How to Generate Financial Services Leads: Everything You Need to Know

If you sell financial products or services, you will need to generate leads. The key to a successful business in the financial services industry is to establish credibility to attract clients. Financial advisors and service providers who fail to gain trust in the marketplace could lose potential clients, so communicating your message well is important.

Direct mail can build a deep connection with clients and is also a great way to make your product a topic of conversation at the dinner table. According to a U.S. survey, 88% of financial buying decisions are made at home. Direct mail can effectively start a conversation and generate leads for financial advisors because the target audience makes financial decisions after talking about it with someone they know.

Postalytics, a direct mail automation software, enables financial advisors and service providers to reach households and foster relationships through highly engaging and effective direct mail campaigns. Financial services providers can use our technology to reach their target audience and ensure their message is well-crafted, targeted, and impactful – all with the click of a mouse.

What are financial services leads?

Lead generation is about either getting people interested in your product or getting them to take a specific action, such as making an appointment. The goal is to get them to have an initial conversation or to buy a service or product from your financial advisor.

Financial leads can be generated to make a sale, build an e-newsletter list, or grow another type of list. Generating leads means more sales opportunities, resulting in more money and a higher return on investment (ROI).

Financial advisor leads

To grow your business, you as a financial advisor need a lead generation marketing strategy to bring new leads into your sales funnel and eventually convert them into clients. For most financial advisors, this is a challenge. Many financial advisors who set up a marketing plan only consider communication methods such as social media or digital marketing. With thousands of other professionals doing the same, there are better opportunities when you utilize direct mail.

Email and social media can be effective, but they are not the answer to everything. Email is affordable and reaches a lot of people quickly. But according to the United States Postal Service and the Direct Marketing Association, 70% of American adults say physical mail is more personal than email. They like it and trust it more – and you can use this powerful tool to your advantage as a financial advisor. 

For example, create a letter and send a referral campaign to your current clients. Or send out a postcard with financial tips to position yourself as the go-to business for financial services. Sending an automated direct mail campaign to targeted leads with Postalytics is an affordable and effective way to grow your business.

AUM leads

Assets under management (AUM) refers to the total value of investments managed by a company or individual. Financial institutions and other industries measure their performance by communicating their AUM. Registered investment advisors (RIAs) can use direct mail to grow their AUM.

Direct mail helps advisors send a personalized message to a targeted audience at a low cost. To be successful, you must:

• Target your ideal clients by building a lead generation list or using a mailing list of people who match their preferred demographics. 
• Segment the list so you can send specific messages to each group.
• Present your message in a relevant and tailored way to your target audience.
• Offer the people on your list a deal, considering what would make a potential customer respond to the mailing.

Mutual fund leads

The more leads you generate, the more business you can earn for your mutual fund company. Automate the lead management process with Postalytics and target your leads at the right time.

Automated workflows make many tasks accessible so you can nurture and engage your leads in the sales pipeline. It helps when you use automated workflows as part of your sales process to accomplish any of the following tasks: 

• Define and execute lead nurturing campaigns 
• Track and manage leads in a lead database
• Perform lead scoring and lead qualification

How do financial services companies generate leads?

Many financial organizations and companies make the mistake of sending cold emails or running generic advertisements. If you have done market research, you may get some results, but a better way to market is to be more targeted and personal. If you make your financial services marketing more personal, you will attract quality leads and qualified prospects.

Personalized postcards, letters, and flyers

Financial institutions should consider several factors before deciding on a mailing format for their campaign, including marketing budget and campaign goal. For example, creating a postcard or flyer may be a good fit if you want to promote your services and entice potential clients with a free consultation.

However, if you are trying to generate leads through referrals, a direct mail letter targeting relevant prospects may be more appropriate.

It’s essential to personalize your direct mail to ensure it resonates with your target audience – especially if you are a financial advisor. Thanks to Postalytics, you can do this in two ways. First, you need to customize your design and offer to fit your target audience. To do this, create a postcard and use our editing tools that allow you to customize the postcard, flyer, and letter templates we provide for free.

