How'd you like to pay $0 in marketing costs for your next financial planning or insurance lead? That's right, no telemarketing costs incurred marketing to your existing client base or leads that you've paid for or clients that you've purchased.
Speaking of books of clients that you've purchased, just how much did you pay? A multiple of 2 times? 3 times? Surely not 3.5 times? In this market?
How'd you like to pay a multiple of 1 times for your next client base if not less?
This is the reality that financial planning and insurance professionals are creating for themselves by asking the right questions.
It is the people that they are posing these questions to that delivers this reality.
They are conversing with and engaging their existing client base.
Pay $0 for your next financial planning or insurance lead
Pick your top 25 clients and ask:
1) Who do they work for?
2) What community or social groups do they belong to?
3) Who do they employ?
4) Who are the related to?
Let's start with who do they work for or who do they employ.
If they are employers themselves - what about that pay packet they pay staff - (that their staff rely upon) - it can be taken away from that staff member in an instant should that person be unable to work due to illness or an accident away from the workplace. Is that something they as an employer thinks is in the interest of the well being of their staff and is a positive outcome? Of course not.
If they are employed. Contact that employer. Offer that employer a free statement of advice (financial plan/insurance recommendation). Why? So they can experience the service and outcomes that one of their staff has experienced. And upon experiencing the positive outcomes and process - should that not be something of value they could expose the remainder of their staff to?
Pay a multiple of $1 times for your next client base
Pick your top 25 clients and ask:
1) Who do they obtain accounting and business advice services from?
Contact the accountant and yes offer that accountant a free statement of advice (financial plan/insurance recommendation). Why? So they can experience the service and outcomes that one of their clients has experienced.
Maybe they won't buy in to that process that easily. No problem. Send them a sample statement of advice. Make sure it's one that aligns with the accountants niche (if they have one). Highlight in a cover letter / presentation the cross referral opportunities.
If you have constructed your statement of advice in the way we here at PCE have talked about (in our previous posts) then it's most probable they have not seen a document like it in the way it speaks and communicates to the client.
One business we know did just this.
A request came back from the accountant to takeup the free statement of advice. But it was not for the accountant. It was for the accountants mother.
Following the perparation of the statement of advice the recommendations were accepted and implemented. Within a short period of time (6 months) the accountant referred with such regularity that the main adviser based themselves out of the accountants office 2 days a week (7.30am until 5am) engaging with staff and clients.
That adviser now owns 50% of the accountancy practice (bought at 0.90 times).
All that by asking their top clients who did their tax.
Tuesday 27 March 2012
Sunday 25 March 2012
Greater Success And Sales Using Emotional Intelligence to Engage Staff and Clients
Research studies have related team performance and team characteristics to effective leadership behaviours.
These behaviours encompass emotional intelligence.
And emotional intelligence becomes then a precursor for the demonstration of transformational leadership.
The conclusions drawn then are that facets of brain dominance and emotional intelligence may be potentially useful predictors of transformational leadership behaviours.
So what is emotional intelligence?
Emotional intelligence is described by Herbst and Maree and again by Schelecter and Strauss as a cognitive ability that involves the processing of emotion.
Other models define emotional intelligence in terms of behaviours and skills, including stress management skills (such as stress tolerance and impulse control), self-management skills (such as self-control, conscientiousness and adaptability), as well as social skills (such as conflict management, leadership and communication).
Overall critical in understanding how effective a persons level of emotional intelligence is, is the requirement to understand how an individual perceives, understands, utilises and manages emotions.
Leadership comprises both intellectual and emotional facets and both these facets need to be attended to during the training of managers in order to equip them with sufficient leadership skills.
Transformational leadership behaviour has been found to be positively related to team-leader emotional intelligence and both these are said to be positively related to trust (both in the team leader and in team members) and to team commitment.
It seems that leaders are important creators and sustainers of the processes and dynamics responsible for effective teams.
So in the financial services world - effective client engagement and client servicing comes from having exceptional teams, team members and team dynamics that support a culture of ownership and empathy with the client.
Further the team needs to be crystal clear on the outcome that the business is creating for the client.
Without a leader that can define in client terms the vision for the business with a meaning and relevance that staff can not only believe in but share the vision and help create it - then the business is only positioning itself for transactions with clients and not transformations of clients and the business itself.
