Money Matters Episode 333- The AI Visibility Crisis W/ Brian Thorp

Money Matters Episode 333

Brian Thorp: [00:00:00] But it's important to remember when consumers are going online, it's very doubtful that they're going directly to your website, especially of course, if they don't yet know who you are. It's very much more likely that they're going and starting that search traditionally on Google. But of course, today we're rapidly seeing.

The adoption of AI tools. So whether it's Google or a tool like Chat, GPT, that's ultimately where advisors need to be found. And if you're not getting found in Google, if you're not getting found in chat GPT, then that's where your visibility really becomes invisibility and the challenge that many advisors are going to need to overcome.

And importantly, a real opportunity because we know there are a lot of advisors that are going to be very slow to take advantage of this.

Christopher Hensley RICP, CES: Your next best client is already talking about you, but not to you. They're asking chat, GPT. They're Googling questions. Your website doesn't answer, and by the time they actually reach out, if they reach out, you might already be off of their [00:01:00] shortlist. In this episode, we uncover why AI has hijacked the first impression and how smart advisors are adapting before it's too late.

Hi everyone. I'm Chris Hensley, and this is Money Matters. But today's conversation is also a special research episode for my upcoming book, digital Kaizen for Financial Advisors, and I'm joined by Brian Thorpe, founder of Wealth. Tinder, one of the most forward-thinking platforms, helping independent advisors get found, not just by people, but by the AI tools that are increasingly guiding those people's decision.

Brian, thank you so much for joining us today.

Brian Thorp: My pleasure, Christopher. Thanks for having me.

Christopher Hensley RICP, CES: Absolutely. , You know, I mentioned, or I don't know if I'm mentioned, I'm mentioning it now, we, we did an article together, uh, talking about this topic. And so this is gonna, we're gonna do kind of a deep, a little bit of a deeper dive in it. Uh, but for listeners to, just to get to know you a little bit better, what's something that you could share with us maybe outside of your bio?

Brian Thorp: Yeah, [00:02:00] so you know, for me, I've always been passionate about technology and so my bio, while it's very much grounded in financial. Services working at Invesco for 22 years before launching Wealth Center in 2019. For me, the opportunity to get a little bit more involved in the technology side of the business while staying within the, the main expertise that I had within financial services has been a lot of fun.

And so today. You know, helping advisors with their digital marketing and now really getting to be at the forefront of how advisors can take advantage of ai, artificial intelligence tools. Not necessarily something that I even anticipated when I launched Wealth Tinder back in 2019, but for me, it's the best of both worlds now that I can nerd out, whether it's on the technology side or and nerd out in the financial services space, whether it's on the compliance front or just generally with advisors talking about marketing.

Christopher Hensley RICP, CES: one of the things that you talked about in the article, you, you said that the first impression now happens without the advisor in the room.

When [00:03:00] did you realize this shift was happening and how fast is it accelerating?

Brian Thorp: I, I, I don't know that we can even quantify how fast it's accelerating, but it's definitely something going back to even when we launched Wealth Tender in 2019 that we were beginning to see, which of course were people that still. Rely upon referrals wherever they may be able to get them from friends or from a professional. they work with perhaps an accountant, but in many cases they either don't have an individual and so they're starting that search online. Or even in the case, if they do get a referral, the first thing they're doing is going online and looking to do their own homework. And so we've continued to see the evolution.

And now, and I know we're gonna be talking about this today, you know, AI almost becomes this personal friend. Starts to become a new source of referrals because now you're having a conversation just like you would with an individual that actually knows all about you. And I think that's gonna be the next evolution that we see.

And a [00:04:00] really interesting one for advisors as well as for consumers that are beginning that search for an advisor.

Christopher Hensley RICP, CES: I love that. Now, you, you coined this, this phrase, or what you've called it, what you call the visibility crisis. What exactly is the visibility crisis that you've been warning advisors about?

Brian Thorp: Sure. So a couple of things on that front. So Visibility Crisis really represents the challenge that advisors are going to have. If they're not getting found online, if they're not visible online, and of course to be visible online by a consumer, it really today increasingly means that you need to be visible to the technology and the tools that are going to serve you up to that consumer.

