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Do Asset Managers "Get" LinkedIn? Not Yet...

By Jesse Mark

With over 150 million users, LinkedIn is the largest professional networking site. But many firms previously dismissed LinkedIn as a job posting board favored by Human Resources to recruit and find potential candidates. The big question for e-business, marketing, and social media executives is whether LinkedIn provides value to departments outside of talent management.

American Century Investments recently released a study on financial professional social media adoption. The study revealed, among a sample of 300 advisors, that a LinkedIn Group was the most important social media offering an asset manager could provide to them. Pat Allen, Principal of Rock the Boat Marketing expressed skepticism about the results from that data point.

In the past two years, LinkedIn has made big changes to become more "social", providing valuable opportunities for brands to connect with customers and prospects (e.g. Group pages and Status Updates, a Products & Services tab). Advisors can interact directly with asset managers. Wholesalers can connect with advisors to share the firm's latest whitepapers and market commentaries. Unfortunately, few firms capitalize on the opportunities afforded by LinkedIn, and those that do take advantage of new capabilities are not seeing results. Just 20% of firms use the Products and Services tab to promote their firm and only a handful of asset managers have created LinkedIn groups for clients and prospects. The few firms that do have LinkedIn groups see little valuable engagement beyond self-promotional spammers. This is not a limitation of LinkedIn itself, but a result of many firms not prioritizing the platform.

WHAT ASSET MANAGERS AND INSURERS ARE DOING ON LINKEDIN

In our new whitepaper, Getting Results from Social Media: Leaders and Best Practices, we outline a number of strategies that firms can utilize to kick-start their LinkedIn presences. Just some of the many things firms can do to increase engagement on LinkedIn is to employ a community manager to spark debate and steer discussions with advisors. When the Group has reached a certain threshold, firms can benefit from actively encouraging clients and prospects to join the Group and further the dialogue. Additionally, experiences outside of the industry show that LinkedIn thrives when a firm’s employees are active and visible in industry groups.

Branded Presences on Social Sites Cannot Exist in Silos

By Jesse Mark

Asset managers continue to adopt social media and create branded presences on sites like twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, YouTube, and company blogs. These dynamic, content rich digital channels present enormous potential to engage with and listen to valuable clients and prospects.

But these online capabilities must be seamlessly integrated so that advisors can access all information from an asset manager easily from any of the firm's online pages. Branded presences on social sites cannot exist in silos. They must be highly integrated, provide intuitive and easy navigation to the firm's other online outlets, and most importantly, support the firm's overall digital strategy.

Here are five steps firms can take to integrate their social media efforts to drive increased engagement across all of their social media presences:

1. Provide links to firm's branded social media pages on public and advisor homepages.

2. Bring the social media discussion to the website with a live Facebook or twitter stream.

PUTNAM'S ADVISOR SITE HOMEPAGE

3. Create Facebook tabs to showcase firm's other social feeds like YouTube and twitter.

AMERICAN CENTURY'S FACEBOOK PAGE & TABS

4. Use the twitter bio as an opportunity to link to the firm's website, blog, or other social outlets.

iSHARES TWITTER BIO

5. Brand firm's YouTube page with recognizable firm icons, background, and imagery, and offer advisors the ability to connect on the firm's other outlets.

OPPENHEIMER FUNDS' YOUTUBE CHANNEL

In preparation for our upcoming e-Business report on social media leaders in asset management and insurance, we will continue to review and evaluate best practices on company blogs, twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, and YouTube. If you are an e-Business executive or Social Media Manager, we welcome you to participate in our research by taking this short survey. Survey participants will receive complimentary research and a summary of findings.

Making Market Commentary Valuable

By Lee Kowarski

According to a kasina FA Vision survey on financial intermediaries' usage of marketing materials from asset management and insurance companies, 90.8% of advisors read firms' market commentary/outlook and 67.4% of advisors think that such information is important (rated 7-10 out of a possible 10). And while most firms offer market commentaries and outlooks, not all firms do so as effectively as others.