Businesses that are not defining a vision, purpose and message for clients, sharing that vision with staff and building capbilities to deliver on the promise may do well in the short term in transactional wins.
But the businesses such as industry funds and the major financial institutions that are shaping messages to win hearts and minds of clients will be the businesses that truly capture the attention and the longevity of client loyalty.
The longer they are able to do this, then the longer they will be able to build their capbilities further to provide true family advice, true intergenerational offerings that deliver on providing the unspoken needs of clients.
These behaviours encompass emotional intelligence.
And emotional intelligence becomes then a precursor for the demonstration of transformational leadership.
The conclusions drawn then are that facets of brain dominance and emotional intelligence may be potentially useful predictors of transformational leadership behaviours.
So what is emotional intelligence?
Emotional intelligence is described by Herbst and Maree and again by Schelecter and Strauss as a cognitive ability that involves the processing of emotion.
Other models define emotional intelligence in terms of behaviours and skills, including stress management skills (such as stress tolerance and impulse control), self-management skills (such as self-control, conscientiousness and adaptability), as well as social skills (such as conflict management, leadership and communication).
Overall critical in understanding how effective a persons level of emotional intelligence is, is the requirement to understand how an individual perceives, understands, utilises and manages emotions.
Leadership comprises both intellectual and emotional facets and both these facets need to be attended to during the training of managers in order to equip them with sufficient leadership skills.
Transformational leadership behaviour has been found to be positively related to team-leader emotional intelligence and both these are said to be positively related to trust (both in the team leader and in team members) and to team commitment.
It seems that leaders are important creators and sustainers of the processes and dynamics responsible for effective teams.
So in the financial services world - effective client engagement and client servicing comes from having exceptional teams, team members and team dynamics that support a culture of ownership and empathy with the client.
Further the team needs to be crystal clear on the outcome that the business is creating for the client.
Without a leader that can define in client terms the vision for the business with a meaning and relevance that staff can not only believe in but share the vision and help create it - then the business is only positioning itself for transactions with clients and not transformations of clients and the business itself.
Businesses that are not defining a vision, purpose and message for clients, sharing that vision with staff and building capbilities to deliver on the promise may do well in the short term in transactional wins.
But the businesses such as industry funds and the major financial institutions that are shaping messages to win hearts and minds of clients will be the businesses that truly capture the attention and the longevity of client loyalty.
The longer they are able to do this, then the longer they will be able to build their capbilities further to provide true family advice, true intergenerational offerings that deliver on providing the unspoken needs of clients.
Wednesday 21 March 2012
Low Emotional Intelligence = Low Client Advocacy
We are constantly surprised at how the good old sales skills of basic rapport have eluded some of the new entrants into the world of financial services incorporating financial planning and insurance strategy professionals.
What seems to generate ridicule and scepticism with this new breed is what any etiquette book or course will define as basic manners and what members of groups such as the Million Dollar Round Table will define as going deep with a client.
The old breed of salesperson formed deep engaging and long term relationships with clients. These relationships lasted years, they developed into friendships - lifelong and they were not only with the client but the clients family who invariably became clients as well.
We are floored when we hear advisers say "I don't think I need to do any of that client engagement stuff.....I just sell insurance".
Well sir, we shan't be buying it from you.
EI - the ability to know one's self and therefore the ability to place yourself in the other persons shoes, to control your emotions and manage theirs is a fundamental part of sales.
It's about connecting with values, beliefs and respecting them. It transforms relationships and creates advocacy.
This is about leadership.
We'll talk more about leadership and EI in coming posts and how it transforms teams, businesses and lives.
What seems to generate ridicule and scepticism with this new breed is what any etiquette book or course will define as basic manners and what members of groups such as the Million Dollar Round Table will define as going deep with a client.
The old breed of salesperson formed deep engaging and long term relationships with clients. These relationships lasted years, they developed into friendships - lifelong and they were not only with the client but the clients family who invariably became clients as well.
We are floored when we hear advisers say "I don't think I need to do any of that client engagement stuff.....I just sell insurance".
Well sir, we shan't be buying it from you.
EI - the ability to know one's self and therefore the ability to place yourself in the other persons shoes, to control your emotions and manage theirs is a fundamental part of sales.
It's about connecting with values, beliefs and respecting them. It transforms relationships and creates advocacy.
