Episode 51: Modern Marketing for Investment Boutiques

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Feel like your marketing is falling flat? You’re not alone. In 2024, most fund managers are facing the music. Outdated marketing tactics like sending PDF letters to investors just don’t cut it anymore.

The good news? Embracing modern marketing can be simple and time and cost effective when you have the right game plan. Listen in today for Stacy’s modern marketing blueprint that's been consistently delivering real results for fund managers. 

In this episode, Stacy and Havener Capital's director of content, Emily Boyle discuss: 

• What social capital is

• How you can build and nurture different types of social capital within your network

• What a personal brand is

• How your personal brand differs from your business brand 

• Content ideas that have proven effective in helping founders and fund managers grow their personal brand

TRANSCRIPT

Below is an AI-generated transcript and therefore it may contain errors.

[00:00:00] Stacy Havener: As a boutique, you actually have an advantage because. It's your company. You can show up however you want. You can write whatever you want. You can choose to be a person and a portfolio manager. You can choose to be a person and a professional and it will work. But you have to be brave enough to start.

[00:00:23] Stacy Havener: Hey, my name is Stacey Havener. I'm obsessed with startups, stories, and sales. Storytelling has fueled my success as a female founder in the toughest boys club, Wall Street. I've raised over 8 billion that has led to 30 billion in follow on assets for investment boutiques. You could say against the odds.

[00:00:43] Stacy Havener: Yeah. Understatement. I share stories of the people behind the portfolios while teaching you how to use story to shape outcomes. It's real talk here. Money, authenticity, growth, setbacks, sales and marketing [00:01:00] are all topics we discuss. Think of this as the capital raising class you wish you had in college mixed with happy hour.

[00:01:08] Stacy Havener: Pull up a seat, grab your notebook, and get ready to be inspired and challenged while you learn. So

[00:01:21] Emily Boyle: we're going to talk about modern marketing and how boutique managers can leverage it for efficiency and other ways, why they should and how they can. So I'd like to start with you though, being the expert.

[00:01:38] Emily Boyle: An explanation. So what, how does modern marketing differ from traditional marketing? So

[00:01:43] Stacy Havener: this is going to be the worst answer ever because you're going to laugh. I didn't know that modern marketing was actually a thing. I thought modern marketing just meant like do marketing, but don't get stuck [00:02:00] like in the old school ways, like embrace a modern approach to it.

[00:02:06] Stacy Havener: So I feel like I need to turn the tables on you because if there's like a whole school around modern marketing, I haven't been to it yet. But I'll tell you what I think it is. You can do a counterpoint on like, here's what it actually is. And here's what, what Stacy thinks it is. But to me, and I'm going to do this specific to boutiques.

[00:02:27] Stacy Havener: I think that investment management old way. was very much around, well, of course, data and performance and paper. How about that? Like print, heavy, big, esoteric, like brochures and Commentaries that were just like heavy and the only way you could get them was like get on someone's like mailing [00:03:00] list or something, literally a mailing list.

[00:03:02] Emily Boyle: Right.

[00:03:02] Stacy Havener: And same thing with the pitch books. It was all like heavy bound. Remember that like back in the day you had to have a binding machine. It was the worst job, right? You had to like bind all the presentations and it was just this very old fashioned way. Now, I mean, you could argue that there's actually maybe now a boomerang where some of that stuff.

[00:03:22] Stacy Havener: gone so far away that it probably could be cool again. But that old way of like, no personality, no people. No authenticity, just lead with data, and probably put it on a piece of paper.

[00:03:37] Emily Boyle: Right. The question of, is anybody even reading this?

[00:03:41] Stacy Havener: Right. And I don't think anyone, there was no thought to how to repurpose it.

[00:03:45] Stacy Havener: It was like, we just know we have to write a letter to our investors every quarter. telling them what's happening in the market. We'll start with what the Fed is doing or something totally boring. And we'll talk about like what we bought and what we [00:04:00] sold and what helped the portfolio and what hurt it.

[00:04:03] Stacy Havener: And there's a place for that. I'm not saying that there's not a place for that, but that's really marketing, right? That's not really marketing. That's like keeping people, that's like investor relation. That's not marketing. I don't know what to call that. But to me now, I think there's modern marketing to me means new way.

[00:04:27] Stacy Havener: You have to be digital. You have to be digital, you have to be online, and having a website with a, like, a picture of your city that you're in and a contact us form doesn't count. Like, that's not enough, that's not having a digital presence, that's having like a landing page. And so, I think you've seen some investment managers try to embrace modern marketing like I do.

[00:04:55] Stacy Havener: I have a website and I put a PDF of my letter now online and it's [00:05:00] like, okay, so that doesn't really cut it. Modern marketing to me means people first, not performance first and showing up with authenticity in new ways. Like this. In some ways, Zoom is really like, um, an entree into marketing because you're on video.

[00:05:22] Stacy Havener: Even if you don't realize that you're actually on video, you are. Podcasts, blogs, social, all of these things that allow people to connect with people. That to me is what's modern, where maybe the old way was performance and company and, you know, all that first. The new way is authenticity and people first.

[00:05:50] Stacy Havener: That's

[00:05:50] Emily Boyle: how I feel about it. Yeah. And so putting people first, both on the boutique side, the business side and the investor side. [00:06:00] Yes, absolutely.