As firms look to develop market commentaries and outlooks, they should:

• Be Timely: 32.5% of advisors check market commentaries and outlooks from asset management and insurance companies on a weekly basis (including 5.2% that read them daily), making them the most regularly accessed materials. It is critical that any commentary posts promptly as advisors (and their clients) are looking for insights that relate to the latest news. Unfortunately, too many firms struggle to produce content, have it approved by compliance, and have it posted to the website in a prompt fashion. JPMorgan Asset Management, however, is consistently a leader in this area - its renowned "Guide to the Markets", for example, was updated through year-end by the first business day of 2012.
• Be Digital: 53.9% of advisors prefer to access market commentaries and outlooks online as opposed to 36.9% that prefer hard copy versions, according to the kasina FA Vision survey. Rather than simply posting a link to a PDF file, firms such as BlackRock and PIMCO recognize that it is important to provide multiple options, including HTML, PDF, audio, and video formats that make the content more engaging and easier for advisors and others to consume.
• Be Substantive: When asked what differentiates one firm's commentary/outlook from another, the most common response was "content quality" (cited by 45.9% of advisors). While timeliness and ease of comprehension are both important, it is most critical to have something meaningful to say. Too many firms' commentaries lack true insights and simply provide a backwards-looking view of what happened in the markets - information that advisors already receive from industry news sources, such as the Wall Street Journal, CNBC, or Yahoo! Finance. Valuable commentaries provide the asset managers' views on what has happened and, ideally, what the firms' investment experts expect to happen in the future and the impact of those activities on the investments.
• Be Social: Given that nearly a third of advisors share market commentaries and outlooks with their clients, it is important to make it easy for advisors to pass along the material (either via e-mail, hard copy, or social media). Similarly, as social media continues, firms need to incorporate the ability for advisors to provide feedback, as Pioneer has done with its new blog.

Making Social Media Use Easy and Compliant

By Julia Binder

The SEC used a recent case of alleged fraud perpetuated on social media sites, including LinkedIn, as a springboard to issue alerts on the appropriate use of social media by investment advisors, including asset managers and insurers. Among the charges, the SEC alleges that the financial advisor promoted fictitious products in LinkedIn discussions. The medium is almost a side note, given that this type of scam can be perpetrated on- or offline. But it is a reminder to firms to revisit compliance procedures, monitoring and training programs to ensure common understanding of what is permitted and appropriate.

kasina's research shows that the majority of financial advisors are using social media . As the oldest professional networking site, LinkedIn is particularly popular. Firms should assume that their employees are on social media, at least for personal use. They should want employees to build rich, personalized customer relationships to enhance brand loyalty, retain and build assets. Leading firms are working hard to build a robust presence on LinkedIn, with rich profiles of the company, its products and wholesalers, to generate advocacy and loyalty among advisors with business-building support, thought leadership and commentary.

Compliance and IT must be key business partners in this effort to implement effective processes and technologies that allow firms to reach customers and prospects while managing risk and keeping firms protected. The SEC alert should be a rallying cry to firms to get sales, marketing, media relations, compliance and information technology around the table. Examine compliance procedures for clarity, simplicity and efficiency and develop effective policies. Review technology options to monitor and ease compliant use of social media as well as record-keeping. Enable key personnel in customer-facing business units to become certified to review content. Develop training programs to teach customer-facing employees best practices for communicating online. Make it easy to use social media to reach advisors where they are with communication that build loyalty, advocacy and, ultimately, assets.

Making Sense of FINRA's Updated Social Media Guidelines

By Saadiah Freeman

Regulatory uncertainty has been an ongoing challenge for asset management and insurance companies seeking to connect with their customers through social media platforms. Released in January 2010, FINRA's Regulatory Notice 10-06, providing guidance on the use of blogs and social media Web sites raised a host of compliance issues which have made many firms reluctant to ramp-up their social media strategies. According to kasina's 2011 Harnessing Social Media to Drive Business Results report, nearly two-thirds of asset managers cite Compliance as a primary hindrance to participating in social media.

Yesterday's release of FINRA's updated guidance on social media, Regulatory Notice 11-39, should help clarify at least some of these issues, enabling firms to act with more confidence when developing and implementing social media policies and initiatives.

Regulatory Notice 11-39, entitled "Social Media Websites and the Use of Personal Devices for Business Communications", provides additional and long-awaited clarification to the guidance set out in Regulatory Notice 10-06. It does not replace the earlier document but instead, responds to specific questions firms have raised about how the rules apply to social media platforms and mobile communications. Although firms should review the full text of the updated guidelines in order to understand the implications for their business, some selected highlights from the new document are below:

Recordkeeping

A firm's obligation to retain records of a communication depends on the content of that communication (whether it relates to the firm's "business as such"), not on the device used to make the communication. For example, this suggests that it is irrelevant whether an employee Tweets from their networked business computer or their personal iPad - if the Tweet relates to the firm's "business as such", it must be archived.

