Broker Dealer Marketing Secrets!

Broker dealer marketing is an area that few insurance and financial services companies do well. But this is good news for broker dealers because that means there is tremendous opportunity to make an impact.

When it comes to advertising and generating leads for broker dealers it boils down to two choices: direct response marketing or branding.

Whether you want to generate a lead for your brokers or you want to get new agents and planners under your broker dealer program you have to stand out from the crowd.

Branding is a broker dealer marketing strategy that will not accomplish this. Branding is about slapping your logo all over the place hoping that people will remember you when it comes time to make a decision. It rarely works and you can't measure response.

Direct response marketing is about creating broker dealer advertising that gets a response and you can measure response so that you can find which ads are performing and which ads are not.

Fortunately for you most broker dealer marketing is boring. OK, always boring. And it all sounds the same...

Every broker dealer has:

• Good service
• Good support
• Wide range of products
• Software
• Brochures and other terrible marketing pieces.
• Etc. Etc.

But how do you get an agent or advisor to be interested in switching to you? How do you generate leads?

Here's the secret: Find out what agents and advisors want from a broker dealer, and give it to them. Ask them! And then put it into your marketing. Make it bold and up front (take your logo out from the top of your marketing and make it smaller and put it at the bottom or the very end). You can't lose with that simple, grass roots broker dealer marketing strategy.

I can tell you from experience that if you can help agents and advisors generate leads, referrals, and even do some selling for them, you will have them practically busting down your door.

Take for example the Insurance Mavericks. These guys popped up out of nowhere a little over a year ago and they get it. At the time of this article they are just starting their new agency where they are teaching agents and planners how to generate their own leads, and in their top tier program they are actually generating leads for them (I believe if they join their agency they will do this for them).

Buy their products and see what they are doing right and model it in your broker dealer marketing. Don't copy it!

That is one example of very few effective marketers in the insurance and financial services arena. And in the broker dealer marking arena? I can't find anything that is worth mentioning.

To make your broker dealer marketing make an instant impact show agents and advisors how to get new business. Give them the tools: Seminar marketing, online marketing, referral marketing, direct mail marketing, and social media marketing.

Here are a few Broker Dealer Marketing and Promotional ideas to consider:

• Help agents and advisors produce a quality seminar in their area. Tell advisors and agents that once they come on board you will help them produce a killer seminar and one of your proven presenters will do all or the seminar.

• Plug them into your local lead generation program.
• Drop a proven direct mail piece (tout your list selection techniques, response rates, etc.).
• Create a website that generate leads. Not a professional site that is stagnant.
• Include a fast track application process. Nothing is more irritating than following up on applications and dealing with delays. Do it for them.
• All of the above.

About 15 years ago my broker dealer was a small time operation. But the guy who headed the operation was a master salesman. He would do the seminar for you, and he would close at least half the audience (on a bad day). That's good.

So if you want to see your broker dealer marketing make a big jump in response rates and interest, stop marketing your services the same way as everyone else. Start using effective direct response marketing, and give agents and advisors what they want. Not what you think they need.