We had a great conversation today with an adviser who posed the question : what have financial planning businesses done to be successful with social media and has that activity generated business?
We see many advisers who have dabbled.
They have a twitter account, Facebook - but it's not a business site more an extension of their social world and blended with clients often it's happened very much by accident, they have a linked in profile and sometimes they've written an article on financial planning and posted it on a company site and perhaps tweeted it.
Maybe they've been a little bit more advanced and using Hootesuite that blog has been tweeted and made its way to Facebook, where it's scored some likes.
What next?
The question: "what next" is actually the wrong question...."what should I do first" is the right way to go.
Lon Safko, The Fusion Marketing Bible, 2013, discusses the three major tools of social media, what he calls "the Trinity" - blogging, micro blogging and social networks.
Blogging is vital as not only does it improve SEO results but provided your content is what your desired audience values then you hit the mark as becoming someone trusted and regarded as a subject matter expert.
Directing people to your blog via Twitter espouses Safko, works provided you have great content and content that is original or adds value. Retweets and tweets about articles might provide information to your followers but for originality or interpretation and WIFM why wouldn't they go direct to the original authors?
Either by making your content original or actually writing an opinion piece on a topic that is relevant to your target audience that actually adds value by making it easier for them to understand a topic makes you ...useful....followable.
Finally all this activity is great but pointless unless you can generate a community that you can engage, share with, bond with, consult and learn about - then you don't have a base to build your business from.
So actually the first step is to decide ....who is your market? Where do they congregate? What do they follow? What are they interested in? What are the concerns they have?
It's about listening. In the Hypersocial Organisation, Gossieaux and Moran gave countless examples of corporations listening first to their target market before engaging successfully versus those who embarked on a social media strategy that was quickly seen as a marketing push.
Demonstrating that you care, understand, empathise and share similar values to your target market are critical factors in successfully engaging them to use your services.
It has to be genuine else it is easily seen through.
So the answer to the question posed?
Businesses in financial planning that have successfully used social media have:
- listened to what their clients and people like their clients want
- they have created original content based on those insights
- they have communicated that content via blogging and micro blogging
- they have engaged their followers via Facebook - appropriately separated from their personal page - and twitter
- they follow people who can add value to thier target market and to their own business
- they have engaged their followers by doing what social media is designed for : communicating and engaging
- they then have offered face to face group engagements on the topics that generate a buzz
- they have attracted friends of followers
- they are consequently seen as leaders, opinion leaders, subject matter experts....someone who can be trusted ......
- they collaborate and contribute
And by doing this they have built loyalty and their business.
Thursday, 13 December 2012
Friday, 7 December 2012
Do you - have a claims service?
When the rubber hits the road - that promise - when your client first took out their policy for be it life, total disablement, critical illness (trauma cover) or income protection - that promise that sadly for your client now, they or their family need you to deliver on.
That worst case scenario now facing them, is your moment the true test of your business.
What do you do? What are you prepared to do? Are you prepared?
This can not be an administrative process. This is a human interaction that transcends your other client engagement protocols.
Are you prepared?
Do you have at your disposal :
- committed empathetic staff
- people trained to deal with grief
- a process of engagement
- a network of specialists: counsellors, physical therapists, builders, car services, food delivery, florists, child minders, caterers, doctors, handymen services, travel agents
- what can you deploy immediately to help your client with whatever they need
- can you anticipate and deliver
- do you want to?
And that last question is key.
Claims take an enormous commitment from an advice business. Complicated claims can focus the business on nothing else and so we can understand why some businesses are moving to a fee for service for claims management.
But what is claims management?
Is it simply getting the money to the client as quickly as possible?
Many would argue that yes that is the purpose.
For us that is the minimum. And if that is what you are planning on charging for.....well we want to say shame on you ....but we do get business...we've been there....we've experienced dealing with claims.....but we always wanted to do so much more.
To be that central hub, to organise all of the things our clients need to get better, to recover, to get through the grief, to deal with the loss, to share the time left with a loved one.
Our promise to clients is to provide the financial framework for them to live their dreams and to support that with a back up plan in the worst case scenario.
Should not then the promise be to deliver as many of those dreams as possible perhaps as merely being a facilitator - and sometimes being so much more.
What sort of claims service do you want to provide?
That worst case scenario now facing them, is your moment the true test of your business.
What do you do? What are you prepared to do? Are you prepared?
This can not be an administrative process. This is a human interaction that transcends your other client engagement protocols.
Are you prepared?
