Investment Product Videos Are Eating Your Lunch
Look, I'm going to be straight with you. If you're a financial advisor in South Africa and you're not making investment product videos, you're getting crushed. You just don't know it yet.
Your competitors are making videos. Your clients are watching videos. 82% of all consumer Internet traffic will be video by 2025. That's not a prediction anymore. That's your reality right now.
And you're still printing brochures.
Here's what's actually happening while you're perfecting your PowerPoint deck. Some advisor in Sandton is posting a two-minute video on LinkedIn explaining the difference between active and passive investing. It gets 500 views. Three people book consultations. Two become clients.
You spent the same two minutes explaining it to one person who forgot everything by the time they got to their car.
91% of businesses now use video marketing. You think that's a coincidence? You think all these companies just decided to waste money on cameras? They're doing it because it works. Period.
72% of businesses see good ROI from videos. That's not theory. That's math. But you're still "thinking about it" while your market share disappears.
I hear the same things every time. "I'm not good on camera." "It's too expensive." "My clients prefer face-to-face meetings." "I don't have time."
You know what all of those are? Excuses. And excuses don't grow businesses.
You're not good on camera? Practice. Record fifty videos on your phone. Delete forty-nine of them. Post the fiftieth one. Nobody's first video is good. Nobody cares. They care about the value you're giving them.
It's too expensive? Professional animated explainer videos cost between R30,000 and R250,000. Know what's actually expensive? Losing clients to advisors who communicate better than you. That's expensive. A video that costs R50,000 and brings in three new clients is the best money you'll ever spend.
Your clients prefer face-to-face? Cool. They also prefer watching Netflix to reading instruction manuals. They prefer Google Maps to printed directions. They prefer everything else in video format, but somehow financial advice is different? Come on.
You don't have time? You have time to explain the same thing to twenty different clients this month. Make one video. Send it to all twenty. Now you have time.
Here's what you do. Pick the three questions clients ask you most often. Record three videos answering those questions. Put them on your website, LinkedIn, and YouTube. Send them via WhatsApp, Africa's most widely used messaging app with the highest open rates.
That's it. That's the strategy.
Video one could be about retirement annuities. Video two about ETFs versus unit trusts. Video three about your advisory process. Simple. Clear. Valuable.
Live-action videos provide authenticity and relatability. People want to see your face. They want to hear your voice. They want to know you're a real person who cares about their money. Give them that.
Or go with animation if you're explaining complex stuff. Animated videos simplify complex topics through visual storytelling. How does compound interest work? Show it growing over time. How does diversification protect portfolios? Illustrate it. Make the invisible visible.
Simple videos cost R5,000 to R25,000. Professional ones run R25,000 to R75,000. That's nothing compared to what you charge in annual fees. Nothing.
Distribution Is Everything
Making the video is twenty percent. Getting it in front of people is eighty percent. Most advisors get this backwards. They spend months perfecting one video then post it once and wonder why nothing happens.
LinkedIn is best for B2B marketing and professional networking in financial services. Post there. YouTube is search. People are looking for answers right now. Be the answer. WhatsApp is personal. Send videos directly to clients who need them.
Email your database. Put videos on every service page of your website. Share them in your newsletter. Post them on Facebook. Create shorts for Instagram. Repurpose the same content across every platform your clients use.
One video becomes ten pieces of content. That's how you win.
The Truth About Your Competition
Over 1,500 funds exist in South Africa today. Your clients are drowning in options. Every advisor promises great returns. Every fund claims to be special. Everyone's qualified. Everyone's FAIS compliant. The FAIS Act requires qualified persons to render services and give advice.
So what makes you different? How do you stand out?
Video. That's how. Because most advisors still aren't doing it. They're talking about it. They're planning it. They're waiting for the perfect time. Meanwhile, the advisors who just started making videos six months ago are booking out their calendars.
The window is closing. Not in five years. Not next year. Now. Right now, while you're reading this, someone is watching a competitor's video instead of booking a meeting with you.
You have two choices. Start making investment product videos today, or keep doing what you've been doing and hope it keeps working.
Spoiler alert: it won't keep working.
The market doesn't care about your comfort zone. Your clients don't care that you're camera shy. They care about understanding their investments. They care about feeling confident in their decisions. They care about advisors who communicate in ways that make sense to them.
Video does that. Nothing else comes close.
You can wait until everyone's doing it. You can wait until it's "necessary" instead of just "smart." But then you're late. You're following. You're trying to catch up instead of leading.
Or you can start now. Make one video this week. It doesn't have to be perfect. It just has to exist. Then make another one next week. And another one the week after that.
In six months, you'll have twenty-five videos. Your competitors will still be thinking about it. Your clients will already know, like, and trust you before they ever walk into your office.
That's the difference between advisors who grow and advisors who survive.
Stop Reading and Start Recording
Seriously. Stop reading articles about video and go make a video. Pull out your phone. Record yourself explaining something. Anything. The basics of a retirement annuity. How you choose investments. Why diversification matters.
Post it. See what happens. Then do it again.
Investment product videos aren't coming. They're here. The question isn't whether you should make them. The question is how much business you're willing to lose while you keep avoiding them.
The answer better be none.