Webinars have become a powerful and cost-effective marketing tool for financial advisors. In this exclusive how-to webinar, I’ll show you exactly how to create your first webinar. We’ll review:

1 How Advisors Are Using Webinars
2 Why Webinars Are So Powerful
3 Choosing the Best Topic for Your Audience
4 Ten Steps to Creating Your First Webinar
5 Which Technologies to Use
6 How Many Leads to Expect

Stick around until the end of the presentation to ask questions and receive your free gift!


Meet Your Webinar Host


Claire

Claire Akin, MBA

Claire Akin runs Indigo Marketing Agency, a full-service marketing firm serving top independent financial advisors. She is a former Investment Advisor Representative and holds a Master’s Degree in Marketing. Claire works closely with several of Barron’s Top 100 Financial Advisors to grow their AUM using digital marketing.

Read The Transcription Below

Claire Akin:

Hi and thanks for joining me. I’m Claire Akin with Indigo Marketing Agency, and today we’re going to talk about webinar marketing for financial advisors. So, I’m going to cover everything that you need to know to create your first webinar to start this marketing process. Now, we’re going to cover a lot, so I’m going to move quickly because I know you’re really busy and your time is valuable. But today we’re going to talk about how advisors are using webinars, why webinars are so powerful, the technologies that you should use to create your webinars, and we’re going to give you 10 steps to get started creating your first webinar. Then we’ll talk about how to promote your webinar, and how many leads that you should expect. So, stay tuned to the end to ask a question and to get a free gift. Thanks for joining me. Let’s get started.

               All right. Thanks so much for joining me. I’m Claire Akin and this is Webinar Marketing for Financial Advisors. Now, if you don’t know me, I want to give you a little bit about my story. I’m a former Investment Advisor Representative, and I grew up in the industry because my dad’s an Investment Advisor, and he’s been in the business 37 years. And he was one of the first reps with LPL Financial when they first started out, when they were Linsco Private Ledger in 1981. And so I definitely grew up in the industry. I understand some of the challenges that financial advisors face with marketing, and how things have changed over the past couple of decades, and what worked in the past doesn’t work anymore. And so, I understand that it’s challenging to adapt your marketing and to do things differently to get clients to grow your business. And so, that takes a little bit of investment in new techniques. And so I really appreciate you guys joining me to learn some new techniques that are going to help take your marketing into the future.

               I also have a bachelor’s degree in Economics from UC Davis, Go Ags, and a master’s degree in marketing at UC San Diego. I worked at FMG Suite, which is a leading website provider for financial advisors. And I started my own company, Indigo Marketing Agency, to help top advisors really embrace a specialty with their marketing. And I also wrote a book called, The LinkedIn Guide for Financial Advisors, which you can check out on Amazon, on Kindle or in a paperback copy. And you can take the LinkedIn Course for Financial Advisors if you’re interested in using LinkedIn to target prospects that fit within your specialty.

               So, webinars are really important to me and that I’m passionate about webinars. As you guys know, I do a webinar every month. I give away 90% of what I know about marketing for advisors and it’s been so successful for me. And so I really want to share that with you guys because it’s how I built my business between webinars and LinkedIn, that’s how I grew my email list and got all of my clients. And that’s just how I share my knowledge with people so that they can understand what I do and how I help advisors.

               And so, in the last six months alone, I’ve doubled my email list just with my webinar prospecting marketing strategy. And so I highly recommend it. I’ve been on webinars for companies, broker dealers, key influencers, and it’s such a great way to build your network and to become a subject matter expert so that people can get to know you without you meeting with a thousand people individually. You can do webinars and so so many people can learn from you and get to know you and it gives you the maximum bang for your buck. And so, through my work, I’ve created a system for advisor clients to use webinars in marketing to their own prospects. It’s been really successful and I’m excited to share it with you today. It’s something that I’ve been waiting months to get the word out there, about how webinars are working for advisors.

               So, today we’re going to cover a lot. We’re going to talk about how advisors are using webinars, why webinars are so powerful, choosing the best topics for your audience, because your webinar is only as powerful as the topic that you choose. 10 steps to creating your first webinar, which technologies to use, and I get a lot of questions about which technologies to use. I’ll go into detail about everything that you need to know on that subject. And then, how many leads to expect. Because the great thing about using webinars to market, is they’re very predictable. They have a predictable conversion rate. And if you do them over and over, and you get people to register, you can get new clients each and every month using this system.

               Stick around until the end because I will give away a free gift at the end of the presentation, and let’s get started. So, a couple of the top advisors that I work with use webinars every single month to fill their pipeline. And these are people that are running big firms. They have billions, billions with a B, assets under management. And every month they use webinars. So, a lot of advisors in the past use seminars and that worked in the old days. But now as you guys know, it’s very expensive to do seminars and it’s expensive with your time. You have to show up, you have to feed people dinner, you have to worry about plate lickers coming and sitting through your seminars just to get a free dinner. And so, webinars are a great way to showcase what you know and how you can help without having to put on the expense of an in-person seminar.

               They are fantastic for employer specific campaigns and that’s how a lot of my top advisors use them. They’re efficient for personal client education. And so I have some advisors who do a webinar every quarter, to do market updates or to communicate about their firm with their clients. So, an alternative to a client meeting, you could do a quarterly client webinar. And they’re excellent for growing your network. So, if you partner with CPAs or lawyers or other people in your community, key influencers in your community, to answer questions or cover a certain topic, it’s a great way to get people on their email list to become aware of you and maybe sign up for your email list. And so, it’s just a great cross pollination opportunity.

               So, you can see the example here is, is your portfolio ready for the election? And this is just one of my clients did this webinar, a free financial education webinar, and basically just they talk, they brought in an expert and the advisor talked about, what the election was going to do to markets. And it got a really high attendance rate. It was really effective for them. And so, any topic, the sky’s the limit as far as which topic you cover. But webinars are just a great way to start the conversation with prospects. So, why are webinars so powerful? So, I don’t really need to spell this out for you guys because I’m kind of preaching to the choir, because you guys are attending a webinar right now. And so you understand the power, right?

               Because if you came to my website and you read a couple of pages on my website, you would maybe get an idea of what I do. But by listening to this webinar and by engaging with this webinar, you get a lot more of my personality, my background, my insights. You feel like you know me, you feel like you understand more of what I do and how I can help. And so, it’s just so much more powerful than a blog post, or a website, to really communicate what makes you different. So, another great thing about webinars is they’re scalable for small or large audiences. So, in the past with seminars, you have this huge outlay of cash to have this big event, and if only a couple people show up, you’ve still spent a huge amount of money.

