85% of individual investors and 95% of millennial investors are interested in sustainable investing, according to a 2019 report. How do you engage these investors?
Here are some best practices we've noticed in impact-focused lead generation for financial advisors:
This is a foundation for other lead generation practices. Using your CRM tool (or however you keep track of leads and clients), start segmenting leads into those who are interested in ESG or impact investing and those who are not.
Other attributes to consider segmenting by include causes (which leads care about climate change, for example), percent of assets in ESG or impact investments, target percent of assets in ESG investments, current brokerage or firm relationship, etc.
Tracking this information will allow you to tailor emails and other outreach to these leads based on their impact interest.
SEO is one of the most cost-effective client acquisition strategies, according to Michael Kitces, co-founder of XY Planning Network.
Want an overview of SEO? Here's a helpful beginner's guide.
First you'll need to determine how you want to brand your ESG or impact investing strategy -- sustainable investing? SRI investing? Social justice investing? Investing with a gender equality lens?
Defining a basic impact brand, keywords and associated content will help you stand out among other search engine results.
When considering impact-related keywords it's helpful to find out what people are searching for the most. There are several free tools to help find top-searched keywords -- one example is Wordtracker.
Your website content will be a driver of your SEO success. Once you define an impact-focused brand, develop content like blog posts, an overview page of how you do sustainable investing, and video to match. For all of your impact-focused content, use keywords and unique H1 tags that line up with your impact brand and the specific page content.
Want some sample blog posts related to sustainable investing? We can share example posts with any Advisor customer that you can tailor to your needs.
Several of the educational sources covered below (such as GIIN and USSIF) publish content that can be good starter ideas or references for your own content.
There are many other best practices for SEO that are well-covered elsewhere (such as the beginner's guide referenced above). Most of the general best practices apply to impact-focused SEO as well; just build your content, site structure and other strategies with your impact brand.
Directories are the 2nd most cost-effective client acquisition tool, according to Michael Kitces.
Some directories will let you specify a specialty or interest in sustainability or impact (e.g., XY Planning Network). Consider indicating that you offer or specialize in sustainable investing (using your impact brand from #8 above).
Other directories to consider include FeeOnlyNetwork, SmartAsset, and Zoe Financial.
There are many "Centers of Influence" (COI) related to impact investing. A few examples include GIIN, USSIF, the UN Principles for Responsible Investment, Change Finance, and the Impact Finance Center.
Attending events, networking and building relationships with COI can help you deepen your impact investing-related knowledge, find ideas to promote your impact brand (e.g., speaking opportunities at an event), and generate referrals.
Also consider building your impact-focused network in your local community. Getting involved with local nonprofits, community organizations, and/or religious groups takes a little longer but can go a long way if you’re looking for leads in your local geographic area. Local radio shows, TV shows, podcasts, and social media channels (like YouTube or IGTV) can also help.
Social media is one of the least cost-effective client acquisition strategies, so be targeted with your time and money and test before making a big investment.
First determine your target demographic and where they spend time, e.g., Facebook for older millennials and above, LinkedIn for professionals, Instagram and YouTube for Generation Z.
Budget the time you spend on each channel and track success in generating and converting leads from each channel. Adjust your time based on where your leads are coming from.
Mix in impact-focused content (e.g., posts and video about sustainable investing) with other content. Just make sure the impact-focused content lines up with what's on your website. You want leads to see a consistent impact brand across channels.
If you want to try out an impact-focused ad on a social media channel, use your impact brand and keywords with a limited budget and timeframe (e.g., $250 over a week or so). Depending on the targeting options available on your chosen platform, try to get your ad in front of leads who are a) geographically close to you, and/or b) interested in impact. For example, Facebook lets you target people who engage with specific pages -- you could target individuals near you who engage with sustainability-related pages.
No matter what social media channel you focus on, video can be a great medium. It's also a lot easier to do than many advisors assume. We use Wistia at Ethos (here's a guide from Wistia for doing your first video) but there are many options for creating, posting, and using video on your website and other channels.
One tactic to try out with videos is a turnstile, i.e., let people watch a few minutes of a video and then a form pops up asking for contact information in order to continue watching. Wistia and other video providers offer easy turnstiles.
Using your web analytics tool (e.g., Google Analytics), determine which of your pages get the most visits, and which of your impact-focused pages get the most visits.
Add impact-focused forms and CTAs to at least the top-visited impact pages (e.g., a page providing an overview of your approach to sustainable investing), and consider adding to other pages as well.
A good place to add an impact-focused subscribe form is on the sidebar of your blog. If someone is reading your blog, subscribing is an easy next step for them.
Forms could be inline or pop-up forms to subscribe to a newsletter where you provide impact-related information, set up a meeting to discuss sustainable investing, download an e-book or attend a webinar, or a simple contact form to find out more about sustainable investing.
We think one of the best CTAs is a link to take your Impact Assessment (see #1 below).
Educational, impact-focused content helps establish you as a credible source for impact investing.
First figure out where you’re going to source or learn impact-focused content, e.g., subscribe to GIIN or USSIF; join ESG investment groups on LinkedIn; or just use Google to find relevant impact-focused information.
Come up with a list of topics that you think your prospects and clients care about, e.g., green bonds, renewable energy, plastic pollution, financial returns of sustainable investments vs. non-sustainable investments.
Use your list of topics to build a calendar of impact-focused educational content and events, e.g., webinar(s) introducing sustainable investing, blog posts, podcast interviews, and short YouTube videos.
Ethos can help organize and run educational webinars as part of your Advisor subscription. Contact us if you would like more information.
Your existing client base can be a great source of impact-focused leads.
Start by determining which of your existing clients are interested in sustainable investing. For example, send a short survey or just ask them in your next meeting or call.
For those who are interested in sustainable investing, explore ways to deepen the relationship through impact investing. For example, offer a seminar on sustainable investing, offer to do an impact audit of their portfolio (Ethos has tools you can use for this), or use visual impact reports on Ethos to show them the impact of their portfolio.
If clients like the impact resources you offer, ask them if any of their friends, family or colleagues would be interested in similar information.
Generate interest and start an impact-focused conversation using your firm-branded Impact Assessment through Ethos.