Content isn’t just the main course of your marketing meal. It’s also the appetizer, soup, salad, dessert, and free bread. In an ideal world, we’d all have a never-ending budget for our content efforts to feed our marketing needs, from a weekly updated blog to constant social media updates. For many small or mid-sized companies and financial advisory firms, this isn’t possible.
While a large budget is nice to have, it’s not necessary to create amazing content that your clientele will enjoy. Here are just a few small tweaks you can make to transform your content from “eh” to “ah!”
1. Add Visuals
Visuals, such as photos, videos, and infographics, are the fastest, easiest, and most effective way to make your content more engaging and shareable. Graphics catch a reader’s attention and can explain your point better. Adding relevant images to your posts can result in 94% more visitors than a blog post without images because it makes your content easier to read and understand. Along with more reads, your content will get more shares by using images, including an average of 150% more retweets, 37% more engagement on Facebook, and 84% more link click-throughs.
There are a few easy ways you can find images for your content without having to create them yourself. One option is a stock photography site, such as iStock or Shutterstock. On the upside, there are hundreds of thousands of images from which you can choose, and you can download a la carte or purchase a package. On the downside, you’ll have to sift through generic images to find more natural looking options.
Another option is Canva, which includes a drag-and-drop feature and professional layouts to design beautiful graphics without needing an art degree.
2. Use Curation and Evergreen Tools
Quality is key with content marketing. Rather than churn out substandard content, focus on developing a few robust and personalized pieces of content and mixing them with content you receive through another source.
There are two other places you can find content to use within your marketing. First, you can curate content from news sources. While you can’t post these articles as your own on your blog, you can share them on social media to liven your feed. Second, you can subscribe to a provider’s content library, such as FMG Suite, and fill your site and marketing with evergreen content, or content on basic concepts and topics that never expire. These two other options take two-thirds of the content creation load off your back.
3. Share a Story
Everyone loves a story, and it’s one of the surest ways to infuse a unique element into your content. When explaining a financial concept or offering advice on retirement planning, incorporate a story, whether it’s your own or that of a hypothetical client. Along with education, people want something of value and entertainment, both of which you can fulfill with a story.
If you’re having trouble, start with the absolute basics: why you became an advisor, or what you’ve learned about retirement since working with so many retirees. We’ve seen so many advisors experience success when they get personal.
These are just three strategies to help you create higher quality and more valuable content on a budget and timeline. There are many other ways to take your marketing to the next level and we encourage you to experiment to see what works best for you. By giving your target audience content they enjoy consuming, you’ll see more referrals and new leads filling your inbox and voicemail.