Do you have at your disposal :
- committed empathetic staff
- people trained to deal with grief
- a process of engagement
- a network of specialists: counsellors, physical therapists, builders, car services, food delivery, florists, child minders, caterers, doctors, handymen services, travel agents
- what can you deploy immediately to help your client with whatever they need
- can you anticipate and deliver
- do you want to?
And that last question is key.
Claims take an enormous commitment from an advice business. Complicated claims can focus the business on nothing else and so we can understand why some businesses are moving to a fee for service for claims management.
But what is claims management?
Is it simply getting the money to the client as quickly as possible?
Many would argue that yes that is the purpose.
For us that is the minimum. And if that is what you are planning on charging for.....well we want to say shame on you ....but we do get business...we've been there....we've experienced dealing with claims.....but we always wanted to do so much more.
To be that central hub, to organise all of the things our clients need to get better, to recover, to get through the grief, to deal with the loss, to share the time left with a loved one.
Our promise to clients is to provide the financial framework for them to live their dreams and to support that with a back up plan in the worst case scenario.
Should not then the promise be to deliver as many of those dreams as possible perhaps as merely being a facilitator - and sometimes being so much more.
What sort of claims service do you want to provide?
Tuesday, 4 December 2012
How to Sell Insurance For Children
Selling child trauma cover : an insurance option under a policy for a parent - that provides a payment should that child be diagnosed or suffer from a specific listed event must be a really hard thing to sell.
We have to believe that because we are told constantly by advisers that they find it a hard conversation to start with parents.
We have to believe that because when we look at the data : the number of policies that have child trauma attached is incredibly low : single digits in percentage terms.
Yet when we look at our own families surely we acknowledge that were anything to happen to our children we would as parents want to be there by their side.
We acknowledge that to be able to do that for however long their recovery takes will require financial adjustment.
We take out insurance on our children not to profit but to be able to fulfil the promise of parenthood - to be there for our children.
Why then is so little of it sold?
We have forgotten to share our values with our clients. And in doing so we have not connected to their values that are a mirror of ours. Of course they would want to be there for their children. It is the professional advisers job to facilitate that opportunity for them.
All that is required then is to share your values and beliefs and your action with a client.
An adviser dear to us, tells of how she sells child trauma insurance to every parent every time.
She tells them that if anything happened to her child she knows where she would rather be and she has arranged the method to allow that to happen.
Her clients acknowledge that choice as completely rational. They agree with it. They share that value and belief.
Why does this adviser do it? Because one day her daughter came home distraught that a school friend had been diagnosed with cancer. There was a physical and emotional battle about to start for that child and that family. There was also a financial battle.
For that reason this adviser tells her clients that she knows where she would want to be.
For that reason every recommendation includes child trauma. There is no need to go into micro detail about the policy.
The positioning is simply:
- tell the client what you have done for your own children and why
- they will agree with what you have done : sometimes with just a nod of agreement sometimes with an emphatic "oh yes, I'd want that too"
- then when you present your recommendation you simply say and I have included childrens trauma because I want you to be able to make the same choices I can make and so you can be there for your children too
At about $10 per $10,000 of cover, I do not know a parent who would opt out of covering their child for an appropriate level of cover at what amounts to essentially a cup of coffee a week per child.
We have to believe that because we are told constantly by advisers that they find it a hard conversation to start with parents.
We have to believe that because when we look at the data : the number of policies that have child trauma attached is incredibly low : single digits in percentage terms.
Yet when we look at our own families surely we acknowledge that were anything to happen to our children we would as parents want to be there by their side.
We acknowledge that to be able to do that for however long their recovery takes will require financial adjustment.
We take out insurance on our children not to profit but to be able to fulfil the promise of parenthood - to be there for our children.
Why then is so little of it sold?
We have forgotten to share our values with our clients. And in doing so we have not connected to their values that are a mirror of ours. Of course they would want to be there for their children. It is the professional advisers job to facilitate that opportunity for them.
All that is required then is to share your values and beliefs and your action with a client.
An adviser dear to us, tells of how she sells child trauma insurance to every parent every time.
She tells them that if anything happened to her child she knows where she would rather be and she has arranged the method to allow that to happen.
Her clients acknowledge that choice as completely rational. They agree with it. They share that value and belief.
Why does this adviser do it? Because one day her daughter came home distraught that a school friend had been diagnosed with cancer. There was a physical and emotional battle about to start for that child and that family. There was also a financial battle.
For that reason this adviser tells her clients that she knows where she would want to be.
For that reason every recommendation includes child trauma. There is no need to go into micro detail about the policy.
