Marketing has shifted from generic brands and companies doing all the talking to personalities and individuals and personal brands with a little bit more color, a little bit more flair and interest. So how do you capitalize on this trend, and how do you start applying some of those principles into your own personal brand as a financial advisor?
In this quick video, we want to share with you how we go about empowering our clients to show who they really are to attract more of their ideal clients…and how you can apply it into your own personal branding strategy and overall marketing strategy.
Transcript
0:00 Marketing has shifted from generic brands and companies doing all the talking to personalities and individuals and personal brands with a little bit more color, a little bit more flair and interest being the way to go.
0:11 So how do you capitalize on this trend and how do you start applying some of those principles into your own personal brand as a financial advisor?
0:18 Well, that’s what I want to talk to you about in this video. Hey there my name is Hugo with Indigo Marketing Agency and we help financial advisors and wealth management firms better market themselves online
0:33 and attract more of their ideal clients. And one of the best ways that we’re doing that today is by empowering our clients to show who they really are.
0:41 And I want to share with you in today’s video how we go about doing that and how you can do that to apply it into your own personal branding strategy and your overall marketing strategy.
0:50 The first thing is just a quick mindset shift. It’s realizing that it’s just that. People need to see the authentic version of you.
0:59 Share pictures (to the degree that you’re comfortable) of yourself as a complete human being. You know, we recently took our management team to a Seahawks game; we’re huge Seahawks fans.
1:09 And so we posted a picture of us getting together at the game as well as our leadership meeting that we had right after.
1:16 And so that is a simple way to show some color, some depth, some different ways of showing people that there are real humans on the other side.
1:25 Whether that’s sharing pictures of loved ones or pets or certain travels or certain interesting things you have, it’s showing people more of your hobbies and your personal side, because people want to connect with people.
1:37 And if you mix that in with your regular content, it’ll give your social media marketing and your personal brand some color.
1:45 A couple of my favorite personal brands are brands like the Rock. He was able to build a lot of different companies on the backbone of his personal brand.
1:55 And you get to see a mixture of his professional side, his family side, his interests, and he’s constantly promoting his personal brand.
2:03 And so find personal brands that you like and individuals that you like and try to emulate or model them as well.
2:09 But really it starts with you getting comfortable with showing that. I’m still working on that myself because I’m typically a pretty private person, and everything I want to talk about is marketing and business and sales and marketing and business and sales.
2:20 But I know that people don’t just want to see that from me. They want to see the full breadth of me as an individual.
2:28 So don’t be afraid to show who you are and be an authentic version of yourself, both online and offline.
2:35 So that’s my tip, my first thought. The second thing is you need to be consistently posting content. And that content can be in the form of a short-form video (like this), or it can be written content if you like to write.
2:48 You can do long-form LinkedIn posts or Twitter threads as well as blog posts or other types of short-form content.
2:54 If you like podcasts and more longer-form content, you can do that as well. So that’s the second thing, is that’s the way you start to show a lot of who you really are.
3:03 And you do that by creating a nice mixture of entertaining content as well as educational. So if you’re more of an educator, cool.
3:10 Spend a lot of time educating your clients and talking about topics you really care about. And it’s even better if you can mix entertainment and education.
3:19 And the last final thought is you. You have to be consistent. You have to show up day in, day out, week in, week out, month in, month out, because over a span of a year, if you commit to posting consistently on social, you can really build up your network, your circle of
3:36 influence. You can build out your client base and start to actually see results from your social media marketing efforts by investing more in your personal brand.
3:47 Don’t just post on your LinkedIn page and your company LinkedIn page generic content, try to invest in your own content, in your own voice; again, videos like this, or images or written content.
4:00 So how do you put all of this together in one simple cohesive strategy? Well, let’s use LinkedIn as an example.
4:07 On LinkedIn, you optimize your profile to tell people who you are and how you can help. You update a photo of yourself.
4:14 A lot of folks just don’t even update it. I suggest having a photo at least once or twice a year, a fresh photo of what you look like today. Use a professional photographer or most iPhones do a great job these days.
4:27 So update your photo, update your description, and tell people who you are and how you can help. The second thing after that is get on a consistent schedule to post original, high-quality social media content, whether even if it’s just twice a week or once a week, invest the time in creating
4:43 that content and posting it consistently and show thought leadership. What happens is this is where the secret sauce lies, you then start to connect with other people.
4:54 When you’re an interesting person on social media and you reach out for a LinkedIn connection request, the first thing they’ll do is they’ll go check out who is this person that’s connecting with me, they’ll see your profile, they see you’re a serious person or that you have some value to offer.
5:07 You’re constantly posting content and they, right there, will make a decision, “Do I want to connect with this person or not?”
5:13 More often than not, the answer is yes, because you’ve shown to be somebody that is worth connecting with, because you’re investing in your personal brand.
5:21 They’ll connect with you and they may not interact with you or be a client or send you a referral right there, but they’ll stay in touch with you.
5:29 And as you’re posting more content on social media, they’ll see that in their feed. You’re constantly staying top-of-mind and a lot of marketing is just staying top-of-mind.
5:38 But then because it’s original content, it’s content that you have invested the time, and you’re showing your true, authentic self, people will start to resonate with that content, and that is where they’ll start to raise their hand and want to become a client or send you a client.
5:54 And so that is how you put all of this together, but you have to be consistent and you can’t expect one post to go viral and you know that’s going to change the trajectory of your practice.
6:03 This is a long-term game. Think of it as how you’re building your own reputation. A reputation isn’t built overnight, right?
6:10 Reputation is built by consistently showing up and what you do consistently. I hope you found this video helpful on personal branding.
6:17 If you did, I would love to hear from you in the comments, and I look forward to seeing you in the next video.