Whether it's serving up your website where you can be found, or a directory listing on a third party site like Wealth, Tinder, or any other location, that ultimately can be something that is going to be surfaced. But it's important to remember when consumers are going online, it's very [00:05:00] doubtful that they're going directly to your website, especially, of course, if they don't yet know who you are. It's very much more likely that they're going and starting that search traditionally on Google. But of course, today we're rapidly seeing the adoption of AI tools. So whether it's Google or a tool like Chat, GPT, that's ultimately where advisors need to be found. And if you're not getting found in Google.

If you're not getting found in chat GPT, then that's where your visibility really becomes invisibility and the challenge that many advisors are going to need to overcome. And importantly, a real opportunity because we know there are a lot of advisors that are going to be very slow to take advantage of this.

So the forward thinking advisors that are listening to your show today are in a tremendous position. To really be able to set themselves apart and solve for that visibility crisis. Long before peers and many other advisors in the industry even recognize that this is an issue that they need to even consider.

Christopher Hensley RICP, CES: For sure. I mean, when we did the article together as a, as you [00:06:00] kind of explained it, I was like, oh, here's this problem. I didn't even know I had as a, as an advisor. Right. We, we just got our head wrapped around SEOI mean, actually it's been a long time coming. But to, to realize that, you know, now we're, we're at a different point, and I know advisors, this will speak to them as they're listening to the show, but even for our consumers, uh, uh, uh, clients that are listening to the show, you know, you've got people who are like, I'm not gonna get involved with ai.

And if we think about in the last six months, our cell phone, we just start, every time we get an update, there's another little piece being added there. Now, the, the, um. Uh, Google AI search. I don't wanna say the G word or my phone might turn off here, but, but, uh, whether we're ready for it or not, the AI search stuff is, is here.

Uh, and it's here pretty, pretty darn fast. One of the things that I thought was fascinating that you talked about in the article was the schema, right? Uh, for advisors who aren't tech savvy or trying to play catch up here, can you explain what schema markup [00:07:00] is and why it matters so much right now?

Brian Thorp: Sure. So at its essence, schema is code behind the curtain of any website or webpage that. Is structured in a manner that makes it much more easier and much more likely that tools, including traditional search engines like Google, but increasingly tools like Chatt, these next generation of AI tools can very easily identify and understand what content represents on a page.

And so, as an example, with Wealth Tinder profile pages where we feature advisors and a lot of great information about. An advisor or their bio, their firm on their webpage, uh, or on their profile page on wealth tender, um, including their address, location details, et cetera. There's what's called financial services schema, where all of that information that I just mentioned we're organizing that in the backend to ensure that the AI bots that the search [00:08:00] engines are able to understand. A, this is a financial advisor. B. This detail in these particular sections of the profile page represent these particular elements or features or services. Then an advisor provides. And so that's really at the core, nothing that's visible on the front end. So the consumer, the person that's visiting a webpage, like a wealth center profile with Schema, or it could be an advisor's website with Schema or any number of other websites that incorporate that schema design. The individual on the front end that's visiting that site, they're not going to know that Schema exists. So it really is just entirely. On the backend, but with proper coding now you're really ensuring that whether it's an individual human visiting your profile or visiting a website, or it's a bot that both are having a great experience and very a, uh, easily able to collect and gather the information that they need on the first try.

Christopher Hensley RICP, CES: Well, so what I like [00:09:00] about Wealth, Tinder, and what we've, you know. Pointed out in the article was that you guys are already there. You know, you're already solving this problem that advisors didn't even realize they, they had. Right. So, uh, that, that's, that's fantastic to, to see that. One of the things that you use, you use this analogy about, uh, grocery store, uh, when people are looking for advisors.

Can you talk a little bit more about that?