               So, webinars are scalable. So, if two people show up or 200 people show up, it’s still a cost effective endeavor for you. They’re also an effective avenue to share complex ideas. And so, maybe your specialty is legacy planning for the wealthy or social security claiming strategies for spouses. These are things that are a little bit dry and they’re not as easy to communicate with a blog post or in writing, but they really lend themselves to webinars. And so, by distributing this information in webinar form, you’re able to have it resonate more with your potential clients. You also can capture email addresses to grow your email list with webinars. So, even if somebody watches your webinar and they don’t become a client, they’re still on your email list so that you can nurture them over time and hopefully convert them later. It’s a great avenue to have a call to action at the end to urge people to take the next step. And they have high conversion rates.

               So, webinar conversion rates range from 20%-40% versus 3%-5% for email. So, it’s a great high impact way to convert more of your prospects. They can showcase your expertise, they’re definitely more personal than articles, and they can be used forever. And so, you can set up an automated webinar and have it run over and over and over for new clients. And it’s something where, think about doing your sales pitch that you do at a coffee shop, or in a client’s home, or at your office over and over. This can be automated, so your sales pitches ongoing in a digital format while you’re doing other things, while you’re on the beach having a pina colada. So, it’s a great avenue to use into the future and it’s very powerful.

               So, let’s talk about automating your marketing. So, imagine that you have a webinar that you know that converts well, that is on your area of expertise. So, we could use Facebook or LinkedIn Ads to drive traffic to the registration page, where people sign up for your webinar, and then they watch the webinar where they get to know, like, and trust you. At the end, the presentation explains the next step and creates a sense of urgency for them to take the next step. And then the call to action sends people to your calendar scheduler. So, an online calendar scheduler. And the new appointments pop up on your calendar for you to take a phone call with a new prospect who already understands what you do, how you help, and is ready to talk about their needs and how you can help them.

               And so, it’s a way to truly automate your marketing so that new leads show up on your calendar without you actually doing anything. So, webinars also can qualify prospects. And this is a big thing. I look at all the new leads that come in from my advisor clients, and this week I saw a lead come in where the person wrote an email to the advisor saying, “I want to invest my money but I don’t want to pay a fee for investment management or advice. Are you an advisor that can help me without a fee?” So, I don’t know any other profession where somebody would ask you to do your job for free. But that’s what this prospect was asking. And so we want to qualify out these people. We don’t want them to waste your time. And so webinars can do that.

               You can talk about your minimum investible assets, you can talk about your minimum account size, you could talk about who you serve best and no more selling to everyone. Instead you do targeted presentations that are directed at what you do best, at your specialty and they explain the value that you offer. And so, interested people who are qualified can take action and you can sit back and be ready to meet with them, and do more of what you do best instead of doing all the qualification, in person, in your office, where you can waste a lot of time. So, the challenge of traditional webinars is basically that, it’s hard to do a live event. If you don’t do live events all the time it can be scary. You can have technology challenges, you can maybe get nervous and not present as well as you know you should, live.

               You could have a low attendance rate because people have to be available at that day and time. And it’s difficult from a compliance perspective because compliance likes to see everything in advance. And so, doing live events can be hit or miss with compliance. Of course, it’s possible, but it’s definitely challenging. So, what I recommend is automated webinars, and it’s what I use for my own webinars and it’s what I really recommend for my advisor clients. Because I’ve seen so many advisors get really stressed and have issues with running live webinars. And there’s no gold medal that people are going to give you because you did a live webinar. I think it’s much more important to do a webinar that respects people’s time. And so, you make sure you deliver maximum value and that you have no technology issues, so that the people watching your webinar get the best version of your presentation. So, automated webinars feel like a live webinar. Somebody goes to the registration page, they pick which day and time is best for them, and a software system plays the webinar for them at that time.

               The software system also sends out the, thank you for signing up email, the reminder email, maybe a day or an hour before the webinar starts, and the replay the day after the webinar. And so, it saves a lot of your time and it’s a great way to set up your webinars so that they feel like a live webinar. But you get some other advantages, like you can record your webinar in advance and get compliance approval. So, compliance has signed off on the final video of your presentation, so you have no compliance headaches or no concerns. It removes any technology risks, so you don’t have to worry if your internet goes down, or if your audio isn’t working right that day. We make sure your webinar’s perfect, you know it’s going to play correctly every single time. You don’t have any live broadcast jitters. And we have double the engagement over live webinars.

               And it’s interesting to me when people sign up for a live event you’d think they would attend. But of course things come up, and I see more than half of people watch the replay of the webinar. And so, you’re effectively getting double the people to view your presentation by doing an automated webinar, with an automated replay. And so, I’m going to tell you right now, 10 steps to create your first webinar for your marketing campaign. And we’re going to focus on automated webinars because of all the reasons I just listed. So, the first thing you want to do is select a topic, and then we’re going to build your offer or your call to action, create your presentation, design it, record it, and then of course get compliance approval. Then we’ll talk about setting up your automated webinar, building your registration page, promoting it, and following up with the leads that your webinar generates.

               So, the first thing you want to do is selecting your topic. Now, your webinar attendance rate is going to be only as strong as the topic that you select. And so it’s critically important that you select a topic that is interesting, relevant, and valuable to your target audience. And so, consider when you’re thinking of, what should your webinar be on? Consider the questions that you get most frequently from your top clients or your top prospects. Maybe it’s about lowering the fees on their investments. Maybe it’s about taxes, maybe it’s about the risk in their portfolio. You probably know exactly what it is for your clients. And so, think about your frequently asked questions, and write down a few ideas for webinars that you could cover on those topics.

               Ask your clients, ask them what they’re interested in. Maybe they’re interested in a market update. Maybe they’re interested in, how you go about creating your portfolios for them. So, that’s a great way of just getting your clients feedback on what you should cover, and what they want to learn about. You could pull your network. So, you could do a quick survey from everyone on your email list of, which webinar should I do next? And that’s a great way to get effective feedback, so that you can create your strategy around an actual data point. And then another strategy is to look into your Google Analytics. So, Google Analytics records all of the traffic to the different pages on your website. And so, if you do any blogging or if you have a variety of pages on your website, you could take a look at which pages are most popular.

               Maybe it’s your pages on your investment strategy, or maybe it’s your pages on your 1035 exchange service, whatever it is that can give you an idea of what’s popular for your visitors to your website. And then if you really want to get technical, you could test with technology. And so, you could create Facebook Ads that maybe have ads for two different webinars, maybe one is on maximizing their 401(k) benefits, one’s on retiring at age 55. And you could test out those two ads and see which gets more clicks. And then you could create your webinar based on the winning topic. And so, you want to make sure you do spend a little bit of time selecting your topics, so that you’re not putting all of the time of creating a webinar into a dud of a topic.