This is about leadership.
We'll talk more about leadership and EI in coming posts and how it transforms teams, businesses and lives.
Saturday 17 March 2012
$600K in lost super, ETF's, Julia as Morticia..and how advisers assist clients to live the dream
We've been travelling a lot lately and so this morning decided to flick through the last three weekend editions of the Australian Financial Review that we'd missed enjoying.
First priority; was to enter the competition to win a Mont Blanc watch; then cut out an article pointing to data indicating that young Americans are less interested in the environment, less energy conscious and less civil minded than their parents; another article on the mounting number of elections upcoming in the Eurozone; and finally the double page spread on self managed superannuation noting 33% of SMSF trustees were not using a financial advisers as the trustee thought they could do a better job of it themselves.....a point that was attempted to be underscored by the article about an Anglican vicar in Minister Shortens electorate who'd lost $600k in super after following advice.
But none of this (apart from the competition entry) got the blood flowing and more so the frustration building than the "theme" of each weekend.
March 3-4th.....risk appetite up and small caps the way to go
March 10-11th....economy is drowing and the worst week for 2012....time to go with ETF's as your strategy...eurozone looks to have settled
March 17-18th.....super funds overloaded with shares...so corporate bonds the way to go...oh that pesky eurozone with Greece jobless rates at record highs...but don't forget to get your Smart Invester magazine for the feature on the top 601....yes that..six hundred and one....suburbs for property.....
Now, we've always been contrarian investors....but schizophrenic...we are not.
The article reporting on and attacking advisers and fees (once again) contrasted with the change of tact in each weekly edition provides us with somewhat of a conundrum.
How is the average investor meant to succeed in developing, implementing, reviewing and adjusting a total financial planning solution including the foundations of asset protection (not a topic of any of the three editions mind you) when:
1) advice is lambasted as a waste of money or unreliable
2) "expert" opinion is poorly developed, researched and further a commentary on what's past rather than what awaits
3) stories of the need for advice and the positive lifechanging consequences of an advice relationship are not presented
Thank goodness for the watch competition and cartoons of Julia Gillard as Morticia to keep us amused.
The stories that need to be told that need to be written are those stories of:
1) advisers battling industry funds (pro bono mind you!) to provide decent and timely insurance payments to terminally ill members
2) advisers doing pro bono work for groups like the cancer council
3) advisers making a difference in the lives of clients by being advocates and friends during the claims process
4) advisers becoming the trusted family adviser as they work with multi-generations - supporting and facilitating entry into aged care facilities, handling the succession of family farms and businesses, providing the funds for childrens educations, assisting clients to pay down debts, to build for the futurem to start a family to......live their dreams.
Where are those stories?
Those stories are held in the hearts and minds of the too few of the public who get financial advice. Swayed from seeking advice by a focus on the few bad apples reported over and over and over again long after the damage is done. These stories are held in the businesses who deliver value everyday to their clients and do it quietly without fanfare and without the need to publicly seek kudos.
But these stories need to be told. Now is the time to tell your story. Tell it to your clients, get yor clients to tell it. Tell it to your AFSL licensee and let them publicise it. Tell it to your product providers. Tell it to your MP.
Advisers facilitate the dreams of their clients WHEN they understand what it is that is important to the client - what drives them and what it means to the client to live well and look after their family.
Advisers who do this and who truly understand what it means to provide solutions that have relevance and meaning shoudl be lauded.
We hope that in upcoming editions of the weekend AFR, we get to read those stories.
First priority; was to enter the competition to win a Mont Blanc watch; then cut out an article pointing to data indicating that young Americans are less interested in the environment, less energy conscious and less civil minded than their parents; another article on the mounting number of elections upcoming in the Eurozone; and finally the double page spread on self managed superannuation noting 33% of SMSF trustees were not using a financial advisers as the trustee thought they could do a better job of it themselves.....a point that was attempted to be underscored by the article about an Anglican vicar in Minister Shortens electorate who'd lost $600k in super after following advice.
But none of this (apart from the competition entry) got the blood flowing and more so the frustration building than the "theme" of each weekend.
March 3-4th.....risk appetite up and small caps the way to go
March 10-11th....economy is drowing and the worst week for 2012....time to go with ETF's as your strategy...eurozone looks to have settled
March 17-18th.....super funds overloaded with shares...so corporate bonds the way to go...oh that pesky eurozone with Greece jobless rates at record highs...but don't forget to get your Smart Invester magazine for the feature on the top 601....yes that..six hundred and one....suburbs for property.....
