Digital marketing strategies take years to perfect, but can yield prospects galore

Financial advisers revere the idea of new business leads coming to them instead of them having to pursue prospects, but successful inbound marketing requires a focused strategy and trial-and-error that can take years to perfect.

At McLean Asset Management, after two years of evolving its digital strategy, the financial advisory firm is seeing it bear significant fruit. Last month, the firm began offering groups of 50 to 75 people from its cultivated list a retirement income optimization map and 90-minute meeting.

The firm quickly had 30 people take them up on their several-hundred-dollar offer and decided to pause the campaign to catch up. After 15 completed meetings, several of these prospects have become clients, said Alex Murguia, managing principal of McLean Asset Management, which has about $700 million in assets under management.

 "We have nurtured a relationship with the people on the list and given them valuable content over time," he said. "So when we present the offer, they think, 'I've learned a lot for free, imagine what we'll get if we're paying.'"

At the most basic level, inbound marketing involves creating an impactful website, attracting interest to that site, building trust with visitors and then offering something that prompts interested parties to submit their contact information.

That process, though, needs to beat out the natural human inclination to keep that information private.

"The adviser has to create credibility and make the online prospect trust that nothing bad is going to happen to them," said Jack Waymire, chief executive of Paladin Digital Marketing.

Building the trusted relationship takes time and typically involves an investor receiving content that is valuable to them, repeatedly. Those pieces also need to get themselves noticed through search engine optimization, he said.