Over the past 10 years the internet has exploded, life without emails and Google seems a distant memory, and along with it we have developed a whole new way of researching.  How many times have you been looking for an answer to something and the first thing you do is Google it?  Consumers looking for help with their personal finances and legal issues are doing exactly the same thing.  This is why it is crucial to not only have an online presence but also an effective strategy so that you can build it up logically and spend your time on the most successful things.  Unbiased.co.uk has put together this guide to help you, starting from the basics like getting a website to excel in the realms of social media.

Let’s start at the beginning...

Get yourself a website!  There are a number of companies out there that will build you a website for as little as £500.  You should include clear information about your business, the services you offer and make sure it appeals to the type of clients you are trying to attract.  So you now have a website how do people then find you?  A common misconception about the internet is that once you have a website consumers will be able to “find” you – unless you undertake various steps to establish your presence that is simply not going to happen.

A great way of getting yourself plumbed into the web is to get an advert on unbiased.co.uk – not only do we ensure that we are all over the web but we also work on the Google Local programme so that advisers listed with us are coming up when a consumer looks on Google for advisers in a specific town.  From summer we will have local pages for every adviser registered on our site, and as with everything we do we will make sure that it is as Google friendly as possible so that it is picked up and indexed in a jiffy.

Creating an effective profile on unbiased.co.uk – a quick how to...

1. Product areas – make sure that you pick areas of business you are actually looking to attract, 65% of all searchers on our site look for advisers based on a specific area of advice
2. Registered Individuals – add details of all your RIs, as this gives searchers a feel for the size of your business and the areas of expertise
3. Qualifications - get all of your qualifications added onto your profile. With RDR fuelling increased professionalism across the sector, consumers will be closely behind.  Nearly 30% of all searchers on unbiased.co.uk are looking for advisers that are incrementally qualified
4. 75 word description – get some personality into your advert – help the searcher understand what you do and how you might be different from your closest competitor

When you get leads via your new website or on the phone, don’t forget to conduct a bit of customer insight research, ask them how they found out about you.  If they say on the internet try and see if they can be more specific.  If you can pinpoint where your clients are finding you then you can make sure that you adjust you marketing strategy appropriately.

So you have your website and you’re listed on unbiased.co.uk – what’s next?

Social media – you can’t have missed all the excitement across the internet and media about social media.  Turn on the TV and every other programme has its own hashtag to tweet with on Twitter, or a Facebook profile to make friends with.  But how do you harness this powerful tool for the benefit of your business?  There are three main places to get started: Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter. 

Let’s start with Facebook, the social network site with over 500 million active users which even has an awarding winning movie about it, but what are you going to do with it?  Start with a business profile – this is a specially designed page that is different from a personal profile – it allows consumers who know your business to “like” your business.  You can use your profile to stay in contact with the customers that have “liked” you and it also provides you a way to post any news, views or offers you might have.  Facebook pages are also indexed by Google so your profile can come up in local searches. Some advisers are reporting to us that up to 30% of their new business enquirers view their Facebook page before going on to contact them!

LinkedIn has 90 million professional users worldwide and had over two billion people searches conducted in 2010.  LinkedIn is a professional networking site that allows professionals around the globe to stay in contact with business connections and colleagues, and displays an online CV.  There are over five million members in the UK and the site provides a platform for networking, recruitment, professional development and to join groups.  Start by creating yourself a professional profile, add in your education, qualifications and employment history and then get cracking on building your connections up.  Remember this is not Facebook – the connections you make are business connections – it is very much like giving out a business card so don’t be shy about reconnecting with people you haven’t had contact with in a while.  Once you have done that create a company profile and encourage your colleagues to join the company page.  Ensure the description really explains what you do as your personal profile can be indexed in the site searches people conduct to find specific types of companies. 

