Ask Ernest is a lead-gen platform that I created to drive qualified leads towards financial advisors.

Lead Gen is a huge issue of Financial Advisors, especially in times like these as their traditional referral channels and acquisition channels change.

This lead funnel exploits a universal truth (that I tested in over a dozen different countries), that is: “Nobody truly knows what they should be doing with their finances”.

First I run ads on FB with fairly open targeting. The goal is to convert on events, so I pixeled various events in the survey so that I can optimize for specific conversions.

The survey itself can be web-based using a custom build, or even as simple as a SurveyGizmo, though I found that using a ‘chatbot’ style questionaire is fairly easy for the user, as the platforms are highly optimized for UX and conversion. They also tend to have easy integrations to Zapeir and Integromat, making it easy to platform and customize.

The front end looks like this (if it doesnt load, click refresh):

This is only half the magic though. The other half is what to do after the leads start pooring in.

This is where Problem Interviews come in handy. Testing this funnel I called dozens of the leads and wrote everything down. I found common traits, and common sales pitches that converted a conversation into a potentail sale. In this case the “sale” was a confirmation to take a call with a qualified financial advisor, which is a lead that Advisors will happily pay for.

The spread between what you pay for a lead and what you can sell it to an advisor for is the simple business model. Distribution is a hurdle that obviously needs to be overcome, which I will leave for another future post that touches on LinkedIn automation.