When I work with advisors to build their email lists, I’m often asked whether they should add friends and family. While I never advocate “selling” via our relatives and social acquaintances, there are two solid reasons to add your personal contacts to your email list today.
1. Help Prospects Find You When They Need You Most
The type of content marketing strategy I run for advisors is not designed to sell, but to help people find you when they need you most. If your network doesn’t understand what you do and who you help, they can’t refer business to you. I coach advisors to make their niche so clear that even those who don’t buy can still refer.
Family, friends, neighbors, and acquaintances are great referral sources if they understand what your niche is. By sharing your newsletter with them, they’ll better understand what you do and how you can help. In turn, they are able to help people find you when they need you most.
Your referral pipeline is strengthened when conversations with family or neighbors go from “I think Tom is in finance” to “Tom helps divorcing spouses get a fair and equitable settlement” or “My brother-in-law helps baby boomers who own a business catch up on their retirement savings in a hurry.”
(Not sure what your niche even is? Check out How to Select Your Niche (for Financial Advisors. In this article, we recommend watching our exclusive workshop webinar that I created with Bill Cates, bestselling author of Get More Referrals Now! and Beyond Referrals: How to Choose Your Niche & Create a Radically Relevant Marketing Message.)
2. Improve Deliverability of Your Emails
Take a look at this quick case study I did to analyze the difference in email behavior of friends and family vs. business contacts. I uploaded business contacts and personal contacts for one of my advisors and did a simple A/B test. The open rate for business contacts was 21.7%, which isn’t too shabby.
However, the open rate for friends and family was 48%, which is phenomenal. By combining the two lists, we increase the averages for the overall list.
This is important because it affects how well your emails get delivered. Deliverability depends both on open rate and click-through rate. For this reason, we want to send to folks who know our name, so they will open our emails. Then we want to include one clear call to action for them to click on.
Many advisors put the whole blog post or article in the body of an email, but that doesn’t drive traffic to their website for conversion, or get click-throughs. If you have a low click-through rate, your emails are more likely to be seen as spam, and less likely to be delivered by mail delivery systems.
You may be wary of adding friends and family to your email list, but I promise that people who care about you want to know what you’re up to (Hi, Mom!). If you’re offering truly original, helpful, and interesting content, they’ll appreciate your emails even more.
(Wondering how often to send out those value-packed emails? Read How Often Should You Email Your Network? for more info!)
Do you want to grow your referral pipeline and generate more leads? Learn more about our Total Marketing Package today!
To learn more about what we do for financial advisors and their marketing, watch my free webinar on What We Do & How We Help. In this webinar, I walk you through everything financial advisors need to know about marketing. You can even use this information to do your own marketing if you don’t want to work with us directly. And if you’re ready to partner with Indigo to maximize your marketing, schedule a free strategy session here!
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