The Challenge — Recruiting Top Notch Financial Advisors
Even a highly regarded nearly century-old financial firm like Sage Rutty has difficulty recruiting…
It’s not easy to convince financial advisors to move their “book of business” to a new firm — there are risks. And some prefer the safety of a large financial firm, while others prefer complete independence.
What if there was a perfect middle ground, where one had “supported independence,” the best of both worlds? That’s what Wayne Holly, President and CEO of Sage Rutty, the Rochester financial management firm, and key employees feel is the strength of their firm and what’s unique about their brand.
It sometimes takes Holly a year to recruit an advisor due to the difficulty of finding candidates who will make a move. Additionally, Holly says, “Finding an advisor that is a good cultural fit is the most the most challenging component of recruiting.”
So how can Holly attract the right talent that he needs to aggressively grow the company? By effectively and efficiently leveraging the uniqueness and the strengths of the Sage Rutty brand.
Communicating the Heart and Soul of a Business
Holly decided to create a recruiting micro-site separate from the Sage Rutty website that would be direct, engaging, and fresh in its intimacy. “I chose a video-rich solution that allows Sage Rutty people to connect with viewers,” he said. Holly called on Maria Friske Design to create the project. Friske engaged POV-Rose for our video storytelling abilities. Holly then “let go” and applied his supported independence approach to the communications team.
A Highly Effective Collaboration
Holly is a leader who trusts his people, and he similarly trusted Friske Design and POV-Rose to get honest, truthful, believable stories from his staff. We began by identifying what was needed — a series of videos that spoke directly to the key interests and concerns of the highly capable financial advisors that Holly was recruiting, integrated with supporting messages on the micro-site.
No one speaks to the Sage Rutty experience more believably than people who have made the decision to join and stay with the company. We agreed on a story-based approach, engaging current Sage Rutty financial advisors who had previously overcome the same fears and hesitations about moving to Sage Rutty as targeted viewers.
A Designed Delivery
Friske proposed the micro-site have “an open, warm design that pulls visitors into the site and expresses the core of the Sage Rutty experience, resulting in greater opportunities to connect with potential recruits.” To compliment her design she requested a cinematic anamorphic aspect ratio for the video. Director/DP Jeffrey Mead chose a shallow depth-of-field filmic look to enhance the experience, blended with an as-it-happens Backpack Video℠ documentary approach to add liveliness to what might be a visually dry subject.
Process is Key
To fully appreciate Sage Rutty’s uniqueness and strength, then elicit revealing, engaging stories about working at Sage Rutty, we began by listening, a lot. Working with very little direction, we dug deeply to really understand the needs of the target audience. We pre-interviewed advisors. We read between the lines. And then we made it happen.
Interviewing financial advisors in their environments at work, and “hanging out” while shooting at Sage Rutty proved to be the right blend for capturing the family feel, the core values, and the compelling stories needed.
“POV-Rose did a wonderful job with working with us at Sage Rutty. They immersed themselves into our daily lives, meetings and celebrations. I could not be happier with the final version of our micro-site.” Wayne Holly
The Results
The video-based micro-site has integrated well into the recruiting process. “If you have a special story to tell, video is a terrific medium to use,” said Holly. “Our story is unique in our industry so it helps to differentiate us.”
While recruiting is a long term strategy, the input Holly is getting from prospective advisors is good. “We have a new advisor joining us in early January 2012 that was looking for a change in his environment. The micro-site impressed him and the video connected with his pain.”
And in the end that’s what it’s all about — connecting with your desired viewers, communicating your story, and achieving your goals.
Visit the Sage Rutty recruiting micro-site.
