24th January, 2024 - Webinar replay

The 11 directories prospective clients might use to find a financial adviser/planner

Phil Bray  00:00

Good morning, everybody and welcome to our first webinar of 2024. Where did that go? So I hope everybody’s well, hope you’ve had a good start to the year. The sun is shining, it’s a good day today. So what are we going to be talking about today? The 11 directories, prospective clients might use to find a financial adviser or planner. So, the directories people might use to find people like you. We’re going to start by talking about the Big Three directories, we’re then going to talk about some of the directories you might not know about, and then we’re going to talk about some of the mistakes that advisers and planners make when it comes to directories. We’ve got a lot to get through today, there’s going to be some really practical stuff for you to do when you follow up this webinar. Abi has got a follow-up email to write to you after the webinar with the recording that has got more links in it than you can shake a stick at. So really practical stuff today. Dan, do you just want to talk about housekeeping for anybody that hasn’t already been on one of our webinars before?

Dan Campbell  01:15

Yes please. Hello, I’m Dan, the Head of Branding and Design here at Yardstick. I suppose I’d better quickly run through some of these house rules before we all get blown away by storm Jocelyn. Before I do that, it’s good to be back for another year packed full of webinars, we’ve got some really exciting stuff coming up over the next few months, kicked off today with a deep dive into directories. So, what do you need to know? First of all, we are recording this session. So, don’t worry, if you miss anything, a follow-up email with a link to the video plus any notes, resources or links we mention will be landing in your inbox later on. Secondly, this is a safe space for us all, not only from 97-mile-per-hour-winds, but also from judgement. So, get those questions in because there’s no such thing as a silly one. If you’re thinking it, so is somebody else, so use the Q&A box or the chat function to get those questions and comments in. We’re going to answer them as we go today and time permitting, we’ll sweep up any stragglers at the end. As always, Abi will be in the background working hard as ever answering any of the techie questions directly. If you set them up, she’ll knock them down. Looking at the attendees list today, we’ve got plenty of familiar names in the attendees list. So you’re going to know that these sessions work really well with plenty of engagement. So question us, agree with us, or tell us that we’re speaking complete rubbish. It’ll mean, we all get the most out of the hour today. So without further ado, Phil, what directories are out there? And how can we make the most of them?

Phil Bray  02:52

Cheers Dan. Funny should ask, shall we start? The other thing that we’re going to have today is some polls. We’ve got three polls at different points in the presentation, I’d really like it if everybody could vote on those polls, that would be  great. So, let’s look at a bit of background about directories, what are they? What are they not? Directories of Financial advisers are not a shortcut to success. There’s no magic bullet, there’s no guarantee that they’re all going to work, there’s no guarantee if you are on one directory, and not on the others, that you’re suddenly going to exponentially grow your business. They’re not a shortcut to success. They’re also not, as I think we might prove today, sometimes known about. There are some directories that many of the people on this call might not know about and there are some directories that are not particularly well understood and hopefully today we’ll deal with a few myths and misconceptions. Also, directories are not a replacement for a recommendation strategy. As we’ve said numerous times, referrals and recommendations from existing clients are the best type of new enquiry, they’ve got the highest conversion rate and the lowest cost of acquisition. So, directories don’t replace a referral and recommendation strategy and they work better if you have a broader and impressive online presence because everybody who gets in touch with you, takes a digital journey to your door. If a prospect finds you on a directory, they might immediately get in touch, but you know what, if they find you on a directory, they might find others as well. That’s the point where competition happens. They might find firm A and firm B, don’t know who to get in touch with if there’s not enough information on the directory so they start Googling. They start running brand searches. They look you up online, they look at Google reviews, they look at VouchedFor reviews, they go to your website, and they form an impression. As we’ve said before, sat between someone becoming aware of you and taking action is Google. Someone might become aware of you on a directory and then Google you so we need to have that broader and impressive online presence to really support the directories that we’re going to be talking about today. So that’s what directories are. Directories also need to be understood so we’re going to deal with some myths and misconceptions today. They need to be tracked and monitored. I saw a post on LinkedIn yesterday about Unbiased. The crux of the question was essentially, How do other people find Unbiassed? My view is from other things that I’ve seen in the past, too many people make decisions based on gut feel when it comes to Unbiased rather than data. So directories need to be tracked and monitored and they need to be part of a wider marketing strategy. You can’t just go on to these directories, and expect it to work. So that’s a bit of background about what directories are, and what they’re not. Also, what makes a successful directory? I thought it was worth a quick slide on that. The barriers to entry in the directory market are huge. I’ve had a few people come to Yardstick and ask if we intend to launch our own directory of financial advisers, and the answer is absolutely not. The barriers to entry are absolutely massive and that’s because directories need to be promoted to consumers, you need that consumer traffic on directories, to make them work. As we’ll see, on some of these directories, there’s not a lot of promotion of them going on. Also, directories need buy-in from the adviser and planning communities. You need two groups of people on these directories, you need advisers to make them useful to consumers, and you need consumers to make directories useful to advisers and planners. Then you need a financial model that works for both the directory, unless it’s a charity, although it’s still got bills to pay, and the advisers who are on it. We’ve seen with some of the directories, how difficult it can be to get the financial model, right. So it’s those three things that make a successful directory; we need consumers using it, we need advisers and planners buying into it, and we need a financial model that works. So, a bit of background, and hopefully some useful context about why life is pretty hard if you run directories, I have a lot of sympathy for firms who run directories. So we’re going to start with a poll before we go into the 11 directories that we’re going to talk about. Now, Dan, let’s see if this works. That’s my reminder to put the poll up. Dan, could you put the first poll up about Unbiased? If that’s okay.

Dan Campbell  08:13

I certainly can.

Phil Bray  08:14

And can everybody go and vote, please?

Dan Campbell  08:17

Right, the poll has been launched. Let’s hope we have a successful first flight.

Phil Bray  08:25

Can you see people voting Dan?

Dan Campbell  08:26

I certainly can

Phil Bray  08:27

Excellent. You can give a running commentary.

Dan Campbell  08:30

Oh, wow.

Phil Bray  08:31

Although, that might affect the results.

Dan Campbell  08:32

Yeah.

Phil Bray  08:33

Maybe don’t do the running commentary. We’ll keep it open for another 10 seconds. How are we doing Dan? Can we see the votes?

Dan Campbell  08:46

Yes. So your question is “Thinking about Unbiased over the last 12 months, how do you feel?” And the answers are more positive, more negative, the same, and non-applicable because you don’t use Unbiased? So most people have voted now so let’s close the poll. The most common answer is non-applicable because they don’t use Unbiased with 44%, the second most popular answer is more negative, with 38%, 15% of people say the same and only 4% of people are more positive.

