Jorge's Thoughts: Innovate Your Marketing with Direct Mail

Of all the marketing vehicles, direct mail marketing gives you the most opportunities to specifically target your ideal prospect, to be innovative and to be more personal. 

From new technology in printing to the delivery of fresh ideas in messaging to the ability of addressing your prospects in a creative and personalized manner, direct mail allows you to drive response and drive engagement with your most ideal audience in a way that can powerfully impact your business.  

Here's how:  

1. Personalization:  Personalized mail stands out and gets attention. For your target audience to receive a direct mail piece from you shows that you have taken the time to deliver a customized message based on their potential needs. 

Additionally, 73% of American consumers said they prefer direct mail and 62% said they enjoy checking their mailbox. Give your target audience not only something to look forward to but also something that is personalized and will help you develop an initial impression.  

2. Packaging:  Direct mail response rates are higher than all digital media. Before your prospects respond to your direct mail, they first have to open it. You've got a small window of time to make that happen: 5-7 seconds. Make sure you stand out in the mailbox with creative packaging. 

Maximize response by using the latest print and imaging innovations to create the best looking and highest impact invitation in the mailbox. Take advantage of live stamping, handwritten fonts, full color graphics, odd size envelopes and other techniques that will help you avoid that dreaded look of junk mail. 

Pro tip: Postcards are for coupons and local general advertisers. All important and personal mail comes in envelopes; just ask Hallmark! 


3. Digital components:  Digital vehicles on their own may not generate enough response to keep you interested. You are targeting that guarded 50+ age group who still like traditional media, so you will need to reach with a mix of personalized direct mail, TV , radio, social media and internet ads. That approach will cover more ground, expand your message and give you more reach - what we call “critical mass” in the marketing world. It’s a combination of all or some of these that gives you maximized exposure, more opportunities to generate a higher response and stand above your competitors.

I've created a series of podcasts on this and other marketing tips to help you reach your target audiences. If you have suggestions for topics you'd like for me to cover via this type of content (or any type of content), tweet me at @JorgeVillarRME! 

By: Jorge Villar, President and Founder 

#howdoyouinnovate

Jorge's Thoughts: Add Digital Marketing to Your Prospecting Efforts

77 million. 

That's how many baby boomers reside in the United States today, a powerful generation that makes up a significant part of financial advisors' target audiences. 

While it is easy to lump boomers into one large category, it is crucial for today's advisors to realize that boomers have diverse concerns and needs and respond differently to various types of marketing. Just as crucial? For advisors to understand how boomers respond to today's digital marketing strategies.

1. Select the appropriate social media channels. 

Not every social channel will be an effective avenue to market your brand to boomers. Consider the needs and concerns of the boomer audience that you want to target as well as how the sector(s) of your targeted audience use social channels. For instance, 70% of online boomers actively use their Facebook accounts, but only 39% of them actively use their Google+ accounts. 

2. Use visual content. 

There is no doubt that visual content grabs attention, but what does that mean for your digital marketing? By creating and distributing pictures and videos, your content will more than likely earn more interactions and drive more engagement, which can earn you more leads and more referrals. For instance, visual content on Pinterest generates more referral traffic for businesses than Google+, YouTube and LinkedIn combined, and consumers who watch videos about a product are 85% more likely to make a purchase. 

3. Provide an omnichannel experience. 

Social media channels and other digital marketing avenues can be effective ways to begin conversations with future clients, but an omnichannel experience can help you seal the deal. 41% of those aged 55 and over who are online prefer to talk to someone on the phone before making a purchase. Include your phone number - as well as other contact information such as as email address and social media links - on your digital marketing materials. Each point of contact should be able to provide prompt and clear answers about your target audience's needs and concerns. 

Adding digital marketing to your prospecting efforts should be a critical part of your overall marketing strategy. I've created a series of podcasts on this and other marketing tips to help you reach your target audiences. If you have suggestions for topics you'd like for me to cover via this type of content (or any type of content), tweet me at @JorgeVillarRME! 

By: Jorge Villar, President and Founder 

#finservdigital 

Happy Senior Citizens Day: Why Seniors Attend Social Dinner Events

As we salute seniors today for Senior Citizens Day, let's take a look at how financial advisors can help them enjoy their worry-free golden years with 

financial freedom. 

Social dinner events provide seniors - a crucial part of your target audience - with a level of comfort to talk to you about their financial goals and concerns. 

Hear Jorge Villar, our founder and president, share his insight on why seniors respond to this important strategy in your marketing toolkit. 

