Dont Shoot The Messenger

Ads That Actually Work For Financial Advisers

• Chris Ball • Season 1 • Episode 14

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Most financial planners say they want more clients…
…but they’re still relying on referrals, cold calls, and hope.

In this episode, Chris sits down with Alan Turner, Group Marketing Director at Hoxton Wealth, to break down the exact advertising and marketing system that helped the firm scale across the UK, UAE, USA, Australia, and beyond.

They cover:
- Why ads matter now more than ever
- How to structure Top, Middle, and Bottom of Funnel campaigns
- Mistakes financial planners make when targeting
- The truth about ad agencies (and when to use one)
- Why compliance scares people, and how to navigate it
- The “follow-up failure” costing advisers thousands

If you want more volume, more consistency, and predictable growth, this episode gives you a blueprint.


If you want to see what life in Hoxton Wealth is like, please visit: / @hoxtonlife

For more information on Hoxton Wealth careers, please https://www.careers-page.com/hoxtonwealth.com

For my videos by Chris, please visit his Youtube: ⁨@ChrisBallHoxton⁩

SPEAKER_02:

Welcome to Don't Shoot the Messenger. With me, Chris Ball, and today I'm joined by Alan Turner, who heads up our marketing team and is the marketing director for our group, Hoxton Wealth, and has been instrumental in helping us get to speed.

SPEAKER_01:

You know, there aren't that many people who wake up in the morning thinking, oh, do you know what I'm going to do today? I'm going to go and get a will or I'm going to get a pension.

SPEAKER_02:

But it's the indirect part that I most have underestimated, I think, early on, which is how much brand exposure you actually get from your name.

SPEAKER_01:

Almost every gift I bought for everybody last Christmas was a reaction to having seen a post or an advertisement on Instagram or something similar. And this was news to me when we first started. Yeah, where are you getting your where are you getting your revenue from?

SPEAKER_02:

I mean there's insane amounts get spent on these ad platforms now, don't they? You know, Google's revenues are from advertising. If you are working with a a marketer with an agency, then they should be able to guide you with that. You know, spraying and praying as as I probably is probably the best way to put it.

SPEAKER_01:

Where are they where are they spending their time online? Uh what are their behaviours look like?

SPEAKER_02:

Welcome to Don't Shoot the Messenger. Uh with me, Chris Ball, and today I'm joined by Alan Turner, who heads up our marketing team and is the marketing director for our group, Hoxton Wealth, and has been instrumental in helping us get to speed and you know really build out our whole online presence, um, which I would like to think we're pretty well thought of uh and do a great job at. It's a lot of it's an area that a lot of financial planners often ask me about, which is marketing. A lot of people use separate agencies. We went a separate way when we started the business, which was to start this and build this out internally. Uh we chose not to go down the agency route, and we'll get into to why we chose to do that. But really, you know, it's it was a it was a it was a step in the direction for us of the way that the world's been travelling, which is, you know, no longer does just knocking on people's doors or just trying to call people, um, you know, or hope that referrals come in really enable you to, you know, and enable you to get the levels of organic growth that most businesses want. You have to go out there and you have to make sure that not only you're prospecting with your existing clients, but you're also prospecting online because that's you know your uh new storefront. So welcome, Alan, and great to have you on. Yeah, great to be on, mate. Thanks very much for having me on. Looking forward to it. Yeah, me too, mate. I am indeed. So let's let's start off, you know, why um why ads matter now? So maybe you can tell uh tell the viewers, obviously I'm very well versed on your background, but tell you know, tell the people listening what it is that you do for us and you know the the types of things that you've been evolving with us over time.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, so I mean as you as you described at the outset, my role now is uh is a a broader remit of uh of group uh group global marketer, uh director, but I at heart what my expertise is is uh is with the paid channel and the paid media, uh the advertising, which um yeah, when I came to Hoxton, that's obviously what what skills I brought to the table in the first instance. Um and uh and I'd brought that from a couple of previous companies that I've worked at before and a bit of time as an independent as well. Um and what that channel gives you is speed, it gets you to where you where you want to be and need to be at the first at the first rung of a ladder, particularly when you're a startup, particularly when you're a new business. Uh that's where you can get there with real with real speed and start to capture um inquiries, start to capture activity um in as yeah as short a time frame as possible, actually, I would say. Um and I really I came from uh a business development background, yeah, initially, um uh which I enjoyed. I was good at, I was good at prospecting, um and I always, always wanted to embrace ways of doing that in what I would call a white hat fashion. Yeah. Um the company that I joined right at the outset of my career weren't so much engaged in that in that uh type of area, weren't investing into white hat marketing. Um, but I fully firmly believed in that, started off with with sort of networking events um to build up my own inflow of inquiries and prospects. Uh, and then you know I'm I'm that old that I started doing that before really online advertising became a thing. But once it did, I really started to explore that heavily to uh to open up uh an inflow of inquiries in that way, and that's obviously been the direction of travel globally for all industries ever since.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, yeah. I mean, there's insane amounts that get spent on these ad platforms now, don't they? You know, Google's revenues are from advertising, yeah, Meta's revenues are predominantly from advertising, advertising, advertising, advertising. Yeah, you know, it is you know one of the biggest industries, professions in terms of revenue generation on the planet, if not the biggest.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, absolutely. Uh, and our industry, I think, um when I started out, uh, I forget who it was that that that sold me these words, but somebody had these intelligent words of uh financial services products are not bought generally, they are sold en masse. You know, there aren't that many people who wake up in the morning thinking, oh, do you know what I'm gonna do today? I'm gonna go and get a will or I'm gonna get a pension. Yeah, um, they have to be tapped on the shoulder, they have to be told it's a problem, they have to be reminded that they need to do it. Um, and typically uh on a volume basis, um, you know, you're selling that to them, and you're not you're not reacting to their proactive uh inquiry. Um, and that's why, yeah, the the in the advertising space, you have different different ways of capturing those people. There are people out there making those inquiries, there are people out there making um making exploration through search, but um the the the the mass audience, like the tapping the people on the shoulder, the equivalent of you know your guy in Dubai Moore tapping you on the shoulder, asking you about uh the latest De Mac property, um, that's where other channels come in where you can reach people who maybe at that moment aren't thinking about financial products, yeah, but you can you can nudge them in that thought direction.

