Part Three: Online Lead Generation

Written By : Clifford Blodgett

In Part 1 of this series, we introduced you to a fictional financial advisor named Jeff. Jeff became discouraged when he didn’t appear to achieve results from his digital marketing campaign, and gave up after wasting a lot of time and energy. We have discussed how Jeff failed to identify his goals, and then in Part 2 we began showing you how your marketing methods should match up to specific objectives.

As you have learned, marketing should work like a funnel. At the top, you will appeal to a wide group of people within your target demographic. Then you should adjust your strategy to deepen relationships with your prospects. Rather than a quick campaign with an instant payoff, digital marketing is a process that gradually convinces prospects to become paying clients.

So far, you have learned how to create brand awareness and drive traffic to your website.

Online Lead Generation for Financial Advisors

Now that you’re driving traffic to your website, you have a prime opportunity to generate leads. At this point in the process, people who visit your website become more than just a number reflected by your traffic statistics. You can gather names and contact information, and your website visitors become very real prospects.

But how do you get their names and contact information? This is where the lead generation aspect of your website comes into play. Generally we do this by offering something of value to your visitors. It might be an ebook, whitepaper, or an invitation to a free seminar. But first, interested visitors are asked to complete a short form.

When you create lead generation content, ask yourself these questions:

• Will this content be useful or relevant to my target demographic?
• Will they want it badly enough that they will be willing to provide their information in exchange for accessing it?
• Is this content high in quality? Does it demonstrate my expertise and reflect the brand of my company?

Of course, it isn’t enough to create the content, offer it to prospects, and then wait for your phone to ring. We aren’t quite there yet! First, you should measure your key performance indicators, to make sure your lead generation campaign is producing results.

To do this, we measure:

• Number of leads that each piece of content generates. Some types of content may generate more leads than others. Pay attention to which subject matters and methods of delivery appeal to your audience.
• Conversion rates for each landing page. It’s one thing to see that 100 people were willing to fill out your contact form. But how many people landed on that page in the first place? 100? 1,000? Looking at percentage of conversions will also provide an important measure of success.

Once you’re satisfied that your lead generation campaign is working, what do you do with all of that contact information? Well, Jeff would be pleased, because we’ve almost reached the part in our process that new clients come walking through your door. We just have one more step to go! In our next article in this series, we’ll discuss how to nurture these leads and convert them into clients.

Filed under: Financial Advisor Marketing