Many financial advisors who are just getting started with their digital marketing often ask, “How often should I email my network?” Like most things in life, there’s no definitive answer.
A recent Morningstar study shows that 36.6% of clients prefer monthly emails, while 30% prefer weekly emails. (1)
I personally recommend emailing your list at least once per month, but no more than once per week. (At Indigo Marketing Agency, we typically send out emails once per month for financial advisors. It seems to be the sweet spot.)
The Consequences of Emailing Too Much
Want to know the #1 reason people unsubscribe from email lists? They receive too many emails. (2) The second most popular reason? The content isn’t relevant to them.
Oversharing makes your marketing less effective by lowering your open and click-through rates and increasing your unsubscribe rate.
Email is the most powerful marketing strategy you can use. (Yes! Even more powerful than social media and advertisements.) But when used incorrectly, it can be a huge disaster—and can quickly destroy a list you’ve spent years building and nurturing.
How to Boost Your Email Marketing Metrics in 5 Steps
If you’re like most advisors, you probably want to know which benchmarks you should be shooting for with your email marketing.
- The average email open rate for the financial services industry is 24.80%. (3)
- The average click-through rate is 2.7%.
- The average unsubscribe rate is 0.20%.
If your metrics are way off base, following these steps will help give them a boost.
Step 1: Segment Your Email Lists
You’d be surprised at how many advisors have all of their subscribers lumped into one email list. This makes it extremely difficult to create a marketing message that truly resonates with them.
Think about it.
If you bought a Toyota Tacoma from a car dealership and they constantly sent you emails about car accessories and maintenance for a Prius, you’d probably get mad and unsubscribe.
The same is true for your email list. For most advisors, splitting your list between prospects and clients is enough to create a more tailored marketing message.
But depending on your specialty and the size of your list, it may be beneficial to sub-segment even further based on your clients’ occupation or life cycle (e.g., early-career, married with kids, pre-retirement).
A study by OptinMonster confirms that segmented campaigns see higher open rates and click-through rates, and lower unsubscribe rates than unsegmented ones.
Source: optinmonster.com
Step 2: Define Your Email Marketing Objective
An email marketing objective explains why you’re sending out emails. You’ll typically have a different marketing objective for each of your segmented lists, but there will also be some overlap.
For example, the main objective for all your email lists is to keep you top of mind and position you as a go-to expert in your niche. But past that, your marketing objective will vary depending on your audience.
For prospects, your main marketing objective is to nurture new leads and convert them into clients. Because of this, you may send emails that encourage them to take the next step, such as:
- What I Do & How I Help
- See a Sample Financial Plan
- Get Started Now: Schedule an Appointment Online
- How Does an Independent Financial Advisor Benefit You?
On the other hand, current clients already know how you help and why they should be working with you (they’re already clients!). Instead, you can send them emails like:
- A Personal Note During the Coronavirus Pandemic
- We’re Never Too Busy to Help Someone You Care About
- Happy Thanksgiving: Here’s What We’re Grateful For
Of course, there are going to be emails that benefit everyone on your email list—regardless of whether they’re a client or prospect. For example, if you’re a financial advisor who specializes in serving veterans, you could send everyone emails on topics like:
- Financial Pitfalls Veterans Should Avoid
- Should You Enroll in the Survivor Benefit Plan?
- The Best Life Insurance Solutions for Veterans
The key is to be mindful of your target audience. Before you send out an email, ask yourself if they’ll find it relevant. If the answer is no, it’s probably not worth sending.
Step 3: Send High-Value Content
A lot of advisors send emails for the sake of sending emails.
They blast out market commentaries every week (which I highly recommend NOT doing). They spend hours creating complex monthly newsletters that no one will ever read. They send the same old emails to everyone on their list regardless of whether it’s relevant or not.
Following these outdated tactics is the quickest way to get unsubscribes—or worse, have people report you as spam.
Creating the perfect marketing email is insanely easy. It doesn’t require any fancy bells or whistles. It doesn’t need to take up a ton of time. It doesn’t need to include a bunch of different topics. One clean, simple, highly relevant email per month is all you need.
Step 4: Be Consistent
Above all else, be consistent with your email marketing. Consistency is the key to establishing trust online. If you need help sticking to a schedule, create a marketing calendar to help hold you accountable. (Here’s a sample marketing calendar for financial advisors.)
If you know your plate is way too full to DIY it, consider outsourcing your marketing to a firm that specializes in custom content creation for financial advisors (such as Indigo Marketing Agency).
Step 5: Always Be on the Hunt for New Leads
I’ve got some bad news for you…if you’re not consistently growing your email list, then it’s probably shrinking due to unsubscribes.
Each week you should be looking for ways to grow your email list as a financial advisor. Some common ways to do this:
- Ask for referrals. (Here’s a neat trick my dad used to add $2 million to his AUM in one month.)
- Add a lead-generating webinar to your website that runs 24/7.
- Add a call to action to the bottom of your website and blog posts that encourages readers to sign up for more helpful content.
Whatever you do, don’t buy any email lists. This used to be common practice in the early internet days, but now it’s a surefire way to get reported as spam. (Trust me, my email address has landed on several lists I didn’t opt into and I immediately report them.)
If you’re not sure how to add new leads to Mailchimp or Constant Contact, check out this article here.
How to Know if Your Emails Are Working
The best way to know if your email marketing is working is to look at the data—specifically your open rates, click-through rates, and conversions.
If you’re a current client of ours, we email you these metrics each month. If you’re doing your own email marketing, you can find these metrics in your email marketing system (e.g., Mailchimp or Constant Contact).
Remember, a good open rate is around 24.80%. A good click-through rate is around 2.7%. And a good unsubscribe rate is around 0.20%.
If your numbers are way different than this, it could be an indicator that you’re sending too many emails or your content isn’t relevant. Some solutions may be to:
- Segment out your email list. (so you can tailor marketing messages specifically to prospects and current clients)
- Adjust your email frequency. (Remember, the goal is one to four emails per month, with one per month being the sweet spot.)
- Change the structure and content of your emails. (I recommend sending one highly relevant topic per email. No need to share three to five articles at once.)
Need Help With Your Email Marketing?
At Indigo Marketing Agency, we specialize in creating custom content for independent financial advisors. Our Total Marketing Package is our most popular service for financial advisors. It includes:
- Setting up your email marketing system
- Creating your custom email design
- Sending one highly relevant email to your audience each month
- Writing one custom article each month
- Setting up and optimizing your social media profiles
- Posting to social media three times a week
- And more!
Schedule a free call with our team to learn more about our Total Marketing Package and how we can help you grow your business by 25% this year.
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(1) https://www.theadvisorcoach.com/19-financial-advisor-email-marketing-tips.html#:~:text=%E2%80%8BA%20recent%20Morningstar%20study,36.6%25%20prefer%20monthly%20emails.
(2) https://blog.hubspot.com/marketing/why-consumers-subscribe-to-email
(3) https://www.campaignmonitor.com/resources/guides/email-marketing-benchmarks/#one