SPEAKER_02:

And it's also you know, advertising as I see it online is it's you know, you have to be very motivated to get out and walk into an office and go, you know, turn up a reception and go, I need some financial planning today. That's not typically how consumers buy now. Consumers in general buy through something coming up on their phone, seeing an advert on a social media platform, thinking they might need to do something about something and then and then kind of researching it online. So, you know, if you're not online and you're not advertising your services online, yeah, you are doing yourself a you know massive disservice to what you can, you know, to what you can actually do.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, yeah, you're not you're not making yourself accessible. Um that is that is everybody's storefront. Um everybody's obviously making increasingly their buying decisions, as you touched on there in in those online spaces. Um I actually um sort of reflected on my uh buying decisions and my gift buying last Christmas and and realized that almost every gift I bought for everybody last Christmas was a reaction to having seen uh a post or an advertisement on on Instagram or something similar. Um yeah, that's that's where those seeds of interest are implanted. Even if you don't click there and then on that on that buy now, that that purchase button, um it's stored in the memory banks, and then um maybe you go and find that product in a in a physical uh setting later on down the line. But I I firmly believe um that there are far, far fewer people today who just go and browse around a department store looking for ideas. Yeah. Um you go to that store with a with an objective of buying something that you've seen online uh or someone's recommended to you. Um and that that I think is is just the the direction of travel.

SPEAKER_02:

With like a real intention. I suppose like if we kind of relate that back to financial planning, it's you know, people are trying to do a bit more research themselves online, they're trying to do, you know, more um, you know, more self-awareness, build build up their own personal toolkit to then when they talk to someone, be more educated, and you need to be playing in those places. I also think you know, you uh the thing that you raised there, which was interesting as well, is that it's di it's the direct uh impact of actually getting a lead in as a financial planner. So you get someone in who's interested, actually wants to speak to you about your service, who's downloaded a guide about something that you can help them with, which shows they're interested, and then you call them to see if they're if there is an interest, absolutely fantastic. But it's the indirect part that I massively underestimated, I think, early on, which is how much brand exposure you actually get from your name being in front of people all day, every day. You know, I regularly have people say to me, Oh, I've seen your I've seen you online or I've seen you everywhere. Um, and it's probably because they've heard of us, clicked on something, and then the kind of advert follows them around online for a bit and that and they see it, but subconsciously putting into their brain Hoxton, Hoxton, Hoxton, or whatever the name of your financial planning business is, you know, that's that's a real indirect benefit that I peep I think people do massively under, you know, under under under underestimate.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, and I think I think actually people on the inside underestimate that at the outset as well. Because I I would as you've just said about yourself, like in the early days of doing this this work, I was very conversion focused. Yeah. Still am, you know, it's still a numbers game. Um, but at that outset, that's all you really focused on. And if you don't get that instant click and conversion, you you kind of see it as a loss. Yeah. But as you uh as as you your business scales up and and brand awareness and brand visibility uh becomes more of a side objective, um, then yeah, absolutely, then you start to realise the soft impact, the indirect impact that comes from from those ads being out there and and um complementing all the other uh pieces in your marketing mix, content-based stuff um that are doing the same job and across different channels.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, it's um it's also kind of because you've got the you know now more of an online personal brand, people building that up. I know like I've I've started that myself um within uh you know within the financial planning space, trying to get more of a build out more of a personal brand, that side of it. And then you've got obviously the direct marketing online as well. And to me, it's not one or the other. You know, I think you have to do both hand in hand. If obviously you can afford the ad spend, which we'll kind of get on to in a minute, and things to watch out for and and to you know to to look out for when you're when you're doing these things, but it's really um you know, it's it's not one or the other, you should definitely be doing both.

SPEAKER_01:

