Can advisors still cut through the noise in digital marketing?

While digital marketing has continued to drive growth among RIA firms, the most successful efforts are those that cut across different channels, while still ignoring the noise and staying focused on their ideal clients' needs.

That's one of the many takeaways from Schwab's most recent RIA Benchmarking report, which found 20% of RIA firms are now using AI to efficiently create their digital marketing content.

According to the benchmarking report, which took self-reported data from more than 1,200 firms representing over $2.4 trillion in AUM, 78% of RIA firms used social media, while another 51% used email campaigns. Blogs (cited by 48% of respondents), webinars (35%), and videos (34%) were also favored.

With AI entering the scene, the overall digital landscape has gotten significantly more flooded with content. That creates more distractions not just for clients and prospects, but also the advisors and firms trying to make themselves heard.

"The amount of noise out there and content ... makes people always feel like they're doing the wrong things, or that they should be acting quickly, or that that there is a silver bullet," Michelle Borkowski, head of marketing at F2 Strategy, said in a recent interview with InvestmentNews. "I think ultimately, that prevents people from taking that steady, strategic approach."

Good things take time

According to Borkowski, the advice business inherently requires a long sales cycle, with prospects having to see specific advisors' and firms' names multiple times across several touchpoints before commiting to being a client. That means for firms testing out different channels, it's essential to maintain a consistent process over reasonable time frame before deciding to drop a specific approach. 

"If you're out there doing webinars, how can you make that repeatable and systematic in terms of the style, the theme, and how you're promoting it?" Borkowski says. "After you do that enough times, your data set will give you a clearer picture of what's working and what's not working, before you decide to go do the next best thing."

To help focus their marketing efforts, Borkowski says firms should look for commonalities between the different demographic and client segments they're going after. By mining their CRM data for those insights – which should become easier with the arrival of AI in CRM platforms – and building marketing plans around that, RIAs can create ads that are specific to their values and objectives, which can help give their campaigns clearer direction and meaning.

Another mistake she sees too often is firms talking about themselves, rather than the value they're providing to investors. While advisors and firms might naturally want to market their reputation, credentials, and track record of performance, she argues that sets a too-low bar for those looking to click with a particular clientele.

"If I am hiring you to handle my wealth, there's a certain expectation that you do have the credentials, the education, and the experience to do so, the same way that you would expect that of a doctor," Borkowski says. "If you find that a large portion of your client base has a desire to travel in retirement, well then talk about that. Create really targeted campaigns that speak to that desire and what they want to do."

Schwab also makes the case for client-specific strategies in its benchmarking study, which found 82% of top-performing RIA firms in terms of growth have a documented ideal client persona, and nearly just as many said they have a documented client value proposition. According to the survey, firms that had a marketing plan, client persona, and CVP – all necessary elements to "engage the entire firm in delivering a strong client experience" – enjoyed 67% more new clients in 2024, as well as 68% more new client assets.

Rethinking growth from referrals

The Schwab study also reinforced referrals as the backbone of organic growth for RIAs. It found that firms with existing client referral plans – that includes 46% of top-performing RIAs, and 42% of those with more than $250 million in client assets – got 1.4 times more new clients in 2024 compared to firms that didn't use them. 

While Borkowski acknowledges the vital role of referrals for RIAs' growth, she argues that digital marketing efforts pave the way for that growth engine to really run.

"When someone says all of their organic growth is based on client referrals, they're not really taking into consideration the homework those prospects are doing on their own," she says. "Even if they're a referral, they're going out there and engaging with your website, your thought leadership, and potentially your podcasts or webinars."

The key to the last ultimate conversion, Borkowski stresses to advisors, is to create a cohesive brand experience as they follow and attract investors across all channels. On that note, she encourages firms to build the data infrastructure to evaluate their campaigns, tracking which leads are being nurtured, which ones are being educated, and which ones are potentially falling through the cracks.

And when it comes to digital marketing, she emphasized that "all roads lead back to your website." That's not exactly lost on many RIA firms in Schwab's benchmarking study, which found 55% of firms have designed their website with an ideal client persona in mind, while another 53% also used search engine optimization.

"[Your website] is the source of truth when you consider your prospect's point of view," Borkowski says. "It's a great place to develop that differentiation and ensure you have a foundation in place before you go out and invest in other digital channels."