For more on seminar marketing and much more, 

listen to Jorge's podcasts here. 

Want to hear about a specific marketing topic from Jorge? Tweet him! 

@JorgeVillarRME

Jorge's Thoughts: 6 Tips to Becoming a Trusted Local Expert

Hyper-local marketing demands that you use a more integrated approach to impress upon your ideal prospects that you are the trusted, go-to local expert. 

It’s important for your company to have a plan that continually places your products and services at the forefront of your local market using a variety of channels that will provide you with several opportunities to deliver a compelling message, your benefits and your value proposition. The company that creates that top of mind awareness with consumers is the one that wins their business in the end. 

Here are a few ways to do just that: 

1: Know your ideal target client.

Believe it or not, this is actually a challenge for many financial advisors. There’s a difference between what you want in a potential client and the clients that actually drive your revenue. To accomplish this, conduct an audit of your last 20 new clients. This audit could include the following data points:

• Source: Where did this client come from? (e.g. referral, seminar, etc.)
• Address: This will indicate if there’s a cluster of clients in a specific area in your geographic market.
• Age: This will indicate a key demographic for future prospecting.
• Admitted assets: How much money do they have to invest?
• Assets secured: How much of the available assets are you able to use for their financial plan?
• Services provided: Retirement income, estate planning, etc.
• Products sold: Mutual funds, life insurance, long-term care, etc.
• Date of first contact: When did you first hear from this client?
• Date of closed sale: When did you receive payment/s for products and services delivered? Knowing the number of weeks from first contact to close will give you a clear idea on how frequently you need to prospect.

2: Know your competition.

Though you would like for your customers to overlook your competition, it’s crucial for advisors to be well-versed in who your competition is, what they offer, what makes them stand out and why prospects respond to them. This information can help you make important marketing decisions as well as help you hone in on what the competition offers and how they differentiate themselves. 

3: Understand your prospects’ needs.

Selling a product or service to prospects begins with assessing their needs and understanding how you can help. This is more than knowing who your clients are as advised in step one; this is more about identifying with your prospects’ short-term and long-term concerns so that you can exceed their expectations, thereby building your brand and outshining your competition. 

4: Use the proven social dinner event approach, not the outdated lectures, workshops and lunch seminars.

It is an incontestable fact that dinner/evening seminars at better restaurants - when compared to all other forms of advertising and if done correctly - generate the most consistent flow of qualified and motivated prospects and the best ROI. In fact, a recent survey of top dinner seminar producers shows an average ROI of more than 300%.  If you think that sounds too good to be true, do the math. If you invest $10,000 in a seminar marketing campaign that generates 40 buying units and you close only 10% of those prospects (assuming an average commission of just $7,500), you’ll have an ROI of 300%.

5: Use local magazines and publications. 

 Simply getting your business’ name mentioned in a local magazine is not meaningful enough to generate buzz or connect with your local market. Local magazine advertising offers many benefits that make investment on your part worthwhile. According to Forbes, many businesses rely upon online advertising, so “the decline of print publication can actually be used as a marketing advantage. The publications are less crowded, allowing more room for your ad to shine, and possibly even cheaper prices for that ad space.” 

6. Establish an online voice with social media.

Social media is a great way to grow your brand, attract prospects and create a digital voice, but tackling your social media presence by creating accounts that you randomly use will do more harm than good. Create a calendar to schedule your postings.  If you already have a social media presence, ask a marketing professional to conduct an audit on your profiles and identify areas that need improvement. If you don’t have a strong social media presence, ask a marketing professional skilled in digital strategies to develop strategies and content and to post on your behalf if needed.  Ask her/him to collaborate with you on marketing goals and to compare your social media presence with your competitors’. Also, follow these best practices:

• Remain current with topics of interest. 
• Stay relevant and consistent…deliver a solid message with benefits.   
• Be engaging by offering value. 
• Monitor and respond to online conversations.  

Tweet me and let's chat about hyper-local marketing:

 @JorgeVillarRME

By: Jorge Villar, President and Founder 

#hyperlocaldata

Jorge's Thoughts: 10 FAQs Can Earn You Brand Advocates

Seminars - or social dinner events - are viable and powerful avenues to convert qualified prospects to satisfied clients. But these conversions don't happen during the event; the event is only the beginning of earning them. It's also the beginning of creating brand advocates. 

Advocates are loyal: they repeat business with you, they choose you over your competition and they promote your brand in both the digital and non-digital world to their friends, family and colleagues. They are valuable to your overall marketing strategy, and your seminar can serve as the first step in earning them. One way to begin creating advocates is to establish yourself as an expert who understands your prospects needs and provides a level of comfort when speaking about them. 