Brian Thorp: Sure. So if we think about a grocery store, one of the reasons we of course have all, uh, trended to go to a grocery store for, for the very needs is it's a one-stop shop. You know, we can go down a handful of aisles and we can find everything from produce to meat, to snacks, and whatever other department we might venture into. the fact of the matter is if we were to try and go to every single farm or every single production facility where those different packaged products exist, we'd never be able to quickly get those groceries and supplies that we [00:10:00] need. And essentially, if you think about these AI tools today, if a consumer is going online and saying, I'm looking for a financial advisor, and it could be a doctor, a lawyer. Regardless of the nature of the profession or the business, it's going to be very difficult for that bot or that tool to go out and search using the grocery store analogy, every single farm, every single manufacturing or production facility of different types of food products. So instead, thinking about a personal shopper that's going to a grocery store, essentially, to find everything they need with that one stop shop. That's somewhat analogous to the types of things that a, a chat GBT or a Gemini. be doing as well. So when you put in that query to these AI tools and you are looking for an advisor, they're going to be much more likely to go to a platform like Wealth Tinder, or a directory of advisors where they can vary quickly, identify a number of different advisors, ideally in a format with a structure that incorporates that schema. So beyond just [00:11:00] shopping on the aisles with. Hundreds of advisors in one place. They also have the information organized in a manner that they know what to do with it and report it back to you, the consumer, to help you then find the advisors that may be a best fit. And of course, we don't want to discourage advisors from continuing to invest in their websites. Including having the appropriate schema to get found there as well. And we can talk a little bit more about some best practices on that front. But ultimately I do think that that grocery store personal shopper analogy is a good one for people to really recognize that yes, you still want to of course have your farm, have that production facility, you know, ultimately have that website where once people do have that connection, they can come out, they can visit. And learn more about you. But in order for those bots to find you, you really need to ensure that you are on reputable platforms that are going to be more likely to get discovered in those initial queries or searches that a consumer is doing [00:12:00] online.

Christopher Hensley RICP, CES: You know, Brian, I'm gonna encourage people to find. Us on LinkedIn. Right. Find both of us on LinkedIn and, and find that article because one of the things that you did is we had another advisor who in the thread, in the comments asked, you know, how big of a deal is this? Is this something I need to be aware of?

And you said, well. Let me share this link with you. And the link was, I think it was the equivalent of like, Google ai, search your name. Like go. It's like what we used to say, go Google yourself, right? Go Google yourself and see what the, the end results were. And so I did that and I looked, and my results on the AI search were like three pages back after we got through a whole bunch of sponsored ads and stuff like that.

I'm gonna share a little bit of an, it's say off color story here. When I first got started in the business, uh, what I had heard that marketing thing, like, you know, Google yourself, see where you're ranking, and I, there was a somebody who had written a prison, a book about prison sex. Okay. I know that's [00:13:00] very bizarre and weird, right?

That was at the first page when you looked up Christopher Hensley. So I've spent the last 20 years, my personal SEO goal was, let's get that guy three or four pages back. And so I can happily say after doing organic marketing and you know, all of that, it's, he's three or four pages back. But when you answered it that way, and I did that new search, sure enough, here I am kind of starting from scratch on page three.

So I'm just sharing that with listeners 'cause I think other advisors will, you know, if it's interesting to go through that exercise. Alright, I'm gonna pivot here. I'm gonna get off of the prison, uh, sex book story here and switch now to, um, your FAQs. So wealth tender. You offer, um, what's called AI optimized FAQs.

Tell us about these new, uh, optimized f FAQs.

Brian Thorp: Sure. So we've really been looking to identify what are all of the different ways that we can ensure wealth. Tinder [00:14:00] profiles that showcase an advisor. best practices, not only from a traditional SEO perspective, but also what many are starting to call a EO answer engine optimization. Or you may hear as GEO engine optimization. see which sticks. Regardless, this is all about optimizing for AI tools and going back to what we described earlier. The financial services schema is really oriented to different elements describing general information about an advisor in their practice. There's another form of schema referred to as FAQ, frequently asked question schema. the AI tools understand to be just that, that these are questions specifically about a particular business where you as an advisor can now take advantage of a feature we rolled out on wealth tender that allows you to list up to 10 FAQs the questions along with your responses in a format that [00:15:00] again, visually will of course be beneficial to consumers that are visiting your profile. And then behind the curtain, we have everything coded with that FAQ schema to help the AI tools better understand that that's in fact what these are, that these are FAQs about the advisor, about their business and could therefore be that much more helpful in the advisor surfacing. In different ways, and of course one of the things that we really encourage with these FAQs is to ensure that you think about these questions being the types of questions that somebody who doesn't know who you are when they're going out and maybe they live in Seattle and they're looking for an advisor that specializes in working with Amazon employees. If that fits the type of client that you're looking to attract because you're an advisor in Seattle that is comfortable working with Amazon employees, then that would be a great. FAQ to incorporate into your website that articulates that. And of course you should still then also have a [00:16:00] landing page on your own website that speaks to Amazon employees.