Phil Bray  09:25

So quick maths from me. really rough maths. I reckon that’s about 60% of people who use Unbiased feel more negative. Interesting, okay. Watch this space for more polls as we work through. Okay, so Unbiased. Each of these slides will have a bit of the basics, a bit of the lowdown of what we think, and then our advice. I doubt there’s anybody on this webinar who hasn’t heard of Unbiased; it’s the oldest and largest of all the directories open to advisers, planners and mortgage brokers. There are essentially two ways that consumers can use the directory, the first thing they can do is that they can browse the directory. So, if anybody is as old as I am, they’ll remember when Unbiased was called IFA promotions. IFA promotions was essentially just a directory; the consumer would browse, and make a decision about which adviser or planner to contact. They’ve still got that option on there, but maybe six or seven years ago, Unbiased introduced the ability to be matched; the consumer would answer some basic questions, Unbiased’s algorithm would push that out to a number of advisers, I’ve heard different numbers between about three and seven, and the first adviser to accept that enquiry, locked everybody out. So, that’s the matching route. If you put yourselves in the shoes of the consumer, and go on to the Unbiased website, you’ll see that the UX, the user journey is pushing people down the matched route. So, we have those two ways of consumers being able to get in touch with advisers, browse the directory the old way, and being matched, the relatively new way, albeit  it’s six or seven years old now. In terms of the pricing model, Unbiased charges for a monthly subscription, plus a payment per accepted enquiry. So when the enquiry comes through, you don’t have to accept it, you can decline it, it’s good practice on Unbiased to give them a definitive answer, yes or no. If you buy it, you have the payment per enquiry. In terms of payments, you can see that this is just information taken from the Unbiased website. There were a couple of changes last year as I understand it with Unbiased, you have the monthly subscription on standard, premium or enhanced, and that gets you 5, 20, or 50 locations. Locations being postcode locations, and that allows you to have more locations if you’re on premium, therefore wider coverage, and wider coverage means potentially more enquiries. You’ve got the lead cost on top, up to 50,000 of investable assets at £52, 150,000 – 250,000 at £125, 1.5 million and above at £276 and there are some tiers in the middle. It would have been a big slide if I had put them all on. Unbiased require a six monthly commitment from you as well, a six-month contract. Unbiased’s sole purpose, in my view is lead generation. In my opinion, I’m really happy to be told I’m wrong, but in my opinion, this is very simply ‘how much am I paying out?’ versus ‘how much am I getting in?’ Clearly, there are three sources of income from a client, initial fees, ongoing fees capitalised over a reasonable period of time, and who knows? potential increase in sale value. But for me, this is very straightforward. Unbiased’s utility is lead-generation, we need to be comparing what comes in with what goes out. Now it can work well, if you are taking multiple locations. For me, for Unbiased to work you have to take multiple locations. This is a numbers game in many ways. Your processes need to be effective as well, to win the enquiry in the first place, and then to follow up effectively, make sure that people are put into your sales funnel so that you stand as much chance of converting the lead as possible. We also need to make sure that results are monitored. As we said before, return on investment is massively important on Unbiased and therefore you need to monitor your returns. Every enquiry that comes into your business should be recorded anyway for reasons we’ve spoken about in the past. So, monitor the enquiries that come in, monitor the returns that you’re getting. It can work well for firms targeting lower-value clients. I am absolutely not saying high-value clients aren’t on there, but the cost of those leads is quite expensive. So our advice when it comes to Unbiased is consider it if you will monitor the results you’re getting so that you’re making decisions based on evidence rather than gut feel. It can work well if you have a large lead requirement. If your business has a relatively large lead requirement Unbiased can work well but you need significantly more locations than firms who have got a smaller lead requirement. You’ve got to be able to commit the budget. We’ve already seen that the budget is quite chunky and it doesn’t replace that fully costed marketing strategy. I also think it can be useful for new start firms. New start firms, clearly, with fewer clients are going to get fewer referrals and recommendations from those clients. So it can work quite nicely for new start firms but with all those caveats. What we’re going to do in terms of questions, as Dan said, we’re going to take questions about each directory as we work through and then we’ll do any general questions at the end. So Dan, have we got any comments or questions about Unbiased?

Dan Campbell  15:48

Questions, no, comments, absolutely. The overwhelming thing is, people used to use Unbiased and no longer do for varying reasons. Pricing being a very common one. Other people are unsure of how Unbiased it actually is. Others have mentioned it feels more like they’re selling Google ads at a premium. So an overwhelmingly cynical view of Unbiased and the overwhelming feel is that we used to use it and now we don’t.

Phil Bray  16:18

Okay that’s interesting. ‘Google ads at a premium’ is an interesting way of putting it I’ve not heard that before. We couldn’t start this presentation about directories without Unbiased, so that was the logical reason for starting there. I thank you for putting your comments in. I assume nobody else has got any more questions or comments about Unbiased, so we will continue if that’s okay Dan?

Dan Campbell  16:44

Yeah, that’s good.

Phil Bray  16:46

So Unbiased, I think we all know about. Right, poll time! The next place we’re going to talk about before we get into the smaller, lesser-known directories is VouchedFor. So, Dan, do you want to launch the poll there, please?

Dan Campbell  17:00

I would love nothing more than to launch the poll.

Phil Bray  17:02

We need some sort of countdown clock, don’t we?

Dan Campbell  17:04

Wow. There we go.

Phil Bray  17:07

So if everybody could go and vote in that poll, please as well: thinking about VouchedFor Over the last 12 months, do you feel more positive or negative? The same? Not applicable, because you don’t use VouchedFor? I’m really interested to see how the results compare.

Dan Campbell  17:21

While everyone was voting, we did have a comment in from Gavin, who said that they couldn’t see the poll. It should pop up in front of you but if you’re on multiple screens, Zoom has a wonderful habit of putting it on the screen that you’re not viewing Zoom on. So just check your other screens if that’s the case, and hopefully you can catch it this time.

Phil Bray  17:41

Thank you Dan. So, what have we got?

Dan Campbell  17:45

Let’s give it just a few more seconds for people to get their last-minute votes in. Okay, so the question being, “Thinking about VouchedFor Over the last 12 months do you feel…” and then the same answers apply, more positive, more negative, the same, or non-applicable because you don’t use it. Again, the most common answer is not applicable because we don’t use it. The second most common answer is they feel the same with 25%. Not applicable was 42%, the same is 25%, more positive has 20% just turned 21% because another vote snuck through, and only 13% feel more negative about it.

