If you’re looking for organic growth opportunities, try this little experiment:
Open your biggest competitor’s website and imagine you didn’t know it was theirs.
Would their headline grab your attention? Would their offer capture your imagination? Would you even recall what they do 15 minutes later?
Probably not, right?
Most advisors have generic copywriting, vague messaging, and all the personality of a corporate LinkedIn Profile.
That’s a big opportunity for you, because copy has an outsized influence on your audience. If your competitors are doing it badly, doing it well becomes even more valuable.
This article will help you claim that value and turn copywriting into a competitive advantage.. But before that, let’s think through exactly why advisory copy is so weak.
The tsunami of generic advisory copy is not a failure of imagination or marketing acumen. Advisors and their marketing teams usually have the skills required to produce great messaging; it’s just that three structural factors stand in their way:
Most of your favorite advertising probably wouldn’t pass an SEC compliance check. The classic copywriting manuals read like guides to ensure your campaign doesn't get lost in an endless back-and-forth with compliance.
Advisors know this, and it’s taught them to be very cautious. They see copy as a liability, not an opportunity. This risk-averse attitude leads to missed opportunities and active strategic errors:
In practice, that means copy gets relegated and downvalued across many firms, which makes good copy even more valuable.
Copy involves an implicit commitment: even if you regularly update your website and LinkedIn profile, the copy is an ambassador for your brand while it's there.
That makes many advisors nervous. They don’t want to turn off potential clients or be perceived negatively. They don’t want to feel personally exposed or have their personality judged.
Advisors often use generic copy to avoid revealing too much. If they speak jargonese and cycle through cliches, the theory goes, nobody can be offended or turned off.
The problem is you can’t opt out of communication. Dull copy suggests a lack of strong values or beliefs; clichés reveal a fear of, or failure of, creativity. Rather than taking a stance or expressing an authentic philosophy, you send a simple signal: there’s nothing special here.
Firms tend to build their book ad hoc, through referrals and networking across multiple years. They likely have an ideal client or core audience, but they’ve never systematically mapped it out or officially niched.
That leaves them in a tight spot, copy-wise; should they finally commit to a specific audience or hedge their bets?
Most opt for the latter and produce copy that bridges the gap between disparate personas. But messages that appeal to multiple unrelated audiences tend toward the vague. “Hit your financial goals” applies to every advisory client, but it doesn’t make any of them feel seen.
That’s not just a lost opportunity, though; it actively hinders your organic growth.
It can be hard to argue for stronger copywriting within financial advisory firms, because the “cost” of poor copy tends to go unnoticed:
None of that means weak copy doesn’t carry a cost, though. Messaging across your website, social media, content, and even event promotion has a subtle but very real influence on how you are perceived and the actions your prospects take.
Dull or generic messages therefore lead to:
Copywriting can maximize or decimate the value of all your other marketing efforts. Great ad performance is pointless if the landing page doesn’t convert; strong SEO is wasted if your website is unclear or unmemorable; and those hours you spend on LinkedIn are all for naught if people secretly think your posts were spat out by Claude or ChatGPT.
That thought might leave you a little anxious; even if you accept that copy really matters, you might be thinking, “But I hate writing.“
Well, there’s good news…
Great copy needs the right tone, rhythms, and phrasing. But you don’t produce it by swallowing a thesaurus or studying Shakespeare. You produce it through:
Being intentional and precise about your business. Who exactly do you serve, and what exactly do you deliver for them? What precisely makes you different from your competitor,s and how can you zoom in on it?
Really understanding and caring about your audience. Active listening during meetings, reviewing testimonials or client feedback. These often produce the best copy—without you ever having to stare down a blank page.
Being honest about who you are and what you believe. A dull, professional tone doesn’t hide your “true self”; it just communicates that you’re afraid of being judged. The best copy for most advisors comes from your literal voice; speak aloud and capture the cadence and nuances of how you really speak.
Hiding behind all that vague advisor copy is a lack of confidence in what you’re communicating. Copywriting should exude confidence without spilling into arrogance; it should be the product of knowing exactly why your service is worthwhile.
Ultimately, copywriting comes down to achieving two goals:
Both of which can be reliably achieved with the right set of marketing principles.
Here are six principles that consistently produce better advisory copy. We call them "best practices" reluctantly—because context matters more than rules—but these are the tactics that tend to work across most firms.
Great copy emerges from deeply understanding who you're talking to and what you're really offering them.
Undertake systematic audience research: client interviews, testimonial analysis, competitor positioning reviews. Then crystallize your value proposition until you can articulate it with precision—not "comprehensive wealth management" but the specific transformation you deliver.
Pre-approved copy enables fast campaign launches and fewer unexpected revisions. Our clients often save hours of effort and internal conflict by creating messaging templates that compliance can review ahead of time. Rather than producing a full campaign and then rewriting it all, they ensure their messages will pass compliance before writing the copy.
Action steps:
Abstract language is the death of conversion. Prospects skim right past it because their brain quickly categorizes it as filler—and doesn’t want to waste its time. Use concrete language that forces you to be specific about who you serve, what you deliver, and why the audience should care.
Financial concepts are abstract. Tax-loss harvesting, financial derivatives, and Monte Carlo simulations; about six people outside financial services are willing to learn about how these things really work.
Use metaphors to illuminate complex, abstract concepts like this. Analogies are like a cognitive shortcut, helping your audience use pre-existing knowledge to make sense of novel ideas. But remember: the metaphor itself must be familiar to your audience. A metaphor that lands with a tech founder might completely miss with a medical professional.
Cliches often feel safe because they’re familiar. Everyone knows what a “financial journey means—even if it’s a pretty vague idea—and so nobody’s going to complain that your copy was gibberish or difficult to understand. But they’re also dead; they don’t light up your audience or signal originality or intelligence.
Don’t just fix cliches using synonyms; it’s the thought behind the language that creates cliches. Instead, drill into the precise idea you’re trying to communicate and how it differs from what other firms say.
Your audience wants to see themselves reflected in your copy and design. They judge your marketing—and whether it’s “for them”—within seconds. They’re unconsciously scanning for signals of relevance and value.
Adapt the tone and terminology that signal you understand their world. Getting the language right requires genuine immersion in your audience's reality. What publications do they read? What podcasts do they listen to? What concerns keep them up at 2 am?
When you truly understand these things, the right language emerges naturally. Force it, and prospects can smell the inauthenticity immediately.