I I think so. I I definitely think that's true of uh of the financial advisory space or any any professional service or business where you are really relying on the inflow of new new clients, new customers to uh to keep the wheels turning. Um I think depending on your objective um uh as a as a professional, as as uh as a role, um the personal branding part with social media and and doing that organically is great. Um, but let's take LinkedIn as an example. Um, I think LinkedIn, if you are looking at a B2C offer that you're putting out there, so you're looking for new consumer customers. I think it's fair to say a lot of people on LinkedIn are there for put in their professional capacity primarily, they're thinking professional rather than personal. Um, so yes, you're gonna you're gonna get people who who pass by through your uh see your posts, see your content, who may take uh may take the the other personal connotations of that message uh on uh on board and may submit an inquiry. But I think really to reach out to people who are potential customers on a on a volume basis, you're gonna have to step outside of that. And as I'm going back to my point earlier on, you're gonna have to start tapping people on the shoulder. What I see from interacting and speaking with our our uh our personnel is that the interaction with their personal brand often comes after they have made their initial inquiry. Um, you know, our processes, as you obviously well know, uh we get an inquiry come through, the the consumer gets a meeting arranged for them with with one of our experts, uh, and then quite often that's when they go looking up that expert and checking out their personal brand and verifying who they are and what their credentials are. So the two things really do work very well. Yeah, hand in hand for sure.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, it's you can't be doing one or the other. And I think look, so I suppose kind of like what this kind of neatly segues into the next part that we wanted to cover, which was really understanding the funnels and the platforms. So this isn't just going to be us telling you how great online marketing is, we're actually going to try and help you understand a bit more on the marketing process as as we go through. So, you know, that and this was news to me when we first started, but you've obviously got top of the funnel, middle of the funnel, and bottom of the funnel. So top of the funnel is obviously just general awareness, so broad audience, builds visibility, you're trying to get very, you know, a very broad, wide reach and get a lot of people interested who may not be very interested at at that time in what you're doing, but there is kind of some interest, they might be the target market, they might be the target segment that you're going over, but they are not saying, Yes, I want to buy today. Next often, you've kind of got that middle bit which is like the retargeting and nurturing, which you obviously work a lot on, uh, which again is something that a lot of people do. Yeah, they just get a lead if it's not ready to convert at that point, then they bin it, which is obviously not not the way there's gold in them hills, and then obviously you've got the bottom of the funnel, which is highly, highly targeted action-focused campaigns that you know people who are ready to move at that point do. Um, but maybe you could go into a bit more detail on on you know those three top of the funnel, middle of the funnel, and bottom of the funnel, on what when you would use it, why you would use it, and how if you were just starting out now, you would, you know, you you would apply those uh those those things.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, so in a in an online advertising setting, um, let's kind of give give some examples of deployment there. So with uh with the bottom of the funnel, you know, people who are already actively thinking about what they need and and uh you're really looking for a vendor and a solution to that particular problem that they've already identified, yeah, that's where people are are on search engines. They're out there using keywords, they're making very specific inquiries that you can you can match advertising against, uh, and obviously make that messaging extremely, extremely specific against that inquiry. So, so yeah, that's your that that's a bottom of the funnel uh person who's already thinking about what they need. At the top of that funnel, it the online the online way of of operating in that space does make it um more effective and more efficient for you than it would have done in a traditional offline space if you think about the comparison of just putting a billboard somewhere physically and that being available for everyone that passes by versus a display ad on social media, which yes is going quite broad audience-wise, but you can use the tools at your disposal to uh refine that audience to a certain degree, be it age range or be it um geography or be it um you know certain uh interactions and uh groups that they may touch on a on a meta platform, for example. So you can you can bring that up a funnel a little bit down the funnel if you like by uh being a bit more specific about who you're who you're getting that into. But typically you're gonna use that process to get volume, to get volume into your um into your uh into your system, into your funnel. Um the middle part, if you call it nurturing, yeah, very good label to put on it because um using the tools that you've got at your disposal, uh you're able to effectively tag those people that have interacted with your your content pieces, with your ads, uh, through the platform that you've captured them. You can remarket to them directly. Um if they've uh got to a certain point in your uh in your asset funnel, clicked on pages, clicked on links, then there are ways again that you can um that you can follow up with them with um yeah, with re uh responsive and uh retargeting methods through through the ads. Um again. So I think as with everything, those three things working in combination and working in tandem is really what what is needed for an effective effective strategy around it. Um we we target targeted at the bottom end is where we started because we very much offer. We have a very specific offer, a technical offer, and we know very specifically who our demographic is and and particularly the the services we were offering when we first started out, that was definitely the case. Um but actually as we've as we've then become a bigger business and we want volume, then we started to go at that higher end of the funnel uh a little bit more uh and rely on the the engine room we have for retargeting to then convert those people and push them down into the lower end of the funnel, uh if that makes sense.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah. And you kind of touched on the point there as well, which is knowing your audience, which I think is really key as well. Like it's it's no good just you know, spraying and praying, as as I probably uh is probably the best way to put it, uh or maybe not the best way to put it, but um you you you get what I'm saying. So, you know, knowing your audience and knowing your target market, obviously as financial planners, we we think we know who our target market is, but a lot of this is really data-led. Like we are super focused on data and super focused on tracking again, which we'll which we'll touch on in a minute, like how important that is. It's no point in it's it's there's no point in just coming up the creative, you really have to be focused on the on the stats as well and making sure that the data backs backs it up and tracking that. But let's start with knowing your audience. Yeah. So, you know, what are the key points there that people should consider before they start spending loads of money on adverts?

SPEAKER_01:

Well, I mean, you you've got to know who your existing clients are. You start with looking at your existing clients, demographic profiling, segmenting them down, you know, where does the 80-20 rule, right? Yeah, where are you getting your where are you getting your revenue from? Um and then you've got to look at how you can get to those people through what means, through what platforms you can get to those people. What is that, what is that demographic uh doing with their time? Where are they where are they spending their time online? Uh, what are their behaviors look like? Um, certain platforms will, you know, you're not gonna get to 60-year-olds by targeting them on TikTok. Yeah, that's not how it's gonna work. Um, and uh many other platforms you could talk about in different ways around that. Um so that that's actually if you don't know that piece, if you don't understand who your existing clients are, who you have success speaking to, then frankly, yeah, you can't really get started at all uh because you're gonna be spraying and praying, you know, you're gonna be uh just shooting bullets blindly into thin air and just hoping that something is gonna land. Yeah. Um and the internet's a big place. So you're gonna be capturing a lot of people of zero relevance, um, being as specific and niche uh as you possibly can be with the targeting, with the messaging to match that, um, is is how you're gonna start to see success.