Supervision

FINRA considers "unscripted participation in an interactive electronic forum" to be a "public appearance" for the purposes of NASD Rule 2210. Public appearances do not require prior approval by a registered principal, but firms must adopt procedures to ensure that interactive electronic communications do not violate FINRA or SEC rules.

Third-Party Posts, Links, and Web sites

Even if a firm has a policy of deleting inappropriate third-party posts, it is not assumed to have "adopted" - taken responsibility for - the content of the posts left on the site. For example, if a firm allows fans to post to its Facebook Wall, but has a policy of deleting offensive posts, the fact that a certain fan post is allowed to remain on the firm's Wall would not automatically mean that the firm is responsible for that content.

Accessing Social Media Sites From Personal Devices

Firms may allow their employees to use personal devices for business communications, but should have the ability to separate business and personal communications, such as by requiring that the employee use a secure and separately identifiable app on the device for business communications. Firms must also be able to retain, retrieve and supervise business communications regardless of whether they are conducted from a device owned by the firm or by the employee.

Social media is a new and rapidly developing field, and it is likely that firms will have many additional questions as they continue to navigate these unfamiliar waters. However, FINRA's Regulatory Notice 11-39 will no doubt bring some welcome clarity to asset management and insurance firms as they tackle this increasingly important issue.

The Power of Intelligent Groups Over Social Networking Sites

By Steven Miyao

Intelligent social networking groups are going to propel content sharing for both individuals as well as companies.

The main advantage of Google+ over other social media sites is its ability to easily associate individuals with groups or social communities. This feature, which will not be unique to Google+ for very long, solves both privacy concerns as well as irrelevant content overload. It is both a filtering process for the user who wants to publish the right content to a specific set of people, as well as a filtering mechanism for keeping content from a specific set of people.

Google just enhanced the groupings Twitter and Facebook have had for a while now:

Twitter has a filtering functionality which enables us to read content based on certain interest groups, which must be associated with specific people.

Facebook enables us to create rules for certain groups or privacy settings. Certain people are only allowed to see my basic information, others are allowed to see photos and status updates.

What does this mean for the financial services community? First of all, it will accelerate the sharing of content. Secondly, it will enable firms as well as financial advisors, to consume and easily publish content based on certain interests or various regulatory requirements.

This will have a major impact as soon as the next iteration of the technology is developed. A start-up called katango has created a software that helps people automatically organize their friends into the right groups.

Facebook and Google will soon emulate this concept and will create default groups, such as family, friends, business, school affiliations, etc. These default groups will be intelligent in nature, able to auto detect who of your network falls under which category, as well as selecting the content to be published to each community. The user obviously will have the ability to override auto filters and the site will learn from the overrides.

Once these features are in place, it will enable us to truly share content without concern for relevance or potential harm of the content to certain networks.

Keeping Up with Social Media - Google+

By Lee Kowarski

The launch of Google+ has received a lot of media attention, but nearly all of the discussion is about the impact of Google+ on Facebook and/or Twitter. I'm not going to rehash the basics of Google+ because that has been covered ad nauseum elsewhere, but I wanted to take a moment to talk about why Google+ needs to be a consideration for every business.

As a search engine, Google's usage dwarves all competitors with over 90% market share globally. And Google+ is going to change the way that Google works. They have long been looking for "social signals" to incorporate into their search algorithms (dating back to their failed attempt to buy Twitter, as well as Google's own failed social media initiatives). Now, Google will be able to incorporate "+1s" (the Google+ equivalent of Facebook's "likes") into its search rankings. They will use all of the information gathered through Google+ to continue to customize the search experience, knowing what users like and share, and to improve their ability to target ads. Firms that want to continue to show up at or near the top of search results will have to be active on Google+ (either directly or by having their content shared and +1'd).

And while the current Google+ "field trial" does not include support for businesses, this feature is coming (and some firms have already created personal pages for their business - e.g. Ford Motor Company). I would be shocked if Google+ doesn't have official support for business pages within the next 6-12 months.

Given how dominant Google's search platform is, every firm needs to be thinking about Google+ (even if their direct customers aren't using the platform). This will be especially true when official business profiles become available, but Google+ cannot be ignored prior to then either. Make it easy for your customers to share and +1 your content, and be prepared to launch a business profile in the not-too-distant future.