LinkedIn lets you get “recommendations” from your contacts which acts much like a personal reference and gives your profile an extra edge – allowing people who find you to see a little bit more about you above and beyond what you write.  Connect to your clients – this is a great way to get a client referral on your profile so any prospective clients can see the recommendations.  You can have links to your website and integrate your Twitter feed to give your profile more personality.

So moving on to Twitter – the King of microblogging sites.  Twitter gives you 140 characters in which to microblog – think Facebook status update that is available to the whole Twitterverse.  Your community is built up by you “following” and being “followed” by other people.  Due to its nature Twitter is often the first place news breaks and it’s not just full of celebrities. Many industry members such as product providers, professional advisers and journalists are there too.  The best way to get started is to register and start following people – get a feel for what happens on Twitter and think about how you would be comfortable engaging with it. Keep it professional with a personality – no one only wants to see press releases and news stories retweeted, or that you are visiting your Aunty Rita on a Monday night – posting opinions on the latest news can be a great way to get around this.  140 characters may not seem like enough to get across an opinion, but follow the lead of those best at using Twitter to circulate a link to your full opinion on a blog or your own website.  Don’t be shy in talking to others on Twitter – it’s very common for people to acknowledge meeting each other at a conference via Twitter – and don’t forget you manners, if someone says something nice about you don’t forget to thank them publically!

So now we have got the basics of Twitter what else can we do? hashtagging!  This is the source of the “trending” data – Tweeters use #xxxxx to signify that their tweet relates to a specific topic e.g. on budget day #budget was included in most tweets so that anyone searching for comments on Twitter about the budget would be able to see EVERYONE'S tweets that included #budget. You can link all your social media profiles together, so that you only have to make a single update to, say, Twitter and this will show up on your Facebook and LinkedIn pages, using services like Friendfeed.

I’ve got social – how will consumers know?

Now you have your social media profiles up and running you can get them added to your unbiased.co.uk profile – making it easy for consumers to just click through and see what you do in the social media world.  This lets consumers get a better understanding of who you are and whether you are the right adviser for them before they give you a call to have a chat.

What else can we do on unbiased.co.uk?

We make it our job to keep ahead of the curve when it comes to new developments in social media. We know that it can be difficult to juggle servicing your clients and finding the time to ensure that your marketing activity is spot on, let alone working out whether or not the new social media revolution is a band wagon worth jumping on or just a flash in the pan.

In the meantime we have been building additional services for advisers on unbiased.co.uk.  All enhanced advertising subscribers automatically get featured on our iPhone app, and this is something that we are looking to develop across the Android and BlackBerry app stores too.  Mobile technology is a platform that is becoming increasingly important with the advent of smart phones feature internet, emails and applications. Consumers are interacting with the internet in a totally different way – now downtime has turned into catch-up time.

You now have a website, an effective profile on the best professional adviser search engine on the web, your social media profiles up and running and consumers can now find you on the go...what else is their left to do?

PR.  Have you ever fancied yourself as a commentator on BBC Breakfast or wanted to get your opinion into a personal finance article in the Financial Times or the Daily Express? Maybe you would like to answer questions on Yahoo! Answers where unbiased.co.uk is a Knowledge Partner for financial advice and mortgage advice.

Unbiased.co.uk runs a long standing and effective media services programme called the Bluebook Online.  We make it our mission to make sure that personal finance and advice on personal finance stays at the top of the news agenda, and thanks to over 200 advisers who have signed up to The Bluebook Online this is something that we are achieving.  These are advisers that are happy to provide comment, case studies and opinions to the press as and when requests come in via the 300 registered personal finance journalists.  Every year we have over 6,000 journalist searches for professional adviser comments.  This is a great opportunity for you to get your name and your company's name out there, both nationally and locally.  We also use the media services programmes to source advisers to take part in other activity we undertake such as webcasts, wealthchecks and even Yahoo! Answers.

Now you should be all clued in and set up with an effective online marketing strategy – let it bed in and check back with us as we will make sure that we keep you in the know about what the next big thing is going to be.