LinkedIn recently released some eye-opening statistics about how successful financial advisors are using LinkedIn to find clients and grow assets under management One of the biggest takeaways from the data was the discovery of just how many high-net-worth investors are basically begging to be prospected to by enterprising advisors. And if those stats are even half right, they show enormous potential for financial advisors using LinkedIn specifically and social media generally.

Here’s what their surveys (in partnership with FTI Consulting and Cogent Research) found:

-- 62% of financial advisors actively prospecting on LinkedIn over the past year converted new clients from that process.

-- 32% of the financial advisors who converted new clients from LinkedIn had $1 million or more in new assets under management from new clients.

-- There are 5 million “affluent investors” with $100,000 or more in investable assets and 73% of them use LinkedIn to research investment decisions.

-- The “ultra affluent investors” with $5 million or more in investable assets are 157% more likely to trust articles shared on LinkedIn and 37% more likely to trust information shared by their LinkedIn network.

-- Finally, 52% of affluent investors say that they would interact with financial advisors via social media, but only 4% currently are being engaged by financial advisors online.

So, how can you use this to your advantage? Crystal Thies, the “LinkedIn Ninja,” has developed a great system to mine the 401k rollover gold mine that is LinkedIn. A large percentage of the LinkedIn membership is people in transition looking for a new job. If they are in transition, then there could be a 401k that may need to be moved from their past employer.

The best part of this technique is that those who are not yet allowed to be using social media for business purposes can use it without being out of compliance You simply have to have a LinkedIn profile (even if it doesn’t identify you as a financial advisor) and a decent sized LinkedIn network (at least 100 people).

Source: Crystal Thies is an online networking trainer and consultant known in social media circles as the “LinkedIn Ninja.”