Megan Carpenter on Authentic Connections

Show Timeline:  

1:35 Megan provides an overview of FiComm Partners
3:15 The differences between client service, marketing, and business development
7:39 How marketing can compliment and support business development
9:51 Using your client experience to inform your marketing efforts
12:02 How Megan helps advisors build their ‘brand infrastructure’
16:03 Leveraging a corporate brand
18:20 The effect of strong marketing on succession planning
21:55 The importance of acknowledging trends impacting the industry 
23:37 Why the average advisor’s investment in marketing is ‘woefully low’
27:01 The single most important activity in which to invest, once the necessary infrastructure is in place   
30:47 Becoming a more trusted, and therefore more referable, advisor

Links:

Website:             https://ficommpartners.com/
LinkedIn:           https://www.linkedin.com/in/meganficomm
Twitter:               https://twitter.com/megan_ficomm

Want more?

Stephen Wershing: www.TheClientDrivenPractice.com/checklistblog
Julie Littlechild: www.absoluteengagement.com/blog

Episode Transcript:

Welcome to another episode of Becoming Referable, the podcast that helps you be the kind of advisor people can’t stop talking about. I’m Julie Littlechild, and on this week’s show Steve and I are speaking with Megan Carpenter, the co-founder and CEO of FiComm partners. FiComm Partners works with financial advisory firms and the firms that support them to create strategic communications programs that incorporate public relations, digital marketing, branding, social media, and creative services. They live and breathe this industry.

In our conversation Megan breaks down the difference between business development, referrals, or client experience, and marketing, and why the latter is often overlooked, and why it’s so important to your growth plans. She talks about what it really takes to stand out in a crowded marketplace, and how authenticity plays into that process. Megan provides us with some great examples of firms that are doing things exactly right. With that, let’s get to the conversation.

Megan, I’m so happy you’re here today. Welcome to Becoming Referable.

Steve:
Welcome, Megan.

Megan:
Thank you so much for having me. I really appreciate the opportunity.

Julie: 
Oh, this is great. I’m so glad to have you. I’ve had the pleasure of hearing you speak, and talking to you about the industry. I’m excited for the expertise that you bring, but I was thinking maybe before we even jump in on marketing, which we’re going to talk about in detail today, could you give us a little bit of background on FiComm and the work that you’re doing for the industry?

Megan: 
I’d love to. FiComm Partners is an integrated communications agency, and essentially what that means is we help our clients to connect more effectively with their target audiences. We believe very strongly in the power of words. We think that for financial services companies that are struggling to make authentic connections with their target audiences in today’s digitally driven landscape, that we can affect change by helping our clients to understand the power of strategic communications.

We work with our clients to help them connect and engage more effectively with their prospective clients through ongoing marketing, public relations, and branding work. We do focus squarely on financial services, and have a specialty in the independent wealth management community. I’ve worked with financial advisors and advisory firms for over 16 years, and FiComm is really founded on the belief that if we can help financial advisors to build better businesses, then we can be a part of positive incremental change in the world.

Really happy to be here because I know that we have a lot of synergies between the audience that you are speaking to with this podcast, and the audience that FiComm works with on a regular basis.

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