SPEAKER_02:

So I think a lot of people worry with that and go, well, what if, you know, what if I might get someone that's out of it? Like, what would you say to that?

SPEAKER_01:

It's it's a psychological challenge that, and even even today, like as a as a marketer, my my default mentality is I want them all. I want all the clicks, I want all the people.

SPEAKER_02:

I want all of the clicks, yeah.

SPEAKER_01:

Because when we have when we have those conversations about um about uh right, let's let's let's change the messaging in this way so that we we don't get those people, the people that we don't want. And I I'm often like, well, well, let's get them anyway, and you know, and and uh and then let's see what we can explore and what we might be able to get out of them. But but it's um yeah, as you say, it's um it's it it can't be a case of all right, let's get a hundred people and hope that one person is is the right match, um, because you're gonna get apathy, you're gonna get fatigue very, very quickly um in your expenditure, um, in your uh trust in the process. And if you are getting people as far as actually making an inquiry, then any follow-up, you're gonna very quickly start to get fatigue around, well, hang on a second, you know, there's another conversation, there's another conversation, then they're all you know, they're all not getting anywhere.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah. Yeah, it's um it it does burn out the people that you have, the setters, the business development managers, the coordinators, whatever you want to call uh the people that are actually calling the leads, if they're not calling people that have any, that have no interest in what you're doing or or actually know why you're calling in the first place.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, and and on the creative side, I mean if you don't know, if if you don't know who you're targeting, then your creative by default is gonna be very generic and very you know very unspecific as well, um, which is gonna make your campaign even less effective. Yeah. Um, because you're just gonna have something out there that says, you know, I'm John, I do this, yeah, and and no one's gonna stop and look at that.

SPEAKER_02:

And that's it, and great ads start with knowing who your client is, understanding the problems they face, and then building the creative around that, don't they? Being noticeable, yeah.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, that that's a that's a big a big piece in today, uh, in today's world, I think people are able to get something up and online and created so quickly. Yeah. Um it's a very busy space, it's a very fast moving space. Your ad has to be noticeable, it has to it has to stick out. Um I uh I was actually I'll tell you this, I was actually I was listening to a podcast during the week, a really interesting one with uh David Droga, who used to be at Saarchi and Saatchi Um in Asia, and um they did a study around uh the effectiveness of of ads online, create different creatives, um, and they compared a video of cows eating grass with a selection of ads that were online, and they discovered that the cows eating grass was more interesting to more than 50% of the audience than the ads um than the ads that they selected online. Um and the reasons they the reasons they came to as far as conclusion was that over time everything just goes to a neutral point, everything just everyone gravitates towards what is the norm. Um increasingly all ads about cars pretty much look the same, all ads about banks pretty much look the same, and over time the audience tends to sort of gloss over that. Um I think with AI and things like that, there's a danger that just everything gets looking the same because everyone's using the same tools, right?

SPEAKER_02:

So everyone looking the same, and I've noticed definitely noticed that of AI now, especially on social media, is everyone's posts sound the same. Like that you can there's a pattern to it, there's a question at the end or whatever. Like you can I don't know about you, but I can very easily tell what has been written by someone and what has been you know what is actually done by AI.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, 100%. And um and yeah, the the skill, the the expertise that you have as a professional um can really be diluted, can really be be lessened if you're you know if you're not telling that story yourself and using your own voice. Um also I think it gives, you know, kind of flip it on his head.

SPEAKER_02:

