2. A pitch deck
3. Templates
4. A brochure
Your website is how people check you out after hearing your name, and it can help you or harm you. Your clients will rarely visit here, so your audience for the site is prospects. My approach is to use the message brief as the core of how to build the site, which makes it easier for the agency when it comes to developing the flow and the copy. I’ve talked to advisors who have great, simple sites built by young freelancers for under $10,000, while other firms spend up to $250,000 for a more robust and engaging digital experience.
Think of your pitch deck as a voice-over for your website. You want to be repeating the same themes you do in your message brief and your website, but in each stage you may go into more detail. Assume the message brief is a skeleton; the website adds some muscle and the pitch deck lets you add more meat on the bone.
When working with firms that like to share a lot about the investment process, I make that a separate presentation. A pitch deck should be like storytelling and no more than a dozen pages.
In the digital age, templates are low-hanging fruit to vastly improve how your brand comes across. Your agency should be able to take the branded look and feel from the website and create templates for company social media, letters, e-mails, newsletters and any other standard communication you have. To increase the effectiveness of your e-mails, focus on interesting headlines (good openers start with words like “How to … ” and “Why …” or offer a list, like “Three Tips ...”). Have a branded banner and make the e-mail crisp, using bullets and charts instead of heavy text. Take the same approach with the investment letters—long-winded text in black and white turns off readers.
Rather than a long, costly brochure, consider a one-page trifold that fits nicely into an envelope. Again, use the message brief, and add in some facts about your firm. We can’t use testimonials, but you can include a short story of “how we help our clients.” Build off the reason to choose part of the message brief for your story in this way, “Mary and John came to us when their financial life felt out of control … ” Using this approach, you can express how it feels to do business with you and the benefits, from the voice of an imaginary client, and that creates connection with your prospect.
Your Marketing Makeover
Good marketing is simple, clear and repetitive. Everything in my process starts with the message brief, which is an exercise you can begin on your own or with some help from a consultant or creative agency. Don’t be surprised if that step takes weeks for you and your team as you hash out ideas and argue over every word. You will find the rest flows from there, and the consistency is what will make your brand and your story memorable.