Phil Bray  18:33

Okay, so people are feeling more positive about VouchedFor than they are Unbiased this time, compared to this time last year. For those people who feel more negatively about VouchedFor, I’d be interested to understand why. Maybe put some comments in the chat, I’d be really interested to understand that. So VouchedFor. Clearly, it’s the place to be the directory is second on our list, largely because of chronology and longevity. So VouchedFor was launched, it seems to me broadly as a direct competitor to Unbiased. It’s open to all financial advisers, planners and mortgage brokers. But over the years it has pivoted towards being a ratings and review platform. I hear a lot of advisers say they don’t get leads from VouchedFor, and that was a fair criticism a few years ago, they might say they get more leads from Unbiased, again, that might have been a fair criticism a few years ago. Now though, for me, VouchedFor does not equal Unbiased. It is not the same thing as Unbiased in any shape or form. It’s a very different beast to Unbiased, and that’s because it’s pivoted towards being a ratings and review platform. The ratings are for individual advisers and they are aggregated to produce a firm score. So if you’ve got five advisers in your firm, and they are all on VouchedFor, they will each have their own individual reviews on there, and they are aggregated to form a score for your firm. There are currently over 280,000 reviews on the platform, on VouchedFor. They go to great lengths to make sure those reviews are genuine so that advisers are getting reviews from genuine clients, and that causes less of a problem in terms of fake reviews, and also that advisers are actually putting all their reviews on there. So it’s a good platform from that perspective. Its main focus, as I’ve said earlier, is to help firms show the value of financial planning, financial advice, mortgage advice, etc. Last year, they introduced the Elevation product, and the Elevation product is very useful for helping you analyse the data within your VouchedFor reviews. So VouchedFor reviews have always been useful from a marketing perspective, but now the Elevation platform enables firms to analyse those reviews more simply, more easily, and take decisions about their business, proposition, and service based on what clients have said. I’m a big fan of Elevation. From a consumer perspective, consumers can search the directory, so there’s no best match as there is in Unbiased. Consumers can search the directory based on postcode, specialisms, etc. and then the results show up in a list, and the list is defined by VouchedFor’s algorithm, which is based on factors such as number of reviews, quality of reviews, recency of reviews – how recently you got the reviews. At the top, there’s a feature box for best match, and you can’t pay to go in the best match box, it’s based on VouchedFor algorithm. Clearly, we don’t know what the weighting is between number of reviews, quality, and recency, but what is pretty clear to me is that those advisers who have the best reviews, and the most recent reviews tend to be higher up the list. So, from a subscription perspective, VouchedFor is £54 pounds per month, per adviser, plus VAT, and then there’s Elevation on top if you want it. You can’t have Elevation without verified VouchedFor membership as I understand it, but you can have the verified membership on its own. That verified membership means that you appear in searches, means you can use the widgets on the website, etc. From our perspective, it’s primarily there for social proof, showing the value of working with you. As we’ll see in a minute, it’s the ideal partner platform to Google reviews. It will produce leads and enquiries. Broadly speaking, in our experience, it tends to wash its face in terms of subscription costs. Its primary focus is showcasing the value that you add to your clients and they do that through a variety of different ways. The widgets that can be embedded on the website, The Top Rated Guide, which is out in March, and then they’re publishing it again in The Daily Mail and The Telegraph later on in the year, and there’s a bunch of other supporting assets as well, that can be tremendously useful, especially when you’re trying to engage with new prospects. So, if you take nothing else out of today’s webinar, take this: it’s that VouchedFor does no longer equal, Unbiased. Our view and our advice is that almost all firms, should use VouchedFor as a partner review platform to Google a couple of reasons for this. And Abi, if we put in the follow up notes, our definitive guide to online reviews, anybody who wants to read more can do that. For my money, the two platforms that you should be collecting reviews on are Google and VouchedFor. The first reason why is that Google is quite hard to get reviews on; it’s important, you should be using it, but Google is quite hard to get reviews on. Therefore, if you don’t offer a second platform, you’re sending your clients down a dead end. In our experience for every review, you get on Google, you’ll get between 5 and 10 on VouchedFor. The second reason is, if somebody has searched for you online, run a brand search, remember, Google is sitting between awareness and action, there’s no guarantee they’re going to search for your name. There’s no guarantee they’re going to search your firm name, they might search for an individual adviser’s name. If they search your firm name, your Google reviews will come up, if they search for the individual adviser’s name, the VouchedFor reviews will come up on a Google search. So for me, and my money, almost every single firm should be using VouchedFor and Google to collect online reviews. Dan, I’m going to pause I can see some things coming in. So where do you want to start?

Dan Campbell  25:37

Right, so ,in terms of comments and questions, there are mostly comments, but we do have a few questions too. So, we’ll begin with the questions. The first question is in from Ian, who asks, “Does VouchedFor have a tipping point as to the number of reviews needed to be credible? I ask, as my firm is consciously small, with a modest number of larger clients so I will never get loads of reviews. Would 20 5-star reviews be as powerful as 150 4.8-star reviews?”

Phil Bray  26:07

I don’t know is the answer to that question. That specific point and that specific maths, the short answer is I don’t know. What I would say, though, is we tend to make a free VouchedFor profile for firms, at the point where they get to maybe a dozen reviews, we tend to say right, turn on the verified membership. Then you can start embedding the widget into your website, using the widgets in your email footers, start to market it on social media, etc. So from a platform perspective Ian, where you might rank? The answer is, I don’t know; from a marketing perspective, and using VouchedFor as a platform to showcase your reviews, I will say once you’ve got a dozen reviews or so, which is relatively straightforward to do because remember, husband and wife can leave a review each, your prospects can leave first impression reviews, existing clients can leave top-up reviews, getting a dozen reviews is pretty straightforward. So second off the question, I don’t know, first half of the question, Yes, it’s about 12.

Dan Campbell  27:12

Fantastic. Let’s go to Jack’s comment now. Jack says, “We go down a road of just Google only, I’m not sure it’s worth doing VouchedFor in conjunction with Google.”

Phil Bray  27:25

I’d be interested to understand, I could sit here for hours and say yes it is and explain why, but I’d be interested to understand why “it’s not worth going down the second platform.” I’d be interested to understand the logic for that. So if you can explain the logic, then I’ll deal with that then.

Dan Campbell  27:41

Brilliant, let’s go to… Oh, Jack caveats that with “because VouchedFor is just Google, but at cost”

Phil Bray  27:47

I disagree, it’s not. Google is reviews for firms, VouchedFor is reviews for advisers. Google reviews are displayed on your Google Business Profile listing, you can embed them in your website, if you want to, with VouchedFor there’s a whole load of ways to embed them in your website and there’s a whole load of ancillary benefits, Times Top Rated Guide, etc. VouchedFor will produce some leads, Google won’t. For every one review you get on Google, you’ll get 5 – 10 on VouchedFor. I just don’t think they’re the same thing, I think they’re very different products. I think they’re complementary, not binary. That’s my personal opinion anyway.