If you are on Google+ already, please share & +1 this blog post - we'll be making this functionality even easier in the near future. You can also add me to one of your circles. And keep a lookout for kasina's business profile as soon as they become available. If you need a Google+ invite, feel free to hit me up on Twitter (although they seem to be limiting the number of invites they are sending out).

Asset Managers Must Ramp Up Social Media Initiatives to Reach Key Relationships

By Julia Binder

Recent announcements regarding use of social media by advisors at key distributors should spur asset managers still dragging their feet on social media initiatives. Morgan Stanley Smith Barney (MSSB), the largest U.S. wirehouse brokerage, revealed that its 17,600 advisors soon will be able to use LinkedIn and Twitter to communicate with each other and clients. Now LPL Financial, the largest independent broker-dealer in the U.S., has decided to enable its 12,000 to use LinkedIn, Facebook and Twitter to connect with customers. Commonwealth Financial made a similar decision this spring. Other distributors will surely follow suit in short order.

Asset managers without robust social media initiatives will be at a competitive disadvantage. MSSB, LPL and Commonwealth are key relationships for asset managers that have assigned national account managers and wholesalers to support them. Without branded, interactive presences on Twitter, LinkedIn and Facebook, firms constrain their sales teams in their ability to communicate with the advisors of these key relationships. kasina's FA Vision research shows that a majority of advisors prefer to communicate with asset managers by phone and online, rather than schedule in-person visits from wholesalers.

Without interactive access to major social media networks, the relationship management and networking skills critical to success for both advisors and wholesalers are impaired. Asset managers need to leverage recent announcements from key distributors to ramp up commitment and support for robust social media engagement.

Asset Managers Need to Support Advisor Social Media Efforts

By Jesse Mark

Social media adoption among advisors is growing quickly. Today, the majority of advisors use social media and not just for personal use. A recent study from American Century shows that advisors are using social media for a multitude of business purposes including business-building, researching contacts, and sharing content with clients.

While there remain roadblocks at some distributor home offices preventing advisors adoption, a number of distributors are beginning to support their advisors on social media. This week, Morgan Stanley Smith Barney (MSSB) announced a plan to let advisors communicate and share content with clients through LinkedIn and Twitter.

Already, both Raymond James and Commonwealth have opened up their doors to allow advisors to post content and respond to client comments and questions without company pre-approval. Other broker dealers are moving in the same direction. According to a survey of independent broker dealers by InvestmentNews, 71% of IBDs permit their advisors to use social media for professional purposes.

The increasing usage of social media for business purposes presents a large opportunity for asset managers. Firms need to think about how to help financial advisors design and execute outreach that integrates traditionally off-line campaigns (prospecting letters, postcard seminary invitations, etc.) with new solutions on social media. A time when prospecting letters and PDFs being obsolete is hard to imagine, but it might not be too far off on the horizon.

For years asset managers have provided actionable content for advisors to share with clients. But as advisors shift towards social media to engage with investors, they will need to restructure their value-added content. A key opportunity for asset managers is to provide:

• Educational content on how to use social media as a business-building tool - Advisors want to reach investors where they are but are also treading in a new and uncomfortable environment. While most advisors use social media for personal use, they may not know how to use LinkedIn, Twitter, or Facebook for business purposes. Asset managers should develop information guides on how to connect with current clients and prospects on social media, and how to create or re-purpose content for followers.
• Value-added content optimized for social media sharing - Many advisors once (some still do) created a monthly newsletter about current economic issues and sent it to their clients. When monthly newsletters became obsolete, e-mail newsletters came into vogue. But increasingly this advisor-investor communication is moving to social sites. Advisors are sharing topical articles and content with their followers. Asset managers that want to be top of mind need to make sure the content they produce can easily be shared with the advisor's clients.

Social media offers a new way to engage affluent Gen X and Y investors who will serve an increasingly important client base when Baby Boomers retire and decumulate. As always, asset managers that are adept at listening to advisor needs and creating actionable, value-added content reap substantial rewards. Is your firm preparing for the tectonic shifts in advisor behavior that are currently under way?

Vanguard, Fidelity, TIAA-CREF Head Top 5 Social Leaders

By Lee Kowarski

Our latest study examines the "Top 5 Social Media Leaders in Asset Management". While working on this research, we found that what distinguishes the top firms is their willingness to listen to and engage with audiences, integrate social media sites, and develop novel, useful, and varied content. We now see that 80% of asset managers are active on social media (up from only 48% last year), but the quality of firms' social media efforts varies widely - clear leaders are emerging.