[00:06:01] Stacy Havener: Like this, you know, I just actually got off a podcast and the woman who was on is the president of a 4 And she talked so much about client experience. And I think that putting ourselves in the shoes of the people we serve, That should not be a modern idea, by the way, but I think it probably is, at least in our space.

[00:06:24] Stacy Havener: Like, we're not good at thinking about what matters to our investors. What matters to them? What would be fun for them to read or interesting or educational? Like, we don't think about that. The only thing we think about is ourselves. Like, what can I say about me? What's my pitch? You know, it's me, me, me, and it should be totally flipped.

[00:06:51] Stacy Havener: To you, you, you. Yeah. All right. Well, let's talk about that. Like, so tell

[00:06:56] Emily Boyle: me what am

[00:06:57] Stacy Havener: I missing

[00:06:57] Emily Boyle: time out? Like, no, I [00:07:00] will tell you, you hit the nail on the head. I did. Yes. The research that I did, which include like included McKinsey and some other sites, the customer. Is the focal point which we just talked about.

[00:07:13] Emily Boyle: Yep. And it's less about changing what marketing does and more about transforming how the work is done. So we talked about social media and digitizing and that sort of thing. So A plus Stacey. Okay, phew.

[00:07:28] Stacy Havener: So I love that. And I think I personally like the, of course, because it's my jam, but I like the authenticity And yes, the client first, but also the people at the company.

[00:07:40] Stacy Havener: Yeah. First, that to me is a huge shift. Yeah, I

[00:07:45] Emily Boyle: agree. So with social capital, Grant and social media. Those are the known building blocks of modern marketing. So let's dive in. Let's start with social [00:08:00] capital. What is that? If I'm a boutique manager, how do you explain social capital to me and the value of it?

[00:08:06] Stacy Havener: Yeah, that's such a great question and I almost. equate that in a way with brand capital, like personal brand capital. So social capital to me is the power of people that you connect with. wherever they are. So it's actually a huge multiplier because in the old day before social, you could only kind of have that brand capital face to face or on the phone, like it was very hard to kind of get any exponential leverage under Social capital, but now with what's happened with the internet and all the platforms where people can show up and connect, share ideas and themselves, I think it's such an [00:09:00] underutilized, untapped value for managers that they don't even realize they could tap, that they could use.

[00:09:09] Stacy Havener: I mean, we've seen it, like, just the power of personal brand over corporate brand. And where does that happen? I mean, it happens online now. Like the first, very first thing someone's going to do after they meet you is what? Go check you out. Google you. 100%. You are getting Googled. If you don't think you're getting Googled, you're crazy.

[00:09:37] Stacy Havener: They're going to Google you and they're going to Google your firm. And are they going to go to your website? Yeah. The first thing that's going to show up is LinkedIn. Why? Because it's freaking LinkedIn. Yeah. Like, they own the number one spot on every search. You could test it, like, I test it, it's, it doesn't matter.

[00:09:57] Stacy Havener: It's going to be like one of the top five [00:10:00] search results when you Google someone. And so if you choose not to own that brand with intention, it's certainly, you can. But what a miss. Right. What a total wasted opportunity. And so everyone knows you're going to have a website, but they also want to see the other stuff that shows up.

[00:10:24] Stacy Havener: Are you on podcasts? Is there a video, like a YouTube video of you? Did you, were you like a guest blogger on something? I don't know. But like all of those things combine to create this social capital and it has real monetary value. Thank you. because it can be converted. Yeah. You build it, you have to harness it, harvest it, but you can do none of the money parts if you

[00:10:54] Emily Boyle: don't build it.

[00:10:56] Emily Boyle: Right. You mentioned that we see this and we do [00:11:00] in the work that we do. Can you share an example, like a success story of a boutique asset manager who embraced it and then saw some amazing results?

[00:11:10] Stacy Havener: Yeah. Well, it's very interesting because I don't think a lot of them do. So I'll tell you some of the people that I think do it well.

[00:11:20] Stacy Havener: And then I'll tell you like personal experience because I've seen the conversions. So, Let's pick someone who's like really, really well known and he's no longer really even on the asset management side, but it's a good example. So Mohamed El Erian, who used to be at PIMCO, is now a professor somewhere in London, I think.

[00:11:41] Stacy Havener: But he's always done this, so even when he was like, big at Pimco, every once in a while, he would post a picture of him on a plane with his favorite plane snack, which is those biscotti cookies. Right. Okay? Every once in a while, he would post a [00:12:00] picture of his dog. Just recently he posted a picture of him, like, bringing his daughter to college or an apartment or something and building furniture.

[00:12:10] Stacy Havener: And those posts get way more engagement than anything he shares about the market or the economy or the investment space. Why? Exactly. Why? Because Not just people do business with people, but because of shared experience. So, if you are a fan of Muhammad Al Aryan, and he is gonna, like, just go bonkers and riff on something that he sees in the market, you're probably slightly intimate.

[00:12:43] Stacy Havener: You're not gonna really be like, Oh my gosh, you know, you might be like, I like that, or, you know, Great point or something, but if he shares something about going to help his daughter set up her first apartment and building something from Ikea, you might [00:13:00] feel so much more comfortable to weigh in on that and engage on that and say, Oh my gosh, I just did the same thing with my daughter and that was easy or sucked or whatever, right?

[00:13:11] Stacy Havener: And so people shared experience. It just takes everybody and sort of says, we're all here together. We're all just trying to figure it out. And it allows people to connect with us. And investment space is really bad at that. Why? What's the hang up? What's the hurdle that they can't? Yeah, because they've been trained.

