Aptus Consultants

At a recent workshop I ran for asset managers, one of the delegates, in a rather superior tone, stated “We don’t have client’s, we have investor’s”. His contention was that people with money to invest behave differently to everyone else.

Surely the time has now come to put this myth to rest?

LinkedIn is a free social network for business professionals that in just 7 years has grown to over 75 million members in over 200 countries. It is an excellent tool to help you expand your business network, stay abreast of industry issues, and exchange mutually beneficial ideas with your peers.

So given the importance of networking for financial advisers, here’s all you need to know about LinkedIn to get started.

Last Friday a Tokyo based designer tweeted and in so doing brought the number of Tweets in the 4 years since Twitter launched to 20 billion. That’s impressive growth so no wonder the web is awash with articles on how businesses can use Twitter.

However, what is less well known is that the total number of tweets ever sent is less than the 24 billion emails that are sent worldwide EVERY DAY!!! So why do IFAs & Financial Planners continue to overlook email, the ideal tool for keeping in touch with their clients?

Blogs are a great way to regularly communicate with existing and potential customers, demonstrate your knowledge and the value you provide, build client relationships and generate new business. Despite these benefits, financial intermediaries will use every excuse under the sun not to get involved. So why is this?

I was recently running an executive briefing on how digital technology and social media are changing our lives as consumers. Such changes are manifested in a number of subtle ways, not least of which being how we access products and services. One of the misconceptions around the table related to the demographic profile of the consumers involved, with the attendees labouring under the impression that online participation is the preserve of kids & geeks.

The initial reaction of the delegates made me wonder, is a wider confusion within the UK life, pension and investments industry about just who the new digital consumers are?

Online consumers are used to getting everything for free, be it music from Spotify, video from YouTube or web tools from Google. Business users can also access a wealth of useful, free content, such as creative common licence Flickr images for use in blogs or the intellectual property represented by presentations in Slideshare. So in this world of free information, just how do IFAs justify the cost of advice?

Most well designed, modern websites use a wide range of tools & techniques such as news aggregation, video streams and reader feedback, to ensure that users enjoy an engaging, interactive experience. So why is it that the websites of so many financial services providers are as outdated as the average dinosaur?

The recent Post Magazine roundtable on ‘Mobile Technology’ is hopefully a sign that financial services is at long last beginning to pay attention to this critical communications tool.

The PR blurb that surrounded the launch of More Th>n’s ‘Car Claim’ app for iPhones suggested it was created to help the 38% of drivers who fail to record sufficient third party details following an accident. But is such an app really going to solve this perennial problem for insurers?

Innovative communication mechanisms are being developed all the time and companies are falling over themselves to work out how to integrate tools such as Twitter in to their communications mix. But in their rush to play with the latest shiny new toys, do they risk overlooking the ideal tool for keeping in touch with their clients?