Based on kasina's proprietary Social Media Index, the "Top 5 Social Media Leaders in Asset Management" are:

While direct-distributed firms are heavily represented among social media leaders, nothing prevents any firm that distributes through intermediaries from leveraging the features that propelled these five to the top. Each of the Top 5 has unique qualities, but all include features that draw advisors as well as investors and strengthen their advocacy of the firms. As Julia wrote about last month when we released "Harnessing Social Media to Drive Business Results", more than three-fourths of advisors use social media and nearly one-fourth of advisors are on social media daily, yet most firms are underutilizing this valuable resource.

In the "Top 5 Social Media Leaders in Asset Management" report, we also include rankings of firms on each of the five major social sites:

• Blogs (with iShares as #1)


• Facebook (Fidelity Investments)


• LinkedIn (MFS Investment Management)


• Twitter (TIAA-CREF)


• YouTube (Vanguard)

Social Media is Not a Billboard

By Julia Binder

Asset managers need to embrace the interactive opportunities for conversation that social media provides. Too many firms use social media like a billboard to push out market commentary or media appearances. Instead they need to leverage social media to listen, interact meaningfully, and build rewarding relationships with key audiences.

From reading our research, you know that more than three-fourths of advisors use social media. Nearly one-fourth of advisors are on social media sites every day. They, just like any other social network user, are discerning when it comes to professing affinity for a business online, such as a "like" on Facebook or a "follower" on Twitter. According to Cone's 2010 Consumer New Media Study, social media users friend only an average of 5 companies online. More than half of users which are able to engage with companies on social platforms are:

• Likely to share information about the company with their networks
• Feel a stronger connection to the company
• Feel better served by the company
• Purchase the company's products or services

Any company, including asset managers, wants these loyal and networked users. A loyal, vocal advisor (or investor) is a firm's most effective ambassador. That's why kasina encourages firms to connect with customers where they are - on social media sites.

Dissatisfied Users Disconnect
Cone also reports that more than half of users will stop following a company if it acts irresponsibly toward its consumers, over-communicates with them, or provides irrelevant content.

Thirty-six percent of users say they will stop following companies which under-communicate and 28% will cease following if user-generated content is censored.

These figures are a warning signal for asset management firms which build a branded social site but struggle to generate interesting content or limit the user experience to one-way delivery of information.

Interact for Impact
Readers of our latest report on Harnessing Social Media to Drive Business Results know that firms such as The Hartford, Russell, Fidelity and Vanguard offer great examples for interactive, engaging social sites. These firms connect with customers where they are and keep them coming back. They post content developed specifically for their audiences and repurpose relevant material and statistics from other sources such as news articles or studies. Their posts are seasonally appropriate or riff on recent events such as the Academy Awards or the Super Bowl. They welcome comments and respond to or highlight third-party posts.

Firms need to interact for impact or risk losing the attention and, more importantly, advocacy of their most networked customers.

Getting Beyond the "Social" to the "Productive"

By Eric Daugherty

Many CEOs hear "social media" and they think "unproductive chit-chat".

We just authored a recent article aimed at getting the C-Suite to say "yes" to social media at asset management firms. It turns out that getting CxOs bought into social media faces a number of headwinds, among them: concerns about productivity.

Source: http://sloansocialmedia.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/07/SM-LOGOS.png

On the heels of that article, this HBR blog got my wheels turning about how e-business executives can attack these hidden biases against social media head-on.

1. First off, as per the HBR blog, disarm the "unproductive" notion by creating and promoting productive uses of social media. Put structure around desired ways employees can and should use social media tools - go beyond "thou shalt not watch music videos at work".

Get creative and think of ways that social media can help people do their jobs better, then step back and watch it work. The example in the blog piece tells of how "Cognizant 2.0, puts a project and task management structure on one side of the screen, and puts the social resources that might help in completing those tasks on the other. That makes it easy for someone working on, say, an IT architecture problem involving cloud computing, to pose a question in an online discussion board on that topic, or to review the profile of a fellow employee with cloud expertise." That seems like ingenious use of technology.