Now, we've always been contrarian investors....but schizophrenic...we are not.
The article reporting on and attacking advisers and fees (once again) contrasted with the change of tact in each weekly edition provides us with somewhat of a conundrum.
How is the average investor meant to succeed in developing, implementing, reviewing and adjusting a total financial planning solution including the foundations of asset protection (not a topic of any of the three editions mind you) when:
1) advice is lambasted as a waste of money or unreliable
2) "expert" opinion is poorly developed, researched and further a commentary on what's past rather than what awaits
3) stories of the need for advice and the positive lifechanging consequences of an advice relationship are not presented
Thank goodness for the watch competition and cartoons of Julia Gillard as Morticia to keep us amused.
The stories that need to be told that need to be written are those stories of:
1) advisers battling industry funds (pro bono mind you!) to provide decent and timely insurance payments to terminally ill members
2) advisers doing pro bono work for groups like the cancer council
3) advisers making a difference in the lives of clients by being advocates and friends during the claims process
4) advisers becoming the trusted family adviser as they work with multi-generations - supporting and facilitating entry into aged care facilities, handling the succession of family farms and businesses, providing the funds for childrens educations, assisting clients to pay down debts, to build for the futurem to start a family to......live their dreams.
Where are those stories?
Those stories are held in the hearts and minds of the too few of the public who get financial advice. Swayed from seeking advice by a focus on the few bad apples reported over and over and over again long after the damage is done. These stories are held in the businesses who deliver value everyday to their clients and do it quietly without fanfare and without the need to publicly seek kudos.
But these stories need to be told. Now is the time to tell your story. Tell it to your clients, get yor clients to tell it. Tell it to your AFSL licensee and let them publicise it. Tell it to your product providers. Tell it to your MP.
Advisers facilitate the dreams of their clients WHEN they understand what it is that is important to the client - what drives them and what it means to the client to live well and look after their family.
Advisers who do this and who truly understand what it means to provide solutions that have relevance and meaning shoudl be lauded.
We hope that in upcoming editions of the weekend AFR, we get to read those stories.
Friday 16 March 2012
The question you need to ask your clients.
We've been lucky enough over the last few weeks to sit down with - financial advisers, leaders of advice groups, industry fund executives and insurance and financial services investment and insurance providers.
The themes that emerge have been consistent.
1) A lack of the number and quality of referrals coming into a financial planning and insurance business from both within the existing client base and from centres of influence.
2) An unhealthy focus on FOFA reforms in regard to the negative perceptions of an onerous imposition in process and in economic terms on financial advisers, dealer groups and planning practices.
3) An admission that industry funds spend very very little - in fact no time - on worring about what retail funds and retail advisers, IFA's are doing.
4) That capturing hearts and minds of clients and engaging with them with that as the focus is the key to success.
IFA's for the most part are (and this is a broad generalisation but one based on 24 years of observation) are asking the wrong questions and focussing on the wrong skills.
We hear comments like:
- we ask for referrals but we don't get any
- i've asked my clients to call me once a year for a review to check in but no-one ever calls
- clients are not interested in what we deliver - they do not see it as part of their lives
- the problem is the clients not us
Does anyone need a mirror here to stand in front of??????
If you want to capture hearts and minds and have a committed growing appreciative client base that provides countless referrals then you need to educate clients, provide them options and connect your solutions to their lives.
And yes PCE have created a range of engagement tools and processes to enable you to do this.
But at the risk of just making things simple for you, here's all you need to do.
The Question
Mr and Mrs Client......what does living well and looking after your family mean to you?
....tell me more.....
....go on....
....how would that make you feel.....
....how would that change things....
...if that happened then what.....
Do you get the picture?
And then......that's what we do here Mr and Mrs Client, our entire business is built on the promise that we create solutions to maximise the possibility that our clients can live well and look after their families.
We have seen this simple question and simple pitch transform businesses into ones that have engaged, attracted and retained clients that are appreciative and willing to pay for services that they see and understand are connected to the way they want to live their lives.
The themes that emerge have been consistent.
