You're listening to Financial Advisor Marketing, the best show on the planet for financial advisers who want to get more clients without all the stress. You're about to get the real scoop on everything from lead generation to closing the deal. James is the founder of TheAdvisorCoach.com, where you can find an entire suite of products designed to help financial advisers grow their businesses more rapidly than ever before. Now, here is your host, James Pollard. [00:31.7]
James: I think it's fair to say, this week's podcast episode, if applied will be more valuable to you than 90% of my other podcast episodes combined, because it's going to be about making advertising work. I believe the ability to market yourself, your company and your services is one of the most important skills you can have and certainly, one of the most profitable. Because advertising is about the ability to turn $1 into more than $1. That's really all it is. The only reason to engage in marketing or advertising is to take your existing money and transform it into a sale of a product or service for more than you spent. Now, you're exchanging value in the marketplace, that's how this works. People give you their $1 in exchange for more than $1. So, you are spending your $1 so people can give you more than $1 and they're hoping to get more than $1. It just goes on and on and on and on. [01:30.9]
People try to twist it around or do cartwheels in order to justify spending more money on marketing that can't be tracked and measured, but it's all ludicrous. If you're running a business, you are playing with your money and you're running a business to increase your wealth. I don't care if your Mother Teresa, money will fuel your goals and your ambitions. As a financial advisor, you talk about this with your clients all day. You ask why is money important to you? What are your retirement goals? What do you want to do? And you have these goals, you have these ambitions, so let money fuel them. Why ignored in your marketing? Money is important and that's why you advertise. [02:08.6]
Now, I want to talk about my biggest secret to advertising success or a few of my biggest secrets. And I want to do so by talking about something, many of you may not consider to be an advertisement, and you may have never thought about it like this, even though it is. And that's a job posting. Before recording this episode, I went to the job section of LinkedIn. I started looking at the jobs and applications. Here's what I found. I didn't spend too much time on this. So, I only have like four here. [02:35.6]
A freelance blogger and Philadelphia job posting got 49 applicants in five days. The chief marketing officer in king of Prussia, Pennsylvania, home of the legendary King of Prussia mall, which used to be the biggest moan in America, or it's the biggest by square footage or something like that. Mall of America is maybe bigger by square footage, but King of Prussia has more retail space. I don't know, it's something like that, it's huge. 33 applicants in a week. A sales executive for a cell phone store in Chicago got 51 applicants in a week. An account executive position that can work remotely got 31 applicants in four hours. Let's think about this. [03:12.6]
In order for a job posting to work, a company must be clear about who it wants, right? A job posting that just says, employee probably won't work. If McDonald's came out and said, Hey, we're hiring employees. People will be like, well, is that a line cook? Is it a cashier? Is it a manager? Is it a night shift manager? Like, what is it? If they just said employee, it probably wouldn't work. You need to be more specific. You need to say something like account executive. Driver, property manager. So, there is a lesson there by the time this episode comes out, I will have mailed out this September 21 inner circle newsletter issue. And quite honestly, I feel sorry for everyone who wasn't subscribed in time, because the bonus I included with that issue is a video called Lead Magnets that win, where I broke down the exact lead magnets, the exact advertisements and the exact landing pages used by some of America's top financial advisors. [04:06.6]
Remember the newsletter and all the bonuses that come with it, it's $99 per month. So, if you're a financial advisor and you can't make more than $99 per month, seeing the exact lead magnets, the exact ads, the exact process, exactly how much they spent down to the penny. And I give all this to you, not even in the newsletter itself, it's a bonus, in addition to the newsletter, everything on top of that is just great gravy too. If you can't make your $99 per month back like, phew, man, you've got bigger problems. The reason I'm bringing that up is because the most successful lead magnets and advertisements, they called out a specific type of person. And this is nothing new. I've seen this for so many years. They call out someone specific and they're actually exclusionary. They're trying to exclude people. This is the part that most people don't get. By their nature job postings must be exclusionary. I mean, can you imagine how wrecked our economy would be if they weren't? Here's what I mean. [05:05.2]
