There can certainly be no denying that social media is changing the ways in which many businesses interact with their prospects and customers.  While it can be tougher to get started with a social media strategy when you’re working in a heavily regulated environment such as financial services, it’s nonetheless important that you begin thinking about how you might put social media to use in your practice. Dependent upon your own level of engagement with social channels, you may be wondering why it’s important that you engage in this manner.

The primary reason is that, whether you are engaged socially or not, many of your competitors and most certainly many of your clients and potential prospects are using Twitter, they are using Facebook, they are active on LinkedIn.  Engaging in these areas provides you with the opportunity to build relationships and demonstrate your expertise in a helpful manner, all while building your brand.  In essence this type of engagement allows you to extend your sales funnel through the development of relationships over time, in a manner which was typically not available via traditional marketing channels.

While there is no shortage of how-to’s on getting started with social media, if you’re interested in the topic Arkovi recently posted the podcast (9:09) below live from the TD Ameritrade Institutional Elite Advisor Forum in Laguna Beach, CA. It’s a good starting point to get you thinking about your strategy when implementing a social media policy: