Email is the Only Future-proof Digital Marketing Channel for Financial Advisors
Let’s take a moment to remember the digital marketing trends that are no longer with us: voice search, we hardly knew ye. Facebook ads, it was great while it lasted.
Marketing trends come and go, but one thing is constant: Regardless of how powerful they are, every single trend is heralded as the “future of marketing” by some thought leader somewhere, while simultaneously signaling the “death” of some other marketing strategy.
The truth is that the digital marketing landscape, while dynamic, doesn’t change much. Social media was a huge disruption 20 years ago, but now it’s crowded and boring. Keyword-focused content has been the backbone of content marketing for decades now, but AI-powered search is beginning to change the game.
Today, I want to look at the issues with social media and search, what makes their future so uncertain, and why future-minded advisors will put email at the center of their marketing efforts.
Social Media: Where You Fight Tooth and Nail for Every Second of Attention
Social media algorithms are constantly changing. Maybe Facebook decided to add a new feature, maybe LinkedIn adjusted their engagement requirements, maybe Elon woke up on the wrong side of the bed—whatever the reason, when you post on social media, you are beholden to the whims of an invisible, unknowable system that may or may not put your content in front of the people who want to see it.
When I publish a post on a social channel, I think, “Godspeed, little doodle.”
Who knows if and when it will be seen? Who knows how long it will appear in anyone’s feed? Will it reach all of your followers? Did you comment enough on other people’s content to earn the right for your post to be seen?
Social media leaders provide “guidance” on how their algorithms work, but it’s intentionally vague and largely unhelpful. It make sense—if they told us exactly how to game the algorithm, we would all game the algorithm with spam posts and their business model would crumble because the social networks would suck.
So we’re left with an unknowable, unpredictable, frequently changing algorithm that holds the keys to success on social media.
Algorithms are basically looking for anything that attracts people to their channels, meaning anything that results in engagement (which has been really good for the social fabric of our country, thanks Facebook!).
The things that work best—hot takes, provocative questions—tend to lead people down rabbit holes that either have nothing to do with their business or have nothing to do with their real personality. In other words, you either become a social-justice talking head or just an asshole.
Related article: When it Comes to Your Content: Are You the Captain or the Cargo?
Of course, social also comes with the risk that your profile and/or page could be irretrievably deleted, never to return again. When you ask the social media gods why your page is gone, they will either shrug, ignore you, or just say, “You violated our terms and conditions.”
In other words: not very future-proof.
Search: Where A.I. is Eating Your Lunch
For several years, search has been foundational to content marketing for advisors. By writing quality content around the right keywords, you could rank in search results and bring traffic to your site for years off of a single article.
Those days are not gone (as some may believe)—but things have definitely changed with the advent of AI.
Google’s dominance as the search engine of choice has eroded, with more and more people opting for AI-powered search using tools like ChatGPT. Not only that, Google’s AI Overview at the top of the page has dramatically decreased the number of people who scroll down to the actual search results.
The AI Overview is still relatively new, but early studies indicate that old-school organic search traffic is cut by as much as 64% when it is present.
Not great, I know.
A lot of big names in content marketing say the pivot now is to get AI to use your website for its results. Whether it’s Google or ChatGPT or something else, it has to get the information somewhere. Why not your website? Then, when a small fraction of people ask AI for its source, they may click through to your page.
Also not great (and a little insulting, if I’m being honest).
The good news is that optimizing content for ChatGPT is very similar to optimizing your content for search results. So if you’ve already got a content marketing plan, then…
That being said, the future of AI-powered search is shaky at best, and an internet-destroying shitshow at worst.
Best not to count on anything. To paraphrase an old saying, “SEOs plan, Google laughs.”
In other words: not very future-proof.
Email: Where You Own Your Audience, Can Take Them Wherever You Want and Have Direct Access to Each Individual
Then there’s email.
No wondering who got your message—you have a list of everyone who received it.
No fighting the algorithm—just press “Send” and it’s in everyone’s inbox.
No worrying that somehow your audience will disappear—you own the list, you can store it in an Excel file on your desktop if you like.
No fear of AI coming between you and your audience—it’s just you and your readers.
Email is as old as the internet, and plenty of people have announced the death of the medium, yet it continues to outperform every other marketing channel in the long-term.
It’s like the S&P 500 of marketing. Trends come and go. Some may work, some may not. But email will always be there.
In other words: email is future-proof.
Should You Stop Doing These Other Things? NO!
Social is a great place to share informal content and connect with new people. Search is still a huge component of any great content marketing plan.
But email should be the core of your activities, not an afterthought, as it is for most advisors.
Want to Maximize Engagement with Your Emails?
At Clay Pigeon, we love diving deep into who your clients and other subscribers are, what makes them tick, what they care about, what articles they read, what articles they hate, etc.
Let’s work together so you can make the most of your emails.