               So, when selecting your topic, we want to think about which one urgent problem do you solve for a specific group. And so, these are some ideas of webinar topics that have been popular in the past. How physicians can catch up for retirement in a hurry, how married couples can maximize their social security benefits, an overview of the Qualcomm 401(k) plan investments. And so, you know which investments are in the plan, what fees you should be paying, things like that. Understanding the Intel Pension Plan. Pension plans can be confusing and complex. And so this was a great webinar on the mechanics of the Intel Pension Plan. And then a mid-year economic update is always a good bet for maybe nurturing your existing clients, and keeping them aware of what’s going on.

               So, once you select your topic, then you want to think about your offer. And your offer is your call to action. So, you don’t want to have a webinar without a concrete way that people take the next step. And so, you want to decide on the call to action, and build a landing page for people to take the next step. And so, for this webinar you would go to indigomarketingagency.com/offer to take the next step. And so, you want to automate the delivery of your offer so that people can go to your landing page, download the report, or sign up for the offer, or get the discount, whatever it is. Or maybe it’s make an appointment, maybe they’re going to add your calendar schedulers so that they can make an appointment for a phone call with you. And then create a direct link so that you can say during your webinar, go to this link, sign up to take the next step.

               And so, here’s some examples of offers. So, it could be a 15 minute question and answer phone call. It could be taking a risk questionnaire to find out how much risk is in your portfolio. It could be scheduling a social security review appointment in person. Maybe it’s a free financial plan, maybe it’s a complimentary business valuation. This is one of my advisors who helps entrepreneurs sell their businesses, and a lot of entrepreneurs have no idea what their businesses are worth, and so he offers a complimentary evaluation. Or maybe it’s how much they’re paying in 401k fees. So, whatever it is, you want to set up a landing page for them to get started, for them to take the next step. And you can see on the right, here’s a free introductory meeting landing page. And then once you’ve created your call to action, then you want to start building your presentation.

               And so, the first step, and this is where a lot of people really get stuck, and they really spend a lot of time without getting a lot of results. And so, the first thing you want to do, is create your text only presentation first. So, don’t worry about putting graphics or putting pretty designs or your logo on your presentation. You want to create your text only slides first. Then you want to start with an outline. So, just think of the topics that you want to cover, and start building out your slides based on that outline. Plan for one slide per presentation minute. So, this presentation is aimed at about 35 minutes. So, I have 35 slides. Aim for about 30 presentation minutes, and that’s… Some people do longer webinars, but I think with today’s people’s attention span, it pays to be a little bit brief and to give maximum value in 30 minutes.

               You want to keep each slide pretty short, as short as possible, maybe four to six bullet points. And then add your data, your graphs, your charts, things that are especially easy to understand. Visuals, like charts, help people digest the information that you’re presenting so it’s not just text. And then don’t add your designs or your images yet. You want to do that later after you get your core ideas down into a PowerPoint presentation. Then this is an example of a great presentation outline. So, you want to have your title. You want to give a little bit about your background so people know, like, and trust you, like we talked about before. And then, of course, talk about why you’re passionate about the topic. Why do you do what you do? Why did you become a financial advisor? Why does this topic matter to you?

               And that’s a great way to start upping the ante and start getting people engaged with you through your webinar. And then give people an idea of what you’re going to cover, and then just dive into the core teachings. So, dive right into your slides and start giving away 90% of what you know. Leave a little bit of time at the end for questions and answers. And of course, if you’re doing an automated webinar, which I recommend, you may just want to answer frequently asked questions. They don’t need to be live questions, but if you’re an advisor, and if you meet with clients and prospects on a specific topic, you know the basic questions that they ask you. And so, you can just have an outliner, three or four questions that you want to answer. And then of course include your call to action for them to take the next step.

               And then you want to design your presentation. And so, once you have all the text slides, it’s really important to have a professional graphic designer design your presentation. And I recommend Upwork.com, it’s a website where you can find graphic designers to bid on your project. Plan to pay about $2 per slide. And so if you have a 30 slide presentation, it’s only going to cost you $60 to $100 to get a professional designer to make it look amazing, and it’ll save you a ton of time. Design with your logo and your branding in mind. So this should match your website and it should look nice. It should be in line with your branding. And then make sure you include imagery on most slides. So, pick relevant images or have your designer pick relevant photography for each slide.

               Next, you want to stop and get compliance approval. And so, a great place to get compliance approval is on your presentation, so that you can put any disclosures onto the slides, or change any text on the slides before you actually go through the work of recording your presentation. You want to make sure you have the compliance blessing. Then you want to go ahead and record your presentation. Now, this is really the hardest part, and it’s not too difficult, but so many advisors this is where they get stuck. And so, I want to urge you to really push past this challenge, because it is difficult to do a video recording of yourself explaining a topic. You may be hypercritical, you may be a perfectionist, but this is really where it gets difficult. What I do, is I use a USB microphone, because the audio for your presentation, if it’s slides with a voice over audio, the audio is pretty important.

               And so you want to make sure you have good audio. And so, I use the Blue Yeti microphone. You can get it on Amazon for about $130. And it just plugs into the USB port on your computer, and then you just talk right into it and it has amazing audio. And so, I would recommend purchasing the microphone, and that’s really the only big outlay of cash or of equipment that you have to use. But it’s worth it to spend a little bit of money on that. And then you’ll want to record your screen with the audio on top of it at the same time, so that your voice lines up directly with each slide. And so, if you have a Mac, you can do QuickTime, which is already installed on your Mac. You just do a screen recording and it’s really easy to do. It’s super user friendly. Or if you have windows, try Camtasia. That’s a good way to do a screen and audio recording.

               And so, what you want to do, is you just want to capture your slides with your voice on top of it in unison, and that’s how you record the presentation. So, here are my tips for recording a great webinar presentation. So, first I would recommend that you do a full trial run. If you’re doing a 30 minute webinar, this is only going to take you 30 minutes. So, do a full trial run and then listen to it. And you’ll think of ways that you can improve it. And you can also review the audio and video quality to make sure that it’s up to par. And so, this is definitely an extra step that is well worth the time in my opinion. If you’re recording an automated webinar like we discussed, you don’t want to talk about time or current events, because this could be running for months or years into the future. So, like for this webinar, right now what’s happening is Hurricane Irma is slamming into Florida right now.

               I don’t want to necessarily mention that, because you guys are going to know that I’ve recorded this webinar on September 10th, when the hurricane is on top of everyone’s mind. So, now I’ve dated my webinar and you’re going to know that it’s not live, that it’s recorded, and which day it was recorded. That’s fine because you guys know that this is an automated webinar, but for yours you want to leave out reference of time or current events just to keep it evergreen. And so, consider answering frequently asked questions at the end. We want it to feel like a live webinar. And one of the advantages of live webinars is that you can answer questions, but just because questions come in live doesn’t mean that they’re the best questions that appeal to the most of your audience. So, think about when you answer questions, think about your frequently asked questions that are really impactful, that help people understand the topic, and just answer those at the end of your webinar and people won’t know whether or not it’s live.

