By Mike Gabriele
Can you imagine life without the world wide web? I remember my days in high school with encyclopedias open all over the place trying to find relevant pieces of information, and now you can practically learn how to take your own tonsils out on the internet. Information gathering has certainly exploded to never-imagined levels thanks to the world wide web.
Social media will do to communications and networking what Google and Wikipedia have done for information access.
Where would you be without email? Dead, you may answer. Well in a number of years, you may have the same response when asked about LinkedIn, Facebook or Twitter. But just as companies struggled with how to manage the internet within the workplace during its infancy, firms today find themselves faced with the daunting task of social media mania. This is particularly true in the financial services arena. Social media is getting more and more attractive to any professional looking for clients, simply because that’s where people are gathering in droves. And it’s not just teenagers and technical junkies. LinkedIn for example, known for its business networking reputation, has 50 million users. Facebook boasts 65 million “friends” with more and more companies publishing business FB pages every day. So it’s not hard to understand why social media has earned a slot among our 7 Trends Reshaping Financial Services.
You can also imagine why the compliance departments for financial firms are proceeding cautiously, some even instituting no-use policies. Advisors are seeing the benefits of social media, they see family and friends using it and they’re ready to go online and make a presence for themselves and for their business. But many are unaware of their firm’s compliance guidelines and policies.
Social media is a platform that allows you to network, share ideas and information, promote your talents and services and create like-minded communities around your industry and around the world. You can expect it to grow. Our suggestion for financial advisors is to learn all you can about social media. Searching the internet is a great way. Tap into the experts like college students and your own kids. Once you’re ready to take the leap, investigate your compliance department guidelines concerning social media.
Through March 8th, we are conducting a survey of advisors and other financial industry professionals to gather information on this topic. By understanding who is using social media for their business and what obstacles they face, we can hopefully shed some light on how to enhance the benefits of social media for financial professionals and steer clear of trouble.
If you would like to partake in this quick, anonymous survey, please click on the link below. We appreciate your thoughts. Stay tuned for results!
http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/ledermark
