Beware the stories in our heads
Stories. Marketing is all about stories, or at least narrative. When done well, we organize the truth into a meaningful and impactful narrative… when done without integrity – or we’re not in touch with our value – we don’t really start with the truth… and that’s when marketing gives itself a bad name. But today’s […]
Investing is the least engaging major activity in your clients’ lives
As a marketing guy, we’re usually trying to make an emotional connection. The common wisdom about investing, of course, is that one should leave their emotions at the door. And although we often see evidence that people react emotionally with their investments, we’ve perhaps lost perspective on the backdrop of disengagement most people have towards […]
You is Kind, You is smart, You is High Net Worth
As we think about marketing opportunities in the investor world, this is a pretty big – and largely overlooked – one: http://cnb.cx/2j02a5p Take aways: $30 trillion in the next 3 or 4 decades will be passed from one generation to the next. And advisors usually lose the majority of the accounts as money flows from one generation […]
WealthSimple and Trudeau: bargain celebrity endorsement
Back in May, as robo-advisor WealthSimple passed the $1B AUM mark, PM Justin Trudeau took up their invitation and stopped by, making a few remarks. Nothing wildly out of the ordinary… a politician shining a light on an innovative startup success story. But here’s where it gets interesting: their latest online ad campaign puts Trudeau […]
Crowdsourcing has come to the investment world
I have to admit it, I’ve got a soft spot for First Asset’s newest ETF: the DEX 1-5 year Laddered Government Strip Bond ETF (ain’t that a mouthful). To be honest, I haven’t slightest interest in it from a financial point of view, but I’m fascinated by how it came to be: a public, crowdsourced […]
Women and financial advisors: Listen!
Great article on the shifting gender tides in wealth management, and the industry’s struggle to keep up: http://bit.ly/10g3IbV women need more education and validation than men to make financial decisions women can easily detect whether an advisor is really listening to them women aren’t as open (thank god!) to the usual advisor-coaching strategy of trying to completely […]
Can ETF flows serve as a weather vane?
The best advisors and fund companies try to read two distinct (and often contradictory) “winds,” judging where their investing business is going. The first is the technical side of investing, the one every financial news outlet spends every moment of every trading day dissecting. What sectors, stocks, instruments are heading towards outperformance? or underperformance? How […]
What we need is another financial crisis
As the liberal-vs-conservative politcal divide continues to widen, Fortune’s Allen Sloan has a great little article on the circular debates around our America’s biggest fiscal challenges. Reminds me of Jonathon Haidt’s sage TED Talk about how crises can heal political division.
The most important pattern investors need to watch for
Carl Richards is someone I admire – someone who has brought wise behavioural coaching to individual investors under the guise of money management. His latest article in the New York Times belittles technical indicators a little too much for my liking, but his core point is spot on: Oddly enough, the only pattern that will […]
Email marketing: phrasing is (almost) everything
No secret that we think email marketing remains powerful – in many cases, the best tool in the toolbox – for the investor demographic. Great insights into the impact wording and design can make. http://bit.ly/11KSf16