2010 Recruiting Pitch: “Social networks are open for business”

Whether you are trying to recruit a seasoned advisor with a healthy book of business to join your firm or attracting the best and brightest to enter the profession, you have to differentiate yourself from the pack. (See more on Social Recruiting – value of networks and recent statistics).

If I’m an advisor with a choice of firms, I’m looking for a place that is going to help me achieve not just success, but overwhelming success – for my clients, the firm, and myself. Sure… reputation of the firm will be important, cultural fit, and the portfolio of products available. However, at the end of the day, the advisory business is about building relationships, acquiring clients, and delivering value. What is step one?  Networking.  And you can argue that steps two through five are the same: Networking.

Advisors and agents now have an unprecedented ability to access, grow, and build networks. Social Networking tools like LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter provide innovative and revolutionary capabilities for enabling success.

Why are social networks important?
There are many, many ways that social networking can help an advisor be more productive – with greater efficiency. Here are four key elements: Visibility, Speed, Assistance, and Information.

Visibility
Never before have financial advisors had the capability to connect actively with their “first degree” network that social networks allow. Have you noticed the “People You May Know” recommendations that LinkedIn provides on your homepage? How do they know that I could be connected with Leslie, a person that I met ten years ago when we were working on a critical project – but we were working at different companies? And, who knew that through 203 contacts on LinkedIn, a person can have 70,400+ friends of friends connections?

Speed
It’s one thing to try and list out on a spreadsheet all the people you have ever met, and then try to find their phone numbers or their email addresses. How long will it take to contact even half of that list? How about this? Start by connecting with ten contacts on LinkedIn or Facebook and see how quickly your ten connections turn into 20, into 50, into 100. You get the picture. Unprecedented. Tip: LinkedIn also makes it easy to download contact information should you have misplaced that business card from 5 years ago.

Assistance
I’m going to attend a week-long conference in San Francisco. Who do I know in San Francisco? That works in high-tech? I can find that with a few clicks. Who have I always wanted to meet? A few more clicks and I am getting introduced by a friend. The value of my trip has just multiplied.

Information
When I make a new connection or research a prospect, I now have more background than ever before. Not only do I know that my new contact, Joe, used to play poker with the friend that introduced us, but now I can see that he belongs to a local triathlon club – and I now have an instant opportunity for a personal connection.

Back to the recruiting pitch… what is your message? Are you demonstrating the firm’s willingness to invest and support advisor success? Or, are you going to wait and see what shakes out with these “personal” tools? The first movers will have an advantage. Don’t be surprised to start hearing stories about losing reps to a firm that has embraced and supported social networking.

Join us on June 22 for a complimentary webinar where we will be sharing Best Practices on how advisors and agents can leverage LinkedIn to drive productivity.