The positioning is simply:
- tell the client what you have done for your own children and why
- they will agree with what you have done : sometimes with just a nod of agreement sometimes with an emphatic "oh yes, I'd want that too"
- then when you present your recommendation you simply say and I have included childrens trauma because I want you to be able to make the same choices I can make and so you can be there for your children too
At about $10 per $10,000 of cover, I do not know a parent who would opt out of covering their child for an appropriate level of cover at what amounts to essentially a cup of coffee a week per child.
Friday, 30 November 2012
Plan for 2013 - taking time out, to move ahead - power of mental replenishment
It's been a busy period for PCE and the to do list is longer than ever as plans are put in place for 2013.
The plans are expansive, ambitious and on first glance the biggest concern is how will we get all of this done?
Clearly careful structuring and utilisation of time are required. But critically PCE just needs to get it done - to be aggressive with action and push through any inertia slowing momentum.
In the run up though as PCE reflected on each day one thing was apparent - a demeanour that was stressed - hardly a positive disposition - the impact on PCE was palpable but the message that sends to clients is equally as destructive.
For the first time in 5 months then, PCE took a time out. It was a client event, but it was designed to take time out. The format was a pleasure cruise, a swim, good food and great company.
We laughed, took of our serious hats, talked some business but with a light heartedness that not only carried through the day but was taken home by PCE. Later that evening PCE quipped "Look I've had a hard day - I spent all day on a boat - I'm really tired" - and that brought the roar of laughter it was intended to from children and adults and the mood was infectious.
The lightness of being continued and as "so you think you can dance" screened, PCE performed an impromptu contemporary routine to the opening credits - all captured on an I Phone for future blackmailing.
What's my point?
You can not run at full speed all the time and expect your internal engine both mental and physical to operate without damage.
As Coach Carter says " a little gas....a little brake".....you have to be ready but replenishment of mind, body and spirit, provides that clarity of thought that actually provides for progress.
The Energy Project and their work " The Way We're Working Isn't Working" is all about replenishment and maximising working with your rhythms.
There is no sustainable rhythm to working in a highly stressed physical and mental state.
So as you plan for 2013 - take a pause - surround yourself with those in your business world who can contribute and support and collaborate with you in 2013 - but take business of the agenda - talk, laugh, share - and watch your mood and positivity for the year ahead move to the achievement zone.
The clarity you will obtain will make those plans sharper, the solutions clearer and the road ahead will in your mind straighten, flatten and seem increasingly achievable.
The plans are expansive, ambitious and on first glance the biggest concern is how will we get all of this done?
Clearly careful structuring and utilisation of time are required. But critically PCE just needs to get it done - to be aggressive with action and push through any inertia slowing momentum.
In the run up though as PCE reflected on each day one thing was apparent - a demeanour that was stressed - hardly a positive disposition - the impact on PCE was palpable but the message that sends to clients is equally as destructive.
For the first time in 5 months then, PCE took a time out. It was a client event, but it was designed to take time out. The format was a pleasure cruise, a swim, good food and great company.
We laughed, took of our serious hats, talked some business but with a light heartedness that not only carried through the day but was taken home by PCE. Later that evening PCE quipped "Look I've had a hard day - I spent all day on a boat - I'm really tired" - and that brought the roar of laughter it was intended to from children and adults and the mood was infectious.
The lightness of being continued and as "so you think you can dance" screened, PCE performed an impromptu contemporary routine to the opening credits - all captured on an I Phone for future blackmailing.
What's my point?
You can not run at full speed all the time and expect your internal engine both mental and physical to operate without damage.
As Coach Carter says " a little gas....a little brake".....you have to be ready but replenishment of mind, body and spirit, provides that clarity of thought that actually provides for progress.
The Energy Project and their work " The Way We're Working Isn't Working" is all about replenishment and maximising working with your rhythms.
There is no sustainable rhythm to working in a highly stressed physical and mental state.
So as you plan for 2013 - take a pause - surround yourself with those in your business world who can contribute and support and collaborate with you in 2013 - but take business of the agenda - talk, laugh, share - and watch your mood and positivity for the year ahead move to the achievement zone.
The clarity you will obtain will make those plans sharper, the solutions clearer and the road ahead will in your mind straighten, flatten and seem increasingly achievable.
Thursday, 22 November 2012
14 Steps to Sales Success in Financial Planning
Want the keys to sales success and achieve results such as 68% referral rate from you existing client bases and over a 90% close rate?
Want to find out how to write 80% of your future new business from your existing client base?
Follow these steps practised by the leading financial advice firms.
1) BE FOUND
Stand out in any search a prospective client makes.
