In my many years of running digital marketing campaigns, I've encountered my fair share of challenges, but nothing like breaking into the financial advisory space in a densely populated area. Undoubtedly, it's a tough market, but that makes success in this arena so rewarding. I recently wrapped up a campaign for a financial advisor that I'm particularly proud of. I want to share the journey, the strategies we employed, and the results we achieved. I'll also blend in some key insights I've gathered over the years to give you a fuller picture of how we turned things around.
The Starting Point: A Struggling Website and Minimal Visibility
When I first took on this client, their situation was dire. They received just two to three inquiries a year—barely a trickle in an industry where trust and visibility are everything. Their website was almost invisible, with traffic numbers that wouldn't even fill a small conference room. They were getting less than 20 visitors a month, and their rankings for crucial keywords like "financial advisor" or "financial planner" were practically nonexistent.
To make matters worse, the previous agency had reduced the site from around 50 service pages to a single-page site. This was a classic case of SEO gone wrong—what I like to call "SEO suicide." The site had been showing up for around 450 keywords across Google, but with the content slashed down to just one page, it dropped to fewer than 100 keywords. As you can imagine, its visibility plummeted, and so did its lead generation.
Rebuilding the Foundation: The SEO Overhaul
The first order of business was to rebuild the site's SEO foundation. I immediately restored the original service pages, essentially reconnecting the "SEO plumbing" that had been ripped out. This involved ensuring proper redirects, rebuilding essential content, and expanding the site to target high-value keywords. The effect wasn't immediate, but it was steady and significant.
Over the next few months, organic traffic increased from less than 20 monthly visitors to around 60. These numbers might not blow anyone away, but every bit of visibility counts in a competitive space like financial advisory. What was even more important was the shift in local rankings. When we started, the business didn't even rank first at its office location. However, after implementing our strategy, they now dominate the search results within a 10-kilometer radius for their main terms. That's a huge leap, translating into an increase in leads—from just a couple a year to around eight a month.
Achieving Precision with Google Ads
While we rebuilt the site's SEO, we also launched a Google Ads campaign to start driving immediate results. I'm a firm believer in precision when it comes to paid search. We focused our budget on exact-match keywords that we knew would bring in the right kind of traffic—terms like "Financial advisor Melbourne" and "Financial planner Melbourne."
Our Google Ads campaign was all about minimizing waste and maximizing impact. I made sure we avoided broad-match keywords, which often lead to wasted spending on irrelevant searches. Instead, we concentrated on keywords that mattered, and as a result, we were able to keep our cost per click (CPC) around $18—remarkably low for this industry.
The results were solid: With a spending of around $7,000, we generated 23 web leads and 15 phone calls, bringing the cost per lead to $188. When you consider the lifetime value of a financial advisory client, this is an excellent return on investment.
Creating Omnipresence with Facebook Ads
In addition to SEO and Google Ads, we used Facebook Ads to create an omnipresent marketing effect. This approach is all about being everywhere your potential clients are—on Google Maps, in organic search results, and at the top of paid search results.
We promoted seminars and used video content from these events as ad creatives, which helped us engage with potential clients on a more personal level. The cost per booked lead through Facebook Ads was about $65. While it may seem high, it's important to note that this number reflects the high engagement and quality of leads we could attract through these ads.
The Power of Content and Ongoing Optimization
Over the years, I've learned that content is king, especially in industries where trust and authority are crucial. For this campaign, we focused on creating educational content that would resonate with our audience. We developed dedicated pages for key services like retirement planning and financial advising and ensured every piece of content was optimized for the keywords we were targeting.
But we didn't stop there. I believe in ongoing optimization—constantly tweaking and improving campaigns based on real-time data. We monitored keyword rankings, adjusted bids in our Google Ads campaigns, and tested different ad creatives on Facebook to see what resonated best with our audience.
We also paid attention to the basics. Every page was optimized not just for SEO but also for user experience. This meant fast load times, mobile-friendly design, and clear calls to action on every page. We wanted potential clients to be able to get in touch.
Results That Speak for Themselves
By the end of the first year, the transformation was clear. Our client's website was now ranking in the top three positions for their main keywords within a 10-kilometre radius. They had gone from receiving a couple of inquiries a year to getting around eight inquiries a month. Their Google Ads drove high-quality leads at a cost per lead that made sense for their business, and our Facebook Ads had created a level of visibility that set them apart from their competitors.
This campaign wasn't about quick wins—it was about building a sustainable, long-term strategy that would continue to pay dividends. By focusing on high-value activities, precise targeting, and ongoing optimization, we turned a struggling financial advisory business into a local leader.
Final Thoughts
If there's one takeaway from this campaign, it's the importance of a multi-faceted approach to digital marketing. SEO, Google Ads, and Facebook Ads played crucial roles, but integrating these strategies made the difference. By being precise, persistent, and proactive, we achieved results that not only met but exceeded our client's expectations. The principles remain the same whether in financial advisory or any other industry: understand your market, focus on what matters, and never stop optimizing.
