Using a Course to Gain Financial Advisory Clients

The client, Brenton Harrison, is a financial advisor for high-income earning young professionals.

Brenton approached me because he wanted to release The Ultra Borrowers Academy, a self-paced course, as a way to bring in potential clients. However, his challenge was that he did not know anything about the process of marketing or launching a course, or how to set up the required software.

Goals

With this project, the goal was to deliver a professional experience that matched his brand. We also wanted to ensure compliance-friendly marketing materials. Ultimately, Brenton wanted to close new advisory clients.

Crafting the Approach

Identifying The Problem

Because Brenton did not have an existing email list, I knew that launching a new course would be a challenge. Without a list, we had to get creative. We could have launched with ads, but because of the heavy regulations for registered investment advisors, any posts via social media would require pre-approval. This would have slowed down our testing process for new creatives. When running Facebook ads, small changes in copy or creative can make a big difference. In addition, we would have had to target cold audiences which requires even more testing and nimble iteration.

Developing The Strategy

Brenton had an email list of connections from live events he had hosted several years in the past and a small list of medical students from a university he partnered with. We agreed to leverage this list for a test launch and began the nurturing process. I streamlined the marketing campaign using an initial survey, a 10 part email sequence, and a webinar sales presentation. During the launch, Brenton hosted the webinar and answered questions from potential students.