I also think it gives people a chance to shine through with real creative as well, because that like when you see something that isn't, I actually want to read more on it now. Yeah. Like it's it's weird it's had the uh other effect, you know, like because there's so much stuff out there now, a lot more noise. Actually, when I can see that something is like creatively really pleasing, or I can see that it hasn't been made but with AI, I'm actually much more likely to read it. Yeah. Um weirdly enough. And I think the other thing as well that that's key is is that obviously within what we do, a lot of the tar, you know, a lot of our target market is particularly, you know, is not you know 15 to 15 to 25. Our target market is probably 40 years uh and above. You know, the income ranges that we're looking at are people either in accumulation to have disposable funds or you know, or near retirement and they're looking now for what to do with that. So it is being it is being super, super and I mean that's not super super targeted. You can be even more targeted on postcodes, on zip codes, on country, on all the other bits and pieces that that that you go into and run different um different different ways. But also what I think's really interesting about these tools now is is that you can actually upload a copy of essentially your client base, and then it will start profiling out people like that for you as well, so finding more of your target audience.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, yeah, the tool the tools are evolving all the time and and the the targeting capabilities are evolving all the time, sometimes not for the better, I have to say. Um, yeah, that the yeah, the the the evolution of it though, if I think about when I started out, and really your your best way of profile targeting was to try and second guess the websites that those people would be would be inhibiting. Uh social media was much less uh universally used as it was today, so you're relying really on the Google ad network at that point in time. So you're trying to second guess who your 40 plus professionals um are following online as far as websites, what websites they're reading for their news, their sport, and all that sort of stuff. Um and that's that's the game that I was playing early doors. But but yeah, with with the advent of um sort of Facebook ads now, meta ads, um Google has evolution um sorry, evolved over time. Um, you know, the the targeting options that they have alongside it, so you can delve much more into what they perceive to be the interests of the audience, um, what's obviously their demographic uh profiling, um, and they base that around the data that they're gathering, which as we know is is huge. Yeah. Um so they're able to give pretty solid um sort of profile matches. Profile matches.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, it's it's very difficult to um it's very you know, you can't compete against that, can you really? I mean it's it's super super targeted.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, and the the the the profile um yeah, the list match targeting that you mentioned mentioned, I find I find really interesting as well. Um I think you you have to be very trusting in the algorithms that the platforms have and the data set that they have to go for that in high volumes. Uh, we've had success with it over over time. Um but yeah, the the the theory is you know, you as you say you've got your client list or prospect list or um yeah, inquiries, people that you've captured, you can upload their their details to a certain point, uh, and then Meta or Google or whatever the platform is going to be is going to try and locate um as close a match uh as possible to more people who look like that, like that, that person. Um it's it's a tactic you have to be careful with because if if what you want them to match against doesn't fall outside um criteria that they can that they will allow you to not ordinarily target, example being nationality, uh, which isn't something that Google will allow you to specifically target against or can. Um so if you are saying to that person, right, find more people who look like this group of um of clients that I've got in my client bank, if those, if those clients happen to all be uh Americans that work in the tech sector, um Google isn't necessarily going to know that. Google's gonna know what websites they go to and it'll find other people that have gone to that websites who might be Japanese people, yeah, or whatever. Um so but it's it's a game as a lot of these things are.

SPEAKER_02:

And again, so you know, like whether or not you're looking to do this on your own or whether or not you're looking to do this for an agency, it's really important that you start with this because this is gonna be the first thing that an agency or uh you know or you would need to really look at before you go on. Yeah. So let's get on to that topic then of DIY versus agency. So, you know, many marketing agencies say that you can do ads, but you know, there are a lot, hell of a lot of marketing agencies out there, and there's obviously a clear reason for that, is it's very low barrier to entry to get into, um, you know, there's not huge setup, you basically just need a computer and then a bit of an online presence, and you can you can kind of get going and start billing yourself as a marketing agency. But we all know that it's not a um it's not a free thing, you you know, it's not a free resource. A marketing agency is gonna charge you. So at what point would it make sense to use a marketing agency versus doing it yourself? Like kind of what ad spend would you say? Um, you know, that's another important one, which is how much do you think people really need to spend on adverts to generate, you know, decent traffic and how many leads would you, you know, that would be the keys. Well, if I'm gonna spend this much, how much do I expect as financial advisors? We're very analytical. We want to know, you know, if I do this, will I get this? Yeah. Um so you know, I think people would be keen to hear that as well.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, so we talked about understanding your client, understanding your your business model and how that works is is really important as well. Um so conversations I have with with professionals in this space will start with um we're talking about right, what are your objectives here? What's going to constitute success? Um, how many meetings are you expecting to create from this activity? How many prospects do you want to be speaking to per week, per month? Um, and also what value do they place on on a meeting? Do they have a do they have their head around like what what price are you willing to pay um for a meeting in your diary or or for a new client? And then you can then you can work from there as far as uh where their tolerance is for spend and where where their business model aligns with that. I think you know if if you think about the funnel that happens within the business once that lead has been captured, so the the sales funnel, if you like, um then you know you're gonna be looking at really trying to to capture, you know, to create one meeting for yourself. You're looking at something like half a dozen inbound inquiries. If they're quality inbound inquiries, uh people that are ready to enter into a meaningful conversation and start to progress. So then you're gonna be looking at trying to figure out, well, okay, with the people that I sit in front of and have a have a first meeting with, how many of those realistically do I end up turning into clients? Maybe it's one in two, maybe it's one in three. And then again you work back from there and multiply to understand what sort of traffic you've got to generate, what sort of impression rate you've got to generate and and there that gives you what sort of spend you're going to look at. I mean typically you know if you're going to meaningfully enter this space then you're going to be looking at probably thousands of pounds on a monthly basis you know rather than rather than anything lower than that, I would say. Because you know if you're not committing to it to a volume uh level that you know is going to get you meaningful volume and enable you to make conclusions about the quality and about the the the conversion points around it it's going to take you a very long time to get there. And 12 months later you're going to have not really sat enough meetings or have captured enough people to really understand whether it's actually working or not and it's sort of going to stretch out the whole process which is long enough as it is right in financial services that buying process takes a long time when we first sat down when I joined the business yeah I had that conversation with you I'm like look I'm gonna be asking you to spend money we're probably not going to derive any revenue for at least six months into the process. I need you to trust me and be ready for that. Yeah um and that's that's that's the same if you're a one man show um and doing the same thing.

