Wealth Think

Among financial planners’ greatest concerns in this turbulent environment is retaining valued clients. In this high-tech era, marketing expert Marie Swift says planners should balance high-tech communications with truly “high-touch” communications.

An advisor’s website is his or her most valuable piece of Internet real estate. TJ Gilsenan, the Web Savvy Advisor, explains not only why, but provides five important steps every advisor can take now to create and maintain a more effective website.

Marketing expert Marie Swift details a strategy that works for financial advisors and allied professionals who are interested in serving families with significant wealth. And while this strategy works especially well for that demographic, the truly high-net-worth crowd, there are also applications for advisors who serve the middle-market millionaire and mass affluent.

Financial Planning senior editor Donna Mitchell says financial advisors are particularly skilled at helping their clients define how their financial lives are -- and should be -- structured. If only they were able to do the same for their practices.

Last month the Insured Retirement Institute released yet another in the long line of reports indicating the majority of baby boomers are nowhere near ready for retirement. Since we can’t slow down the clock to give them more time to prepare their financial capital, consultant and author Keith Weber says maybe it’s time we start helping them prepare their human capital.

Professional marketers and smart advisors always tackle the “The 3 M’s” of marketing before they do any serious outreach. The 3 M’s are the foundational elements of all good marketing. However, according to marketing expert Marie Swift, it’s a very common error for many entrepreneurs and small business people to start with the wrong “M.” The problem with that is, it rarely, if ever works.

Growth -- the kind measured in revenue and profits -- is the ultimate goal for the entire brokerage industry. As On Wall Street editor-in-chief Frances McMorris points out, figuring out how to achieve these goals while dealing with constant change is what firms like Raymond James and its competitors are now learning to do on the fly.

From the 1960s to the 1980s, Japan was on a roll. They had one of the highest economic growth rates in the world. Their manufacturing prowess grew to be the envy of the world. Their stock market soared 373 percent between 1980 and its peak in 1989. And, like China today, there were predictions that Japan would overtake the United States as the largest economy in the world. But, as The Prosperous Advisor Steve Sanduski points out, times sure have changed.

While the recent FPA Convention provided some new and very interesting presentations and introduced some pretty high-brow concepts, Financial Planning columnist Bob Veres felt far too many of the presentations were bogged down by speakers who decided -- or were compelled -- to “dumb down” the material to appeal to the lowest common denominator. What did you think?

We finally have some numbers to attach to all the discussion surrounding social media for financial advisors. The people at Nielsen (the same people who measure television audiences) recently released a report detailing social media use in the US. The report is rich with actual numbers and data. While you can read the report yourself, I thought it might be helpful to hit some of the highlights here.