The year is coming to a close, so it’s natural to take a look back. You might look at your budget and your overall business success, but it is pertinent that you also take a look back at your Marketing. An end-of-year analysis will allow you to evaluate your performance this year and make informed decisions moving forward. 

As a financial advisor, you probably have your focus set on your clients, not on your marketing. But if there is ever a time to evaluate your Social Media, websites, analytics, and more, it’s now. If you’re trying to set goals for 2020, they won’t mean much if you don’t have a sense of how your marketing performed in 2019. You need to figure out what worked, and what didn’t, in order to make a plan going forward. 

Marketing audits are especially important for small businesses because they’re likely operating with small budgets of time, money, and resources. The last thing you want is to use any of those precious moments on a marketing practice that just isn’t working. An audit will help you figure out what your financial advisory needs to change, ramp up, or stop doing moving forward.

By holding an annual audit in November or December, you can take a look at all your marketing efforts and campaigns, including:

• Website performance
• Email newsletters and campaigns
• Social media
• Events
• Traditional advertising
• Referral efforts

Our broadcast, How to Conduct an End-of-Year Marketing Analysis explores all the channels you should dive into, and how to evaluate your success.

A holistic audit that looks at all of your efforts and available stats will ensure that you take a fair look at your marketing. Just saying, “I didn’t get any new leads from email, so email marketing doesn’t work for me,” isn’t always correct.  Did you get high open and click rates of the emails you sent? Did your emails drive new traffic to your website? Did your clients mention they appreciated an email campaign you sent them? Each of these milestones is a sign that you are working in the right direction. 

Perhaps an email newsletter just doesn’t work for your audience, but maybe you just need to try a different approach. Next year, try sending different types of content, sending on a different schedule, or finding ways to increase your contact list. 

An audit can sometimes be frustrating, as you must confront strategies you planned to launch this year, but never got around to. Did you start posting on social media at the beginning of the year, but petered out by the end? Did you forget to send your email newsletter for the last few months?

Take notes of all your marketing attempts and consider whether they worked or not – and whether you want to take it a step further next year.

Questions to Ask During a Marketing Audit

Not sure where to start? Ask yourself these questions to evaluate your marketing efforts for your financial advisory:

• What marketing tools and resources am I using? Am I using them to their maximum potential?
• What types of marketing channels and campaigns did I use this year? (social media, email, print, events, traditional advertising, etc.)
• What does my website look like and how do I use it? How did my website performance metrics look over the year?
• What social media channels do I use and what are those performance metrics?
• How many new clients and referrals did I get this year?
• How many clients did I lose this year, and why did they leave?
• How satisfied do I feel with my marketing efforts? 

A marketing audit for your financial advisory is an important part of the planning process. Taking this time to evaluate how you did will allow you to make informed decisions next year, and hopefully, take your marketing to the next level.

Watch our broadcast: How to Conduct an End-of-Year Marketing Analysis.

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