Our latest survey of financial planning practices was published this week…
The aim of the SLICE survey, which runs 3 times a year (each time on a different theme) is to provide financial planning practices with an opportunity to share their views and insights with their peers and build an understanding of the most effective approaches to a broad range of hot button topics that challenge practices’ efficiency, profitability and viability. The latest SLICE survey focuses on financial planners marketing strategies.
Survey authors, Peter Dawson of The Dawson Partnership and Susan Rochester of Balance at Work, say the latest survey provides data to confirm what they have observed among financial planning practices.
The vast majority of financial planners surveyed have a marketing plan (83%) with 73% of those with a plan saying they put the plan together either on their own or with their business partner(s) and 47% drawing on the resources of a practice development manager. 33% had input from a business coach.
‘Up until a few years ago our marketing plan was pretty rudimentary but as time has gone by we have adopted a more structured approach with regular marketing planning and review meetings that we hold each quarter. This has helped us keep a focus on our marketing campaign making sure it remains relevant to our business and helps us achieve our goals.’
Principal SME financial planning practice
Of those businesses with a marketing plan 53% said that having a plan in place has opened up new opportunities with 40% saying that they were unsure if having a marketing plan was responsible for new opportunities that arose for their businesses.
While most respondents don’t use an external source to assist them put together their marketing plan 50% said that they would be open to doing so as they felt that someone with the knowledge and experience could add value to their marketing planning.
‘I suppose it’s too easy to get bogged down in the day to day work in a one man practice and my approach to marketing is a bit hit and miss but I do recognize the value of having a marketing plan and would be willing to hire a marketing consultant.’
Sole practitioner
The main marketing strategy used by the most respondents was utilising formal business partnerships (33%) followed by direct referrals from existing clients (28%), while 11% use networking as their primary strategy.
‘We have traditionally gained most of our business from our clients but it got to the stage where we realised that to grow to where we wanted to be we would need to look at other means of growing the business. We had some relationships with local accounting firms and worked towards developing these. This strategy has led to an increase in revenue of 22% each year over the last three years.’
CEO SME Financial Planning group.
‘Although the majority of respondents say they track the effectiveness of their marketing via a range of means, there was a surprisingly wide variation in the sophistication of their processes. While some follow a process where all leads are tracked, monitored and the source identified, then report on results regularly to see what is working and what is a waste of time, others have very little in place.’
Susan Rochester
According to our respondents social media is not a major strategy in their current marketing plans and a number of respondents made comments including ‘Social media is just a lot of noise,’ ‘Social media maybe ok for an on line business but our firm is a people to people business and nothing can replace that’ and ‘My kids use Facebook and I just don’t get it’.
‘We expected to find one or two respondents reporting social media as their main marketing strategy. This was not the case in this sample, although comments indicated that practices are using social media to support other strategies, for example by sharing newsletter articles via social platforms.’
Peter Dawson
However social media wasn’t without some support with one respondent stating that she was open to using social media as ‘it’s all about connectivity and if I can interact with people at a professional level on social media that can only be good for my business’.
The practices that responded to this survey were mostly more than 10 years old (78%), with 17% who had been in business 6-10 years and only 6% for 5 years or less. The majority had fewer than 10 staff (72%) although 28% of respondents were from firms with 21 or more staff.
Concluding remarks
The Slice 3 survey has revealed a strong focus on financial planners developing structured marketing plans and that these are far from static documents as most reviewed their marketing plans on a regular basis. Respondents were focused on building their business by drawing on their relationships with their clients and through formal business relationships. Many are yet to embrace social media as a major part of their marketing plan, although this may change in time as attitudes shift.
For more information about the SLICE survey, contact Peter Dawson directly on 0418 601 245 or emailpeter@dawsonpartnership.com.au
Susan Rochester has been managing director of Balance at Work since 2006. Susan has a natural tendency to balance analytical thinking with an optimistic outlook to set direction and solve problems. She is an effective facilitator and constantly creates new and more effective ways of doing things, motivated by helping others to achieve their goals.