Dan Campbell  28:32

Brilliant. Let’s, let’s move on to two questions in from Niall, who says, first of all, “Is VouchedFor applicable to Ireland?” Because they’re based in Dublin, and then, sorry, I think over spoke you there.

Phil Bray  28:51

No, it’s not. It’s not applicable to Ireland.

Dan Campbell  28:54

And then Niall’s second question is, “We use Trustpilot, and asked whether or not we rate Trustpilot?”

Phil Bray  29:01

Yeah, cheers Niall. I think, you’ve still got the logic of two platforms, Google plus a partner platform, because it’s hard to leave reviews on Google, therefore the logic is, you need that second platform. In the UK, for us, the logic is, to use VouchedFor for the reasons we’ve spoken about. Overseas, from the UK, then Trustpilot is the obvious next place to go. It’s not the cheapest platform to embed on your website and get the widgets and that sort of stuff, but Trustpilot would be my go-to after VouchedFor. It’s a bit country-dependent, we were talking to a country on Monday, where Trustpilot  doesn’t seem to be a thing, but I could see why you’d use Trustpilot in Ireland Niall.

Dan Campbell  29:54

Okay, let’s go to Sue’s question now. Sue says, “It’s hard enough to get clients to complete one review form, i.e. VouchedFor. How do we get them to fill in more than one, i.e. Google as well?

Phil Bray  30:11

Great question, dead simple answer. So, you send them one message by email or WhatsApp, explaining you use two platforms, Google and VouchedFor, here are the links. Some will do none, some will do both, some will do one. But it isn’t two separate emails, it’s one email with two links, and that email or WhatsApp message, should be wholly, exclusively, and only about the review request. We see some firms tagging the review request on to the end of a suitability report, or the follow-up to review meeting and clients are just not going to get there, they’re not going to get to the end. So one email, two links, that message should be wholly, exclusively, and only about reviews. If you get your processes, right, either as a kickoff project, or on an ongoing basis, you will see your reviews rise slowly each month. Abi, if you just put that definitive guide in the follow-up; Sue, there’s more information in there about how we do this. This is based on our work with dozens of clients over the years who have been successful at collecting reviews.

Dan Campbell  31:34

Before we move on, I will just give a very quick recap of the comments. So as the poll results suggested, it’s more balanced than people’s views on Unbiased. Now, we did ask for the negative voters to explain in a bit more detail and ultimately, it comes from the feeling that it’s more of a review platform than it is a lead generator. So, we’ve had a few people give a bit of context around that. In terms of other comments we’ve had, there are positive comments about VouchedFor. Many of them give the theme that, the more you put into VouchedFor in terms of effort getting those reviews, the more enquiries it naturally generates. So, there seems to be almost a tipping point of effort for that. That’s kind of it for the comments, let’s move on. I’ve become aware that we’re just past the halfway point.

Phil Bray  32:24

We’re good. Thank you Dan. Right, next: AdviserBook. So, we’ve not got a poll for this one, but we’re starting to move into the directory space where these are less well-known. We’ve done the two big ones, these are less well-known. Albeit despite being the newest directory to the market, there is an argument that AdviserBook is potentially the most comprehensive, because the guys at AdviserBook, take a direct feed from the FCA register. There’s a direct feed from the FCA register periodically, into AdviserBook. By the way, I should have said, after this, Abi will be sending the follow up email, which will have all the links into these directories, and where appropriate, we’ve not only included the consumer-facing link, but we’ve included the adviser-facing link as well, to try and make your life easy. From AdviserBook’s perspective, consumers can browse the directory based on postcode, and then they can narrow their choices down with various filters. The platform was launche just before COVID, maybe a little bit earlier and updated in 2023, it does look good. There’s a new functionality that has been added, so consumers can add reviews. I don’t know how many reviews are on there, but they haven’t gained the traction for the new feature, that VouchedFor reviews might have done. Firms where you’ve got multiple locations, offices in different regions, or different towns and cities with different advisers can have multiple profiles on there as well. It’s free, which makes it an interesting business model, and clearly, might present challenges in terms of how widely the directory is promoted. For me, it’s got better search filters on than Unbiased as a consumer, it is lower profile than VouchedFor or Unbiased though. Again, with a bit of money behind it, I think it could be a real challenger, certainly to Unbiased. I’m a big fan of what AdviserBook are trying to do, its comprehensive nature and it looks good as well. From those two perspectives, I think it could be a challenger certainly to Unbiased. Now, after this presentation, your job is to go claim and complete your profile, it’s free and chances are your profile is on there already because it’s pulling in from the FCA register. So go and complete your profile, add your company logos, add your descriptions, add your images, they will do checks on your regulatory status and independent or restricted status. For me, it’s free, I can’t see there’s anything to lose. It might generate one or two leads during the year because that’s its main purpose right now, and it also will help to pack out those search results for a brand search. AdviserBook could be a challenger to Unbiased, go and claim and complete your profile. Dan, any questions about AdviserBook?

Dan Campbell  35:52

No.

Phil Bray  35:52

Okay, right, PFS, find an adviser. So unsurprisingly, the PFS directory of advisers is only for advisers who are registered with a PFS, that’s not going to come as a shock. This is an individual directory for individual advisers rather than firms, it’s a postcode-based search for the consumer with some basic filters around specialisms and pretty basic profiles as well. It’s free, there’s no charge for being on there. In my experience though, advisers have rarely fully completed their profile. Partly because I think, it might be relatively low-profile as a directory, they might have forgotten about it, they might not have known it was there. So, you often see missing information around website links, social media links, email addresses, quite often you see where the business name should read the address. Some profiles need a little bit of love, and you can make updates by logging into the CII platform. So if you are a member of the PFS, after this webinar, go and check your profile, login, and complete any missing sections. I didn’t want to name and shame any advisers today who weren’t, but if you just go and do a postcode search or go and look at your own profile, there’s just a lot of profiles, and they are pretty basic profiles, but there’s a lot of information missing. So, make sure you’re registered on the PFS directory if you are a member of the PFS, make sure your profile is up to date with the information that is correct about your business, and go and complete the missing sections. Whenever we work with a multi-adviser, firm 80% of advisers profiles have got missing information. So there’s a fair chance yours has as well. So that’s directory four. Any questions?

Dan Campbell  37:55

Not on directory four, but a question for directory three has since come through.  So, referring to AdviserBook, the question is how do they make money if it’s free?