               And then, once you’ve recorded your webinar and you have the video and the audio, you will want to get compliance approval of the finished product. And so, this is a great time to get the sign off on the final version of your webinar, so that you can play it for the public forever and ever and it’s compliance approved. Then, once you have the video, here’s where the rubber meets the road. You’re going to set up your automated webinar using your webinar technology. So, I use Easy Webinar. And so, if you sign up for my webinar, you select the day you want to attend, you enter your name and your email, you click to register, that’s all through Easy Webinar. They send you the email that says, thanks for registering. They have a countdown page, where if you click to view your webinar before the time that you selected, it will say that you’re too early and it’ll have a countdown timer.

               And then it’ll send you a reminder email, and the email the day after with the replay. And so, those are all things that you don’t want to have to bother with. So, using Easy Webinar or EverWebinar is a great option. They are about $500 per year and they do all of the heavy lifting for you. And so, you’ll want to customize your scheduling options. So, I recommend having your automated webinars scheduler give people an option to watch yesterday’s replay, or to select one of the next four appointments to watch the webinar in the future. And so, that’s just best practices. From there, you’ll upload your video to Easy Webinar or EverWebinar, and so that it’ll play automatically as people register. You’ll type up your reminder emails. So, you want to customize them with the title of the webinar and with your information, so that when people get a reminder, they remember what they registered for. And then you’re going to create your replay email and add your biography and your photos, so that when people sign up, they can see your smiling face and understand why you’re credible to teach this subject.

               From there you’ll create the registration page. And you can even add timed offers. And so, that’s when a little window will pop up saying, save $400 on your next webinar by signing up now. And so, all of these webinar technologies allow you to add timed offers, to give a little bit of urgency to your call to action. Once you’ve done that, you want to build your registration page. This is really where you’re encouraging people to sign up, and you’re telling them all of the benefits that your webinar is going to offer them. And so, it’s the landing page on your website where people will enter their name and email address to sign up. Consider using LeadPages. That’s what I use for my clients and for my own webinars. Add the title, add an image, or maybe even a video about why they should attend, and then some text about the benefits, and then the registration form.

               And so, this is the page that we’re going to promote to get people to sign up for your webinar. From then, you want to set up your automated webinar on your website. And so, we want to start promoting it here. So, you’re going to add it to your homepage, you’re going to add it to the events page on your website, if you have an events page. You’re going to promote it by email, and this is critical. We want to send an email to everyone in your network saying, “Save the date for the webinar, register now, and then last chance to register.” And so, it’s really interesting when you do send these emails, you’ll get about 20% of people will sign up for your save the date email. About 30% will be your register now email is what will get them to register.

               And what’s interesting to me, is I get 50% of people sign up during my last chance email. And so, a lot of advisors don’t think to send a last chance to register for the webinar email, but you can double your registrations by sending that email. So, I highly recommend it. Ask your partners to share with their network. So, all of your referral partners, centers of influence, ask them to share this webinar with their network, so you get new people to sign up, and then share on social media. And here you can see an example of a Facebook post where I’m promoting last month’s webinar. You want to add the call to action, of sign up for my webinar, to the end of each of your blog posts. And then consider paid Ads. So, maybe you want to do LinkedIn or Facebook Ads to get more registrations. And then add your completed webinar to the resources section of your website, so that when people are browsing your website, they can look at all of the webinars that you’ve done in the past and that’s just an added resource on your site.

               Then once you’ve completed the webinar, you definitely want to make sure to follow up with leads. So, we’ve worked really hard to get people to sign up, and now we want to follow up and try to convert as many as possible. So, you want to send that email that gives them the link to watch the replay, and about half of the people who view your webinar will be people watching the replay. And then you want to send a follow up email, as offering to answer any specific questions. So, it should be a personal email that says, “Hey, thanks so much for watching my webinar. Do you have any questions that I can answer about social security or about the Chevron benefits package, whatever it is?” And so, that’s a great way to start a one-to-one conversation about their specific unique situation. Urge people to take advantage of the offer that you promoted on your webinar, and then send a last chance offer by email.

               So, it’s your last chance to save 50% on a financial plan, or to find out how much risk is in your portfolio. Always do the last chance email because it really does work. And then, you want to add everyone who had signed up for your presentation to your master email list, so that you can nurture them over time with your regular blog posts and emails that go out. So, let’s talk about what you should expect from your webinar. So, I do webinars for a lot of advisors and for myself. So, I have a pretty good idea of what to expect. Of course, it’s going to vary for your audience and your specialty. But here’s what you should basically expect. If you have an email list of 1000 people, you should get about 50 webinar registrations, which is 5%.

               You’ll get about half of those people that will attend. Half of the people will be too busy or they won’t watch the replay, but 25 people will actually watch your presentation, which is pretty amazing. And then from that you should aim to get about five appointments. And so, that’s a pretty traditional funnel. So, if you have a thousand people on your email list, you should expect to get five appointments, which is great. And so, all we need to do, is get 50 webinar registrations to get you five new appointments. And that’s basically what I’ve seen in the industry. And so, that’s what you can expect. So, think about your business, and think about what you’ve done for your marketing in the past, and what you want to do with your business and how you want to grow your business in the future. What if you created one webinar on a specific area of your expertise each and every month?

               So, you would get new appointments every month, maybe get five new appointments every month. You would have 12 Evergreen webinars on your website each year, which would give people such deep expertise to dive into when they visit your website. And you would have great deep presentations on specific topics. So, if you get an email with somebody asking you, what fees should I pay in my 401(k)? You can send them the link to your webinar and answer their question without having to meet with them or have a long phone call. It’s just a way to share information automatically on a specific area of expertise. And you have ongoing engagement with clients and prospects. So, one of the reasons that clients hire you to work with and to manage their investments and to be their financial advisor, is because they want to stay educated on financial topics.

               And so, it’s also a great value add for your clients, to constantly be putting out new content and educating them on the things that they need to know about. And so, I just want you to think about, what if you did commit to this? What if you did one new webinar each and every month this year? Where would that take your business? So, thank you so much for watching to this point in the webinar. I want to give you a free gift. Now, I know what we covered may seem complex and it may seem difficult for you to execute on your own. And that’s where a lot of advisors find themselves, and that’s why they come to me. And so, I want to offer you $400 off your first webinar. And what that does is our team will create design, automate and promote your webinar.