1) A lack of the number and quality of referrals coming into a financial planning and insurance business from both within the existing client base and from centres of influence.
2) An unhealthy focus on FOFA reforms in regard to the negative perceptions of an onerous imposition in process and in economic terms on financial advisers, dealer groups and planning practices.
3) An admission that industry funds spend very very little - in fact no time - on worring about what retail funds and retail advisers, IFA's are doing.
4) That capturing hearts and minds of clients and engaging with them with that as the focus is the key to success.
IFA's for the most part are (and this is a broad generalisation but one based on 24 years of observation) are asking the wrong questions and focussing on the wrong skills.
We hear comments like:
- we ask for referrals but we don't get any
- i've asked my clients to call me once a year for a review to check in but no-one ever calls
- clients are not interested in what we deliver - they do not see it as part of their lives
- the problem is the clients not us
Does anyone need a mirror here to stand in front of??????
If you want to capture hearts and minds and have a committed growing appreciative client base that provides countless referrals then you need to educate clients, provide them options and connect your solutions to their lives.
And yes PCE have created a range of engagement tools and processes to enable you to do this.
But at the risk of just making things simple for you, here's all you need to do.
The Question
Mr and Mrs Client......what does living well and looking after your family mean to you?
....tell me more.....
....go on....
....how would that make you feel.....
....how would that change things....
...if that happened then what.....
Do you get the picture?
And then......that's what we do here Mr and Mrs Client, our entire business is built on the promise that we create solutions to maximise the possibility that our clients can live well and look after their families.
We have seen this simple question and simple pitch transform businesses into ones that have engaged, attracted and retained clients that are appreciative and willing to pay for services that they see and understand are connected to the way they want to live their lives.
Wednesday 14 March 2012
Minister Shorten Extends FOFA Implementation - Don't Wait - Get the Competitive Edge!
Time to wake up people and set yourself for unprecedented success!
If Minister Shortens announcement of the delayed mandatory implementation to 2013 brings you - Sighs of relief - A jump of the wagon on the way to the gallows - The breathing space you required........then you need to get a move on and embrace this as the best opportunity you have to take a giant leap ahead of your competitors.
Now is the time like never before in your financial planning/financial services business to take this advantage - this gift and run hard with it.
You NEED TO:
1) Build you vision of your ideal business model
2) Share that with your staff and stakeholders (key referrers and your "A" clients)
3) Build your capabilities to deliver
4) Craft your story - your pitch
5) Develop the core engagement questions that will reveal hidden opportunities with clients and prospects
6) Positively engage clients with a visual process in your first two interviews
7) Develop the mechanism to deliver your clients options via education
8) Build the components within your business to deliver on 4 drive theory - acquire, learn, bond and defend
9) Communicate this with your clients in a launch
10) Through these launches - recruit their family and social circle to your offer and importantly your articulation of what it is that you do - it needs to be memorable and repeatable
11) Use the PCE family tree discussion
If you do all of this, your competitors will not catch you in 2013 - it's likely you will have bought their business or their clients would have already found you.
Get set for the PCE book - the step by step guide on implementing your post FOFA vision.
If Minister Shortens announcement of the delayed mandatory implementation to 2013 brings you - Sighs of relief - A jump of the wagon on the way to the gallows - The breathing space you required........then you need to get a move on and embrace this as the best opportunity you have to take a giant leap ahead of your competitors.
Now is the time like never before in your financial planning/financial services business to take this advantage - this gift and run hard with it.
You NEED TO:
1) Build you vision of your ideal business model
2) Share that with your staff and stakeholders (key referrers and your "A" clients)
3) Build your capabilities to deliver
4) Craft your story - your pitch
5) Develop the core engagement questions that will reveal hidden opportunities with clients and prospects
6) Positively engage clients with a visual process in your first two interviews
7) Develop the mechanism to deliver your clients options via education
8) Build the components within your business to deliver on 4 drive theory - acquire, learn, bond and defend
9) Communicate this with your clients in a launch
10) Through these launches - recruit their family and social circle to your offer and importantly your articulation of what it is that you do - it needs to be memorable and repeatable
11) Use the PCE family tree discussion
If you do all of this, your competitors will not catch you in 2013 - it's likely you will have bought their business or their clients would have already found you.
Get set for the PCE book - the step by step guide on implementing your post FOFA vision.