You could certainly have that in the general about your firm if that's a priority for you. But this does provide a supplemental opportunity to ensure that if there are those types of questions that people might be searching, which are reflective of the types of. that you hope to provide and ultimately get them connected with you.

This is a, a great way to take advantage of that opportunity in a manner that's really optimized for those AI tools to better find you.

Christopher Hensley RICP, CES: . You know what we're talking about? The, the two things that we're talking about really, the, the visibility crisis, uh, I, my, the SEO problem, which is now a IO when we're looking at. It through the a IO or or AI lens, right? So you guys have already started solving a problem that's just really coming online, and this is kind of like a value add because when I started looking at wealth tender, um, the, I have to talk [00:17:00] about this even though it's not necessarily AI related.

You guys, the main use case, Gloria, is testimonials. So for advisors who. Um, who aren't familiar with you, can you tell us a little bit about that? About what we need to know about testimonials as advisors?

Brian Thorp: Absolutely, and I'll tie that right back into AI as well, because when we think about testimonials from a traditional sense, consumer, somebody that's evaluating you as an advisor. This is information regardless of the nature of the business, whether it's an advisor, a doctor, or a lawyer, we know absolutely that people want to be able to read reviews in order to make a more informed and educated hiring decision.

And so when the SEC came out with its marketing rule in 2021, that finally repealed the prohibition of advisors being able to use testimonials again, I put on my nerd glasses from a compliance perspective, dove into the 400 page rule, and we rolled out a feature with wealth tender becoming the industry's first. Online review platform designed for [00:18:00] SEC and FINRA compliance. And so today we have hundreds of advisors that are now taking advantage of that and from, again, a consumer perspective that's now helping those advisors accelerate the trust building process with prospects. And we absolutely see many independent advisors that are now winning business over other advisors that don't have reviews. it's unfortunate for the advisors that don't yet have reviews because they're in many cases just as capable and, and doing just as phenomenal a job. But ultimately this is that impactful, that prospects want to see that information. And so we're really eager and excited to help more advisors be able to take advantage of that.

And again, really doing so with an approach that positions us as the Boy Scout in the industry from a compliance perspective. Now, to tie that into ai. There's also what's known as review schema. and so even beyond consumers, and that accelerating the trust building process there, reviews can also help [00:19:00] advisors better position themselves to rank higher in traditional search engines, as well as AI tools because those reviews with the proper schema in place are sending positive trust signals to Google's algorithm, to Chachi's algorithm and letting those. Algorithms understand that, hey, there are people that have worked with these professionals that are saying positive things, assuming you have five star reviews. And, and they're also able to contextually understand what's being conveyed within those reviews. And ultimately that is helping advisors further rank more prominently in these types of tools as well.

So that certainly was more of the, uh, the, the impetus for us launching the platform was less about the AI and more about that. Acceleration of the prospect trust building process, but ultimately today, it's if not equally important to ensure that the reviews are also helping from an AI perspective to help advisors better appear in search results as well.

Christopher Hensley RICP, CES: . I, I had [00:20:00] another question on here. How can advisors maintain human trust when AI is often mediating the first interaction? But I think the answer that you just gave is really good, and I think it ties into that, and I'm gonna nerd out with you here because if I understand it correctly, the testimonials.

It's a different thing if I go and put my professional bio that I've taken time to write, kind of like, almost like a resume, but then I have a testimonial in plain language. And you just said that one of the criter criteria is, uh, trustworthiness and, and so it's gonna rank it in a different way. Um, which I know that we've been.

Shellshocked, right? As advisors, we've been, we just had this rule for so many years, we can't have testimonials. So once they said, yes, we can, we've been very slow to adopt it. So, um, the, the fact that you guys are ahead of this, that you're making sure, uh, that compliant, uh, you know, that it's, it's, uh, friendly with compliance is a good [00:21:00] thing.