Phil Bray  38:00

Go for it! That’s a good question, isn’t it? That’s a good question. I’m going to set up a meeting with AdviserBook over the coming months to understand their business model. As I recall, it was originally started by Ray Adams of CashCalc. I don’t know where AdviserBook are hoping to take it, but it does come back to the point I made on the earlier slide that is for directories to work, it needs traffic, adviser buy in, consumer buy in, and you would have thought that therefore at some point it needs to develop an income stream but other than that, I don’t know.

Dan Campbell  38:49

Interestingly, the people in the attendees list are answering that for us. Apparently when you log in now, you get a notification saying they’re going to be charging in six months time.

Phil Bray  38:59

Fair enough. We shall see what the charging structure looks like then but clearly they need to create income somehow. Are we good to move on Dan?

Dan Campbell  39:09

We certainly are.

Phil Bray  39:10

Cool, number five. We’re still on the CII side of the fence, we’ve got the Chartered Firm Directory. So if you run a chartered financial planning firm, then there is a directory of Chartered Advisers and there will be firms who are chartered who know about this, but quite a few don’t. As a consumer, you can do a postcode search, or you can look up an individual firm’s name. There are no filters at that level, the profiles are relatively basic, and it’s a free subscription service. In my experience, firms have rarely fully completed their profile; the website link is often missing, telephone numbers I’ve seen missing and also they’ve introduced categories of advice, retirement, investment, etc. and often they’re missing as well. So, if you run a chartered firm, congratulations for being chartered, it’s no mean feat. If you run a chartered firm, go and check your profile and have a look at the missing sections. Again, Abi will put the link in the email. If you want to go and look now, just Google ‘CII Chartered Firm Directory’, put your firm name in, your postcode, look at what your profile is like, look at what your peers and competitors are doing, and check for any missing sections and go and update them. So that’s a charted firm directory on our tour of these smaller, lesser-known directories. Dan any comments on that one?

Dan Campbell  40:44

No, nothing for that.

Phil Bray  40:45

Right flipping over to the CISI Wayfinder directory. We talked before about the two directories on the CII side of the fence for individual advisers and chartered firms, well, this is a directory of Certified Financial Planners and Accredited Financial Planning Firms in one directory. It’s free, so if you are certified or accredited, you are going to be on there. It looks really good, they redesigned it, I think it was last year and it looks lovely. The design is incredibly engaging, it looks good. Profiles, in my view, seem pretty well-completed. I’m not sure how they’ve been completed, whether they did a very good job of getting individual planners and planning firms to do it themselves, or they’ve pulled information from elsewhere, but the profiles seem pretty well-completed. I’ve seen a few formatting errors and you might actually want to just go and check on your profile, that you’re happy with what it says about your firm, maybe update some of those descriptions, check formatting and contact details. But the Wayfinder directory, again, if you are a member of the CISI, at a firm level or an individual adviser level, then you should go and check your profile. That’s part of the message with all this stuff. Use this webinar as a catalyst for going to check which directories you are on and make sure the information is as up-to-date as possible. Right, poll time, last poll. Dan, can you launch the final poll before we talk about directory number seven?

Dan Campbell  42:42

Yes, I can. Give me a second to find said poll. All right, there we go, the poll has been launched.

Phil Bray  42:53

So, are you aware of the Money Helper Directory? ‘Yes,’ ‘No’, or ‘Other’. I’m not entirely sure why I put other as an option, it’s a fairly binary question. Are you aware of the Money Helper Directory? ‘Yes’ or ‘No’. But feel free to answer ‘Other’ if you like. How are we getting on Dan, is it working?

Dan Campbell  43:13

It certainly is. Yeah.

Phil Bray  43:15

While people are voting, do we have any questions about the Wayfinder directory?

Dan Campbell  43:19

Nothing specifically for Wayfinder, I do have a few general questions that I will sweep up for the end.

Phil Bray  43:24

Yes we’ll lock those up at the end, if that’s okay.

Dan Campbell  43:28

Okay, it seems to have the majority of the answers in, and nobody has voted ‘Other’.

Phil Bray  43:35

That’s pleasing.

Dan Campbell  43:37

64% No, 36% Yes.

Phil Bray  43:40

That’s really interesting because when we were writing marketing strategies for the firms that we work with, a large proportion of them never heard about the Money Helper and are not on that directory. So that really is interesting that  about two thirds that’ve said no, not aware of it.

Dan Campbell  43:58

Yeah, it’s varying between 36, 64, and around that. There are a few stragglers coming through, so far, no one has voted ‘Other’ just to be that funny one in the group, so I’ll end the poll before they can.

Phil Bray  44:13

The Money Helper Retirement Adviser Directory is for want of a better description, a government-led directory; it’s a directory of firms, not individual advisers. To be listed on there is free, there are no costs for being listed on there. You’ve got to tick three boxes, you need to be FCA regulated, which probably shouldn’t trouble too many people on this call, I think everybody’s FCA regulated, you’ve got to give retirement advice, again, probably shouldn’t trouble everybody, and you have to be whole-of-market. So, if you tick those three boxes, you can be on there. The Money Helper Directory gets traffic from guidance sessions that they run, you’ll be aware of the guidance sessions that are run, Google searches and providers push traffic to it as well. From a consumers perspective, it’s got a postcode search, a range of filters, and the profiles are reasonably detailed. As we’ve seen, many firms haven’t registered, I think it’s probably fair to assume if you’ve not heard about it in the 60%, you haven’t registered. So go and register your firm on there. Again, Abi will put the link in to the follow-up mailern so you can go and do that. Other profiles are incomplete and not up to date, and as I said, it’s free, there’s no cost for being on there. Our advice is go and register, you absolutely have nothing to lose! If you are already on the Money Helper Directory, then check and update your profile. Just remember, on this, this point I’ve made a few times about checking and updating your profile, that these directories will appear in many respects, in Google searches for your business. It might be towards the bottom of page one, even on page two, but if a link appears in a Google search for your individual name, or your business, then someone could click it, someone could go and visit it, and think, do you want them to see a nicely completed profile with up-to-date information? Or do you want them to see incomplete information and things that aren’t up-to-date? It’s clearly the first route, therefore, just make sure that you go and check all of these directories because if a consumer, a prospect can click a link in a Google search, they will and we need to give them a good experience. So Dan, any questions about Money Helper?

Dan Campbell  46:43

Yes, we’ve got a question from Duncan, it’s got two question marks and two exclamation marks. Duncan really wants the answer to this Phil, so no pressure! Duncan asks, “How do you edit your Money Helper entry?”

Phil Bray  46:58

That’s a very good question. As I understand it, you log into the back end, and then go and edit it. But I’m assuming Duncan, there is a reason why that is not necessarily working for you, so I might need a little bit more information. It looks to me when you register, you put a username and password in, but I could be wrong.

