Copywriting has enormous power to help or harm financial advisers in their marketing. What you say can cause potential clients to trust you more and reach out to you. On the other hand, poor financial copywriting also has the potential to make them run a mile from your brand.
In this article, we’re going to share some of the top financial copywriting techniques we utilise here at CreativeAdviser to write stellar copy. We’ll share some common mistakes to avoid, too, so you get off to the best possible start.
#1 Figure out where financial copywriting sits in your overall marketing strategy
Why are you looking to start writing blogs and articles, exactly?
Maybe, you a small IFA startup looking to gain new leads and clients quickly through guest content.
Or perhaps you are a more established financial planning business looking to add value for your clients through incredible article, whitepapers and eBooks.
Setting realistic goals for your financial copywriting is really important, as it will largely dictate how often you write, who you write it for and where your content is published.
#2 Define your target market
You cannot write for everyone and anyone, so it’s a good idea to define who exactly you want to reach with your financial copywriting.
For instance, it might be that you are looking specifically to attract new business owners. Perhaps you are particularly interested in young, successful entrepreneurs with a lot of money, but who do not know what to do with it!
If this is your target market, then your content will contain different information, advice and tone of voice compared to content mainly targeting older, wealthy people who want pension advice.
#3 Use your social channels
You of course have the choice to simply publish articles on your financial website, and hope people come to see it. The reality for most financial advisers, however, is that you are going to have to actively promote your content if you want your target audience to find it, and engage with it.
For instance, if you happen to have a large Twitter following on your personal account, then if your followers would be interested in the content you should consider posting it.
You could even boost the reach of the article you have written through Promoted Tweets.
If your financial adviser business is on Facebook, then you will need to unfortunately do more than just post your article on your timeline in order for lots of people to see it. Facebook has seriously cut back on the amount of organic content people see from businesses in their newsfeed.
If you want to get your content in front of significant pairs of eyes on Facebook, you are most likely going to have to consider its advertising platform in order to extend your reach sufficiently.
#4 Don’t forget your email list
Many financial advisers are sitting on an absolute goldmine – i.e. their email list.
Of course, in today’s world of GDPR and stringent data protection you can no longer hope to simply buy an email list and spam the recipients with your content. You will need to build one organically if the one you presently have is out of date, small or poor quality.
For those IFAs who have a strong, larger list of of opted-in email contacts, make sure you use this asset for your content marketing. For instance, could you send out a monthly newsletter to clients, offering advice and insights into some new market trends that may be worrying them?
For prospects and people who have not yet converted into paying business, are there any articles you could present them with which would demonstrate value, helpful advice and thought leadership?
Doing so might not cause them to transact straight away, but it might give them the nudge they need to pick up the phone in a month or two.
#5 Keep the sales pitch to a minimum
Some financial advisers make this very common mistake. They think the best way to make financial copywriting convert business is to make their content very sales-driven.
For instance, this is often evidenced when IFAs spend more time talking about their services, awards and other aspects of themselves rather than focusing on giving value to the client, or potential client.
A scenario might help. Imagine you were at a dinner party, and someone you don’t know randomly came up to you and started talking about how amazing they are. You might be impressed by their self-confidence, but most likely you would also be put off!
However, imagine that same person instead came over to you, and started up a conversation. They showed a genuine interest in you, asked you questions and actively listened. Part way through the conversation, they offer some tips or advice from their own experience which you find really helpful – asking for nothing in return.
You would come away with a very positive impression of that person, and would likely remember them. You might even act on their advice a few days later, and think to yourself: “I really must ask them more about this topic, to figure out what to do next.”
This is the way financial copywriting can work. If your content can be like the latter person at the dinner party, then it will do wonders for your reputation and lead generation opportunities.
#6 Remember calls to action
Whilst a good rule is to keep your content to a general split of 10% promotional and 90% value-driven, it is important to remember calls to action throughout your financial copywriting.
The fact is, you don’t want people simply to read what you’ve written and go away with a good feeling. Ideally, you want them to actually do something with it.
For instance, it could be something as simple as asking your readers to subscribe to your newsletter in order to receive regular content like the kind they just read. Or, it could be an invitation to book onto a webinar on pensions, or one on business financial planning.