[00:13:36] Stacy Havener: We've all been trained that no one cares. And that that's not what it's about. We've been trained that what investors want is performance and our thoughts on the market show up, look the same, talk the same, walk the same, don't deviate. This is the paper doll of what a investment [00:14:00] person should be, do, say, look like.

[00:14:04] Stacy Havener: And we want to succeed. So we want to fit into that cutout. When really, if we wanted to succeed, we'd go against it. And I think for boutique, so if we think about a boutique now, because that was an example of like, you know, that's, he was at a very big place and he still did it. So I mean, come on, like even being the head of a, a really, one of the biggest asset managers in the world, the biggest at one point, you can still show up as a human.

[00:14:33] Stacy Havener: I think boutiques are, and they have an advantage here because you're outside of the. big company construct. If you're a founder PM, it's your company. So yeah, do you have to still live in the compliance culture? Sure. But you sharing a post about bringing your daughter and helping her build an Ikea, that's no compliance red flag there.

[00:14:58] Stacy Havener: Yeah. Right? [00:15:00] And so as a boutique, you actually have an advantage because it's your company. You can show up however you want. You can write whatever you want. You can choose to be a person and a portfolio manager. You can choose to be a person and a professional and it will work, but you have to be brave enough to start.

[00:15:22] Emily Boyle: Yeah. And you mentioned that you can quantify it. Oh, yeah. How would you see that? How, will somebody who is just dipping their toe into this see the results? In what way? How will they manifest?

[00:15:35] Stacy Havener: Yeah,

[00:15:36] Emily Boyle: that's a

[00:15:36] Stacy Havener: really good question. And I said I would share something personal about my personal brand and I will.

[00:15:41] Stacy Havener: Thanks for reminding me. So, No, you might not at first, which is like kind of hard. Yeah. So, I think this is very interesting. Before I say the idea, remind me to talk about engaging versus creating content. Okay. But if you were to [00:16:00] create content and put it out there on LinkedIn and you post it and you walk away and go do whatever the hell, you might get app zero engagement.

[00:16:10] Stacy Havener: Zero likes. And if you do that a few times, you might be like, this is stupid, and that Stacey person is totally off her rocker. It does not work. And you'll give up. And that's sort of part of it, right? Because like anything, the capital builds on itself. So in the beginning, it can be very silent and deafeningly silent and scary.

[00:16:35] Stacy Havener: It's always sort of scary, but you have to show up. That's the thing. And the other part of it is engagement. So. I personally think if I were, you know, if we were helping someone with their personal brand of portfolio manager with their personal brand, and even now I would say they should do it, is you get more value out of commenting on people's posts sometimes than you do out [00:17:00] of writing your own to start.

[00:17:03] Stacy Havener: Because you jump into a conversation and you engage and that person that you commented on will probably engage back to you because you've given them a gift of your words and your time. And so that's what social is, right? Social is engaging. Social isn't posting and going away. It's commenting and having a conversation and engaging.

[00:17:27] Stacy Havener: So you can't just create the content and be like, I did it and it didn't work, so I don't know what the hell. It's not just that. It's also embracing the social aspect of it, which is engaging on comments people leave you and on posts that people write that you respect and learn from and your target market, your investors, your clients, your teammates, whatever.

[00:17:51] Stacy Havener: So it's both of those pieces. It's not just create, it's also engage. And I think that's a harder thing for people too. That's also [00:18:00] challenging. From my experience, I think the part that's still, I mean, just happened, like I get these notes now almost every day. It still blows my mind. Is that people who are not even engaging are watching and it will feel out of the blue to you as the person creating whatever marketing it is.

[00:18:26] Stacy Havener: It will feel out of the blue to you, but they'll show up and be like, basically, I'm a huge fan and can we schedule a call? And to you, it's gonna be like, holy cow, like, that just came out of nowhere. It was like a one day conversion or whatever, right? Because it's like, they emailed me and now I've got a call.

[00:18:46] Stacy Havener: But, What you don't realize is that all the people who are watching, listening, reading, consuming, and not revealing who they are, that's the most powerful thing [00:19:00] to me. And then after the fact, they say to you, I've been a fan for years. And you don't realize that they're even there. And that is like really crazy awesome.

[00:19:15] Emily Boyle: Yeah, that's like. Getting the sense that you're talking to an empty room. And then all of a sudden, like you described, somebody reaches out. Pops up, yeah. And you realize you had this audience the entire time. The

[00:19:29] Stacy Havener: whole time. That's a great point. And that is what it feels like. And, you know, it'll happen to like, in person, I was at the Wealthy's, and I had people come up to me and say, Oh my gosh, I'm like a huge fan.

[00:19:41] Stacy Havener: I've followed you for a long time. And, and you just, it's really quite, humbling and also like fills you with gratitude when you realize like, Oh my gosh, like I'm helping, I'm helping someone somewhere. And it gets you to keep showing up. And I [00:20:00] think that's also the trick, because if you just use the content to be like, again, the old way of here's my portfolio and here's what I did.

[00:20:10] Stacy Havener: And me, me, me, that doesn't, no one gives a shit. Yeah. What resonates is when you say, here's some thoughts that might help you, right? So that modern American idea of putting them first. And that's where I think it's challenging for people to shift that mindset of like, it's not supposed to be you get up on a soapbox and say, like, look at me and then leave.

[00:20:37] Stacy Havener: Like if that's your whole content strategy is whack. Are you an investment boutique looking to grow your business and need a little help? If you feel like you're fighting for the spotlight and, well, still stuck in the shadows of the bigs, join us in the Boutique Investment Collective, Havener's new membership community dedicated to the specialist in the investment industry.

[00:20:59] Stacy Havener: In the [00:21:00] collective, we'll guide you through the billion dollar blueprint we've used to help boutiques add over 30 billion in AUM. You'll refine your story. Focus on your ideal target market and practice your pitch. You'll rethink your marketing materials, rewrite your emails, and refresh your differentiators.

[00:21:16] Stacy Havener: We'll even help you step up your LinkedIn game and give your profile a makeover. You want to grow your biz, we've got your back. Learn more about The Collective, the curriculum, and the amazing coaches who will help you on your journey. Visit havenercapital. com slash collective. High five! Hope to see you in a coaching session soon.

[00:21:41] Emily Boyle: So we've talked mostly about social media. Yeah. But you also briefly mentioned podcasts. Yeah. What are the other mediums for building social capital that you think are important? Most valuable.

[00:21:55] Stacy Havener: Yeah. I mean, I think podcasts are really powerful. I saw one of [00:22:00] my friends that I follow on LinkedIn. She's not in the investment space, but she had a podcast and she just announced she was shutting it down.

[00:22:06] Stacy Havener: And I thought, Oh, what a bummer. Like it is a lot of work. It's a lot of work, but I don't know if you listen to podcasts. I certainly do. Like they're my friend on walks or in a car ride or whatever. Right. And I just think. Meeting people where they are is another part of like that client experience, kind of putting the client first thing for me.

[00:22:27] Stacy Havener: Like I love to read and I love to read like a physical book or printout or something. I'm still that way, but That's not the only way people consume information. So LinkedIn and social is great, but a podcast is great because they can listen to it whenever they want, on a walk, in a car, on a train, right?

[00:22:48] Stacy Havener: Like, you name it, you can download it and listen to it on a plane. I mean, you name it, you can consume a podcast that way. Video is awesome as well. Like, being able [00:23:00] to go on YouTube. I'm not a huge YouTube person except if I need to fix something at my house and I'm like definitely on YouTube looking up how to.

[00:23:07] Stacy Havener: But that's an incredible platform for connection. A lot of people take their podcast and record them like how we are on Zoom and then turn it into video content on YouTube. You're just giving people different ways to connect with you on their terms.

[00:23:25] Emily Boyle: Yeah.

[00:23:26] Stacy Havener: And I think that's New.

[00:23:28] Emily Boyle: Yeah. And in our industry too, you don't have to create your own podcast.

[00:23:34] Emily Boyle: We have some clients who are guests on other podcasts, so they just share and they don't have to do the production or anything. So exactly. Me too. That

[00:23:44] Stacy Havener: would be an amazing first step into the podcast space. I mean, I was a guest many, many times before I ever decided to be a host. And being a guest is way easier and way more fun.

[00:23:56] Stacy Havener: Because like you said, you show up and people ask you questions and you answer them. [00:24:00] And then you go off and they send you all this, like, here's the recording and here's all these assets I made for you. And it's great. What a great strategy.

[00:24:10] Emily Boyle: Yeah.

[00:24:10] Stacy Havener: That's modern marketing. Definite.

[00:24:13] Emily Boyle: Yeah, for sure. Okay. You mentioned briefly a little bit ago, personal brand, which is your building block of modern marketing.

[00:24:22] Emily Boyle: So let's dive into that. What is a personal brand and how does it differ from your business brand?

[00:24:29] Stacy Havener: Totally. So I would say that brand in general, my favorite definition of it is what people say when you're not in the room. I like that. So, it could be about you, or it could be about your company, or whatever.

[00:24:42] Stacy Havener: But the things that people say about you when you're not around, that is actually your brand. And, You can have an impact on that. Like, I'm not saying you can totally control it, but again, if you don't show up at all, then you're just letting, I don't even know. You're just resigning yourself from owning your brand [00:25:00] at all.

[00:25:01] Stacy Havener: So your company brand. We know your personal brand to me. So your company brand is kind of the culture and values and the people and the mission, you know, the clients you serve and how you do that in a different way. That to me is the crux of any powerful brand is sort of in that onlyness category. Like, what are you the only of what makes you different?

[00:25:27] Stacy Havener: Not better. Personal brand is putting a face, a heart, a soul on that company. So the personification of the company. Now, you're not twins, by the way, but you're going to be very related, right? So there's like things in my personal brand that are slightly different than Havener's brand, but we're very close.

[00:25:51] Stacy Havener: And what that does is it allows, again, it allows people to connect. Because you can't connect with like a [00:26:00] logo, right? And all the stats and all, like, if you look at any big company and you see how many followers they have on social media versus how many followers the founder or the face of the company has, it's always massively tilted towards the person.

[00:26:19] Stacy Havener: But again, that's social, right? That's like people want to feel connected to another human. That's And so I, I also think this is an area I, I would love to see us step into more because I've seen how powerful it is for me. It's amazing the connection that happens when you are brave enough to put a face on your corporate brand.

[00:26:47] Stacy Havener: By the way, I should say face. I would say face is because I think the next iteration of personal branding is that you encourage your entire team to do that, right? Like you [00:27:00] could be the face of the brand, but it's even more powerful when you let everybody who wants to engage that way to do that. And I think that terrifies a lot of businesses, but it's super powerful.