Picture this: you're wrapping up your seminar where you've just spent 45 minutes discussing Social Security and strategies for your retirement income. You look out into a sea of worried faces and ask if there are any questions. One or two hands may go up reluctantly if you're lucky, but more likely no hands will go up. Can you blame them? Would you be willing to possibly embarrass yourself by talking about your finances in room full of people you don't know?

Break the air of awkwardness permeating the room by providing a top 10 list of questions you are most frequently asked (see how to get the list I recommend for advisors below). These will be the questions your soon-to-be brand advocates lack the confidence to ask, the questions they need answers to before they take the next step and make an office appointment with you. For instance: "What happens during an appointment at your office?" Anticipate such concerns and answer them honestly.

Here's what will happen once you begin to answer:

1. Your prospects will realize they aren't alone in their concerns.
2. They will understand your core values.
3. They will trust you and see you an expert.
4. The air of awkwardness will be replaced by the air of social approval as heads nod in agreement and understanding. 

By addressing their concerns in a way that doesn't risk embarrassment on their part, you will inspire a sense of comfort that makes it easier for them to make an appointment with you. You will also be taking a critical step in creating brand advocates. That air of social approval will leave with them, and they will share their seminar experience with others. Brand advocates are the heart and soul of any marketing strategy; revive your strategy by focusing on creating and engaging with them. 

If you'd like to a copy of the top 10 questions I recommend advisors ask, tweet me: 

@JorgeVillarRME

By: Jorge Villar, President and Founder 

#whosyouradvocate

Jorge's Thoughts: Debunking the Top 3 Seminar Marketing Myths

This week, we're taking a look at seminar marketing across our social media. Take a look at these top 3 seminar myths and let us know what you think in the comments below!

1) Feeding at the events 

This is a must to create that social event environment and not that antiquated lecture, workshop or sales pitch scenario. Also, the obvious: it allows time for you and/or your team to make appointments; otherwise, attendees would just leave after your presentation. The restaurant setting is neutral and familiar to your attendees. They probably go there many times on their own, and it's not suffocating or compromising like the other closed door venues. They know they can just leave the crowded restaurant if they wanted to.

 Something is bothering them financially, which is why they originally responded. If there are a few couples who appear to be there just information shopping or just gathering ideas, then so be it. They help fill the room and give you that emotional dynamic that makes people feel comfortable. You are going to get a 20% to 30% appointment ratio from the people who are attending whether you feed or not. You need the numbers on your side. Top producers do not worry about food costs because the ROI takes care of that. Ironically, not offering food does not change the appointment ratio nor does it mean that the attendees are truly more interested in what you are presenting . It will just end up being 30% appointments of less attendees. 

 

2) Converting attendees to appointments 

The amount of appointments you make at your seminars is 100% in direct proportion to the following factors:

• Did you have enough attendance? 

• Did you connect with your audience socially? 

• Did you tell stories that were relevant to the attendee's financial concerns? Could they relate? 

• Did you give your local background and tell your own story?  

• Did you intrigue your attendees with potential solutions and options and not a product pitch? 

• Was your topic current? Did you have too many slides?  

• Did you inspire the audience to feel like their confusion and worries about many financial issues were normal? 

• Did you explain and clarify what will happen at their first office appointments, include that nothing will be sold even then? 

• Did you have an effective and professional process to ask for the appointments during the dinner session? 

• Did you pre-sell appointments during their presentation and not just at the end? 

• Was the event feedback form explained and handed out? 

• Were you diligent in calling attendees who could not commit to a time and date the very next day? 

• Did you ask if a better or a later date would help them commit?  

• Did you offer the option of a private complimentary phone call review session if they were not willing or ready to meet face to face yet? 

 3) Saturation in marketing 

The real saturation is not in the marketing; rather, it is in the amount of advisors who are in direct competition in the immediate area. In one city corner at a business district intersection there could be 10 to 30 advisor offices. Many advisors ignore that fact and decide to blame bad seminar results on the amount of marketing that they perceive is happening in their backyard. If that were even remotely true and it was not working, then why would so many others send out invitations? 

The reality is that a very high percentage of those who are even doing seminars are doing them wrong. Wrong invites, wrong lists, wrong venues, wrong dates, wrong messaging...on and on. They may want to cut corners, save pennies, not take the time to understand marketing and end up usually partnering with local printers instead of experienced direct marketers. Good marketing is based on good data. Understanding and following the 10 to 15 critical variables that create successful outcomes is challenging. 

