A Peek Inside the Process to Updating a Financial Adviser’s Website

Welcome to the New Window to LRPC

A financial adviser’s website serves as a tool to build trust and create relationships with clients and potential clients. Very rarely will a first time visitor turn into a client right away. They are going to use your website to find out more about you, what doing business with you is like, and to form an opinion about you and your services – before even meeting you.

This is why it is so important to make sure that your website is not only visually appealing, but also an accurate and engaging representation of you and your business.

The Situation

Lawton Retirement Plan Consultants, LLC (LRPC) is a small Registered Investment Advisory (RIA) firm based in the Milwaukee, Wisconsin area, and for more than 30 years Robert C. Lawton has helped employers in Illinois and Wisconsin manage their 401k plan responsibilities.

The website was dated and in need of a refresh. While it contained some great content it was very text heavy and hard to navigate. There was room for improvement when it came to SEO (search engine optimization) and calls to action.

The Process – Brainstorming

Mr. Bob Lawton reached out to Crystal Marketing Solutions, LLC (CMS) through the Consulting Package. He had been managing his own website and was somewhat marketing savvy. He knew that he needed help to make some changes, but wasn’t sure of exactly what and where to start.

Bob was receiving a significant amount of traffic to his website through his original, educational content, but was having a hard time generating leads. He did not have defined call to actions to get the audience’s attention and establish a relationship with the viewer. He had the basic email newsletter form and contact form but needed something more to encourage interaction and feedback from his audience. Through our conversations, it was found that a free download could be perfect to help him in this area.

He also knew he needed a more modern, less text heavy feel that would not overwhelm the viewer, but instead would allow them to navigate through the website with ease.

The Goals

Based on our initial meetings and his vision for the website we set the following goals:

Clear messaging and calls to action.

Build trust with visitors with the use of legible copy, lifestyle/genuine photography, and clear branding.

Stay true to the business and image while making the website more user/SEO friendly.

Still appeal to his current clients, while increasing his chance of reaching new clients.

The Work

The project began with the task of copying all of the content from the current site and organizing it into a user-friendly format. We wanted to offer a simple, clean, and unique design that is different from competitors. Clear messaging was also key, as it was important that visitors to the site knew what they were looking at as quickly as possible once they were on the page and didn’t have to go searching for information. This required simplifying the site map, an intentional layout of menu items, and strategic placement of resources. By using a familiar layout and menu items visitors will be able to more easily navigate the site to find the information they need.

On the home page specifically, we wanted to establish what makes him different. We included his 3 main differentiators and trust-building logos in the footer, including publications he had been featured in. This immediately builds trust and verification that he is a thought leader in his industry.

We incorporated keyword rich titles, meta descriptions, and content on each page. Proper metadata sends clear signals to Google and other web crawlers to let them know what you are – and what searches you should show up in.

We stayed with the target of at least 2,000 words total per page. This is very good for both SEO as well as large and important purchase decisions. However, ample use of headlines, subheads, graphics, and interactive sections made the content easily digestible and easy to navigate.

We also included featured photos, title or sharing heading, and a brief description of each page for SEO/social sharing. This ensures that when a link is shared through social media, such as Twitter, FaceBook, and even the latest version of Messages on iOS, that the previews will appear correctly with a description and the chosen image. This makes sharing much easier, cleaner, and increases the chances that someone else will share your content as well.

Once the content was laid out we worked together to create clear calls to action to encourage site visitors to engage and spend time exploring the information that Mr. Lawton had to provide. This included signing up for a newsletter and receiving a copy of a white paper he had written. Remember that free download we mentioned earlier?

Of course with any financial website we had to include legal disclosures, disclaimers, privacy policy, and copyright. We reviewed each one and made sure they were included in the footer to not only provide the needed information but also provide consistency throughout the website.

The Outcome

With the creation of the clear calls to action and automated email responses, Mr. Lawton will no longer have to manage the process himself. Nothing is missed and he is capturing the information he needs while engaging with his visitors. As one of the final steps, CMS assisted in the setup of Google Analytics so that he will be able to track his traffic and metrics and see how his numbers will improve over time.

With the creation of the clear calls to action and automated email responses, Mr. Lawton will no longer have to manage the process himself. Nothing is missed and he is capturing the information he needs while engaging with his visitors. As one of the final steps, CMS assisted in the setup of Google Analytics so that he will be able to track his traffic and metrics and see how his numbers will improve over time.

The cleaner look and the clearer messaging will allow him to be able to promote his business in a way that more closely fits his perspective and will be more appealing to potential clients and site visitors. This will alleviate the need to duplicate content on multiple pages, but still allow the visitor to link to and view useful additional information and resources. There is a possibility that current clients may even find resources now that they didn’t know were available.

The cleaner look and the clearer messaging will allow him to be able to promote his business in a way that more closely fits his perspective and will be more appealing to potential clients and site visitors. This will alleviate the need to duplicate content on multiple pages, but still allow the visitor to link to and view useful additional information and resources. There is a possibility that current clients may even find resources now that they didn’t know were available.

Coming into this project Mr. Lawton was clear about who he was, who his ideal client was, and his vision for the appearance of his website. He needed assistance in maximizing the potential of the site through SEO and the behind the scenes technical data that helps improve views. By combining his vision with the expertise of Crystal Marketing Solutions for the technical aspects of the project, we were able to produce an amazing site that accomplished his goals while also making sure that he is gaining all of the benefits from his online presence.

If you think your website needs a refresh, you are not sure why you are not getting conversions from your site, or you think that traffics seems a little slow, please reach out to me and I would love to see how Crystal Marketing Solutions, LLC could help you maximize your online presence.