These are the components that you must consider when deciding whether to invest in thought leadership materials to deepen your client relationships.
You must be honest with yourself.
Do you have a dedicated marketing team that has the time, expertise, and desire to consistently position you as a thought leader among a time-poor and discerning audience?
If so, then feel free to move on from this article.
However, the reason you are reading this article is likely because you do not fall into this category.
This article explains the ROI of a thought leadership platform.
Let’s dive in.
We are not going to tell you that to be an elite wealth management firm you must set aside X dollars for a thought leadership platform.
Each firm has a different budget, objectives, and ideal stakeholders. The integrity of your situation must be respected.
Nevertheless, far too often wealth management firms do not do the basics to engage an audience that takes years to warm to you.
You might not realize it, but writing an isolated piece does little to put your firm at the front of the line in this industry.
You must be top of mind and a thought leader for your materials to be the catalyst to open doors for you.
With this in mind, let’s go through an example that illustrates the financial ROI of using a thought leadership platform.
Let’s say you set aside a budget of $20K/year to spend on materials to engage your clients and ideal prospects.
Now think about your asset growth ambitions over the next 3 years. What amount of net inflows do you intend to have?
$10M? $100M? $1B?
The main purpose of investing in thought leadership materials is to spark live interactions with clients and prospects that otherwise would not have happened. Those meetings open doors to deeper relationships that can transform prospects into clients, and clients into active referral sources.
Let’s say an insight post on estate planning prompts your client to have a catch-up meeting. In that meeting, the client realizes they need some advanced estate planning help, which leads to that client transferring more of their assets over to you.
All else equal, to break even on your investment you need to bring in $2M.
And there’s more:
You are talking about an ROI that is several multiples of what you paid.
Now let’s turn to time. And we would argue this is far more important than money.
Wealth management is a relationship business. You need to invest considerable time towards each relationship to ensure sticky and loyal partnerships that will withstand the inevitable tough times.
Relationship building is a contact sport. You need to be out in the field as much as possible.
It requires emotional energy to know your clients and prospects inside and out so that you have high-quality conversations that make people feel valued, appreciated, and listened to.
When you have plenty on your plate, your physical and emotional energy is not at 100%. On a good day, it might feel like 80%. On a bad day, it might feel like 10%.
Your physical and emotional energy must be as close to 100% as possible to compete at the highest level. In an industry where people are overwhelmed with choice, you can be assured that if you aren’t satisfying client expectations, someone else will.
So how much time do you need to spend writing consistently enough for the materials to move the needle for your firm?
Let’s take conservative estimates. You write one blog post per month, each one approximately 1,000 words. Let’s say it takes you 10 hours to write each piece from inception to final product.
10 hours x 12 pieces = 120 hours. That is 120 hours each year that are taken away from your team’s ability to build closer relationships with clients.
With a thought leadership platform at your fingertips, not only do you save time, you also benefit from working with specialists to take the load off someone who likely does not specialize in written materials.
Most valuable of all, your physical and mental health flourish because your time-poor schedule has one less ‘hat’ to worry about.
High-quality relationships require high-quality service providers.
Most marketing providers consist of generalists who are not specialized in financial services. Because generalists lack industry-specific expertise, their content does not answer the needs or concerns of a seasoned and discerning audience.
On the other hand, a thought leadership platform gives you a consistent cadence of specialized insight posts designed to engage an audience of high-net-worth individuals and business owners.
Investing in such a platform pays for itself even with conservative assumptions. You receive the missing ingredient to deepen relationships with your clients, drive referrals, and establish your firm as a thought leader.
Most importantly, your time is back to where it needs to be: building high-quality relationships.
Want to know more best practices to establish your firm as a thought leader? Check out our insights library here.
Get access to a consistent stream of insights that provides value to your clients in a way that scales your time, deepens your relationships, and elevates your brand as a thought leader.