Some job applications say that you must have at least five years of experience in a particular role. Is that not a qualification mechanism? If someone's submits a resume with only three years of experience that person's resume will go straight in the trash and for good reason, too, because you have to draw the line somewhere. It is absolutely incredible to see how the top financial advisors who are making a killing with online advertisements are extremely clear about who they want to click on the ad while everyone else is trying to appeal to everyone. There's a reason why the financial advisors we're trying to appeal to everyone or fighting for the leftover scraps. Put another way. If you are an employer in Boston and you, you need your employee to be in the Boston area, what are you going to say in your ad? Probably something like must be in the Boston area. Now is that the only qualification mechanism a job posting has or can have? No [06:05.9]
Job postings can have several of them such as must reside in Boston, must have five years of experience and must have a master's degree. All of those qualifications must be met. Could a company in theory drop those qualifications? Absolutely, but it wouldn't be in their best interest to do it. So that's the first big lesson I want you to take away. The second big lesson revolves around the number of applicants each posting had. Remember one of them had 31 in four hours. That's pretty incredible. And there are a few reasons why so many people are applying. The first reason is related to what we just talked about. And that's because the posting is clearly calling out a certain type of person. When that person sees the ad, he or she applies. If you are advertising on Facebook and you're selling doggy toys, okay? And you have 200,000 impressions to people who own cats, but no dogs. You're probably not going to make that many sales. But if you only have a thousand impressions to dog owners, you might make a sale or two, even though you have a much smaller audience, just it's infinitely more qualified because you're going from non-dog owners to dog owners and you're selling a dog product. It just, it blows my mind that people don't get this. They try to over-complicate it. They try to make it so, so, so complicated. [07:28.5]
When the job offers something that the applicant wants, ot's a lot easier. People who don't want jobs are not filling out job applications. That seems obvious, but it's profound I promise you. When applied to advertising, it means that your ads should be for people who want whatever it is that you're offering. Your advertising cannot create desire for a product, it can only channel the desires that are already there. And I'm going to say that again, because this is probably the most important thing, I'm going to say in this entire podcast episode. Your advertising cannot create desire for a product, it can only channel the desires that are already there. And that is not my original thinking. That is not my wisdom. That actually comes from Eugene Schwartz, who many people consider to be the greatest copywriter of all time. And it is so true. It is the bedrock of the entire marketing industry. [08:23.8]
Hey, financial advisors – if you’d like even more help building your business, I invite you to subscribe to James’ monthly paper-and-ink newsletter, The James Pollard Inner Circle.
When you join today, you’ll get more than one thousand dollars’ worth of bonuses, including exclusive interviews that aren’t available anywhere else.
Head on over to TheAdvisorCoach.com/coaching to learn more. [08:46.4]
The great Nick Murray also talks about this in one of his books, I think it is The Game of Numbers. He talks about how, if someone has no interest in financial planning whatsoever and has no financial future, if that person rejects you, then you shouldn't be rejected because why would you feel rejected by someone who has no interest whatsoever. It’s because you were marketing cannot create desire, you can only channel what's already there. Going back to, I'm trying to say this in many different ways. So, you really get it and you take it away. I want you to be like a sponge and absorb it all. Let's go back to my dog, a doggy treat or doggy toy example. [09:21.8]
If you're selling dog products and a cat owner who has no dogs rejects you, do you really feel the sting? The pain of rejection? Well, no, not really because the desire isn't there because they literally do not have the dog. They don't have it. The obvious desire with a job posting is the desire to make money, afford food and shelter and all that good stuff. But it's obvious. That's the point. All highly effective advertising tends to be obvious. Way more obvious than people realize. It doesn't have to have a bunch of fancy jargon and smoking in mirrors. It is simple. If you're a bakery and you want to sell more cupcakes and example of an ineffective ad, something that does not work would be discover how to be happier with our products. Yeah, it's a great slogan. Yeah, it's great for getting your name out there. It's great for branding. You can put it on billboards and all this other stuff, but it won't work. And people try this stuff all the time. A better approach is this. Do you like cupcakes? We sell incredible chocolate cupcakes for $3 each in Baltimore, Maryland. [10:26.5]
