Financial Advisor Website Showcase: Cornerstone Wealth Consulting Services, LLC

1. To start, can you tell us more about Cornerstone Wealth Consulting Services and give us some background behind the name of your firm?

Cornerstone Wealth Consulting Services, LLC is an independent and privately-owned business consulting firm dedicated to helping contractors build wealth and protect their family business. 

To provide a quick synopsis, our vision is to help revolutionize how contractors and their family businesses are served by the financial services industry.

• I have always used some variation of the name as a d/b/a and served this niche over the course of my career, so the name just felt right.
• In Construction, when a building goes up, putting in the cornerstone is a big deal and people celebrate, it is the foundation of the building.
• From a business aspect, cornerstone means “adding value” to the company, customers, and clients and producing quality products and services.

Right on our website, we have our values-based approach and I felt it was important to incorporate that to show that providing our clients with value is at the “core of our services.” We work with our clients to help identify their values and determine if their behavior is aligned with what is truly important in their lives. 

We do so much more that goes beyond traditional investment and wealth management, so I felt Wealth Consulting Services was an appropriate fit over the alternative wealth management firm.

2.You serve an incredibly unique niche, the construction industry and their families, which is great as we often tell advisors the importance of narrowing down the audience that they serve. Could you tell us more about how you decided to serve this niche and how you go about tailoring your marketing strategies to better connect with those in the construction field?

I come from a long line of family-owned construction owner companies, and in fact, I went to a technical high school and studied masonry. So, I combined my understanding of the construction industry and family business with my experience of helping family-owned and closely-held businesses to grow, protect and preserve their investments, income, human capital and the enterprise value of their business.

3.Integrating technology into your website is crucial for marketing purposes and lead generation. What’s in your tech stack today for your business and what could you absolutely not function without?

My tech stack currently includes: 

• Wealthbox CRM
• Mailchimp
• AdvicePay
• Riskalyze
• Asset-Map

I don’t think I could absolutely function without WealthBox, MailChimp, and Asset Map.

When I come across a new prospect, I immediately put them in my Wealthbox CRM and from there I send them to Mailchimp to include them in my drip marketing strategy which includes newsletters, blogs and other company news. It may be three weeks, three months or three years before that prospect decides that now is the right time to book a discovery meeting.

From there, once the meeting discovery meeting is underway, I send them into my Asset-Map software from WealthBox, I then use Asset-Map as a tool for data gathering and discussion during the discovery meeting and as a starting page for the financial plan. 

I see these three pieces of tech as complementary rather than differing pieces.  And as noted above, Mailchimp integrates seamlessly with my CRM provider Wealthbox and is easy to use itself. Additionally, Wealthbox seamlessly integrates with my financial planning provider, Asset-Map.

As you can probably tell, the integration of software providers is an important theme in my product and vendor selection and it should be for yours when you set up your independent firm.

4. We love the unique rotating graphics just below the fold on your homepage that illustrate the goals your team helps clients achieve. How did you work alongside your Twenty Over Ten designer to decide what features and graphics to include in your new site like this?

Honestly, that was all the work of the outstanding Twenty Over Ten design team. My intent was to be very niche specific and create a seamless experience, and have a website easy to navigate, with strong calls-to-action for organic growth. I couldn’t be happier with the design and outcome, and Twenty Over Ten certainly exceeded expectations.

5. Consistently blogging is a great way to drive traffic to your website and show that you are a thought-leader in the industry, and even though your website just launched in March, you already got a head start – great job! Can you tell us more about your content strategy and any plans that you have for the future in terms of your schedule and the topics that you choose?

I start off every morning trying to find or create my own, interesting content to share and try to post a blog article at least once a week. Sharing content consistently and that is intentional to my niche, has really worked well for me, so I try to keep the topics that choose specifically to my business owner market.

6. Being active on social media is crucial to growing your online presence and marketing strategy, and we noticed that you are active on the big three – Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter. Can you elaborate on your social media strategy and discuss how it has helped your firm to grow?

Once I post a blog article from my website, I then push it out to all three of my company’s social media profiles and stories. From there, I will then go in and share the content from my personal social media profile, and now with the ability to share post to your story on LinkedIn, I will take a screenshot of my post on Facebook and then share that to my LinkedIn and Instagram stories, as well. 

I do not use Instagram for business (per see), but with this platform, I try to drive traffic back to my website through my linktree link. With this,  I strategically have a link for my company website, but also to “latest blog” articles which essentially also drives views to my website. 

An additional step that I take in my social media strategy is creating video content, which I like to keep short and simple. My strategy is really designed around promoting our latest blog article where I will then shoot a quick video making people aware that I recently just posted a new article and where to find that article. And if I think the article really relates to anyone, in particular, I will send the video making them aware of the article via:

• Email
• Direct Message
• Text Message

I see this strategy growing in the future by creating a video series of super short/quick videos that touch on the main points of the content.

7. We noticed that you are using our one-click integration with Calendly, which is great for lead generation! Have you found success in getting more free consultations booked by using this scheduler?

I just launched in March, so I am still creating awareness. I can say this though, the Calendly integration is just awesome! It is so easy to use, and the experience is seamless which was my intention for my site design. I do love the client experience it creates and anticipate it to be very beneficial.

8. What is the best piece of advice that you have ever received that have been able to apply to your business goals and development?

Early on in my career, I had a sales manager who said to me, to be successful you must do what you’re afraid to do. The more we face what we perceive to be scary, the less scary it becomes because we learn that the fear was only ever in our minds.

So, for a new advisor in the business, it’s picking up the phone for the first time and calling that new prospect you were referred to. 

For our clients, It’s hard to have a difficult conversation, but avoiding it only makes the situation worse. It’s scary to be vulnerable and say how you really feel, but this helps you to build authentic relationships.

9. Where do you see your firm in the next five years? Do you have any particular marketing and growth goals for your business in the future?

With the clarity of mindset, vision, and perspective I have, my goal this year was to start and grow a wildly profitable and fulfilling six-figure business consulting practice. And in the next five years, I want to grow my six-figure practice into a seven-figure business by leveraging sales systems, building a team and marketing mayhem.