[00:27:15] Stacy Havener: To have the people out there talking,

[00:27:17] Emily Boyle: how do they work a personal brand and a company brand? How do they work in conjunction with each other? Yeah. When is it more appropriate to go out with your personal brand than your business brand? Mm. Maybe appropriate's not the word.

[00:27:34] Stacy Havener: Yeah, I was going to say, I think it's an and not an or.

[00:27:37] Stacy Havener: I think, so if I had to pick one or the other, I would actually pick personal brand, especially for a boutique, especially for an entrepreneur, especially for a founder. However, I quickly think you need, I mean, you're going to need the corporate brand because the other thing that's going to happen is it like makes you real.

[00:27:56] Stacy Havener: So. If you don't do anything at the corporate [00:28:00] level, it's kind of like, where are you? Yeah. It's almost speaks louder that you're not doing anything from a company level than if you are. Sort of like table stakes, like you got to show up, you got to have a corporate brand, you got to be digital, you got to have some sort of thought leadership that you're sharing, you kind of got to do that.

[00:28:18] Stacy Havener: Like, I don't know what's happening if you're not. So that's like a must. And the personal brand to me is like, the juice. Yeah. I think in general, personal brand for me, like, I love when companies share personal brand stories or anecdotes about the people in the company. To me, those are always the company posts that do the best.

[00:28:46] Stacy Havener: It's like, Oh, here's our team or, Oh, like one of our clients is amazing and look what they did or look what they wrote or whatever, or, you know, here's our team just like in the wild, you know, you guys have done this in Denver, like [00:29:00] we're at an event or we're doing a happy hour, like, because it brings your values and your mission to life.

[00:29:07] Emily Boyle: Yeah.

[00:29:07] Stacy Havener: So I love that. I love when companies are brave enough to. Show pictures and be real and be authentic and tell stories of their people and that is fun. I also love where if your company brand is, has like a sense of humor, it's okay. Like actually that's kind of fun, you know what I mean? So it's like just sort of shaking off all the old things that we were told that like, don't be funny.

[00:29:33] Stacy Havener: If you're funny, that means you're not smart. And you're like, why? Yeah. It doesn't have to be that way. So I think they're together very much together.

[00:29:42] Emily Boyle: Yeah. I agree. Cause as you explained, if someone goes to your website or when I go to someone's website, a business's website, really the first place I go is to their people, their bios.

[00:29:53] Emily Boyle: Yeah. And I go there, but then I also go deeper and, you know, Google them like you explained. So [00:30:00] it's always like there's crossover. And if you go to the, you know, if you find their LinkedIn profile and are looking at their personal brand or anything that they've put out there, vice versa, you're going to probably say, well, what does this person do?

[00:30:12] Emily Boyle: You know, I run the business page.

[00:30:15] Stacy Havener: Exactly. They're like two peas in a pod. Yeah. And so you can do one or the other, but I think they're more powerful when they're together. And I think the continuous sort of nudging that we do to ourselves and also to our clients is around just being more courageous, having more courage in how you show up.

[00:30:37] Stacy Havener: Yeah. Because I think everybody starts kind of very like, it's easy to start very vanilla and sort of in your comfort zone, and that's okay because at least you're starting. But the trick is to keep pushing yourself outside of your comfort zone to share in different ways. Video, photos, audio clips, people.

[00:30:58] Stacy Havener: You don't have to share everything. It's just [00:31:00] choose things to share and then lean into those. I think that's big.

[00:31:04] Emily Boyle: Yeah. And you're a great example of someone who has built your personal brand and seen the advantages. But is there another anecdote or business boutique asset manager that you can share an example of who's done this successfully and

[00:31:22] Stacy Havener: well, see, I don't know because I can see them on LinkedIn, but I don't know how it's converting.

[00:31:27] Stacy Havener: I mean, I could assume it's converting, but maybe it isn't. So I think that's hard. You know, I think we've had clients on our roster to go back to something you said, who very successfully used podcasts, very successfully used podcasts. I don't know that anybody. Has really used LinkedIn. One thing I will share that I don't know if people know this is that going back to like the personal brand and company brand are an and not an or.

[00:31:55] Stacy Havener: So if you want to build your company footprint [00:32:00] following on LinkedIn, It is much easier to do that if you're building your personal brand at the same time. Here's why. If I, as Stacey Havener, am out there connecting with people in our industry on LinkedIn, and then Havener, because I'm associated with Havener as the company that I'm a part of, if I want to now invite people to follow Havener, I can only do that if they follow me.

[00:32:30] Stacy Havener: me. So I can't just like not be on LinkedIn, launch a corporate presence on LinkedIn for Havener and then go like invite a bunch of people to follow me. Right. I can't. So the more you connect with people, the more your company can connect. Now that doesn't mean you can't build a following, but you're just going to have to do a lot more work.

[00:32:54] Stacy Havener: You're going to have to go comment on people's posts and like, you just can't send an, you know, you can't be like, Hey, you should [00:33:00] follow our page. LinkedIn won't let you. And I love that because what it's saying is like, no, you can't do that. Do you know this person? Are you connected to this person? We're going to force you to get, like, be real with who is in your network.

[00:33:16] Stacy Havener: And if you're not connected to them, why the F would they want to follow your company? Yeah. That's a part that I don't think people realize. Yeah.

[00:33:27] Emily Boyle: Okay. So let's break it down. What are the first couple of steps that you will tell a boutique manager? This is what you need to do to begin building your personal brand.