I think that for many financial advisors who aren't natural marketers and who aren't in this world believe that marketing is fancier than that. They always want to spice things up. Earlier this year, I ran an offer where I would critique financial advisors’ ads, and they were shocked at just how straightforward my recommendations were. Rather than trying a bunch of tips and tricks, all I would do is put a specific offer in front of a specific type of person. And that person would act on the offer. That's it. There's a popular marketing story. I think it's attributed to Gary Halbert, but I could be wrong. Where he stands in front of his students. And his protege is in a seminar of some sort and he asked people, well, what is the secret to a lot of hamburgers, if you have a hamburger stand. And people would say, oh, high quality beef, the most amazing buns, Sesame seed buns, toasted buns, like the organic beef, all natural and all these, just little buzzwords and catchphrases. They threw these things out. [11:25.6]
And Gary just sat there and responded. No, no, no, no wrong, wrong, wrong. It's a starving crowd. What you want is a starving crowd. People want jobs. So, they're applying for the job. They're going to the job posting. They are hanging out where jobs are posted. This seems so obvious. People will try to advertise on a bunch of different mediums with a bunch of different messages that aren't channeling any sort of desire that's already there. There are advertisements that will literally say like, now I'm paraphrasing here, but it's like Jim Smith at XYZ wealth management, contact me for all your retirement needs. But what is the desire there? Contrast that with something like how much money do you need to retire? Hmm…there's a question mark. There's a need to satisfy curiosity. All of the sudden people get sucked down this rabbit hole because if retirement is even slightly on their mind and they're nervous about it, they're anxious about it, you have now channeled that desire to know how much they need. The desire for certainty, the desire for something quick, the desire for something easy. [12:39.6]
This, again, I hate, I hate repeating myself, but it should be dropped dead obvious. There's even a book called Obvious Adams, the story of a successful businessman. It's a short book, you can finish it in an afternoon. And it tells the story of how a businessman succeeded by doing obvious things. Sometimes my marketing advice gets criticized for being too simple. I think people use complexity as a crutch. They're not confident in themselves, or maybe they're not intelligent enough to realize that simplicity is a superpower. So, if they don't have the confidence, they don't have the intelligence to back it up. They try to like prop themselves up and prop their businesses up with all these different tips, tricks, and tactics and techniques, and just smoke and mirrors and it's not a good idea because if you work through the obvious solutions to building a business, you will understand a few critical points. [13:35.5]
First, what causes money to change hands, a value exchange. Someone gives $1 in exchange for something he or she values more than that dollar. What does that mean for you? What is the obvious answer here? It means that in order to begin collecting dollar bills from people, you must become a person of value. You must offer something of value. Specifically, you must offer something worth more than the dollar bill. Next, you must realize that you can be successful at creating value, but fail miserably at telling people about that value. This is perceived value. Perceived value is how you, your company, your products, your services, it's how they're viewed in the marketplace. [14:19.7]
So, the newest product over the advisor coach is called The Client Getting Website. And you can check that out over at TheAdvisorCoach.com/website. It's a video training about how financial advisors can well improve their websites and get more clients. And one of the ways you can do it is by sprucing up your About Us page. And it has a lot to do with increasing your perceived value because two financial advisors can offer the exact same thing. But if one makes it clear on the website, while the other one doesn't, the advisor with clarity is going to win because that advisor has more perceived value. Again, these things should be obvious, and you can build an even better business by doing the obvious things. [15:02.9]
How quickly should you follow up with inbound leads? What is the obvious answer? As fast as possible. Should you, or should you not keep records of your marketing and prospecting activity? What is the obvious answer? Yes, of course. Sadly, too many people overthink it and over-complicate it. And it bites them in the butt. The obvious thing is more often than not the right thing to do. And that is one of the biggest secrets to my advertising success. It's just that I am, I guess I'm too dumb. Ignorance is bliss and I'm being very blissful because apparently, I'm ignorant about all the complicated, super technical ways to make things work. And I just do the obvious things. [15:41.3]
So, if you're like me, kudos to you, high five, a virtual high five over the podcast here and keep doing what you're doing. If you're successful with it, more power to you, if you would like to grow, go ahead and check out TheAdvisorCoach.com/website to make your website better. Other than that, I look forward to seeing you next week and I'll catch you there. [16:00.5]
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