Um. Let's talk a little bit more about just advisor marketing. I, I don't know if you can tell this, I've got a passion for it. Uh, where is all this headed? If you had to, you know, get an idea of where we're going with, with the AI and, and, um, where is advisor marketing going in the next, say, 12 to 24 months?

Brian Thorp: Yeah. And I think it's going to be really interesting to see the evolution. And we do have a new study coming out, uh, that we'll be able to share some additional insights. And one of the questions that we asked 500. US consumers, adults with at least a hundred thousand in annual end income, was what it is they are comfortable with from an AI perspective in terms of their relationship with a traditional financial advisor.

And already today, not only are we seeing that 25% of consumers looking for an advisor are turning to AI tools like Chat, GBT to find them. But they also indicated that they're very comfortable with AI being [00:22:00] utilized in a number of use cases. And of course you see a higher comfort level with some more administrative items, such as, yes, I'm comfortable with the advisor utilizing AI tools to record our meetings.

And yes, I am interested and, and comfortable with. u using AI tools even for financial planning. Uh, one area where we did see a little bit of reluctance was around automated investment decisions, which of course, I think, you know, there's something to be said. For that. And then the other thing that I would also emphasize is even as we continue to see greater use of AI as a talk technology among advisors, I certainly don't see it displacing the human element that has always existed.

And you know, this won't be the first time back when, you know, 2000 or whatever the year when we really saw robo-advisors first coming into, uh, being, and many people speculated. You know, the demise of financial [00:23:00] advisors, right? Human financial advisors will no longer be needed. Now, flash forward, and I think we're all amazed at some of the things that AI can do.

And you know, if there were a time to be worried, this is much more the time than before. However, I don't think we're ever going to see AI replace that human experience. And going back to the testimonials. We did a report earlier this year analyzing the thousands of reviews that people have written about their financial advisors, and I think it's really important to share that, what people talked about, you know, it wasn't investing. The vast majority of reviews are talking about that emotional side of the relationship with an advisor, and that's exactly. What AI is not going to be able to replace, at least in my opinion, I don't think AI is ever going to be able to replace that, that personal human connection that advisors can provide.

And you know, we've all seen, yes, technology can be a tool, but technology can also be rather frightening at times and ultimately. You know, being able [00:24:00] to con console and have a relationship with somebody who you truly trust who's walked in your shoes or has other clients that have had similar experiences or life events, you know, that is something that is never going to be replicated, uh, by, by an AI tool, at least perhaps not in our lifetime. And I think for that very reason, um, what we're gonna see is consumers using AI to find advisors comfortable with their advisors using AI to help enhance their services. But ultimately continue to see that human relationship, in fact, maybe even a, a greater opportunity for advisors and their clients to spend more time together, just having conversations and having more of a, a human relationship because there's going to be less need for time to be spent on administrative tasks if AI can take on more of that and allow us to focus more on what really matters most to people, which is that human connection.

Christopher Hensley RICP, CES: . Now, you gave us some, some examples [00:25:00] of here of AI that's rolled out. You know, the ability to find us through ch che GBT. That's one use case there. The voice recorders, the note takers, and then the ones that maybe I say. Slow to adopt, but the clients are a little bit of pushback on an investment decision, like just handing the, the, the, uh, steering wheel over to to, to the robots.

Right. So I can I get that one? I understand that one. But I would say getting found in chat, GPT is from a compliance standpoint. Is, is a good thing, right? It, it's one of the things, and I, I'm gonna, I used to be a compliance guy several years back and you know, they have to look at stuff as the one bad actor out there, right?

They, they have to do things that the lowest common denominator. If there's like one guy who's gonna mess it up for everybody, then they have to kind of speak to that. And so we could see why. Maybe it's, it's, it's slower for the industry to adopt some of these rules, but I love the fact that wealth [00:26:00] Tinder is, is mirroring that.

It's saying, Hey, no, we're gonna make sure you're safe. We're gonna make sure you're compliant, that we're following that rule, but we're also gonna have you, uh, uh, show up in the, in these search engines, people are gonna find you better. I know as a, as a consumer, when I'm looking for anything, the very first thing I do is I go to Amazon reviews and say, okay, who's had a bad experience here?

