How to Build a Quarterly Newsletter as a Financial Advisor

Email marketing is an effective way to build engagement with clients while keeping them updated on the latest trends and happenings within your firm. One of the keys to success with email campaigns is choosing the right frequency to share your messages. A mix of short weekly emails and longer quarterly newsletters can strike the right balance. And building a financial advisor quarterly newsletter is easier than you might think.

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Creating a Financial Advisor Quarterly Newsletter: 5 Tips for Success

Developing a quarterly newsletter for your advisory practice doesn’t have to be complicated. It comes down to developing a process that you can easily rinse and repeat for maximum impact.

Use these tips to streamline your quarterly newsletter efforts and create messages that will resonate with your audience, and that they’ll look forward to reading.

1. Choose the Right Mix of Content

A quarterly financial advisor newsletter allows space for a broader range of topics than a brief weekly email. First, decide what topics you want to cover.

For example, your newsletter may include:

Market updates for the most recent quarter, or year-to-date
Insights on current events or economic trends
Firm-specific news
Financial planning tips for the upcoming quarter
Links to relevant articles, tools or resources

You might choose specific themes for each quarterly newsletter you send. For example, your Q1 newsletter may emphasize tax planning, or you might focus on end-of-year planning for your Q4 update.

Consider adding some visual appeal by incorporating charts, graphs or images into your newsletter. Break up text with bullet points to make lists that are easily scannable.

Remember the most basic rule of email marketing: Anything you share should be helpful, interesting or a combination of the two. If you’re drafting a two- or three-page newsletter, you need to give your clients a reason to want to read it from beginning to end.

Also, think about making your content accessible in more than one format. For example, you might share your quarterly newsletter in the body of your emails, but you could also:

Link to a PDF version of your newsletter in the email
Make the file downloadable in Microsoft Word and attach it to your message
Create a newsletter archive on your website
Send a physical copy to clients via direct mail

It may take a little extra effort to do these things, but your clients may appreciate having multiple options to choose from.

2. Use Templates to Streamline Newsletter Drafts

Templates allow you to produce quarterly newsletters or other email marketing materials in less time. You can create specific sections for each part of the template. Then, when it’s time to send out a fresh newsletter, you simply update the information for each section.

For example, a basic financial advisor quarterly newsletter template might follow this format:

Greeting
Market news/trends
Financial planning tips/reminders
Graphs/charts
Firm news and updates
Helpful links/resources
Closing

You might reorder these sections or add different ones to reflect what your clients are most likely to be interested in.

Using a template creates familiarity for your readers so that your updates feel consistent and focused. Plus, breaking your newsletter into distinct sections makes it easier for clients to digest what you’re sharing.

3. Automate

Automation and technology can simplify various aspects of the quarterly newsletter process.

Artificial intelligence tools, for instance, can help you draft content quickly, which you can then revise and personalize for your audience. Email marketing tools can take the hassle out of scheduling and help you track specific metrics to gauge how well your clients respond to the newsletters you send.

If you’re interested in other ways to automate email marketing, consider using a platform like SmartAsset AMP. With SmartAsset AMP, you can not only connect with leads, and gain access to tools that allow you to nurture those relationships with ease.

4. Encourage Sharing

Shareability is an invaluable trait regardless of the type of marketing content you create, and that includes your quarterly newsletters. The more often your message is shared, the more opportunities you have to connect with prospective clients and/or add new subscribers to your newsletter list.

Adding social media buttons to your email newsletters and including a simple call to action can nudge clients to promote your firm. For example, you might include a brief CTA like this one:

Enjoying our quarterly newsletter updates? We’d love for you to share our latest message with your inner circle. Click the social sharing buttons below to spread the word, or feel free to forward this email to friends and family.

You can include a second message directed to anyone who had the email forwarded to them. Simply tell them they can subscribe to your email list to receive the latest quarterly newsletters as soon as they’re published, with a link to your email sign-up form.

These are relatively low-effort marketing tactics that could potentially have a significant impact if they lead to more referrals and an influx of new prospects.

5. Develop a Schedule

A publishing schedule and content calendar can go a long way toward helping you stay organized when drafting quarterly newsletters.

Your schedule simply details when you send your newsletters. For example, you may schedule them to go out the first or last day of the quarter, depending on how you format your newsletter content.

A content calendar details what topics you’ll cover for each newsletter. Keeping a calendar for email messages, blog content, social media and any other content you produce can help you:

Avoid unnecessary repetition of topics
Draft timely content to reflect changing seasons or trends
Track the performance of your content

Planning for quarterly updates is not something you can wait to do till the last minute. Using a content calendar allows you to plan out the entire year with evergreen topics, then schedule time to determine what newsworthy or trending topics to include for the upcoming quarter. That way, nothing falls through the cracks, and your messages always feel fresh when they arrive in clients’ inboxes.

Bottom Line

Quarterly newsletters offer financial advisors a unique opportunity to deepen client relationships, demonstrate ongoing value and reinforce your firm’s brand. They provide a consistent, professional way to educate clients on market trends, financial planning strategies and updates within your firm, all while keeping your services top of mind.

Tips for Growing Your Advisory Business

Email is a powerful way to reach prospective and current clients, but it’s not the only digital marketing avenue that’s open to you. Social media, content creation and collaborations are all ways to expand your reach and increase your firm’s visibility with your target audience. But what if you have limited time to promote your business? Partnering with an advisor marketing platform could make sense. SmartAsset AMP (Advisor Marketing Platform) is a holistic marketing service that 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.
When sending quarterly newsletters or any other type of communication to clients, keep compliance in mind. Specifically, be aware of recordkeeping requirements for emails, including what you’re required to archive and how long you must maintain those records. Integrating your email marketing platform with your customer relationship management (CRM) platform can help you manage recordkeeping compliance requirements.