SPEAKER_02:

And I think that's that's important because a lot of people go right well I can turn the leads on today automatically I'm gonna expect revenue tomorrow and it does take time to figure it out tune it and tweak it doesn't it? Yeah. And actually I think a big leg up on that is if you are looking to use let's say an agency one of the questions you should ask them is is have they worked with a financial planning business before? Because if they haven't they're going to be learning this as well. It's not they might understand the adverts and you know be a bit ahead of you on that but they don't understand your professional your field.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah it it there's so many nuances in financial services and a lot of it is is down to human um human psychology which you know you build up an understanding of over time in speaking to to clients directly and and how that how that consumer brain is working as they go through the process. As you rightly say an agency that's not worked in that space uh for clients in that space is um is going to find it quite difficult to get there very quickly as far as their understanding I'd actually say you know to to look upon um my career as a professional that's where I've been able to to carve out a place for myself is the fact that as a qualified advisor and and a and a marketer you know that that mix has been good for me on an in-house basis. There are agencies out there that you know that that specialise in in the space and do a good job of it but I think yeah you you said earlier on and you're right there are a lot of digital marketers out there are a lot of agencies out there and just grabbing any any any agency any marketer and saying hey can you get some leads going for me you've got to do your homework on what they've done before once clients if they've been working with fitness trainers then you know that's not really going to be the no they're not really gonna they're not really gonna get what you need to do and where you need to go.

SPEAKER_02:

So it's super important in in that fight and obviously that's quite a unique skill set as well market the marketing side and the financial planning side that's not something that you know lots and lots of marketing agencies uh you know typically have so it is really really worthwhile taking your time and making sure that you pick it because a lot of these guys it'll be a retainer from the get go you know for you know for an average agency you're probably looking at a couple of grand at least for a just an agency it could be ten grand a month for their cost then you've got to spend your adverts advertising money on top.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah exactly if you're spending yeah exactly a couple of grand on the engagement um with the agency in the first place you're gonna have to at least double that to justify yeah to justify the uh the return on the ad spend because yeah otherwise your cost per lead is just amplified by the fact that if you're paying£500 in ad spend and and and£2,000 in addition just for their time then basically you're multiplying your cost by lead by cost per lead by five um and your economies of scale are going to be terrible. So yeah that it it's depending on the person right there are people who will um there are people I've seen who play at it themselves and try and test out their ideas if they see seeds that their ideas are working then it becomes a it becomes a um a capacity and uh you know a time commitment point of view from from their perspective if you're a financial advisor you shouldn't be spending 40% of your working week running ads on Facebook. No probably not yeah so but having a player there understanding you know whether you've got the right ideas in in play I think there's nothing wrong with that and then once you have a cleaner idea of what you want to do reaching out to a party that knows what they're doing to deploy that for you on a bigger scale is is uh is probably the way to go.

SPEAKER_02:

The other thing that financial advisors I think uh will struggle with when they do uh advertising as well especially themselves is is how direct you need to be with the messaging so crafting that as financial planners it's quite especially in the UK I notice it less in the US but more in the UK it's you have to obviously have to be very compliant which is a given and people are constantly worried about being very direct with people whereas actually the best adverts and the bet or the best converting adverts let's put it that way are normally the most direct and will get you the best quality leads because they are honing in on a problem that the client has just putting an advert out there for a generic financial plan. I mean I don't know many people that get out of bed on a daily basis and go, oh do you know what I really need to uh I really need to get my financial plan sorted today. But what they do get out of is is I'm really worried that if something happens to me I might need to get a will in place or I'm really I'm really worried that I don't have enough insurance if if my income was to dry up or I'm really worried that I don't know where 10 of my pensions are now. Yeah. You know actually you know trying to understand the worry which isn't a financial plan. A financial plan helps you understand the client's needs and put them on the right direction for sure but that's not what you would typically advertise for. And people will probably say to me well you know that you you know that I'd completely disagree with that. And I and I and I do understand that you should try and lead with a financial plan but that is not what motivates people to take action.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah yeah I think so the the messaging part I think is really is is really interesting and really key um whenever I think about that I there's a visual that pops into my head and actually if I think about when I arrived here earlier on you step out step out of the lift and you're looking around and there's a load of doors in front of you and you're trying to figure out which door you're supposed to go in. Yeah no one's telling me which door it is I I walked around and went to five different doors before I got to the right door for this studio. Now you're just increasing your possibility of losing that person and then giving up on the task in hand. If you're only giving the person one door to walk through and that's the door that you think they should be walking through then that's the way to do it. They're going to make a beeline for that door open it and walk in and then have that conversation which is great. But I think too often people go down a route of almost too soft and too vague too vague. Let's take them to this page let's let's let them have a look around let's uh see what they want to what they want to explore uh maybe there's something here maybe there's something to download maybe there's uh links here to other pages uh maybe there's a video over here um the person's gonna get to that page and just be in a state of flux right what does this person want me to do? Yeah um and you know the the cleaner it is um click here to learn about this this thing which is a solution to this problem which we think you have um you go to that page that message is amplified they've got a bit of more explaining content around you know around what that solution might be and what they might want to explore um and then it's either download something or or give them a point of conversion to just get to the next stage with that process whether it's a conversation whether it's um you know accessing a content piece or whatever I firmly believe in that you know linear linear funnel yeah um and uh not giving people the opportunity to deviate off into parts you don't want them to go down definitely I mean it's create the hook give them the value and then make sure that you do the follow up and the last bit I mean everyone gets online advertising so we you touched on it before but everyone gets the you know you need to be out there and that's obviously why you're listening to it like I need to advertise and then they get the need that they need to create something of value and it doesn't you know it doesn't have to be war and peace but it should be something that someone picks up and goes oh actually they made a lot of sense with that or you know it help or it you know help them understand their problem more but they really need to speak with you to you know to to take the next step it's kind of is it's quite generic obviously it wouldn't be personalised advice and we'll get onto the compliance part of that in a minute but the bit that pe I see people really fall down on is is they get this lead in and then well you you can tell the story when you came in to us initially but you know they just weren't getting called as quick enough and that logistical step of actually they reckon that you should call a lead when it comes in within the first five minutes that is when you have the biggest uptake after that it gradually decreases.