Dan Campbell  47:18

So while Duncan gets some more context for that, we do have a comment from Jill, who mentioned they’ve received enquiries leading to business from the Money Helper Directory. Joseph mentions, “Personally, I think providers need to be better at directing the public to Money Helper rather than Unbiased, which is often erroneously positioned as a government directory by some providers.”

Phil Bray  47:41

Interesting perspective. I think, talking to other planning firms who are on Money Helper, they would concur with that point that actually lead volumes aren’t massive, this is definitely a satellite directory, and it’s worth being on there, but actually, the quality is very good because a lot of people are going for guidance sessions, etc.

Dan Campbell  48:02

I’m interested in a comment from Claire, who mentioned, “We’re on there, but we don’t appear in the search.”

Phil Bray  48:09

Right, in that case, I would be messaging Money Helper and saying, “Can you help? Why are we not appearing in the search?” After you’ve done the normal checks at the postcode match and that sort of stuff.

Dan Campbell  48:22

Finally, a question from Mia who just wants some clarification “So you see, you can’t be on Money Helper, if you are a restricted adviser?”

Phil Bray  48:32

That’s my understanding. To put it slightly differently, you’ve got to be whole-of-market. That’s the language they use on the website, whole-of-market. When we were preparing for this webinar, I did answer the three questions that you’ll see on the registration page and I put “No” to whole-of-market, and it wouldn’t let me progress to the next step. Right, shall we move on?

Dan Campbell  48:56

Yes, please.

Phil Bray  48:58

Directories 8 through to 11. I’m very aware that in the directories we’ve spoken about so far, a relatively large proportion of people here will be able to go on will be able to add their firm to them. For example, Money Helper, anybody who’s independent or let’s use whole-of-market because that’s the language Money Helper use, can go on to that website. These final four though, I just want to make sure people are aware of them. So SOLLA, SIFA, and Resolution have directories. Now clearly, these are smaller, because the addressable audience is smaller but if you are a SOLLA, SIFA, or Resolution member, it’s back to that same advice that I gave before. Check whether you are on there, and if you’re not, make sure you are. If you are on there, check your links are up to date, the profile is fully completed, and the information that is being displayed on there is again, up-to-date. Advisers or planners who are members of SOLLA, SIFA, or Resolution, you may have already known this directory exists, you might have forgotten, and not updated it for a while, and things change. So if you’re a member of those three organisations, do go and check your listing. The last one, Boring Money. Boring Money is a new, relatively new directory, I think it’s got massive potential. It looks very different to a lot of the directories we’ve spoken about before, it allows financial coaches to go on the directory, so if we’ve got any non-reg financial coaches on this call, you can go on it. The profiles look good, and it is predicated on user-generated content; advisers and people on the directory get asked questions, they leave replies, people like your replies, it’s got more of a community social feel about it. It does require an ongoing commitment to answering questions, etc. So I’m a big fan of Boring Money, and we’ll be doing a bit more about what Boring Money are doing later on this year. But I’m a big fan of what they’re doing and the directory looks really good. Go and have a look at it, and as soon as you see it, it just looks different to the others, even just from the images that people use, it feels far more personal, I think is what I’m trying to say there. So if you’re a member of SOLLA, SIFA, or Resolution, go make sure you’re on their directories, make sure your profile is up-to-date, and the information is current, go and look at Boring Money and see if you think that’s for you. So, we’re going to do quick fire mistakes, and then we’ll come to any final questions and comments from people Dan if that’s okay?

Dan Campbell  51:57

Yeah.

Phil Bray  51:58

Six directory mistakes that people make in our experience. The first, as we’ve said earlier, is believing Unbiased and VouchedFor are the same thing. They are absolutely not the same thing for reasons we’ve spoken about before. For me, Unbiased’s utility is around lead-generation VouchedFor’s utility is primarily around social proof. Some of the comments that Dan read out earlier heartened me and makes me feel that that message is getting through. Second, judging Unbiased on the opinions of others, not your own evidence. So I feel, too often, there’s a pile on with Unbiased based on people’s gut feel, and I do get it to a degree, but base your opinions on Unbiased based on evidence like the number of leads coming in, amount paid out, and the calculated the return on investment. I see a few advisers doing that, which is a good thing, but I don’t see as many doing it as they should. So just make sure you’re judging Unbiased, based on evidence. As I said earlier, not completing or dating profile listings. Some firms don’t know they’re on directories, and therefore never think to check, or never know to check that the directories are up-to-date. Some firms have built a really nice listing, but it was some time ago, and have since forgotten to update it. So just go and check all the links that we’ll give you later on today, when we pass the recording to you. Go and check your profiles and spot any gaps. Let me know if you find some gaps, I’m really interested to see whether this hypothesis plays out in reality. Go and update your links, and any missing information. Lastly, before we take some questions, linking your website out to Unbiased. I see this more often than I should. On some advisers websites, we see a link from their website to Unbiased. So you’ve worked hard to get somebody onto your website, ideally, you then want them to take a call to action. You’ve worked hard to get someone on your website, but then you link them out to a directory of 28,000 peers and competitors. I cannot think of a logical reason why you would do that. Plus, if they get in touch via Unbiased, you’ve got to pay for the lead and they were on your website five minutes ago. So, I can’t think of a logical reason why you would link from your website out to your Unbiased profile, just don’t do it. Number five, incorrectly displaying VouchedFor reviews. VouchedFor provide a really lovely set of widgets, there’s a bit of code that allows you to embed those widgets into your website, both for individual advisers, and the firm. Then when somebody is on your website clicks, the widget, a little pop-up comes up, they’re still in your domain, it works really well. But some advisers still insist on linking out to VouchedFor. So linking out, the consumer will go from the website to VouchedFor. They’re then only one click away from seeing a list of other advisers in their area. Again, why do it? You’ve worked hard to get people onto your website, don’t do it, use the VouchedFor widget code instead. Lastly, not monitoring return on investment. I think I’ve spoken about that a lot already. You need to monitor your return on investment from these directories. For Unbiased, and for any other directories you pay for, that’s relatively straightforward, providing you record accurately, every single new prospect, lead, and enquiry that comes into your business, no exceptions. It is a marketing hill that we will die on here at Yardstick that every single enquiry into your business needs to be recorded. To help you we have an enquiry recording template. Abi, could you stick a link to that in the follow-up notes as well? So those are six common directory mistakes that we see. Right, If you want to stay in touch with me, there’s the Yardstick website, my LinkedIn profile, I’m always happy to accept a LinkedIn connection request. If you got any questions or feedback after this session, drop me an email, and if you want to follow us on X (twitter) for some marketing hints and tips, there you go. But that’s what I wanted to say today. We’ve got plenty of time, I know people might need to shoot off at 11:00am, but I’m very happy to stick around afterwards. Dan, should we do some questions? Yes.

