm’s unique situation. With that in mind, here are some proven ways to ramp up your referral traffic.
1. Focus on Client Experience
Organic referrals happen when your clients are so overwhelmingly satisfied or impressed with your services that they’re eager to tell others about you. In other words, you need to give your existing clients a reason to refer you.
How can you do that? Here are some ideas:
- Talk to your clients about what you do so they fully understand how your client service model works and why it works to help them achieve their goals.
- Aim to surprise and delight clients by anticipating their needs or offering the unexpected. For instance, offering a secure account portal or dashboard shows your clients that you’re committed to transparency and keeping them connected to their portfolios.
- Respond promptly to client communications and don’t make them chase you down for answers. Develop a written communication plan and share it with your team. This can help ensure that everyone is on the same page and aware of your expectations.
- Show your appreciation by hosting special client events, sending personalized greeting cards or birthday cards, or offering small holiday gifts. Be sure to review compliance rules for these activities beforehand.
And remember that you can always ask your clients what they’d like from you. Sharing an anonymous client experience survey allows them to tell you what they like most (or least) about your business.
2. Ask for Referrals
While you may prefer to generate referrals naturally, there’s nothing wrong with asking clients directly. You can always inquire if they know someone who might benefit from your services. Timing matters, of course, and you want to word your request in a way that doesn’t come off as desperate or pitchy.
Listening to cues in the conversation can help you gauge how to frame a referral request. For example, say you’re meeting with a married couple in their 50s. They mention that their oldest child has recently tied the knot themselves. You might offer to meet with the newlyweds and answer any questions they might have about merging their finances.
You can also include referral requests in the closing of email communications you send to clients. This kind of request lets your client know that you’re available to help someone they know if needed, without putting them on the spot.
3. Build Your Network
Strategic partnerships and collaborations are an often underutilized form of referral marketing for financial advisors. Branching out your network can allow you to tap into a broader pool of investors who may be looking for an advisor to work with.
For example, you might connect with local estate planning attorneys, CPAs or business owners. You can refer your clients to these individuals if they need help with services that are outside the scope of what you offer. They, in turn, can send referrals your way when they encounter someone who needs the services of a professional advisor.
Online collaborations can help you extend your reach and potentially garner more referrals if you’re partnering with others who also serve your target audience. For example, you might guest on a financial podcast that caters to your ideal client type. The podcast host might encourage their listeners to visit your financial advisor website to learn more about what you do, which is another form of referral traffic.
4. Consider a Referral Program
Creating a formal referral program is another pathway you might consider if you’d like to get more leads for business. Referral programs offer some type of benefit or incentive to clients for each person they refer. There are two keys to making this work:
- Delivering service that encourages your clients to refer others to you (see tip No. 1)
- Offering an incentive that your clients will actually want
Examples of incentives you might offer include gift cards, discounted services, access to exclusive services or resources, small gifts, or donations to the client’s favorite charity. Researching referral programs offered by competitor advisors can give you some ideas for how to structure your program.
It may be helpful to survey your clients to get a sense of how a referral program might be received. If it doesn’t generate much interest, that could indicate that the incentives aren’t sufficient, or your clients don’t feel they have enough of a reason to refer you.
5. Expand Your Digital Footprint
More than ever, investors are searching online to find financial advice. If you don’t have an established digital footprint, you could miss out on some serious referral traffic.
Some of the basic elements of a digital marketing plan include:
- A well-designed, user-friendly website that employs search engine optimization (SEO) tactics
- Social media accounts that feature a consistent brand identity
- An email marketing list
Digital ads may also be part of your marketing plan. How do these things help you earn more referrals? When you actively use them to build an audience of loyal followers, those followers may in turn refer other people they know to your business.
If you don’t have a digital marketing plan yet, it’s time to create one. Consider whether it makes sense to partner with an advisor marketing platform if you’re trying to gain traction in the online space. This can be an effective way to generate qualified leads who are ready to close the deal.
Bottom Line
There’s no single approach to referral marketing for financial advisors. You might use a combination of methods to level up your referral game. Experimenting with some of the ideas and tips shared here can help you identify your best sources for referral traffic, specifically which ones you should be nurturing.
Tips for Growing Your Advisory Business
- Deciding how much money and time to spend on marketing is challenging, and you may feel stretched in either direction. If it’s time that you need more of, SmartAsset AMP can help you streamline your marketing efforts. This holistic platform is designed with growth-focused advisors in mind. Schedule a demo to learn how you can leverage it to find leads.
- As you approach marketing and referrals, consider the compliance implications. Registered investment advisors (RIAs) are subject to regulatory rules that govern what you can and can’t do concerning marketing. Reviewing compliance guidelines, including the SEC’s marketing rule, can ensure that you’re using the right approach.
Photo credit: ©iStock.com/Jirapong Manustrong, ©iStock.com/David Gyung, ©iStock.com/courtneyk