2. Avoid using the term "social media" itself, instead focus on what the tools actually do for your firm. While it seems a bit superficial to think a name can matter, subconsciously, perhaps the moniker itself reinforces the "chit-chat' impression on some decision-makers. Like it or not, perhaps "kasina's Online Client Dialogue" creates a different image than "kasina's Facebook page".

"What's in a name? That which we call a rose
By any other name would smell as sweet."

Romeo and Juliet (II, ii, 1-2)

At a minimum, make senior management recognize that these tools, applied creatively, are better viewed as "collaborative media", "community builders", "efficiency enhancers"- anything that will subtly change the (probably unstated perception) that "social" equals "chit-chat".

I look forward to hearing (and sharing) more success stories of how "social media" gets used to enhance people's jobs and, ultimately profits.

Blogging about Blogging

By Andy Edwards

I am not the most frequent contributor to the kasina blogosphere, but the nature of this medium is one that lets me hop in now and then to share my opinion and direct our audience and clients to valuable information. That being said, it is truly surprising that blogs have not taken off more in the asset management industry. While Compliance places many hurdles on the interactive components of the medium, there certainly is a vast audience hungry for the timely and topical information that blogs can provide.

It is hard to believe that blogging is no longer a peripheral, marginalized value-adding activity, but has entered the mainstream media lexicon. Much of the content the NY Times updates throughout the day on its local news Web site is posted in a blog-like setting to keep it competitive with the 'antiquated' medium of television.

All sales and marketing efforts are driven by the flow of information, and the asset management industry is even more vested in this value proposition than most, so why aren't blogs a more prominent part of asset manager's Web sites? Other industries that live and die by the ability to communicate rapidly changing information to core constituencies, have seized the power of this medium - politics comes to mind with the emergence of forums such as Politico.com and The Huffington Post.

As we look at Time Magazine's recent article on The Best Blogs of 2010, the simple answer is that it appears to be a medium focused on entertainment and the narrow interest of enthusiasts - not a 'serious means' of communication. Ironically, our industry represents such a parochial interest and could benefit tremendously from taking advantage of this technology.

With efforts by firms such as PIMCO (with Bill Gross's prominent entry into the blog-like space), we have to consider this to be a serious outlet for communicating to our customers and key constituencies. While firms routinely and proudly post appearances of their PM's on CNBC, most don't take the initiative to bring this content directly to their audiences. While the imprimatur of a CNBC appearance might drive initial interest, if we sincerely believe our own marketing literature about the uniqueness of our firms' perspectives, we should be able to generate content that rivals those 30-second sound bites. Blogging can be that vehicle. Best of all, blogging does not involve the expenditure of a lot of hard-dollar resources. Instead, it is dependent on a commitment to communicate in a manner and timeframe that many in our industry are not yet comfortable with. Audiences have developed an appetite for this type of content; it is up to our industry to deliver.

Why Asset Managers Need to Invest in Social Media NOW!

By Steven Miyao

I firmly believe that asset managers need to invest in a social media strategy for three reasons:
1. More advisors use social media than use asset managers' advisor sites
2. Personal and professional use of social media is converging
3. The current benchmark for asset managers' social media use is low - it's time to experiment

I've used our latest FA Vision research, cited in this blog entry, to explore these three reasons.

More advisors use social media than use asset mangers' advisor sites

Financial Advisors spend more time online now than ever before. They average 13.2 hours/week online (not including e-mail) for work related use and spend an additional 4.9 hours/week online for personal reasons. Most asset managers' advisors are infrequent visitors to their firms' advisor sites. However, 77.5% of advisors use social media sites at least once per month (up from 74.5% last year) and 20% use them daily.

Right now firms reach a limited number of advisors through their sites. If firms invest in their social media strategies, there is the potential to connect with a much larger group of advisors. Only 48% of firms claim any social media presence and fewer than 20% intend to develop a presence in the next twelve months. This is your opportunity to shine and to build a sustainable, competitive advantage.

Personal and professional use is converging

The father of one of my son's good friends is also one of my clients. We connect on Facebook in regards to our kids' school activities and after school events, but we also share industry articles and links. Social media is clearly starting to blur the line between professional and personal networks. We co-mingle colleagues, clients, friends, family, and those who share our varied interests within our social networks.

Let's take a look at my Facebook feeds. I "like" and connect with asset managers as well as my friends and colleagues. This enables me to see what is going on with my personal connections as well as to follow what Bill Gross, Mohamed El-Erian and other industry thought leaders have to say.