Dan Campbell  57:07

So the first thing you’ll be thrilled to know, Phil, is that Jill has successfully avoided mistake numbers two and six, and says “We check where we receive all of our enquiries from and we are in credit to date with Unbiased.”

Phil Bray  57:25

Nice one!

Dan Campbell  57:27

Right, some questions. Paul asked a little while ago, where can they find metrics around how many clients or potential clients use each of these directories?

Phil Bray  57:40

Really good question. I guess what we’d have to do is go to each of those directories and ask for information about search volumes. I feel a blog coming on for that one. Abi shall we stick that on our blog list? We could send the same questions out to each of the directories and see who responds. That will be a really interesting blog, thank you for the inspiration, we’ll do that over the next month or two.

Dan Campbell  58:12

Thanks. Where should we go next? Ooh an anonymous attendee questions, I always like these, they seem so mysterious, don’t they? So anonymous person number one says, “As a one person company, is Google alone okay then? Because I’m the company and also the individual adviser.”

Phil Bray  58:31

No, I don’t believe so, I’d still say no because we’ve still got that inescapable logic of it’s very hard to get Google reviews. I can think of a couple of Google review heroes for the sole practitioner firms. I don’t know if Charlie is here from South Devon Financial planning, or Francis over in Ireland at Fortitude, who just do a brilliant job at collecting Google reviews and have got, I think 55 or so for Charlie, and 80+ for Francis, but it has still got the inescapable logic, that it is hard to collect Google reviews, Charlie and Francis are outliers here. From that logic, let’s give people those two links, those two options, so we’re not sending prospects or clients down a dead end. Also, there’s no guarantee that somebody will search for your firm, they might search for your individual name. When they search for your firm, Google reviews come up, when they search for your individual, John Smith name, your VouchedFor reviews come up. So no, I still think the logic is to use both platforms.

Dan Campbell  59:39

Brilliant. For anybody that missed it in the chat thread, Charlie mentions that AdviserBook will be £10 plus VAT per month, in six months time when they start charging. So keep an eye on that. In terms of other questions, another anonymous one “What can you do on VouchedFor? Or Google? If you get spam or unfair reviews? Can you take them down or challenge them?”

Phil Bray  1:00:07

So, unfair is a subjective point. You could have a client and adviser both go through the same journey together, but have different views on the fairness of the outcome. So I think it’s hard when it comes to fairness. When it comes to fake reviews, you can appeal to Google, there is a form you can complete, and most firms that I see get a fake Google review are able to get the Google review to come down. You can also leave a reply to the Google review while you’re going through that process, and we often receive replies that say “We’ve checked our files can’t find somebody by this name, etc.” From a VouchedFor perspective, VouchedFor is clearly a much smaller organisation than Google, so if you get a fake review, it’s relatively straightforward to prove to VouchedFor, that the person who has left the review or is reported to be the person who’s a client, is not a client and therefore is easier to sort out. I’ve seen firms sort those issues out with VouchedFor much quicker. The other thing with VouchedFor, of course, before you accept it, you don’t see what the review says, but you do see the person’s name. So fake reviews are far less of a problem on VouchedFor, they’re not that much of a problem on Google, I don’t see it very often. In terms of fairness, though, that’s a subjective point.

Dan Campbell  1:01:41

Let’s go to Benjamin’s question next. So Benjamin asks, “What are your thoughts on LinkedIn recommendations? Could it be a third link in an email alongside VouchedFor? And Google?”

Phil Bray  1:01:52

It could, I might come to Abi about this in a second and get her view. I think it could, I wonder whether there’s two things there, the first is, whether that is becoming a bit overkill, are we asking for too much from clients? In my experience, one email with two links works fine, I don’t have much experience, if any, of one email with three links. That’s the first thing I’m thinking of. The second thing I’m thinking of is, how easy are those reviews to then use in your wider marketing? It’s pretty straightforward to embed Google reviews on your website, for example, very straightforward to embed VouchedFor reviews. So they would be the two things that I would be thinking about, but Abi is the LinkedIn queen. Have you got any thoughts on that Abi?

Abi Robinson  1:02:45

Yeah, I would agree. I think unless your VouchedFor profile, and Google Business Profile is looking incredible and you can’t possibly get a single more review on there, I don’t know if getting a LinkedIn recommendation is entirely necessary. They feature so far down on your LinkedIn profile that If a prospect gets all the way down there, they’re probably pretty keen on you anyway. So that would be my point.

Dan Campbell  1:03:17

Okay, let’s go to Jack’s question next. Jack says, “As a small firm of five advisers, we’ve agreed collectively to go all in on Google to enhance leads to the firm, as opposed to using it for advisers individually. In your opinion, if you could only do one, would you keep Google and driving firm leads? Or would you scrap Google and get everyone to get a VouchedFor profile and push client reviews to that?”

Phil Bray  1:03:49

First thing, I wouldn’t just pick only one. It’s not binary. In my opinion, there is an inescapable logic that we’ve formed over years of research to use two platforms. However, if for any reason, I can’t think of what it would be, but if for any reason, you only wanted to promote one at a time, I would maybe have a period of time collecting Google reviews and a period of time collecting VouchedFor reviews. But, I just think it’s the wrong way to go about things. I can think of firms where they’ve got five or six advisers that have now got 400 reviews on VouchedFor and maybe 50, 60, 70 on Google, and they’ve been following our processes, kick off project, boosters, top ups, one email with two links. For me, the logic is, it’s always two platforms. If there’s a cost issue, I can accept that although VouchedFor should wash its face. For me though, use two platforms. Sorry Jack, that might not be the answer you want, but it’s an honest answer if nothing else.

Dan Campbell  1:05:10

Thanks for that. Joseph is still here, so let’s ask Joseph’s question next, “Do you recommend using the standard VouchedFor automated email or an email from the firm with links to VouchedFor and Google?”

Phil Bray  1:05:26

There are various ways of doing it. We’ve seen firms have success both ways, I’ve also seen firms have success with WhatsApp messages where they’ve maybe sent the first email request out, then followed up with a WhatsApp message, I’ve seen that works. I think you have got to play around with different things and see what works for your firm.

Dan Campbell  1:05:48

Okay, in from Chloe, Chloe asks, “How often would you recommend to send Google requests out to clients?”