               The only thing that the advisor needs to do, is record the actual video presentation. So, we want to make sure it’s your voice and your insight. And so you need to spend the half hour to record your webinar. But we do everything besides that. Everything from designing your slides, to doing your email automations, to promoting your webinar on Facebook, we take care of all of that. It includes the EasyWebinar software fees. And we normally charge $1,750 and now it’s only $1,350 through the end of the month. So, go to indigomarketingagency.com/webinars to say $400 today. Type your question into the chat and I will email you a personal response. The cat’s out of the bag. This is not a live webinar. But I still care about your questions and I want to make sure I understand where you guys have questions on this topic. And so, send me an email or enter your question into the chat, and I will personally answer your question by email.

               If you want to learn more, please sign up for my newsletter, indigomarketingagency.com/newsletter. As I mentioned, I have new webinars every month, and you could take my online courses which are a deeper dive in any of these topics. So, check out indigomarketingagency.com/courses, and connect with me on LinkedIn, linkedin.com/n/claireakin. And that way we can stay in touch on LinkedIn. Thank you so much for watching. Let me know if you have any questions, and I really appreciate your time. I hope this webinar was helpful for you.

 

Katie Cress Digital Marketing Consultant, Sales & Client Strategist
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Joshua Yanson

Web Developer
Negros Occidental, Philippines

Joshua spends his days developing client websites, implementing automations, and troubleshooting website issues. He enjoys the challenge of working with websites while simultaneously learning new tips and tricks to optimize them for maximum efficiency.

Originally from Pulupandan, Negros Occidental, Philippines, Joshua holds a Bachelor of Science in Information Technology, and in his free time enjoys playing computer games and watching anime and movies.

Indgio Team Member Dan Corcoran

Dan Corcoran

Account Manager
Madison, Wisconsin

Dan Corcoran enjoys being on the front lines of financial advisor marketing, working directly with advisors to help them build a strong marketing plan to get their firm’s message out. Working remotely can be a challenge as talking to others, brainstorming, and sharing experiences recharges him; he maximizes touchpoints to connect with others to make every day at Indigo rewarding.

Dan holds a bachelor’s degree in journalism and mass communication from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. He enjoys drone photography and videography (he owns his own drone business, Forward Focus Photography), sports broadcasting (he was a hockey broadcaster for four years prior to COVID), spending time with family, camping/hiking, running, swimming, and road biking.

Originally from Sun Prairie, WI, Dan has three siblings, and prior to joining Indigo’s team, he worked for an RIA in Madison for two years.

Hugo Fernandez CEO of Indigo Marketing

Hugo Fernandez

CEO
Whispering Pines, North Carolina

Leading the Indigo team with heart, Hugo Fernandez is passionate about helping our financial advisors attract a flood of their A+ clients with sustainable marketing campaigns. He enjoys running companies that are wildly successful and wearing a black t-shirt every day of his life. When his two favorite things come together, you have an average day at Indigo.

Hugo Fernandez is also CEO of Indigo’s partner company, Just Digital, and author of The Client Acquisition Blueprint. He has personally helped hundreds of entrepreneurs grow their business through his proven blueprint for creating an EPIC marketing strategy and online presence.

Kelli McLeod Director of Client Services

Kelli McLeod

Director of Client Services
Colorado Springs, Colorado

Kelli McLeod plays an integral role at Indigo while overseeing the Account Services Team, providing customer service, getting financial advisors onboarded and in serving as their primary point of contact during that process. Her team looks to her for her leadership and decision-making abilities For Kelli, the most rewarding part of this role is working with clients one-on-one to ensure they’re happy and that their needs are met.

Kelli has a bachelor’s degree in communications and public relations from Pacific Lutheran University. More recently, she’s done extensive work in the corporate housing and property management industries.

Kelli currently lives in Colorado Springs, Colorado, with her husband, Ian, who is an officer in the U.S. Army, and their two sons, Zachary and Cameron. When she’s not working, you can find her running or hiking, attending group fitness classes, and cooking. Kelli’s also an avid book club enthusiast, so be sure to reach out to her if you’re looking for a new read.

Sara Dressler

Director of Operations

DuPont, Washington

Sara Dressler manages all systems and operating processes while overseeing several departments. Sara is responsible for supervising many activities within Indigo and identifying areas of improvement to better meet company goals. She functions as the bridge connecting management to every department.

Sara has a bachelor’s degree in business administration and a minor in communications from Pacific Lutheran University. She leverages this degree, along with her years of experience as a virtual assistant, to keep our company running like a well-oiled machine. Sara is happiest when spending time with her family. Her three young boys and life as a military spouse keep her busy, but she wouldn’t trade it for the world. She lives an active lifestyle and loves working out, getting outside, and watching sports with her family (whether it’s on TV, at her kids’ games, or in the backyard).

Indigo Marketing Team Member Elizabeth Reider Director of Marketing

Elizabeth Reider

Director of Marketing
Clearwater, Florida

Elizabeth Reider is a woman of many talents. She spent 10 years as a Chief Marketing Officer for a top-level independent financial advisor, and since her entry into financial services, she has networked and become friends with many advisors. Elizabeth admires their empathy, knowledge, and passion for their work, and has seen how independent advisors are more than professionals providing investment and planning advice; they are trusted confidants, life coaches, and guides. Over time, they become a part of their clients’ extended family—and she loves coming alongside that. (Check out this video to hear directly from Elizabeth about why she loves working with financial advisors.)

As Director of Marketing, Elizabeth helps get the word out about how partnering with Indigo can take an advisor’s marketing to the next level and beyond to grow their business and increase their productivity.

Elizabeth earned her bachelor’s degree in management information systems from the University of South Florida Muma College of Business. She also holds a life, health, and variable annuity license, which gives her a special understanding of the many products and services advisors offer. Originally from Clearwater, FL, Elizabeth loves to travel and has visited 12 countries, including extended visits to eSwatini, Africa, to visit family and assist with humanitarian relief programs. She has seen firsthand how independent financial advisors are providing advice to their clients that outpours into the lives of their own families, staff, community, and sometimes across the globe. When she’s not working, Elizabeth enjoys attending orchestral and theater productions with her husband, David, and taking their son, Julian, to art museums, as well as family evenings in the backyard playing baseball with her son and shih-tzu poodle, Wrigley. She is also an active participant in overseas humanitarian work—using her skills to make a difference in the lives of others.

Indigo Marketing Team Member Katie Cress

Katie Cress

Digital Marketing Consultant, Sales & Client Strategist
Cincinnati, Ohio

It’s Katie Cress’s mission to help financial advisors reach their ideal prospects through custom digital marketing. On any given day, you can find Katie meeting with new financial advisors to learn more about their marketing goals, who they love working with, and why they’re passionate about helping others. Her favorite part of her job is meeting new advisors every day and continuing to learn how each firm and individual advisor is different, and using her marketing and small business background to help them craft a game plan that empowers them to grow their business and enhance their services. Often described by loved ones as a “helper” and “caretaker,” Katie is passionate about advocating for her advisors’ needs and supporting her coworkers to help them succeed.