[00:33:39] Stacy Havener: Okay, so let's say if I were, and we do this with our clients, so this is good because we walk the talk. So basically to me, none of this will work until you like, go back a bit.

[00:33:53] Stacy Havener: You gotta like, go back to the beginning. And the beginning for me is really getting clear [00:34:00] on who you serve, how you help them, and why they should care. Like, why should they pick you? What makes you different than everybody else who also serves them and solves that same problem or harnesses that same opportunity.

[00:34:15] Stacy Havener: So, we start, and I would recommend everybody starts with understanding your target market and what matters to them. So this is modern marketing, the client is first. So that's the time that needs to be spent right at the get. Who am I serving and what do they care about? And don't, what you can't do, is tell yourself that they care about something because you want them to care about it, right?

[00:34:42] Stacy Havener: Like, you can't be like, well, since I run a high yield bond fund, what people want is yield. I think that's what

[00:34:52] Emily Boyle: we all fall into. It's

[00:34:54] Stacy Havener: so easy. Yeah, like, well, my target market would want that. And it's like, but who's sitting down and be like, I [00:35:00] need yield. That's not what they're thinking. I need high yield bonds.

[00:35:05] Stacy Havener: So the trick is to like, you can't sort of. talk yourself into something that's not real. You have to really think about like, what would they be searching? What would they be asking? What is the real problem? So when you understand that, that target market, then you say, okay, well, how am I the guide to them?

[00:35:23] Stacy Havener: They're the hero. I'm the guide. How am I helping them get from where they are and transforming and getting somewhere they want to go? And again, it's hard not to just tell yourself a story about that. And then to say, okay, well, what is it that I do differently than people who also Our guides in this space.

[00:35:41] Stacy Havener: So that's going to give you a really good base to build your corporate brand for sure. And then I think if you wanted to go personal brand, you know, we do this, the story selling session and that has been pretty amazing. [00:36:00] I think it's a place, especially in our industry that people struggle because they haven't been taught to use their voice or even that they have one.

[00:36:09] Stacy Havener: And certainly, words are not their language of choice, right? Numbers are their language of choice. So that's an exercise of getting them out of their comfort zone and really working on their stories. And the last part on that personal brand, and even for the corporate brand, is to, once you have all that information, to really understand, like, okay, what are the things I'm going to talk about?

[00:36:32] Stacy Havener: And to pick things that. Your clients care about like, how are you going to help them? How are you going to entertain them? What are the things that you're going to write about, talk about, et cetera. So all of that foundational, you still haven't written a thing, right? You haven't written anything. You haven't done a video.

[00:36:49] Stacy Havener: I've done a podcast. But like that work in the trenches of building brand capital is so [00:37:00] necessary. Or you're just like throwing spaghetti against the wall. So I say you gotta go to the beginning, you gotta get to the basics, and do the thinking, and the exploration, and get out of your comfort zone before you step to any kind of creating or social or like the stuff that's maybe more outward facing, it's like, it starts

[00:37:22] Emily Boyle: internal.

[00:37:23] Emily Boyle: Makes complete sense. And then, as you just mentioned, you can go out on LinkedIn. And LinkedIn, we've talked about it earlier, is also underutilized by boutique managers in this industry. And so how do you address that with people who object to it or are

[00:37:40] Stacy Havener: uncomfortable with it? Yeah. So I think, and I've been thinking a lot about this because I think this is a place where we could maybe help our clients more.

[00:37:50] Stacy Havener: So it's work. It takes time. And so I absolutely get why a portfolio manager is like, you're [00:38:00] telling me that I have to effing go on LinkedIn for an hour and say great post to all these investors. Like, are you crazy? I so get it. So get it. You're cracking up because you know, they're going to be like, no, period.

[00:38:18] Stacy Havener: And so. I don't think there's any shame in your game for asking for help. I don't think there's anything wrong with getting a ghostwriter or finding somebody to help you build your personal brand. I really don't. I mean, the trick is to make it authentic. So it doesn't work if you say, Stacy, can you run my personal brand for me?

[00:38:43] Stacy Havener: And I say, sure. And you go, great. Let me know how it goes. Like, that doesn't work, right? You need to figure out how you're going to keep it authentic and give this person your words and your thoughts and your insights and [00:39:00] all the things that make you uniquely you. How are you going to give your you ness?

[00:39:05] Stacy Havener: to this, like, whole experience. And so that could be doing an interview for an hour a month and getting a whole bunch of content or whatever, I don't know, or recording little audio clips on your phone and sending them along. Doesn't matter. But I think there is a lot of pressure when you say personal brand.

[00:39:29] Stacy Havener: It makes people think that I have to do it. It's personal. And the reality is, if it's not your unique ability and you don't have time, that's okay. You can still find a way and it's who, not how, but you have to be willing to delegate it and that takes a lot of trust. Very uncomfortable for people to delegate their personal brand.

[00:39:52] Stacy Havener: I get that. But you see it done a lot, again, like I always look to other industries, you see it done in tech, in SaaS, a [00:40:00] lot of executives at big companies, you think they're writing all their content? No. But I hope that they are informing that content and whoever is writing their content is getting, you know, words and thoughts from them directly.

[00:40:13] Stacy Havener: So I think that is fine, that is okay.