SPEAKER_02:

If you're calling a lead three days later after they've made a you know comment on your website that's too late.

SPEAKER_01:

Way too late way too late and you're you're you're battling with human inertia all the time here right and yeah and you know when you've dealt with clients you know that you've got to constantly keep nudging them along because you know their their lives are going on and they're getting distracted by all sorts of things and and you know not continuing to think about this solution that you're discussing with them and that they really really need and that's what you're battling with uh the the the whole way through so if you just if you're capturing leads um and then at that point just say right okay yeah well hopefully they'll follow up yeah I'm sorry that's just they're just not gonna do that. They're gonna yeah their their kids need new shoes they yeah they've got other things to think about um so yeah that follow-up is so so important and I think it comes back it's the same it's the same problem I think really as the messaging piece because I think there's a mindset of almost like it's almost an apologetic or or too defensive oh yeah I can't really call these people you know but they've inquired they've come to you they've walked into your shop um providing you've you know you've utilised all the right um you know the right the right text and the right explainers of right if when you come through this form this is what's going to happen next yeah as long as you've explicitly you know left it out there in terms of what they can expect to happen then call them straight away.

SPEAKER_02:

100% call them straight away and follow up follow up follow up yeah like if someone tells you you followed up too much in my view you've probably done it enough. Yeah you know I know that sounds kind of you know I know that sounds kind of a bit uh you know it's until someone says no go away I'm not interested that you should keep following up with that person and I think in life too many times now we're too nice it's too too worried about oh well will this person think about this or this person think about that and actually it's just normally life gets in the way it's normally a false emotion appearing real and that false emotion is is you are saying that they're thinking one thing oh you know this guy's too much when really they're not they're just busy with life yeah it's the most important thing for you to call that lead it is not the prospect's most important thing for them to answer. So therefore you have to heighten it and raise it with their you know in in their importance and you're doing in my view you're doing them a disservice if you don't if you don't if they've inquired about something and then you just let it go then surely someone has said that they need your help or expressed the need of help and then you're just not giving them the help that they need.

SPEAKER_01:

Absolutely I think I think I think that hits the name on the head you know you're you're essentially dealing with somebody that somebody that directly or indirectly has put their hand up and asked for some help. It's a cry for help about a problem that they've got by nature they are going to continue to try and bury their head in in the sand about that problem. Yeah you know it's it's the personal trainer like nagging you right you've you've got to do these reps you've got to keep you know you've got to keep going if you want the physique if you want the if you want the uh the health that the health the healthy body that you you crave um if you want financial independence it isn't gonna happen um unless you follow up on this um yeah on this interest you've declared and we sit down and go through it and and follow up um if you're a doctor if you're a lawyer you know these are these are services that you know that that people have to be followed up on and be chased on to make sure that they go the full ten yards. Yeah um and you you describe it very right I think you're doing a disservice to the prospect that's come to you in the first instance if you treat that very softly and say all right yeah I can tell you need some help but I'll leave it with you. Yeah. Yeah which is not very helpful to that person. They probably already put it off for about 10 years before they before they summoned up the bravery to actually knock on your door in the first place. Exactly you're you're pushing it down the line yeah and I think that another thing we'd look let's just kind of touch on it while while we while while we can um is uh compliance so obviously we all operate in a regulated environment if you're giving financial advice globally you will have to be regulated no matter where you are be that by the SEC in the US be that by the FCA in the UK ESCA DFSA ADGM whoever it is here um you know like you you would have to be um you you have to be properly regulated yeah now obviously there's rules around promotion and uh you know and what you can say and what you can't say how do you ensure that the adverts uh and that the messaging that we put out is compliant for those financial promotions well we have we have incredibly uh rigid processes around that now as a business we we have to for all the reasons that you've you've cited there um so the way we structure it um is that we have a we have a weekly um compliance uh roundtable meeting which is co-chaired by myself and our our group head of compliance all of the the the content pieces whether it's actually from for advertising or for other channels will have been submitted into that committee in the in the course of the the prior seven days uh we've got all the regional heads of compliance on that panel um that's their chance to raise any concerns or any recommended changes to what we put in front of them um and then we you insert those into a round of edits um and move forward um we've been doing that now for for two to three years and what we found is that as a department we've become way more uh wise and understanding of what those requirements look like um and had a much much more cohesive relationship with compliance um so that we've been able to make sure that most of our what we want is things to just sell through that sign off process right and and uh we've worked hand in hand in compliance to get it as close to that as possible um today we're also yeah we're also using smart tools um to you know intelligently scan our content pieces uh before we even get it to the compliance committee which is great yeah exactly to try and raise any flags within our department you know before we before we push it through um I I I find that you know very disruptive um or I did find it very disruptive early on I think the the the relationship between marketing and compliance is is going to be a very very sort of fractured one at the beginning because you look it's it's our job to create things that people are are going to react to uh which naturally is going to toe the line to what a regulator says that they want you to say yeah um and um but over time you realise just how important that is and that that you can't um take any risks with yeah with um within that space and I think you know as we as we're talking as we are today to people who might be uh potentially thinking about doing this I think that's a really really heavy message to take on board back to the agency part if you're dealing with an agency that doesn't understand how a financial regulator is going to treat and look upon uh your your ads um then you're immediately taking quite a big risk it's not like selling shoes or gas ovens you know um it's uh there are very very tight controls around what type of messaging and and and and how you can display it.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah I think that that's it's not a reason not to do it it's you just make need to make sure that you really take these things you know you you take these things seriously because it will you will come a proper because the regulators globally do look at this stuff and they and they do want to make sure that that that you are doing it. But it definitely shouldn't deter you because also it's another barrier to entry it means that a lot of people will be deterred and they won't want to do it because of that reason. So therefore there's more opportunity to you is is generally how I how I see it. Another thing that I fight I think people also do is they don't give these things long enough. Like they they they start them and then they stop them very very quickly. So we get that compliance get you know it's not compliance getting in the way it's being scared of what you can say and what you can't say so therefore you do nothing.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah um and then you've got the other six which is I've tried it didn't work for me within the first week therefore I'm turning off yeah yeah it's it's that um it's that commitment again to spending a bit of money to uh sticking with the process for a period of time uh being consistent how many times we talk about you know with various things around our business you've got to be consistent with things um and yeah because because in financial services the turnaround to purchase can be so long if you bail out on that process of filling the funnel up then all you're gonna do is just go in a in a sort of state of flux in a in a cycle because if you you generate leads for a month and you think to yourself right I'm gonna stop spending more money I'm gonna see what's going to happen to those leads um and then make decisions around whether I'm gonna spend any more well that might take you five or six months to actually turn any of those initial leads into a client. In the meantime five months have passed where you haven't pulled anyone else into your funnel so you're gonna be starting from ground zero again at uh the six month mark having converted your first client which means that your second client's not going to come until another six months down the line and you're never going to get any momentum um moving through. So it's it's about entering into it with your eyes open and realizing okay right I'm not it's not about me deciding to spend some money in month one and then deciding whether or not to continue. You've got to commit to minimum a six month investment into it to make conclusions around whether it's uh whether it's working for you, whether it's delivering 100% yeah yeah it's not something you can turn on or turn on or turn off um you will fail if you do it that way. I I went through a period where um where I was working independently with an array of advisors across Europe you know generating uh inquiries for them uh on an independent basis and that was the that was the the dominant frustration for me with working with those guys is that consistently it was like I'll spend a few hundred quid here I'll spend a few hundred quid there stop and start stop and start and they didn't get the results yeah but most cases because they weren't um prepared to enter into it onto a consistent basis it's that long term mindset with it isn't it that this is going to be something that we're gonna do for the long term you either choose to do it or not knowing that it is going to cost money initially it is an investment.