Katie holds an MBA from Xavier University and a BA in Economics from Ohio University. A Midwest girl for life, she lives in Cincinnati, Ohio, with her husband, Brandon (who’s also a marketing guru), and their three kids, Charli, Lucy, and Teddy. She and her husband also own Clean Eatz Cafe, where they use their collective marketing prowess and love of food to create a welcoming space for employees and hungry customers alike. Katie is passionate about and for small business owners, being raised by her father who was an entrepreneur, being one herself with her husband, and working with them every day at Indigo. She loves the spirit, creativity, and drive of entrepreneurs. When Katie’s not working or helping run the family business, she enjoys working out with her husband at Orange Theory, loving on her three kids, and cooking delicious food.

Indigo Marketing Team Member Lori Koepke

Lori Koepke

Account Manager
Boise, Idaho

Lori Koepke plays a major role as a liaison between Indigo Marketing Agency and its wonderful clients. She works directly with our advisor clients on their marketing strategies, marketing calendars, article creation, editing processes, compliance approvals, deployment of their content, and more. Lori enjoys helping strategize and be a support to her clients, and loves the camaraderie among the Indigo team members.

Before joining the Indigo team, Lori was a schoolteacher for 10 years. She has a Master of Education and Bachelor of Arts in Elementary Education from Concordia University in Portland, OR. She was born and raised in Vancouver, B.C., and lived in Vancouver, WA, for 25 years before moving to Boise, Idaho, where she currently resides with her husband, Jeremy, and four wonderful kids, Sophie, Tanner, Jonas, and Violet. In her free time, you can find Lori reading, watching football, and driving her kids to all their activities.

Watch this video to hear why Lori loves working with Indigo.

Indigo Marketing Team Member Heidi Wilson

Heidi Wilson

Account Manager

Alexandria, Virginia

Heidi Wilson thrives on helping advisors create an online voice and streamline their marketing efforts. With her mother being a retired financial advisor and her brother-in-law currently a CFP® professional, she’s passionate about taking the marketing pressure off of advisors so they are able to focus on their clients. She loves when advisors tell her something we did for them helped; it can be as simple as taking something off their very busy plate or helping them land a new client with one of the articles we wrote. With broad-based consumer and B2B marketing experience, Heidi is constantly thinking outside the box and brings a fresh perspective to the Indigo team.

Heidi holds a bachelor’s degree in public relations from Florida State University and hails from Tampa, Florida. Her husband, Chris, is in the U.S. Army, and as they are constantly moving, they take every opportunity to explore the new areas where they’re living. Some of their favorite places they’ve called home include Hawaii and New Orleans. Heidi is thankful for the opportunity to work remotely with Indigo, which allows her to take her job with her, no matter where the Army moves her family next.

Watch this video to hear why Heidi loves working with Indigo.

Indigo Marketing Team Member Jillian Segrue

Jillian Segrue

Account Manager
Columbus, Georgia

Jillian Segrue acts as a liaison between clients and the Indigo team, using her 12 years of customer service experience in fields such as healthcare, financial services, and risk management to help hone their message and deploy it effectively and efficiently. Jillian enjoys building unique relationships with each of her clients as she uniquely helps them reach their ideal target audience.

Jillian has a bachelor’s degree in healthcare administration and a minor in business administration from SUNY Brockport. Originally from Rochester, NY, she currently lives in Columbus, GA, with her husband, Tim (an Army captain), daughter, Macie, son, Henry, and two cats. As a military spouse, Jillian appreciates the flexibility Indigo provides—allowing her to juggle motherhood and excelling in her career—and its unmatched positive, supportive, and uplifting company culture. In her free time, Jillian loves to read, shop, and go running outdoors (just not in the Georgia heat!).

Indigo Marketing Team Member Amanda Laskey

Amanda Laskey

Account Manager
Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania

Amanda Laskey works with clients one-on-one to develop and implement marketing strategies that help spread the word about who they are and how they help. In her role, Amanda strives to deliver outstanding customer service to our clients. She is tech-savvy, an independent problem-solver, extremely organized, an excellent communicator, and thrives on helping others. She appreciates the ability to work remotely in a collaborative team environment while supporting her family.

Amanda holds a Bachelor of Arts in Education and a Master of Arts in Inclusive Education from Seton Hill University and has over 10 years of experience in secondary classroom teaching and over 3 years as an Executive Assistant. A proud Army spouse, Amanda resides in Pittsburgh, PA, with her husband, Brandon, their two sons, Jackson and Harrison, and their sheepadoodle, Waylon, and goldendoodle, Cash. Outside of work, Amanda enjoys spending time with her family, relaxing at the beach, traveling to new places, dessert, and all things Disney.

Indigo Marketing Team Member Beverly Anderson

Beverly Anderson

Account Manager
Portland, Oregon

Beverly Anderson is the go-to contact point for advisors to create a targeted and cohesive marketing strategy that is unique to their specific goals. She loves seeing her clients experience positive results from their marketing efforts, and as a world traveler, she appreciates the ability to work remotely and connect with clients from any country.

Beverly holds a Bachelor of Science in Business Administration from Oregon State University. In addition to traveling, she enjoys making music as a singer/songwriter and anything outdoors (she’s an avid snowboarder and rock climber). She and her partner have a rescue pup, Toro, a former street dog in Cabo, Mexico, before they adopted him. Beverly has three older sisters, with whom she is very close, and they all, along with her mother, live in the Portland area. Although she spent the first half of her childhood in Fountain Hills, Arizona, Beverly considers Portland to be home.

Watch this video to hear why Beverly loves working with Indigo.

Indigo Marketing Team Member Kasey Yhap

Kasey Yhap

Account Manager
Ellicott City, MD

Kasey Yhap’s commitment to her clients is the driving force behind her work. Her diverse educational background (a bachelor’s and master’s degree in vocal performance from the Peabody Conservatory of Music and a master’s degree in communications from Syracuse University) has equipped her with the unique skill set required for success. Kasey’s strong communication skills and creative mindset, combined with her passion for helping her clients, make her a valuable asset to the team.

In her free time, Kasey stays active and maintains a healthy lifestyle through yoga, CrossFit, and spending time outdoors. These hobbies complement her professional life by allowing her to recharge and bring new ideas to her work at Indigo.

Indigo Marketing Team Member Lisa Gaines

Lisa Gaines

Content Deployment Manager
Fort Hood, Texas

Lisa Gaines spends her work days uploading blog posts to our clients’ websites and LinkedIn profiles, drafting emails, and making adjustments to content as advisors request. Lisa has learned a lot as a long-time member of the Indigo family and has enjoyed seeing the processes evolve to become more streamlined and efficient over time. And she loves working with the amazing Indigo team! 

