What You Should Be Tracking As A Financial Advisor

Trying to eat healthier? Track it.

Trying to spend less time on your phone? Track it.

Trying to build a successful financial advising practice? Track it.

Just like any goal you’re trying to reach, your actions and progress as a financial advisor should be tracked.

With so many activities to track as a financial advisor it can be hard to determine where to start. Here, we’ll help you understand why your due diligence is important, what you can start tracking today, and how to implement these efforts to build a more sustainable practice.

 

You Can’t Manage What You Don’t Measure

As a financial advisor you’re expected to make informed decisions not only for your clients but for yourself. From simply documenting who you’ve spoken with to how a client’s portfolio is performing, it’s essential you have your hand on, not just one pulse, but multiple. 

By continuously tracking and monitoring the right aspects, you can continue to prove your value, maximize your time spent, offer more tailored strategies, and ultimately, improve both your prospecting efforts and your client service model, all to build a seamless practice.

With endless opportunities to track, where should you start?

 

 

4 Measurements For Financial Advisors To Track

 

#1 Client Interactions

Your clients are the backbone of your practice. Tracking your client interactions HAS to be an area of focus.

While we know this may seem obvious to some, it’s a simple practice that’s overlooked. Every time you have an interaction with a client, you should be taking notes on what was discussed – whether it’s a goal or a personal anecdote. 

Tracking your interactions helps you keep your hand on the pulse of your clients and their unique financial goals and aspirations. Oftentimes, it’s these conversations focused on qualitative data where you can see if your advice and recommendations are actually aligning with what your clients are doing in relation to their objectives. This may include helping to monitor their:

• Income
• Expenses
• Debt levels
• Major life events

Sometimes, there’s a huge discrepancy in what your client says they want and what they are doing (or not doing) to achieve that. Tracking these aspects will undoubtedly impact their financial situation. Advisors at Consolidated Planning utilize The Living Balance Sheet® to help their clients visual where they are at in relation to what you’re tracking.

Consistently tracking your client interactions allows you to provide personalized solutions that reflect your clients’ evolving needs, nurturing strong and enduring relationships.

 

#2 Website Analytics

Your website should serve as part of your online blueprint, and a valuable lead generation tool for your practice. But, it’s not enough to simply have a website. You need to understand how people are, or are not, interacting with your website.

Tracking website analytics, such as traffic, bounce rates, time spent on site, and popular pages and content, can help advisors optimize their online presence. Utilizing search engine optimization (SEO) strategies and offering valuable educational content can attract organic traffic and position the advisor as an authority within their target market. And that’s what you’re after – building credibility and demonstrating experience for your ideal clients.

 

#3 Conversion Rates

A conversion rate is the percentage of users who take a desired action on your website. In this case, that action would be interacting with your page and/or directly reaching out to you.

And that’s the ultimate goal – having prospects reach out to YOU.

Tracking conversion rates at various stages of the client journey, such as initial conversations, proposals for services, and onboarding, provides insights into the effectiveness of the advisor’s sales cycle. A low conversion rate may indicate the need to refine your communication, client experience or improve your ability to address clients’ concerns and objections proactively and effectively.

 

#4 Client Referrals and Resources

As you know, client referrals are a powerful growth engine for financial advisors. Tracking the number of referrals received and their sources helps advisors identify their most effective referral channels. 

Understanding which clients are referring prospects to your business and the reasons behind those referrals can help you in developing targeted referral programs and nurturing client relationships. Your client service model might look a bit different for those clients who are sending you multiple referrals every year.

Client referrals also circles back to the importance of tracking your client interactions. When you ask your client to refer you to their friends, that should be documented. Tracking who you ask and when you ask for a referral can save you the embarrassment of asking too frequently or missing out on business because you never even asked.

 

What Can You Start Tracking Today For Your Financial Advising Career

 

Tracking your marketing and prospecting efforts is a long game. With that being said, there are analytics that you can and should start tracking…yesterday.

Gauging the effectiveness of your marketing efforts and your content conversions can start with:

• Email campaigns – who is opening emails and clicking on your content
• Utilizing LinkedIn’s CoPilot – gauge connection rates based on the level of familiarity with your connections

While you will be investing your time and money to track some of your efforts, you need to understand your ROI here. Especially as a financial advisor. These efforts will help enhance your prospects and client’s experiences to better build the practice you’ve been dreaming of.

 

 

The Living Balance Sheet® and associated graphics are property of The Guardian Life Insurance Company of America, New York, NY and cannot be used or replicated without express consent. © Copyright 2005-2023 Guardian.

 

2023-159305 Exp. 8/2025