Monday 12 March 2012
Stuck in the 1950's? Marketing in the new world.
Is your financial planning / insurance solution business stuck in the 1950's?
Back in the 1950's, the consumer, was seen as uninformed and not cogniscant of their needs. So they had to be educated or rather sold to. Marketing was in fact a sales function. The white shoes brigade was in full force.
It's ironic that governments around the world have revived this thinking adapting policy to the lowest common denominator and legislating for the uniformed and providing what is in fact a financial planning, insurance and superannuation "nursery" - where rather than educating, informing and engaging with choices - the legislation plans to provide pigeon holes for the uninformed - they will be "sold" something as the wonder cure.
This 1950's doctrine just does not work in todays modern world.
The new focus is about building long term bonds with clients. It is all about an exchange. Services in exchange for information and that is a two way street with customers more involved in your business planning that ever before. In fact they are critical stakeholders in your businesses and your business development and ever changing business value proposition.
This new way of operating allows for personalising and tailoring your proposition for each client - true one-to-one marketing.
The leaders in this type of marketing are household names as well as the band of independent financial advisers IFA's that adopt this methodology and personalise statements of advice for each unique client - true one to one marketing.
It's odd then that the barriers to dealing with IFA's are being raised so much so that the people who need assistance and tailoring the most will be priced out of dealing with IFA's and rather have to accept a one size fits all dumbed down version of advice.
Our advice is then:
- tailor your offer
- build scaleable solutions
- operate in multiple markets
- build tiers of advice in your business
- utilise technology to engage clients face to face and importantly online
This way what consumers need - advice, options, mutiple methods of engagement can still be the choice of the consumer and your business can be the one to benefit from that choice.
Referrence: Marketing, Real People Real Choices, Solomon, Huges et al
Back in the 1950's, the consumer, was seen as uninformed and not cogniscant of their needs. So they had to be educated or rather sold to. Marketing was in fact a sales function. The white shoes brigade was in full force.
It's ironic that governments around the world have revived this thinking adapting policy to the lowest common denominator and legislating for the uniformed and providing what is in fact a financial planning, insurance and superannuation "nursery" - where rather than educating, informing and engaging with choices - the legislation plans to provide pigeon holes for the uninformed - they will be "sold" something as the wonder cure.
This 1950's doctrine just does not work in todays modern world.
The new focus is about building long term bonds with clients. It is all about an exchange. Services in exchange for information and that is a two way street with customers more involved in your business planning that ever before. In fact they are critical stakeholders in your businesses and your business development and ever changing business value proposition.
This new way of operating allows for personalising and tailoring your proposition for each client - true one-to-one marketing.
The leaders in this type of marketing are household names as well as the band of independent financial advisers IFA's that adopt this methodology and personalise statements of advice for each unique client - true one to one marketing.
It's odd then that the barriers to dealing with IFA's are being raised so much so that the people who need assistance and tailoring the most will be priced out of dealing with IFA's and rather have to accept a one size fits all dumbed down version of advice.
Our advice is then:
- tailor your offer
- build scaleable solutions
- operate in multiple markets
- build tiers of advice in your business
- utilise technology to engage clients face to face and importantly online
This way what consumers need - advice, options, mutiple methods of engagement can still be the choice of the consumer and your business can be the one to benefit from that choice.
Referrence: Marketing, Real People Real Choices, Solomon, Huges et al
Thursday 8 March 2012
Are you ready for the financial planning "value" conversation
One of the most transformational conversations we believe you can have with a client is the "so what" conversation.
In that very first interview, the first engagement with a client when they are about to lay down all their financial paperwork and you are tempted to start copying and documenting the information into your client fact find.....STOP.
Why is any of this important? Why does it matter?
And yes, you actually need to ask the client these questions.
What do you mean they ask, I'm here to consolidate some superannuation.....
Yes, but why does that matter. So what? How is that going to change your life and which aspects of your life will that impact on? And what are the positives and negatives that you can think of for a good outcome and a bad outcome respectively.
And in that dialogue that follows you have engaged the client on what matters most to them. What is important to them and why.
We have had the fortunate pleasure of hearing Simon Wallace from AXA speak over the last two days and he posed the question that "are advisers ready for the value conversation?" When they get the call from the client "you've charged me $x thousand for your service over the last year....I can't see the value"......are advisers ready for that conversation?