To wrap this up, everything we do here at RME360 is intended to create predictable marketing and sales processes that will continuously drive prospects and results for advisors over and over, all year long. We have 20 years of data. Let us show you how we can generate a continuous flow of prospects for your business. 

Tweet me and let's chat about seminar marketing:

 @JorgeVillarRME

By: Jorge Villar, President and Founder 

Seminar Marketing Success Factors: The Critical Factors You Must Avoid

Long before social media marketing, there was the original social marketing concept: seminar marketing. And while there are many marketing trends that allow you to reach your targeted audience with your brand messaging, your brand can't afford to ignore the classic solution of seminar marketing that brings you face-to-face with interested prospects.

Click here for our FREE white paper to learn more!

#planyourseminar





By: Susan Gail Taylor, Social Media Manager and Copywriter at RME360

Summertime and the...

...marketing's easy!

Yes, summer is in full swing. And if you're like many financial professionals, you've throttled back your marketing and lead generation activities - this despite the fact that it's a proven fact that consumers continue to respond to direct marketing campaigns. (See my June 2nd blog post: Debunking the Myth about Summer Seminars).

If you're among the savvy minority of producers who are keeping up their marketing momentum and continuing prospecting efforts throughout the summer months - BRAVO!If, however, you're "taking the summer off" and aren't investing in your marketing, at least take this time to review your marketing results from the first 6 months of 2014. Marketing and prospecting, like investing, is a process and cycle. If you aren't tracking what you're spending your marketing dollars on - and the results of those investments - this is the time to do so. Then, calculate your ROI.

If the ROI on your marketing dollars is 200% or more, you're doing things right and you should use the summer to set in place a marketing plan and strategy to capitalize on your past results. 

If the ROI is less than 200%, something's broken. Identify what's not working and consult with a trusted colleague or marketing professional to help you find out why a specific marketing campaign failed and then put in place a plan to fix it. 

REMEMBER THIS: When it comes to direct mail (be it lead generation, appointment setting or seminar marketing), if consumers aren't responding, they are sending you a clear message: your offer stinks!

There is a myriad of reasons why a campaign fails. Perhaps you promoted a seminar and didn't offer a free meal or held your seminar at a library. What list did you use? Is the list accurate and up-to-date? Did you offer something as an incentive to respond? (Note: a "free consultation" isn't an incentive; a gift card is an incentive!)

If you're not sure what to do, find a person or company with experience in financial services marketing and ask them to review your failed campaigns. If they're worth their salt, they will be able to give you feedback and recommendations that can improve your results.

Bottom line? Use the summer months to develop a marketing plan that will help you finish the year strong. Collect and analyze data from your marketing and use that data to drive your marketing investments. Finally, find a marketing partner to help you with lead generation activities. Focus on what you do best and outsource tasks that take you away from getting face-to-face with motivated and qualified prospects.

Marketing is an investment - treat it like one!

Have a happy and safe summer!

Debunking the Myth about Summer Seminars

For as long as financial advisors have been using social dinner seminars to get in front of a consistent flow of qualified prospects, there has been a persistent myth: “People don’t go to seminars during the summer.” Good marketers listen to consumers and base their approach on data, behaviors and trends. 

HERE ARE THE FACTS: A comprehensive review of seminars marketed for the months of June, July and August in both 2012 and 2013 shows that over 90,000 reservations were taken!

Your target audience does not suspend their financial planning needs, concerns or issues during the summer - or at any other time of the year for that matter. They need your help, advice and solutions year round.

Makes total sense right?

When I recently asked a group of advisors their motivation to conduct summer seminars, the overwhelming response was, “Because they work.” The next most common reason was because so many other advisors take the summer off and that gives them a big advantage!Another theme that emerged in these discussions was the importance of maintaining production momentum. One advisor confessed the obvious, “I know from personal experience that it takes an average of 30 to 60 days to convert a seminar prospect to a client. If I was to take two or three months off during the summer I’d be hard pressed to meet my personal and business goals.” 

One advisor added, “Marketing and lead generation is all about being consistant. Starting and stopping my marketing based on months of the calendar is short-term thinking. I know that marketing is an investment. I need to be in front of prospects every month of the year. After all, if they (prospects) aren’t meeting with me, chances are, they are meeting with someone else.”

Bottom line, financial advisors who continue their marketing efforts throughout the year will see more prospects, increase their client-base and generate the highest revenues. Avoid the “summer seminars don’t work” myth. Listen to the consumer –all successful marketers do.