Phil Bray  1:05:58

Again, it will be in the definitive guide that Abi is going to send. It’s going to get a lot of traffic today that definitive guide. So in the definitive guide, we talk about the fact that you do an initial project, where you email out to all clients, and say, these are two review platforms that we use – two links, one email. That will give you an influx of reviews, you then need to keep those topped up. Both Google and VouchedFor’s algorithms are partly based on recency of review so you need to keep those reviews topped up. What we see work is the adviser have a conversation with the client at the end of the annual review meeting, six-monthly review meeting, or the forward planning meeting, whatever you call it, just check that the client is happy to receive a request for a review and then a follow-up email or message goes out saying “Here are the links.” So booster project, at each of the annual reviews, the adviser asks whether they can send the email, if the client says yes, then the email gets sent out. Only you will know in your firm, whether that email should be sent by the adviser or someone in a more supportive admin role. The answer to that question is whoever is guaranteed to get it done. In some firms, we see advisers are very reliable and get it done, in others, we see they’ve got a lot of other things on and therefore they might be less likely to do it.

Dan Campbell  1:07:33

Right, I count three more questions. Do we have time for those Phil?

Phil Bray  1:07:36

Yeah, of course, let’s do those.

Dan Campbell  1:07:38

Lovely stuff. Let’s go to Sarah’s question next. Sarah asks, “I find clients are reluctant to do Google reviews as they’re not anonymous. Are there any ways around this?”

Phil Bray  1:07:49

They could set up a Google account under a pseudonym, but that’s probably quite a lot of hassle for them. You’re absolutely right, this is one of the reasons why Google reviews are relatively hard to get. They’re incredibly important, but they are hard to get, you got to have a Gmail account, and in practice it’s probably going to leave your name and that makes them hard to get. So unless they’re going to set up an anonymous account, that’s why we have that inescapable logic of having two platforms.

Dan Campbell  1:08:24

Okay, let’s go to a question from Ross next then. And Ross asks, “What’s your view on the SEO benefits of being on these directories?”

Phil Bray  1:08:38

So if we’re assuming that Google is not a directory, there’s SEO benefit from having Google reviews. I think it’s marginal. I think from a brand perspective, it helps to pack out that Google search results page to make sure that page is all about your business and you’re dominating that page, but from a financial adviser near me, financial planner, Nottingham that sort of SEO perspective, it’s negligible, if not zero. It doesn’t mean you shouldn’t be on them, and it’s a wider conversation about SEO, that might be another webinar. But the direct response to that question in my experience is practically zero.

Dan Campbell  1:09:22

Okay, right. I lied Phil, I said three, but there’s actually four. It feels like a lock-in, doesn’t it? Look at that, we’re here till  all the questions are answered. Jack’s got a follow up to their question. “Okay. Thank you. Sorry for banging the drum on this, but this is helpful. Would you think clients then if given an email with links to both VouchedFor and Google would opt to leave the VouchedFor review?”

Phil Bray  1:09:49

Yes, they’re more likely to do that. That comes back to that point, I said earlier, and I’ve got literally dozens of KPI dashboards for firms that we work with that show a row for the number of Google reviews and a row for the number of VouchedFor reviews, hence my point for every one Google your review you get, you’ll get 5 -10 on VouchedFor.

Dan Campbell  1:10:13

Okay, and then this is really the last question. It’s from Duncan, about Money Helper again, so Duncan says “Money Helper on the default setting, is it more advantageous to opt for advice face-to-face than remotely? So is there a difference there in terms of settings?”

Phil Bray  1:10:31

It’s a good question, I don’t know the answer to that. I would play around with it, do a search based on your local area and toggle on and off remote versus face-to-face, maybe see what your peers and competitors are doing locally. Ask people, ask advisers if you’re on any forums, for example Phil Calvert’s Life Talk Forum, go and ask a few questions. I don’t know the answer to that and I was always told when I don’t know the answer to something, say so.

Dan Campbell  1:11:06

Okay, well, there ends our questions and our comments.

Phil Bray  1:11:10

Fantastic. Thank you, Dan. I think you’ve worked harder today than on any other webinar that we have ever done with three polls, umpteen chat messages and the Q&A. So thank you.

Dan Campbell  1:11:20

I like it, I think we’ve got the crowd to thank for that. I like an engaged bunch, it always makes for a better hour, doesn’t it?

Phil Bray  1:11:27

It does, absolutely. Thank you Abi, for your help, you have the small matter of putting together a follow-up email with about 30 different links in there. I hope you’ve all found value in today’s webinar, I hope it was useful. Do go and start checking your profiles, adding those profiles in when you’re not already on there, updating links, adding information in. We’ll see you next month everybody. Cheers. Bye bye.

Dan Campbell  1:11:54

Take care guys. Bye.

Hear from our clients

Working with some great businesses.

Ian Else

Founder & Financial Planner, 4 Financial Planning

"The brand, logo and website has hit the brief perfectly and I couldn’t be happier! I wouldn’t hesitate to recommend them.”

Read More
client-logo

Heather Hopkins

Managing Director, NextWealth

"They were a delight to work with – super responsive to our requests and also brought lots of good ideas to the table."

Read More
client-logo

Rob Gill

Managing Director, Altura Mortgage Finance

"Best of all, their results driven approach is both refreshing and helping us achieve real goals. Thank you Yardstick!”

Read More
client-logo

Tom Orchard

Director and Financial Planner, Annetts & Orchard

"I’m a big Yardstick fan now and look forward to working with them on future projects."

Read More
client-logo

Alasdair Walker

Managing Director, Handford Aitkenhead & Walker

"We have felt like collaborators, rather than customers, and feel like Phil and his team has a vested interest in our marketing success that far exceeds his fee.”

Read More
client-logo

ENDA BRADY

Financial Planner, IQ Financial

We were lucky to be referred to Yardstick last year. We are delighted we hired them. They have specialist knowledge designed specially to help Financial Planning businesses like ours.

Read More
client-logo

JAYNE GRAVES

Head of Marketing, Ellis Bates Financial Advisers

Phil's style is informed, humorous and collaborative. The content is punchy, relevant, a go-to guide on how to create more recommendations and prompts action with no exceptions. Great workshop.

Read More
client-logo

LLOYD FRENCH

Financial Planner and Founder, Delaunay Wealth

I am absolutely delighted with all the work the Yardstick team has done for us and am very excited about how this will drive our new business/client acquisition in future. I would highly recommend them to any financial planning firm that takes their business seriously.

Read More
client-logo

JASON MCCONKEY

Director and Financial Planner, Insight Wealth

Great to work with a good professional outfit that had provided us direction and clear thinking in marketing our business effectively to obtain quality new clients.

Read More
client-logo

GUY SKINNER

Director & Financial Planner, Citygate Financial Planning

A thorough and excellent service. Phil and his team know exactly what to do, how to do it and when to do it. We very much look forward to working together more in the future.

Read More
client-logo

Get in touch

Request a callback

Whatever your marketing challenges, we're here to help. Simply complete this form and we'll be in touch.