During the COVID-19 Pandemic, most businesses have struggled to survive. There are so many that rely on in-person interaction, and they have taken a huge knock, especially the travel and hospitality industries.
As a financial advisor, though, you are in an incredibly unique situation. You can run your entire financial planning practice online. In fact, by transforming your practice into a virtual one, you will not only survive the challenges of doing business during this tumultuous time, but you will thrive and stay ahead of the curve forever.
As a financial advisor who made the virtual migration over six years now, my business is booming at the moment. Although I have felt the effects from a social perspective just like anybody else, my business is rocking!
Tradition Vs. The Future
Although the finance industry is traditional and relies on face-to-face interactions, you can still operate remotely with the technology available today. It may even be more suited to your target audience.
I run my entire practice remotely from my home office and have the freedom to run my business from anywhere in the world, at any time of the day.
The best part? My overhead is minuscule in comparison to what I used to have to fork out when I was running a physical practice.
Most of my clients prefer communicating via a virtual meeting, conference call, or combination of the two as they can take my call from the comfort of their own home, or from anywhere really – whatever suits them – no more commuting or prepping before meetings.
The benefits of holding virtual client meetings are now evident to everyone, but they were not so clear just a few months ago. The future is now.
Being A Virtual Financial Advisor Is Simpler
“Why should I spend days on end traveling, away from my family, if I can conduct business just as effectively online?” This is a common answer I get from advisors when I ask how they are coping with the new normal.
If anything, COVID-19 accelerated what we all knew was inevitable; a fully digital world.
Why would you pay thousands of dollars a month on office space, or spend a fortune on travel expenses to meet with and maintain your client relationships when you can have the same impact on their lives digitally? It’s illogical, no matter which way you look at it. Being a virtual financial advisor is simpler, cheaper, and easier to control.
As business owners, yes, most financial advisors should consider themselves business owners, we must look at things from a place of logic and scalability.
Generating Leads as A Virtual Financial Advisor
When speaking to my peers, their primary concern of going fully digital is almost always lead generation. How do you find clients without leaving your home? Quite simply, you need to rethink your approach to communication and marketing.
Although, theoretically, much of how you run your financial planning practice remains the same, your approach to sales needs to change, and it needs to change fast if your business is to survive.
It comes down to adapting your approach to your consumer’s needs. To stay ahead of the curve, you need to create a virtual presence that drives inbound clients to you while enhancing the client/advisor experience.
Your lead generation will be a direct result of how much effort you put into digital marketing. As of March 2020, 1.8 billion people do their shopping online, and half of those people shop from their handheld devices. When we refer to shopping, this includes shopping for services such as seeking a lawyer or financial advisor.
Those numbers are only going to increase, so you would be doing yourself a disservice by failing to adapt. You’ve got to sell your services in the place where your audience lives, and according to the statistics, that place is online. You simply can’t argue with the data!
Staying Ahead of The Curve
Although the transformation to a virtual business takes some doing, don’t be spooked – luckily, I have paved the way for you. You don’t have to endure the trial and error I did. As a result of my experiences, I decided to create a virtual advisor system called Conneqtor.
I understand what it takes to run a virtual financial planning practice and have thought about absolutely everything.
Conneqtor will show you, step by step, in great detail how to:
- Hire a team of virtual assistants
- Build a virtual client contact/service module
- Communicate digitally over email and social media
- Create a website that converts leads
- Create a blog and use it to generate leads
- Use social media for brand awareness
- Use SEO to generate leads
- And so much more….
To learn more about how my system can help you, download our free ebook today.
Thanks for reading!
Now, go get ahead of this curve before it passes you by!
Kind regards,
Derek Notman