If they have engaged the client on what it is that truly matters, if they have sat back from the financial fact find, sat back from the strategy and simply asked...so what? And then they have had the dialogue with the client to deep dive into the answer. And if they have documented that in the advice document and refer back to it, remind them and further they have systemised and industrialised the positive engagement that resonates with the client .......then yes they'll be ready....but they won't have to be, because the clients will not be questioning the value in the first place.
In that very first interview, the first engagement with a client when they are about to lay down all their financial paperwork and you are tempted to start copying and documenting the information into your client fact find.....STOP.
Why is any of this important? Why does it matter?
And yes, you actually need to ask the client these questions.
What do you mean they ask, I'm here to consolidate some superannuation.....
Yes, but why does that matter. So what? How is that going to change your life and which aspects of your life will that impact on? And what are the positives and negatives that you can think of for a good outcome and a bad outcome respectively.
And in that dialogue that follows you have engaged the client on what matters most to them. What is important to them and why.
We have had the fortunate pleasure of hearing Simon Wallace from AXA speak over the last two days and he posed the question that "are advisers ready for the value conversation?" When they get the call from the client "you've charged me $x thousand for your service over the last year....I can't see the value"......are advisers ready for that conversation?
If they have engaged the client on what it is that truly matters, if they have sat back from the financial fact find, sat back from the strategy and simply asked...so what? And then they have had the dialogue with the client to deep dive into the answer. And if they have documented that in the advice document and refer back to it, remind them and further they have systemised and industrialised the positive engagement that resonates with the client .......then yes they'll be ready....but they won't have to be, because the clients will not be questioning the value in the first place.
Thursday 1 March 2012
How to positively change your world in 2012
So as we draw close to the next stage of Positive Client Engagement - the specific tools and processes (including process maps) to develop, launch, implement and maintain the positive client philosophy and grow your financial planning and insurance business it is important to understand that one of the critical things you need to change in your business is....you.
This means adopting some key behaviours and processes in how you manage yourself and mentor your staff.
1) Set your success goal
The need for setting goals to aim for and measure yourself again is critical. Just as you need to coach your clients towards the ideal of success for them, you need to to design what success looks like for you.
2) Develop your networks
Nowadays people link through networks more than ever through the speed and depth that technology caters for. How you manage, contribute and participate in networks is crucial. Diary management and setting aside time to network is a success strategy that with only as little as 2 hours per week can build your networks exponentially.
3) Get your own success coach
If olympic atheletes at the peak of their prowess, tennis players at the height of their career seek out coaches - why are you any different? A mentor/coach/professional business consultant is someone to challenge, guide and keep you accountable to the promises you make to yourself and are a vital element of your success plan.
4) Understand yourself
This means assessing yourself, having other assess you and all in all means developing your emotional intelligence and capacity to become a transformational leader.
5) Understand your skills and capabilities
Conducting an audit on yourself and importantly on what it is that empowers and motivates you delivers the will and the attitude and focus that you will need to deliver on your success plan.
In our next series of posts we will take all the discussions so far from Positive Client Engagement and walk you through the process of engaging your clients in real life scenarios.
This means adopting some key behaviours and processes in how you manage yourself and mentor your staff.
1) Set your success goal
The need for setting goals to aim for and measure yourself again is critical. Just as you need to coach your clients towards the ideal of success for them, you need to to design what success looks like for you.
2) Develop your networks
Nowadays people link through networks more than ever through the speed and depth that technology caters for. How you manage, contribute and participate in networks is crucial. Diary management and setting aside time to network is a success strategy that with only as little as 2 hours per week can build your networks exponentially.
3) Get your own success coach
If olympic atheletes at the peak of their prowess, tennis players at the height of their career seek out coaches - why are you any different? A mentor/coach/professional business consultant is someone to challenge, guide and keep you accountable to the promises you make to yourself and are a vital element of your success plan.
4) Understand yourself
This means assessing yourself, having other assess you and all in all means developing your emotional intelligence and capacity to become a transformational leader.
5) Understand your skills and capabilities
Conducting an audit on yourself and importantly on what it is that empowers and motivates you delivers the will and the attitude and focus that you will need to deliver on your success plan.
In our next series of posts we will take all the discussions so far from Positive Client Engagement and walk you through the process of engaging your clients in real life scenarios.
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