In the fast-paced world of financial advising, every conversation counts. Here are five essential reminders for anyone looking to make a meaningful impact in discussions with financial advisors.
Throughout our years of working with both investment providers and wealth management firms on their marketing and communication initiatives, we’ve had the benefit of speaking with scores of financial advisors across all channels.
What We’ve Learned from Interactions with Financial Advisors
Regardless of the topic, whether it’s about a new product, brand awareness, financial market activity, or client relationships, we like to inquire about financial advisor experiences with the investment provider relationship teams they engage with.
We all know how difficult it is to get their attention.
While 1 in 5 advisors surveyed by YCharts in 2022 agreed that wholesalers play a significant role in their success, 65% of advisors they surveyed only meet with 1 to 5 trusted wholesalers each year.
That’s a tough group to break into.
Understanding Your Audience
From a marketer’s perspective, we want to understand:
- Financial advisors’ preferred methods of communicating
- Which emails they read (and calls they tend to take)
- What they look for in conversations with providers and partners
According to the results YCharts found, some of the top “roles” wholesalers are expected to be include:
- Educators on investment products (76% of advisors surveyed)
- Deliverers of insights on market and industry trends (67%)
- Providers of quality client support (53%)
- Facilitators of access to portfolio managers (44%)
Obviously, much of this comes back to the conversations between wholesalers and financial advisors.
The Importance of Listening
Below are some of the things we repeatedly hear in the conversations we’ve had with financial advisors. While this information is not new, think of it as a reminder of the best practices we should strive to follow when communicating with financial advisors.
- Listen first. Advisors want to know how you can help them solve a problem. Tailor your conversation to their interests, questions, and needs.
- Be informative and valuable. Advisors are inundated with information and have a lot to keep up with. They look to interactions with you to give them information of value.
- Be there in the good and bad. While they obviously prefer positive times, they also respect the harder conversations in the tough times. They want to be informed so they can share the right information with their clients.
- Know your solutions (and the competition’s). They want to understand the comparisons and contrasts between your solutions and the other solutions available to them. According to the YCharts study, advisors want experts who can speak to their own firm’s products as well as the competition’s. They also want to know how the strategies fit with the market environment, what the firm’s top researchers are saying, and what economic data is being followed.
- Give them something to share. Advisors want concise, client-ready stories and examples that help them communicate with their clients.
Maximizing Time with Financial Advisors
We gain valuable insights from our conversations with financial advisors.
Although it can be challenging to connect with them as they juggle multiple roles and schedules around serving clients, growing their practices, and assisting colleagues, we should strive to be part of their information pipeline. It’s important to be present and prepared for each conversation.
Working on a marketing initiative that could use some advisor input? Reach out—we’d be happy to help you shape your conversation and interview questions.