Yellow pages, local business directories, online or word of mouth in a social circle.
2) CREATE CLIENT CENTRED COLLATERAL TO ENGAGE CLIENTS WITH PRE FIRST APPOINTMENT
3) HAVE A WEBSITE THAT IS ENGAGING OFFERS VALUE AND CONNECTION TO YOUR CORE PROPOSITION
4) HAVE AN OFFICE SET UP THAT TELLS A POSITIVE STORY THAT YOU UNDERSTAND YOUR NICHE CLIENTS
5) BE ABLE TO SAY WHAT IT IS THAT YOU DO AND WHY
6) BE ABLE TO EXPLAIN AND DEMONSTRATE VISUALLY YOUR PROCESS
7) EXPLAIN THE STEPS IN THE PROCESS AND WHAT HAPPENS NEXT
8) HAVE AN ENGAGING AND DEEP CLIENT INFORMATION COLLECTION METHOD THAT COLLECTS MORE THAN JUST FINANCIAL DATA BUT COLLECTS DATA ON VALUES AND MOTIVATION
9) CHECK FOR UNDERSTANDING BEFORE MOVING FORWARD
10) FOLLOW UP POST MEETING WITH A REASSURANCE PIECE
11) BRIEF YOUR STAFF WEEKLY ON THE CLIENTS AND PROSPECTS THAT WILL VISIT YOUR OFFICE AND WHY THEY ARE COMMING IN SO THEY CAN MANAGE CLIENT PSYCHOLOGY WITH SIMPLY A WARM AND RELEVANT WELCOME
12) MAKES SURE YOUR STATEMENT OF ADVICE SPEAKS TO THE CLIENTS INDIVIDUAL NEEDS AND WANTS
13) ENHANCE THE UNDERSTANDING OF THE STATEMENT OF ADVICE BY USING VISUALS
14) CONNECT THE STRATEGY TO THE CLIENTS VALUES, BELIEFS, ATTITUDE AND MOTIVATIONS
Want to find out how to write 80% of your future new business from your existing client base?
Follow these steps practised by the leading financial advice firms.
1) BE FOUND
Stand out in any search a prospective client makes.
Yellow pages, local business directories, online or word of mouth in a social circle.
2) CREATE CLIENT CENTRED COLLATERAL TO ENGAGE CLIENTS WITH PRE FIRST APPOINTMENT
3) HAVE A WEBSITE THAT IS ENGAGING OFFERS VALUE AND CONNECTION TO YOUR CORE PROPOSITION
4) HAVE AN OFFICE SET UP THAT TELLS A POSITIVE STORY THAT YOU UNDERSTAND YOUR NICHE CLIENTS
5) BE ABLE TO SAY WHAT IT IS THAT YOU DO AND WHY
6) BE ABLE TO EXPLAIN AND DEMONSTRATE VISUALLY YOUR PROCESS
7) EXPLAIN THE STEPS IN THE PROCESS AND WHAT HAPPENS NEXT
8) HAVE AN ENGAGING AND DEEP CLIENT INFORMATION COLLECTION METHOD THAT COLLECTS MORE THAN JUST FINANCIAL DATA BUT COLLECTS DATA ON VALUES AND MOTIVATION
9) CHECK FOR UNDERSTANDING BEFORE MOVING FORWARD
10) FOLLOW UP POST MEETING WITH A REASSURANCE PIECE
11) BRIEF YOUR STAFF WEEKLY ON THE CLIENTS AND PROSPECTS THAT WILL VISIT YOUR OFFICE AND WHY THEY ARE COMMING IN SO THEY CAN MANAGE CLIENT PSYCHOLOGY WITH SIMPLY A WARM AND RELEVANT WELCOME
12) MAKES SURE YOUR STATEMENT OF ADVICE SPEAKS TO THE CLIENTS INDIVIDUAL NEEDS AND WANTS
13) ENHANCE THE UNDERSTANDING OF THE STATEMENT OF ADVICE BY USING VISUALS
14) CONNECT THE STRATEGY TO THE CLIENTS VALUES, BELIEFS, ATTITUDE AND MOTIVATIONS
Sunday, 18 November 2012
High Performance Teams
So how good a team member are you? How good is your team?
Are you as good as the 1986 Giants?
The 1986 New York Giants season was one of the most successful seasons in the professional American football franchise's history.
The 1986 Giants had been ranked as one of the greatest NFL teams of all time by fans, and members of the media.It was this Giants team that popularized the practice of the "Gatorade shower", which entailed the players dousing members of the coaching staff with Gatorade near the end of a victorious game.