Lisa is a proud alum of Texas A&M University, where she received a Bachelor of Business Administration in Finance. As a military child, Lisa feels as though she grew up everywhere; however, she claims central Texas as home where most of her family is originally from. She currently lives in Fort Hood, Texas, with her husband, Korey (an active-duty Army officer), and two kids, Madelyne and Jameson. As a military family, Lisa moves quite a bit—often to areas where the job market is small. She loves that Indigo provides her with a steady job she can take with her wherever she goes. When she’s not working, Lisa enjoys dabbling in interior design, binging a good Netflix series, and spending time with friends and family.

Read more about why Lisa loves working with Indigo.

Indigo Marketing Team Member Anne Wheeler

Anne Wheeler

Marketing Assistant
Cincinnati, Ohio

Anne Wheeler is responsible for a variety of administrative tasks as well as updating social media pages for clients. Anne enjoys the creative side of her position and the ability to collaborate with the team to help advisors get started with Indigo.

Anne holds a bachelor’s degree in communication from the University of Tennessee. Outside of work, she enjoys walking, baking, spending time with her husband, Rick (a structural engineer), and two sons, Thomas and Turner. Anne loves being a full-time mom, and appreciates that Indigo gives her the opportunity to work part-time while still caring for her boys.

Melanie Valdez

Account Manager
Vancouver, Washington

With her marketing expertise, Melanie Valdez leaves no stone unturned when helping clients hone their marketing strategy. She loves interacting with clients and brainstorming new ideas to enhance their marketing results. No two days are ever the same, and that’s the way Melanie likes it!

Melanie holds a bachelor’s degree in psychology from Western Washington University as well as an MBA from Western Governors University. When she’s not rocking her role at Indigo, she enjoys cooking (trying out new recipes every week), painting, and discovering new restaurants with friends. She and her husband, Dat, love to travel and go on walks with their dog, Brutus, a pomeranian-chihuahua whose personality is definitely not proportionate to his small size!

Indigo Marketing Team Member Jennifer Farrior

Jennifer Farrior

Lead Writer & Proofreader
Louisville, Kentucky

Jennifer Farrior is Indigo’s go-to for all things proofreading and editing. Her attention to detail is unmatched, and she takes pride in making sure every article is clean and concise before it heads out to our financial advisors. She says, “Even a single typo can affect an advisor’s credibility, and we strive for perfection when it comes to how they’re presented online.” As Lead Writer, Jennifer trains and manages the team of writers, and also writes and collaborates with team members to create Indigo’s blog posts and promotional material.

Jennifer holds a bachelor’s degree in English from UCLA. In addition to her role at Indigo, she runs her own copy editing and proofreading business, She Proofreads LLC. Jennifer hails from San Diego, California, but now lives in Louisville, Kentucky, with her three kids, Joshua, Julia, and Joel, and goldendoodle, Dexter. She loves working at Indigo because it provides her with the income, flexibility, and the community she needs as a stay-at-home mom. Outside of work, you can find her spending time with her kids, friends, boyfriend, or working on a puzzle while watching Netflix.

Indigo Marketing Team Member Sarah Robichaud

Sarah Robichaud

Social Media Manager
Rochester Hills, Michigan

Sarah Robichaud uses her love of spreadsheets to create engaging content calendars for our clients’ social media pages. Sarah holds a bachelor’s degree in psychology from Salisbury University and a master’s degree in marriage and family counseling from Liberty University. In addition to her role at Indigo, Sarah volunteers as a virtual administrator for Army Wife Network, a nonprofit organization that aims to empower and educate military spouses through blogs, podcasts, and various other resources.

Born and raised in Maryland, Sarah currently lives in Rochester Hills, Michigan, with her husband, Andrew, two children, Emily and Logan, and two fur babies, Penny and Chewbacca. As a military spouse and mother, Sarah loves working for Indigo because of the flexibility it affords her, allowing her to continue to build her career while frequently relocating around the globe and working on her own schedule to accommodate a busy lifestyle. Sarah also loves Indigo’s supportive team atmosphere. Outside of work and volunteering, you can find Sarah enjoying time outdoors with her family, typically running, camping, or traveling. An avid traveler, she’s visited 16 countries and is always planning her family’s next great adventure.

Peter Wardenaar

Peter Wardenaar

SEO Specialist & IT Lead
Cali, Colombia

As a natural problem-solver, Peter Wardenaar uses his skills to help financial advisors find new ways to grow their site traffic and attract more clients they love. Peter enjoys the dynamic nature of his role; the challenges are never the same as every situation is unique and requires a different approach. But don’t let Peter’s technical prowess fool you—he also has quite the creative side! Before joining the Indigo team, he worked as a first-grade teacher and university English professor in Cali, Colombia.

Peter has bachelor’s degrees in education and in music from Portland Bible College and a master’s degree in music production and technology from Berklee College of Music. In his spare time, he loves writing and recording music, graphic design, engaging with people, and studying leadership and theology. Peter is also one of the most well-traveled people you’ll ever meet! He was born and raised in the Netherlands but lived in the Pacific Northwest for over 12 years. Today, he resides in Cali, Colombia, with his wife, Gloria Isabel, and their three kids, Emanuel, Paloma, and Violet.

Indigo Marketing Team Member Kourtney Kearney

Kourtney Kearney

Tech Support
Antelope, California

Kourtney Kearney is a data-driven woman with a knack for coding. On any typical day, you can find her building web pages, troubleshooting bugs in code, and setting up automations to make life easier for our clients. Thanks to her technical background, Kourtney has a vast understanding of the inner workings of websites and the data associated with them. She’s always on the lookout for new technology that will help us improve our workflows so we can focus on what we do best—helping financial advisors grow their business. Kourtney enjoys the variation of tasks and loves the challenge of taking an existing website and making it better without completely rebuilding it.

Kourtney is originally from Newark, CA (Bay Area), but currently resides in Antelope, a suburb of Sacramento, and holds a Bachelor of Arts in Art History and Curatorial Studies. Outside of work, Kourtney spends her free time reading, playing volleyball, baking with her two sons, and hanging out with family.

Indigo Marketing Agency Adrian Bachini

Adrian Bachini

Web Developer & Tech Support
Manila, Philippines

Adrian Bachini works on tasks requiring technical knowledge and other various administrative tasks. A software developer by day, prior to joining Indigo, Adrian had very little knowledge on how nontechnical positions operate. His position at Indigo allows him to both learn and experience a variety of platforms and gain more knowledge about how to maximize marketing initiatives.