Usually I'll whittle those people out, and that's kind of my short list, right? So I love what you, you're doing. Uh, we've got about five minutes before the show is over here, so I want to make sure to get a few more questions here As an independent advisor, right, one of the few things that we can do is, you know, solo entrepreneur, we, we do have the superpower of being able to pivot.

And change our business model on a whim, right? So if you're with a larger company, a lot of times it's very difficult to do that. Um, you talked about in the article, uh, that competitive window for independence. Uh, what are independents able to do right now that big firms simply can't?

Brian Thorp: [00:27:00] Yeah, and you mentioned that lowest common denominator and I, I think that's one of the things that we're seeing really cause larger national networks to either delay or continue to completely block the ability for their advisors to be able to use, uh, certainly some AI tools, but even going back to just these online reviews, which have been permitted. Now for the last four years, that's providing a tremendous advantage and opportunity for independent advisors. And so whether it's the wirehouse firms that are just slow to move, or some other large national networks that do have a, a small army or arguably a large army with, you know, 10,000 or more advisors and they're just not comfortable, at least yet determining how they want to move forward. They're in a position where their advisors are not able to invite their clients to share feedback online. They're not able to have online reviews, and [00:28:00] as I mentioned previously, we absolutely are seeing independent firms that are now winning business over wirehouse advisors In some cases where that prospect says. Oh, I was doing a Google search and I saw your reviews on Wealth Tinder. I clicked on your profile, read the reviews, went to your website, and that's why I'm here having this introductory call, and then that turns into a client. In other instances, they were up against a. Wirehouse advisor where it came down to the two firms, the wirehouse advisor or the independent advisor. And the prospect said, you know, I'm really torn. The advisor at this very large household brand name wirehouse firm is telling me about all of these services that they offer. And of course I've known of them, uh, forever. But you work with this independent firm and how do I know that I can really. Trust you.

And that was the trigger that the independent firm said, well, why don't you take a look [00:29:00] at our reviews on wealth tender? And if you're able to compare that to the reviews of the wirehouse advisor, you know, let's then have a conversation about that. And two things then occurred. The prospect doesn't find any reviews for that wirehouse advisor.

And then of course, starts to see the glowing reviews and what all of these clients that have been working with that particular advisor for, in some cases a couple of decades. Had to say about their experience and then that prospect became a client moved over a million dollars the next day. So there are absolutely some tremendous case studies and examples that we're now seeing of independent firms that are by virtue to your point of being able to be more nimble and act more swiftly now able to take advantage of this opportunity and growing their business as a result.

Christopher Hensley RICP, CES: I love it, and you know, if you're. A new advisor getting started in the business. I always think of it this way. You could be the best financial advisor in the world, and if nobody knows about you or how well you a job you do, right? [00:30:00] You're, you're, you're, it's crickets, crickets. Nobody's ringing the phone, right?

So I think the idea of, of testimonials, whether it's from your, your existing clients that can share that experience with others. It's a very helpful thing for, I know it is with me when I'm making a buying decision there. Okay, Brian, we have, we're right here at the end of the, that was a quick 30 minutes.

We could sit here and, and talk for all day. Uh, for people who wanna find out more about wealth Tinder, where is the best place for them to look?

Brian Thorp: Well, because we've really done our own efforts on SEO and A EO, I'm happy to say if you just type the words Wealth Tinder, it's gonna take you right to our website, whether you put that in chat GT or or Google. But it is wealth tinder.com and I'm also always happy to. Jump on a call. My email is Brian, BRIA n@wealthtinder.com.

If you wanna shoot me a note, or, again, if you go to the website, you'll find where you can schedule time. If you're interested in getting to know a little bit more about what, we just wanna have a, a sounding board and a brainstorm session, [00:31:00] nerd out whether it's on the engine optimization, AI topic, SEO, or anything else where I can be helpful.

Christopher Hensley RICP, CES: . Brian. Have a good rest of the day there. Thank you so much for being on the show today.

Brian Thorp: My pleasure. Thank you again, Christopher. I.