When we think of what the Giants had to overcome (first Superbowl in 30 years, and had come from an abysmal record only some three years earlier), they as a team and as individuals demonstrated:
- high level of trust
- defined roles and expectations
- set plays that played to individuals strengths
- ability to honestly call a spade a spade
- positive team talk before during and after
- focus, vision, goals
- measure and positivity , game plan, calculated risk, open comms
As Individuals they were:
- intrinsically motivated
- clear on how they attributed success and they had
- clearly defined goals.....constantly reviewed
- daily self assessment
- driven by positive self talk
- mindful of daily thankfulness
How successful you are as an individual and as a team depends on how well you embody and develop some of these characteristics.
Are you as good as the 1986 Giants?
The 1986 New York Giants season was one of the most successful seasons in the professional American football franchise's history.
The 1986 Giants had been ranked as one of the greatest NFL teams of all time by fans, and members of the media.It was this Giants team that popularized the practice of the "Gatorade shower", which entailed the players dousing members of the coaching staff with Gatorade near the end of a victorious game.
When we think of what the Giants had to overcome (first Superbowl in 30 years, and had come from an abysmal record only some three years earlier), they as a team and as individuals demonstrated:
- high level of trust
- defined roles and expectations
- set plays that played to individuals strengths
- ability to honestly call a spade a spade
- positive team talk before during and after
- focus, vision, goals
- measure and positivity , game plan, calculated risk, open comms
As Individuals they were:
- intrinsically motivated
- clear on how they attributed success and they had
- clearly defined goals.....constantly reviewed
- daily self assessment
- driven by positive self talk
- mindful of daily thankfulness
How successful you are as an individual and as a team depends on how well you embody and develop some of these characteristics.
Tuesday, 13 November 2012
5 Steps to Success
It's been a couple of weeks since PCEs last post. There's been a bit of travel that has been a pre-occupation, some daily life activities that have needed attending to, some personal development and well being that took priority but what has occupied PCE most,in these two weeks has been the opportunity to meet and sit down with some masters of client engagement and personal success.
What the clear message is from these meetings is that success comes from doing what you love.
Joseph Campbell offered us the phrase "follow your bliss". Or more exactly If you follow your bliss, you put yourself on a kind of track that has been there all the while, waiting for you, and the life that you ought to be living is the one you are living. Wherever you are—if you are following your bliss, you are enjoying that refreshment, that life within you, all the time.
These businesses that PCE have met in the last two weeks are deliberately and methodically following and leading their clients into following their own bliss.
They have a process. They believe in it. They have developed it and honed it and adapted it to their personalities and the personalities of their client base.
At its core the process is simple:
1) Know and define what you want
2) Create a plan
3) Enlist the services of an action coach
4) Take action
5) Review and adjust
This is about being crystal clear on what it is that you want and creating a sequence and set of objectives in the form of a plan to get you where you want to be.
Having accountability and a guide is crucial.
You can apply this process to anything you do in life - anything that is important enough to you to apply considered thought and process to.
But for financial advice, wealth creation and protection businesses - building this into a client engagement process is by no means an easy proposition. What it requires is you living and experiencing your client service encounter and reflecting on how engaged you would be with your current process. Then answering the question - how would I like to be engaged.
Then follow the 5 steps above and make it a reality.
When you get to step 3 - maybe give PCE a call.
What the clear message is from these meetings is that success comes from doing what you love.
Joseph Campbell offered us the phrase "follow your bliss". Or more exactly If you follow your bliss, you put yourself on a kind of track that has been there all the while, waiting for you, and the life that you ought to be living is the one you are living. Wherever you are—if you are following your bliss, you are enjoying that refreshment, that life within you, all the time.
These businesses that PCE have met in the last two weeks are deliberately and methodically following and leading their clients into following their own bliss.
They have a process. They believe in it. They have developed it and honed it and adapted it to their personalities and the personalities of their client base.
At its core the process is simple:
1) Know and define what you want
2) Create a plan
3) Enlist the services of an action coach
4) Take action
5) Review and adjust
This is about being crystal clear on what it is that you want and creating a sequence and set of objectives in the form of a plan to get you where you want to be.
Having accountability and a guide is crucial.
You can apply this process to anything you do in life - anything that is important enough to you to apply considered thought and process to.
But for financial advice, wealth creation and protection businesses - building this into a client engagement process is by no means an easy proposition. What it requires is you living and experiencing your client service encounter and reflecting on how engaged you would be with your current process. Then answering the question - how would I like to be engaged.
Then follow the 5 steps above and make it a reality.
When you get to step 3 - maybe give PCE a call.
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