Adrian holds a bachelor’s degree in computer science with a specialization in software technology from De La Salle University Manila. Adrian considers himself somewhat of a workaholic, with a full-time day job in addition to working with Indigo. When he’s not working, he enjoys watching documentaries, action movies, and anime, and also loves cycling on muddy downhill trails or cross-country rides, playing video games, and simply resting when he can. He is also a licensed commercial pilot and flies in his free time; he obviously also enjoys traveling. Adrian lives with his family and more than a few pets (11 dogs, 6 cats, a few birds, and fish)—he has more pets than humans in his home!

Claire Akin

Claire Akin

Founder
San Diego, California
Claire Akin founded Indigo Marketing Agency with the mission to help financial advisors leverage marketing to grow their businesses. As a former Investment Advisor Representative and proud daughter of an independent advisor, she’s seen first-hand the value advisors bring to their clients and community. Claire transferred ownership of Indigo Marketing Agency to Hugo Fernandez in 2022 to spend more time with her family.
Indigo Marketing Team Member Adriana

Adriana Escalante

Website Project Manager
San Antonio, Texas

Adriana Escalante thrives on creating an online representation that looks and feels true to our financial advisor clients as she builds their websites to best represent them and their businesses. Her experience working on travel and tourism websites motivates her to make sure every site she works on is exciting and engaging to web visitors. A graduate of University of Texas in Austin, Adriana double-majored in International Relations and a Liberal Arts program called Plan II. She also received a certification for front-end development from a coding academy in Austin, which has equipped her to serve as a great liaison between developers and clients.

After living in Austin, TX, for most of her adult life, Adriana now resides in San Antonio, TX (a city with a ton of history and many things to do), with her partner, Russell, and their dog, Abbey. She also has a brother and sister with whom she’s very close and tries to see a few times a year. Most of Adriana’s hobbies revolve around nature. She grew up spending lots of time on a sailboat or at a beach, and her family has a small cabin in Creede, CO, where she spends half the year hiking, camping, skiing, or snowshoeing (depending on the season). When she’s in Texas, she tries to get out most weekends to kayak. A Texas Master Naturalist, Adriana loves learning about all the plants, birds, and animals in her home state. She also dabbles in making stained-glass suncatchers!

Kaitlin Thornal

Marketing Assistant
Fort Moore, Georgia

Kaitlin Thornal helps clients onboard as they begin their marketing journey with Indigo, and she loves meeting new people and learning new things. She holds a Bachelor of Arts in Journalism and Mass Communication/Public Relations, International Studies, and a minor in French from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, as well as a Master of Arts in Communication and Leadership Studies from Gonzaga University.

Kaitlin was born at Fort Lewis, Washington, but she moved around a lot growing up, spending the most time in North Carolina. She now resides in Fort Moore, Georgia, with her husband, Mason, and their four children, Caroline, Mason, Jack, and Bo. Kaitlin’s favorite place to live has been Europe (Italy, Ireland, and Belgium) and she would go back in a heartbeat! In her spare time, she enjoys long-distance running, reading, and spending time in the mountains of western North Carolina.

Samantha Triglia

Marketing Assistant
Queens, New York

In her integral role, Samantha Triglia schedules social media posts, deploys email campaigns, and updates Google Business Profile pages for clients’ new blog posts. She also assists with lead generation/tracking and other administrative tasks. Helping out wherever she’s needed, Samantha appreciates the opportunities she has to learn and grow in her position. She says, “I love being a part of the team, especially when content deployment involves many moving parts and collaboration to get done and ready to go.”

A former teacher for 14 years, Samantha holds a Bachelor of Arts in Childhood Education from St. Francis College in Brooklyn, New York. She also holds a Master of Arts in Middle School Earth Science Education from CUNY Brooklyn College and a Master of Science in Educational Administration and Leadership from the University of Scranton. (Yes, TWO master’s degrees!) While in college, Samantha was the assistant to the Chief Compliance Officer of a brokerage firm on Madison Avenue in New York City for high-net-worth individuals and families, so she’s quite familiar with the types of clients Indigo serves.

Born and raised in Brooklyn, Samantha currently lives in Rockaway Beach in Queens, New York (the place the Ramones song is about!), with her husband, Matt (a Navy veteran and currently a New York City Firefighter), and their three sons, Matthew, Thomas, and James. Outside of work, Samantha enjoys spending time with her family riding bikes on their neighborhood boardwalk and going to the beach. They love to travel, including yearly family trips to Hershey, Pennsylvania, and Universal Studios in Florida (they’re big Harry Potter fans!). Samantha also stays active exercising and playing on a women’s softball team and a co-ed beach volleyball team with her husband.

Amanda Bicknese

Marketing Assistant
Colorado Springs, Colorado

Amanda wears a few hats at Indigo, bringing value to the team by creating custom social media posts for advisors, assisting with the onboarding process of new team members, and tackling behind-the-scenes team tasks. She loves to collaborate with our amazing clients and supportive team members.

Born and raised in Fort Myers, Florida, Amanda holds a bachelor’s degree in English Literature from the University of Central Florida and a master’s degree in education from North Carolina State University. She worked as an educator for about a decade before pivoting to a career in writing and marketing. A Space Force military spouse (former army), Amanda and her husband, Michael, are currently located in Colorado Springs, Colorado, with their two children, Mikayla and William, and two fur babies (a cat and a dog). When she’s not reading or writing fiction in her spare time, Amanda enjoys hanging out with family, hiking, trying new foods, and traveling.

Adam Spera

Account Manager
Astoria, New York

A marketer at heart, Adam finds satisfaction when consulting, strategizing, and implementing strategies to improve his clients’ business. He specializes in organic and paid social campaigns, as well as email and SEO optimization.

Adam holds a bachelor’s degree in philosophy from the University of Central Florida and a Juris Doctor degree from Thomas Jefferson School of Law. Raised in Boca Raton, Florida, by his mom (an event planner) and dad (a private boat charter captain), Adam currently lives in Astoria, New York, with his wife, Olivia, who works in pet care. When he’s not cooking up killer marketing strategies, he enjoys role-playing games, Brazilian jiu-jitsu, and reading non-fiction and philosophy books.

Hugo Fernandez CEO of Indigo Marketing

Hugo Fernandez

CEO
Los Angeles, California

Hugo Fernandez acquired ownership of Indigo Marketing Agency from founder Claire Akin in 2022. Leading the Indigo team with heart, Hugo is passionate about helping our financial advisors attract a flood of their A+ clients with sustainable marketing campaigns. He enjoys running companies that are wildly successful and wearing a black t-shirt every day of his life. When his two favorite things come together, you have an average day at Indigo.

Hugo Fernandez is also CEO of Indigo’s partner company, Just Digital, and author of The Client Acquisition Blueprint. He has personally helped hundreds of entrepreneurs grow their businesses through his proven blueprint for creating an EPIC marketing strategy and online presence.

To get in touch with Hugo, email him or connect with him on LinkedIn.