SPEAKER_02:

You know you're gonna I've said that wrong it is it's an investment it's not a cost and that's how you have to see it that's the mindset that you have to have with it.

SPEAKER_01:

What are some of the other challenges and lessons that you uh that you've kind of learned from your time from doing this then as well um I think I think platform selection um is is a big one um I think that it takes this back a little bit to the your understanding who your audience are and so forth but if you get that wrong um and and don't understand how the differences between the platforms um are then you know that's going to be a real problem and I think if you are working with a a marketer with an agency then they should be able to guide you with that um but yeah if you if you're looking to um if you're looking to approach people who are of a professional standing then obviously you look at LinkedIn perhaps as a as a potential platform. If you look at people of a middle age range then you know typically today those people are on the the meta platform or they're on or they're watching videos on YouTube and and and so on.

SPEAKER_02:

And and yeah that if you get that wrong if you don't have the right uh creative and the right um style of uh offer for the right platform um showing static ads on a video based platform is not going to work um that these are things that there's so many layers to put in a campaign together um it definitely isn't a case of right I've got got one ad I'm gonna bash that out on four platforms and it's gonna work everywhere absolutely not when we create one one campaign we we're probably creating upwards of 18 to 20 different varieties of that single uh creative message so that we can be sure of having uh an effective version of that message to go on different positioning across different platforms um so I think yeah so I think that's uh I think that's a a mistake that some people will make at the outset um I also think that um trying to go too broad like consciously trying to go too broad um is a a a very common mistake it's like all right let's let's just let's just put ads out and uh and and uh I don't really mind where they are in the world I don't really mind whether they're male or female I don't really mind you know how old they are well you know that's helping nobody basically not at the not at the consumer end or at the advertiser end um you're just not you're just gonna not gonna match anything with anything basically at all um but typically with somebody who isn't experienced in the space that's gonna be their default that's that's gonna be their default it's you know it's the equivalent of you know sticking a flyer on a lamppost um and just hoping that the right person's gonna walk past yeah um so I think that's probably the most common error I would say it's uh it is definitely uh an interesting uh an interesting one and look and and the other one obviously compliance which we've covered as well which is uh you know which is key but look I think you know on the we'll kind of end on that note now but that was a really interesting chat uh Alan thanks very much for for your time and and hopefully uh people listening you've learned a bit more about what it takes in terms of being able to you know use adverts within your business and help you scale that ads are the single fastest way to a scale as a financial advisor whether you own your own business or whether you're just doing it for yourself today they don't replace relationships but they help you accelerate them through um so if you're investing in visibility or if you're not investing in visibility you're really losing the ground um on on what others are are doing as well I'd you know massively encourage you to really look at this seriously if you're keen on organically growing your business. I hope that was use uh and thanks very much and hit like and subscribe if you enjoyed the video thanks very much