[00:40:17] Emily Boyle: Don't you also think that, especially with personal brand bios, anything that you are challenged to write about yourself truly is a challenge. Like I, as a writer, I've written so many of those things for people writing about yourself. Oh, what a great point. It's uncomfortable.

[00:40:37] Emily Boyle: And so true to your point, though, I mean, it is definitely possible for someone else to do it for you in an authentic way and probably even better than, than what you could have done. I

[00:40:49] Stacy Havener: agree. Because as you said, like you are going to be most critical about yourself. So if you're writing it, you're going to be like, that's stupid.

[00:40:57] Stacy Havener: No one's going to want to read that. I had changed that, you know, you're going to edit [00:41:00] and you should edit, but cut yourself out of the knees when you should give yourself some grace and just post the darn thing. And so, I like that comment a lot, Emily. I also like the thought that your personal brand, it's not just what you're, you know, how you're showing up on an ongoing basis, it's also the static things that live.

[00:41:21] Stacy Havener: online about you. Like I always talk about this whole picture as like your portrait doesn't hang on a wall anymore in a building, in a room. It lives online and it's a constant evolving picture. So you have to own it. You have to paint it. You have to write it. You have to paint it with your words and That, to me, is huge opportunity, huge.

[00:41:53] Stacy Havener: So the static things, your bio, as you said, your LinkedIn about section, all [00:42:00] of those things that just are there permanently need to be thoughtfully approached as well, because it's part of your personal brand. What's on your website about you, what's on your LinkedIn profile about you, all of those things contribute, whether it's static or.

[00:42:17] Stacy Havener: evergreen or evolving content.

[00:42:20] Emily Boyle: Yeah,

[00:42:21] Stacy Havener: agree. Someone else writing it, it would probably be, they're gonna like amp you up in a way that you probably wouldn't do for yourself. They're gonna tell your story in a much more powerful way than you would probably tell about yourself. And you know what? That's okay.

[00:42:36] Emily Boyle: Yeah. That's

[00:42:36] Stacy Havener: good.

[00:42:37] Emily Boyle: Or identify facets of your story or your life that, yeah, you think are insignificant, but that someone else would really connect with and appreciate. Totally.

[00:42:48] Stacy Havener: That's one of the biggest things I walk away from our story selling sessions with is that all of this magic was there the whole time.

[00:42:58] Stacy Havener: They just needed somebody [00:43:00] to pull the threads and connect the dots. Yeah. And that's how the tapestry gets woven, but it's all there. And if you're brave enough to share authentically, somebody can help you weave it. Yeah. Right? Or paint it. Or, you know, stitch it together. And it's amazing. Like, I get emails from people after the story sessions and they're always like, wow, I didn't even know that was in me.

[00:43:29] Stacy Havener: Oh, that's cool. People in the office are like, oh, that's like a therapy session, but not a therapy session. I don't even know how to describe it. It's just a very special thing that happens when you help somebody find their voice and find their story. And everyone has one. Yeah.

[00:43:44] Emily Boyle: And we didn't talk about this, but I wanted to share, like, I have had recent conversations.

[00:43:51] Emily Boyle: With, uh, boutique managers who say, well, linkedin isn't very important to us. It's really just a place where you go find a [00:44:00] job. Oh, I know. And so, you know, getting past that, getting over that perception is so important. And it's amazing that we're, some of us are still stuck there. What a great

[00:44:11] Stacy Havener: comment. I know, isn't that so true?

[00:44:13] Stacy Havener: And I don't know how you fix that, to be honest. It's not something that they can think, it's something they need to feel. They almost need to experience it in order to believe it. Which is very much a chicken and an egg thing, because how do you do that? Here's a great example of a boutique story that really worked well.

[00:44:38] Stacy Havener: So, my friends at Shelton Capital, they're actually going to be on the podcast soon, the CEO, Steve Rogers, they asked me to come out and do some training for their sales team on Story. a narrative and how to use that from a marketing perspective and how to use that from a sales perspective. They're right in your neighborhood, right?

[00:44:57] Stacy Havener: In Denver. I was like, yes, I [00:45:00] would love that. So I did. And before I went out there, they sent me a box of stuff. And I've never done this before, but I did like an unboxing and I literally opened, I didn't like open it and then close it and record. I like opened it on video and It was consumer packaged goods, like, good.

[00:45:25] Stacy Havener: I mean, it was so thoughtful, the box, the packaging, what was in it, it was amazing. So, I make this video, and then I post it on my LinkedIn, right? And that thing exploded. it had something like 30, 000 views.

[00:45:44] Emily Boyle: Oh my gosh. And I saw that. That was pretty cool.

[00:45:48] Stacy Havener: Yeah. And I'm like, but I don't get why it's like exploding.

[00:45:52] Stacy Havener: But then on the podcast with Steve Rogers, he's like, No, you don't understand how many people reached out to us after that. [00:46:00] So, why am I sharing that story? Well, first of all, I think it's a great example of the power of branding. In this instance, corporate branding, right? And how you can use it to really create an experience.

[00:46:13] Stacy Havener: I also think that for them, and I don't know, I could ask them, Spoke to the power of LinkedIn, and it wasn't them testing it. It was me doing it. And then they were like, holy cow, what is happening? Their websites visits spike. They had people emailing them and reaching out. Their employees were saying things.

[00:46:37] Stacy Havener: And so maybe it's things like that, where if you even put yourself out there a little bit, you do a podcast or you do something like this. And somebody who's active on LinkedIn. tags you, mentions you, spotlights you, maybe then you feel it and you experience it and maybe then you say, you know, am I [00:47:00] missing something here?

