This week, Kitces.com released its 2024 marketing study, “How Financial Planners Actually Market Their Services.” Since it's unlikely most people will read all 108 pages of the study, I thought I would highlight some key points of interest over the next few weeks. For this week, here are some key numbers:

• The median acquisition cost per client in 2023 was $3,800, a 75% increase since their 2021 study (Page 7).

• New client growth slowed from 10.6% in 2021 to 8.6% in 2023 (Page 7).

• Marketing expenditures for a typical high-growth practice were 12.5% of revenue (including both soft labor costs and hard dollar costs), whereas their peers spent 9.7% (Page 9).

• High-growth advisors commit 15% of each work week to marketing activities, compared to 10% for other advisors (Page 9).

These numbers suggest that marketing is becoming more expensive and less effective. However, those who are seeing the most success are the ones spending more time and money on marketing.

Read the entire study here.