How to Build Effective Financial Advisor Ad Campaigns

Advertising can help financial advisors attract high-quality clients and grow their practice, especially when done through digital channels. While traditional formats like print and billboards still exist, online ads offer better targeting, clearer ROI tracking and more flexibility. Knowing how to plan, place, and optimize your campaigns is key to turning your ad spend into a reliable growth engine.

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Why Financial Advisors Need an Advertising Strategy

Referrals and word-of-mouth can take you far as an advisor, but they’re only part of the puzzle. As more investors use online searches to seek out financial professionals, digital ads have become increasingly important as a marketing tool.

Here are some of the advantages of using ads to market your advisory business:

Digital ad campaigns can target your marketing toward specific channels or demographics so that you’re not wasting time showing ads to the wrong people.
Your competitors are most likely using ads, so incorporating them into your digital marketing strategy can help keep the playing field level.
Online ads can help to reinforce brand awareness if you’re also active on social media channels where your ideal clients tend to spend time.
Digital ads give you the chance to test different strategies and see which campaigns perform best.
Local ads can give your business a boost when people in your area are searching for ‘financial advisor near me’ or ‘financial advisor + zip code.’

Does running ads cost money? Yes, but when done correctly digital ads can help to generate a steady stream of new leads for your business so you can recoup those costs over time.

However, your paid advertising can be just one component of a comprehensive marketing plan. In fact, a Broadridge survey found that advisors with a “defined marketing strategy” onboarded 50% more clients than advisors without a clear plan in 2023.

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Where Financial Advisors Place Ads

If you’re new to digital marketing, it helps to know where you can run ads for your advisory business. There are several possibilities for ad placements, including:

Facebook
Other social media platforms, such as X (formerly Twitter), Instagram, YouTube and TikTok
LinkedIn
Display ads on websites
Interstitial ads

Each one has pros and cons regarding things like conversion rates, visibility and cost. Keep in mind also that it may take varying amounts of time to begin to see results, depending on which channels you’re using to advertise. If you’d like a shortcut to getting more leads, then you might try an online lead-generation service for financial advisors instead.

Creating an Effective Financial Advisor Advertising Strategy

A financial advisor taking steps to implement an effective ad campaign.

Developing a strategy for running ads as a financial advisor is similar to creating any other type of marketing plan. Here are five common steps you may want to consider:

Define Your Target Market

If you don’t have a target client profile or persona established yet, that’s a good place to start. This profile or persona should reflect who you want to attract as a client, based on the niche that you serve. You might identify them based on factors such as:

Age
Education level
Career status
Marital status or family situation
Annual income
Net worth

You may create one persona or multiple personas, depending on the types of clients you serve.

Tailor Your Messaging

Once you know who you want to see your ads, you can work on fine-tuning your message. But why does this matter?

Whether an ad campaign resonates with its target audience often hinges on how that audience prefers to receive information. Everything from the format an ad takes to the images used to the way the message is presented matters when you’re trying to attract your ideal client. An ad that appeals to a 30-something professional may be ignored by someone nearing retirement.

If you only serve one type of client with the same goals and pain points, then this step automatically gets a little easier. But if you’re working with a diverse client base, you’ll need to spend some time deciding what to include in the ads you plan to direct toward different segments.

Create a Compelling Design

Financial advisor ads that can convert are visually appealing and interesting enough to force the viewer to stop scrolling. If your ideal client isn’t attracted by an ad’s images, graphics or text they might scroll past it—which is exactly what you don’t want.

There are different elements you can use in financial advisor ads, including:

Stock images
Infographics and charts
Text
Video
Background music or voiceovers if you’re creating video ads

When designing your ads, think about what’s most likely to trigger a reaction or response from target clients. At the same time, make sure that you’re keeping your branding consistent across different ad campaigns.

If you’re using one color scheme on your Facebook ads but a different one for display ads, for example, that could get confusing for prospective clients. That doesn’t mean you shouldn’t test different versions of the same ad to see which one gets the most clicks, but it should be clear that both ads represent your business.

Choose Your Ad Placement Carefully

As mentioned, there are several places you might choose to run financial advisor ads. You could try running ads on all of those channels but if you have a limited budget or you’re simply looking to test the waters, it may be more efficient to focus on just one or two targets to start.

This is where it pays to really understand your ideal clients and where they typically spend time online. Earmarking a sizable chunk of your ad budget to Facebook or YouTube might be wasted money if the investors you’re trying to gain as clients aren’t active on those platforms.

Also, keep in mind that getting better placement on certain channels may require you to spend more of your ad dollars. Before buying premium ad space, consider how much of a return you’re likely to get.

Include a Call to Action

You want your ads to convert so that prospects eventually become clients. However, you might need to give people a nudge to encourage them to contact you.

Your call to action should be short and to the point. A simple “Schedule a Free Consultation Today” may be all you need to include. You can also use persuasive language to create a sense of urgency so that prospective clients reach out sooner, rather than later.

How Much Should You Spend on Advertising?

Determining the right advertising budget is crucial for financial advisors aiming to grow their practice. According to the 2024 Broadridge survey, advisors spend an average of $15,908 annually on marketing, with a median spend of $6,250. Notably, growth-focused advisors invest four times more than their non-growth-focused counterparts, and teams tend to spend more than solo advisors.

The 2024 Kitces Research study on advisor marketing strategies highlights that while many advisors rely heavily on time-intensive methods like networking and referrals, these approaches often yield lower marketing efficiency compared to dollar-based strategies such as online advertising and paid web listings. Scalable, dollar-based marketing tactics often yield lower acquisition costs and greater efficiency for advisors.

In practice, allocating between 2% and 5% of your annual revenue to advertising is common among growth-oriented firms. For instance, a solo advisor earning $250,000 annually might budget $5,000 to $12,500 for advertising. Regularly assessing the return on investment from your advertising efforts can help ensure that your budget aligns with your growth objectives and market dynamics.

Bottom Line

A financial advisor researching strategies at home to create an effective ad campaign.

Financial advisor ads can help boost your visibility and attract new clients. Regularly reviewing your advertising and marketing strategy can help you identify what’s working for you and where you may need to adjust to produce better results.

Tips for Growing Your Advisory Business

SmartAsset AMP (Advisor Marketing Platform) is a holistic marketing service financial advisors can use for client lead generation and automated marketing. Sign up for a free demo to explore how SmartAsset AMP can help you expand your practice’s marketing operation. Get started today.
While there’s no denying the importance of digital marketing, ads aren’t the only way to spread the word about your business. Email marketing, PR outreach and direct mail marketing are other options to consider when creating a comprehensive marketing plan for your advisory business.