The same is true for financial advisors who are using social media sites for both personal and professional purposes.

The benchmark for social media is low - it's time to experiment

Most asset managers' social media implementations are still quite rudimentary. Only 20% of asset managers have a Facebook presence, 39% a LinkedIn presence, 24% a Twitter presence, and fewer than 20% intend to develop a presence in the next twelve months. This data indicates that the social media benchmark in our industry is still very low. Still, there are a number of asset managers who are working on building deep interactions with their advisors through social media, and are even starting to segment content to advisors based on product preferences.

There is opportunity in the number of people who "Like" an asset management Facebook site (PIMCO 2,284, Putnam 323) and who follow asset managers on Twitter (PIMCO 4,519, Putnam 871). Now, when only a few advisors are watching, is the time for asset managers to experiment with this medium. Once tens of thousands of advisors are connected with asset managers on Facebook, firms will have little room for taking chances.

Firms should be building the appropriate internal processes, including compliance, and working on the cultural adoptions to allow content delivery through social media. In the next 12 months the expectations and the usage of advisors is going to be significantly higher. Firms will no longer be able to infrequently post general investment content in order to gain the attention of the advisors.

Develop your social media strategy now

Now is the time to build your social media strategy

Camaraderie and Community

By Deb Wetherbee

Having just finished the Boston Marathon (which I am happy to talk about with anyone willing to listen) I am struck by the camaraderie and community the runners develop while preparing for the race. More than 27,000 runners come, each with personal reasons and goals for the marathon, all aiming for the same spot in downtown Boston. The support, goodwill, sharing of advice and experience is truly a wonderful thing to experience. Coincidentally, Inc. Magazine published, "The Case, and the Plan for the Virtual Company", which got me thinking about camaraderie and community in the work environment, two things virtual employees, such as wholesalers, can miss. However, this is changing with the proliferation of social media and technology that make virtual communities possible.

Over the years, our industry has tried to build great communication and community for wholesalers using company intranets. Social media and technology allow us to emulate environments in which we can exchange experiences and ideas. Wholesalers are usually only at corporate headquarters or sales meetings a few times a year. This has been their only time to catch up with peers, compare notes and war stories, refresh knowledge on products and get up to speed on the programs their firms offer. The infrequency of this contact leaves a lot to be desired. Technology and social networking offer additional ways for wholesalers to support each other and share best practices. Groups on LinkedIn (Wholesaler Connect, Investment Wholesalers of America), blogs and Web sites specifically focused on wholesalers (www.wholesalerbriefcase.com), provide access to articles and discussion threads, enabling wholesalers to connect with their colleagues and peers at other firms. As they all focus on the same goal - improving sales, they can easily share their successes, tools and war stories.

Technology improvements, coupled with the proliferation of social networks, have greatly expanded our access to continued learning, support, idea exchange, and even the coveted sales lead. As social networking tools devlop, wholsalers will reap the benefits of this new type of community, especially if it is as inspirational and full of advice as the marathon blogs were for me. There is nothing like personal support and community at sales meetings, as well as at the marathon. Wholesaler social communities and networks will continue to connect great wholesalers and help them improve their businesses.

Social Media is Here to Stay

by Julia Binder

Asset management firms need to be where their customers are. That's not on their Web sites. It's on Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and LinkedIn.

When we surveyed executives at asset management firms last fall about compliance issues with respect to social media, 73% responded that compliance or legal concerns impeded their ability to participate in social media.

At that time, only a few firms including American Century, Putnam, TIAA-CREF, Vanguard and others had ventured into the lawless Wild West that is social media. They applied existing compliance processes and sought legal guidance to support their as yet limited participation. All waited for clarification from the SEC and FINRA.

Well, FINRA has spoken. And thus, compliance issues around third-party content and record-keeping have been addressed and effectively removed as an excuse to remain on the sidelines. That doesn't mean that firms should dive in without a plan. kasina's newest paper, The Asset Manager's Guide to Social Media, helps firms understand opportunities and challenges associated with social media. You'll find a rich set of examples from the asset management industry and others on:

• Developing a social media strategy,


• Who's doing what and why, and


• Implementing best practices in compliance and monitoring.

The lack of clear FINRA and SEC guidance coupled with the fear of legal repercussions has kept firms from plunging into social media. But consider, as communicators subject to regulation, you are used to building caution into the way you approach all communications.

Social media is here to stay. It's time to review how social media fits into your communications strategy.