Second, you want your recipients to feel like you are addressing them directly. You can achieve this by personalizing the content of lead generation mailings thanks to variable data printing, making it even more relevant to the particular person reading it.

Triggered mail and email promotions

When it comes to lead generation advertising and marketing, consistency is key.

With so many advertising channels and platforms, it can be difficult for a financial advisor to keep reaching out to potential clients. It would be best to use a mix of channels – such as direct mail, email, and digital advertising – to stay in the public eye. It’s not enough to distribute your content – you need to seek opportunities to connect with potential customers actively.

One way to do this is to include personalized URLs and QR codes and schedule triggered campaigns in your lead generation marketing campaigns. You can also use Postalytics’ editing tools and triggered campaigns to make your direct mail campaign go the extra mile.

CRM integrations

Thanks to our ability to integrate with various tools, Postalytics automatically sends personalized postcards and letters directly from your Salesforce account. Send tracked marketing lead generation emails to your sales leads, prospects, or customers in minutes. You can even use it for multi-channel marketing.

Member Closing Center (MCC), an automotive refinance client, invests heavily in automated direct mail created by Postalytics. The MCC has used Postalytics’ automated direct mail service with great success. In this case study, we illustrate how the Postalytics system has made their direct market efforts easy, provides excellent analytics, and gives them creative freedom. MCC uses Postalytics’ Pro tier, which has Salesforce integration and offers some of the lowest rates per mail piece. They send out tens of thousands of postcards and letters every month.

How much do financial services companies pay for leads?

Some businesses consider lead sources? Buying leads from a lead generation company and expecting them to convert into sales is ineffective, and recent data shows that it can also be a costly marketing venture for financial services. 

The cost of leads working with major lead generation companies is higher in the financial services industry than in any other sector. In 2018, the average cost per lead for financial services companies was $160. That’s a high cost for a sales team in a business to incur to target relevant prospects and source high-quality leads.

Financial service direct mail lists

Thanks to targeted mailing lists, you can promote your services to a specific group of people. Let us take millennials as an example of attracting new clients. They need financial assistance when pursuing careers, starting families, buying homes and cars, and buying insurance. Direct mailings to potential millennial clients on a targeted mailing list allow you to connect with them in a targeted and personal way.

Buying leads for financial services

An accurate and authentic mailing list tailored to a specific audience is the key to high response rates in your business’s lead generation and market expansion efforts. You do not have to worry about negotiating with large lead generation companies when you want to buy leads. Postalytics can help you buy or rent highly targeted financial services mailing lists from the best list brokers in the industry.

Exclusive leads for financial advisors

Exclusive leads are individuals who need wealth management services and are either ready to make a purchase or have expressed interest by asking questions about pricing and products.

They are also referred to as qualified leads. It’s in your best interests to work to generate your own exclusive leads for your financial advisors through direct mail marketing. This will allow your sales team or financial advisor to focus on building a relationship with them.

Once they do, clients will come after you, not the other way around.

Free leads for financial services leads

Free lead generation marketing strategies for financial services – such as word of mouth and networking – are no longer as effective as they once were for getting potential clients to contact you. These lead generation efforts for businesses are often slow, unpredictable, and sometimes expensive.

Final thoughts

Direct mail is an excellent way for smart financial advisors to reach potential clients with your financial products, advice, or services, generate leads, and build trust.

The only downside is that many firms do not take the time to measure the return on investment. Consider linking landing pages on your website to specific mailings. 

Postalytics’ tracking tool that links to your website or landing page allows you to precisely analyze where new customers are coming from when they contact you and which postcard or letter campaign worked best. This is valuable information for your marketing and sales team if you are in the financial industry or are a financial advisor.

Not only will it help you reach more leads, stay top of mind, and drive sales, but thanks to Postalytics’ direct mail pricing, you’ll save money doing so.