[00:47:01] Stacy Havener: But I don't know how to solve that one because I do think people think it's kind of stupid.

[00:47:06] Emily Boyle: Yeah.

[00:47:06] Stacy Havener: Like

[00:47:06] Emily Boyle: it's silly. I think you're right. I think just spending time out there is the answer. I mean. Yeah. I think you get a different view, you get a different perception if you just, I mean, I know I have, like the articles that I'm interested in that I'm seeing are not just in one vertical.

[00:47:25] Emily Boyle: They're all over the place. And I know that when I'm commenting or liking. That that's giving others who might look me up a broader view of who I am and what my interest totally, um, what a great comment, but I'd love to hear it. Talk with you just a few more minutes because I know we're at our hour, but.

[00:47:47] Emily Boyle: We talked a lot about, like, kind of posts, LinkedIn posts with like a personal share, that sort of thing. But what other types of content would you encourage boutique managers to [00:48:00] share on LinkedIn? I know because we do this all the time. Yeah, so I

[00:48:04] Stacy Havener: mean, look, I'll tell you what.

[00:48:06] Emily Boyle: Yeah,

[00:48:07] Stacy Havener: that old school letter that you're writing.

[00:48:10] Stacy Havener: You can turn that into so much stuff. I mean, charts, chart books, carousels. You could read your freakin commentary and then turn that into an audio file. I mean, just the stuff you're already doing. you probably have a gold mine of content. I mean, I've heard people say, like, if you actually just went through your Dropbox folders, you probably have so much content that you could be sharing, questions that you, you know, checklists and all kinds of stuff that you create and use that could be valuable to somebody else.

[00:48:53] Stacy Havener: And you don't think twice about it. So I think that's the place where boutique managers could [00:49:00] really leverage what they're already doing. I mean, come on, you love charts, so share them. And don't just share the chart from Bloomberg that's this big and expect people to know what the heck they're looking at or what they should take away from it.

[00:49:15] Stacy Havener: Share the chart and then tell people why are you picking this chart? What does it say? What does it say to you? Like what does it actually say? And then interpret it. That's an amazing post. Right? And carousels, like, LinkedIn still loves carousels, so that's an amazing way. And you know what? It loves carousels that are long.

[00:49:38] Stacy Havener: It doesn't love carousels that are short. Dwell time on a post matters. And so if you have a lot of slides to move through in a carousel, someone's hanging out on that post for a really long time, that says something to the algorithm, that like, this is a valuable post. People are hanging out on it. So much.

[00:49:58] Emily Boyle: That's great. That's already there. Yeah. [00:50:00] Easier than you might think.

[00:50:01] Stacy Havener: Way. And I'm just such a huge fan of that they ask you answer methodology, which is basically like talk about repurposing. You take the questions your salespeople are being asked. Sales basically gives that to marketing and says, here's what we're being asked.

[00:50:19] Stacy Havener: We need content on this. Marketing takes those questions and Let's keep it super simple. Sets up a Zoom call for one hour, asks the portfolio manager the questions, takes those answers, and now creates a whole bunch of stuff. Blogs, and videos, and posts, and social, and guess who gets to use it? Sales. So like, it's all connected, and it has monetary value.

[00:50:47] Emily Boyle: Absolutely.

[00:50:48] Stacy Havener: Yeah.

[00:50:49] Emily Boyle: I love it. I love it too. It's like what we're doing now. Yeah. Perfect. What else Stacey? We've covered everything on my list. I love it. We'd like to share closing thoughts.

[00:50:59] Stacy Havener: You know, I [00:51:00] think this is just like anecdotal, but whatever, that's like my whole jam. Like, I have been blown away recently by the notes I'm getting from people.

[00:51:09] Stacy Havener: And they're just saying things like, I've been following your content for a long time and listen to your podcast. And I just want to say thank you. And like, I don't think anybody realizes how much that means. Another great way to show up on LinkedIn, by the way, or on Twitter or wherever you consume content, like if you're always reading someone's stuff, and you send them a note that says, I just want you to know, like, I don't engage a lot, but I see you and I'm listening and it's helping me.

[00:51:38] Stacy Havener: I'll run through a wall for that person. Yeah. So I think that's really special. And That probably took them a lot of courage to probably write it, but the actual writing didn't take long and the impact it gives to the person receiving it is massive.

[00:51:58] Emily Boyle: Yeah, and that's exactly what we're [00:52:00] talking about is the human connection.

[00:52:02] Stacy Havener: Yeah.

[00:52:02] Emily Boyle: That platform allows you to make.

[00:52:05] Stacy Havener: So go send some thank you notes. I don't know, write them, you know, handwritten or on LinkedIn or write an email to somebody who's not expecting it and then just watch what happens. Yeah. Yeah. Call me later. Okay. It'll be great.

[00:52:20] Emily Boyle: Well, thank you. Yes. Thank you. This podcast is for informational purposes only and should not be relied upon as a basis for investment decisions.

[00:52:29] Emily Boyle: The information is not an offer, solicitation or recommendation of any of the funds, services or products or to adopt any investment strategy. Investment values may fluctuate and past performance is not a guide to future performance. All opinions expressed by guests on the show are solely their own opinion and do not necessarily reflect those at their firm.

[00:52:49] Emily Boyle: Manager's appearance on the show does not constitute an endorsement by Stacey Havener or Havener Capital Partners.

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