To Connect, Communicate Solutions, NOT Methods

Wednesday, November 30th, 2011

Peo­ple care less about what you do and more about what they get.

When I asked advi­sors what they do, or what value they rep­re­sent, too many describe the process they uti­lize and not enough describe solu­tion they deliver. Peo­ple won’t send you a refer­ral because you have a cus­tomized finan­cial plan­ning process and eval­u­ate indi­vid­ual goals and gen­er­ate rec­om­men­da­tions tai­lored to client spe­cific needs, and they won’t send you a refer­ral because you care­fully mon­i­tor rela­tion­ships between mar­kets and rebal­ance port­fo­lios based on pro­pri­etary pro­to­cols. They will pro­vide a refer­ral beause you pro­vide a solu­tion to a prob­lem their friend has. Peo­ple care less about what you do and more about what they get.

I believe the most pow­er­ful descrip­tions of the value advi­sors offer encap­su­late the ben­e­fit a tar­get prospect real­izes by work­ing with them. This requires, first, that you have a prac­ti­cal and well defined tar­get mar­ket, but that’s another post. Con­sider describ­ing what you do worded as a solu­tion from the client’s point of view. Com­plete this sen­tence “Peo­ple like [describe tar­get prospect] come to me for [solu­tion that tar­get mar­ket requires]. Con­sider these possibilities:

Cor­po­rate exec­u­tives fac­ing retire­ment in the next three years come to me because I show them the right choice on their retire­ment plan distributions.

Sin­gle pro­fes­sional moth­ers come to me to learn how to bal­ance the demands of rais­ing kids with the abil­ity to afford college.

Peo­ple who have saved enough to take care of them­selves and want to use their sav­ings to leave a mark on the world come to us to plan their legacy.

You can teach your clients state­ments of value like these, and they will repeat them to oth­ers when pro­vid­ing you a referral.

Don’t worry about answer­ing the ques­tion “What do you do” with a sen­tence that starts out by describ­ing your tar­get client. You may think the per­son who asked you the ques­tion wants you to be the sub­ject of the sen­tence, but you can much more effec­tively get their atten­tion by describ­ing the per­son you spe­cial­ize in – espe­cially if it is them.

When I ask advi­sors what they do, most often I hear ver­sions of “I help peo­ple reach their finan­cial goals” or “I man­age people’s port­fo­lios to help reduce risk.”  Or “I give peo­ple peace of mind”. These are usu­ally too gen­eral to be use­ful. And the big­ger prob­lem is that I don’t think of my prob­lems in those terms. I have just started a new busi­ness with one child in col­lege, and am newly mar­ried, work­ing on con­sol­i­dat­ing two house­holds and have a three-year-old in the house for the first time in 14 years. You are NOT going to give me peace of mind.

Peo­ple will come to get a solu­tion, not to get a process. And peo­ple will remem­ber to refer you because a friend men­tions a prob­lem that your client can plug your solu­tion into, not because they like your process or because you have pro­vided them returns to keep up with the mar­ket (even if it’s with lower volatility).

If you stand for process you are a tech­ni­cian. If you rep­re­sent a solu­tion, you will attract clients and refer­rals who need a prob­lem solved.

    Lat­est Advi­so­r­An­a­lyst Prac­tice Growth Sto­ries

Tags: Answering The Question, Benefit, Corporate Executives, Financial Planning, Legacy, People, Point Of View, Portfolios, Possibilities, Proprietary Protocols, Raising Kids, Referral, Relationships, Retirement Plan Distributions, Right Choice, Target Client, Target Market, Worry
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To Connect With Prospects And Attract Referrals, Communicate Solutions – Not Methods

Wednesday, October 12th, 2011

Peo­ple care less about what you do and more about what they get.

When I asked advi­sors what they do, or what value they rep­re­sent, too many describe the process they uti­lize and not enough describe solu­tion they deliver. Peo­ple won’t send you a refer­ral because you have a cus­tomized finan­cial plan­ning process and eval­u­ate indi­vid­ual goals and gen­er­ate rec­om­men­da­tions tai­lored to client spe­cific needs, and they won’t send you a refer­ral because you care­fully mon­i­tor rela­tion­ships between mar­kets and rebal­ance port­fo­lios based on pro­pri­etary pro­to­cols. They will pro­vide a refer­ral beause you pro­vide a solu­tion to a prob­lem their friend has. Peo­ple care less about what you do and more about what they get.

I believe the most pow­er­ful descrip­tions of the value advi­sors offer encap­su­late the ben­e­fit a tar­get prospect real­izes by work­ing with them. This requires, first, that you have a prac­ti­cal and well defined tar­get mar­ket, but that’s another post. Con­sider describ­ing what you do worded as a solu­tion from the client’s point of view. Com­plete this sen­tence “Peo­ple like [describe tar­get prospect] come to me for [solu­tion that tar­get mar­ket requires]. Con­sider these possibilities:

Cor­po­rate exec­u­tives fac­ing retire­ment in the next three years come to me because I show them the right choice on their retire­ment plan distributions.

Sin­gle pro­fes­sional moth­ers come to me to learn how to bal­ance the demands of rais­ing kids with the abil­ity to afford college.

Peo­ple who have saved enough to take care of them­selves and want to use their sav­ings to leave a mark on the world come to us to plan their legacy.

You can teach your clients state­ments of value like these, and they will repeat them to oth­ers when pro­vid­ing you a referral.

Don’t worry about answer­ing the ques­tion “What do you do” with a sen­tence that starts out by describ­ing your tar­get client. You may think the per­son who asked you the ques­tion wants you to be the sub­ject of the sen­tence, but you can much more effec­tively get their atten­tion by describ­ing the per­son you spe­cial­ize in – espe­cially if it is them.

When I ask advi­sors what they do, most often I hear ver­sions of “I help peo­ple reach their finan­cial goals” or “I man­age people’s port­fo­lios to help reduce risk.”  Or “I give peo­ple peace of mind”. These are usu­ally too gen­eral to be use­ful. And the big­ger prob­lem is that I don’t think of my prob­lems in those terms. I have just started a new busi­ness with one child in col­lege, and am newly mar­ried, work­ing on con­sol­i­dat­ing two house­holds and have a three-year-old in the house for the first time in 14 years. You are NOT going to give me peace of mind.

Peo­ple will come to get a solu­tion, not to get a process. And peo­ple will remem­ber to refer you because a friend men­tions a prob­lem that your client can plug your solu­tion into, not because they like your process or because you have pro­vided them returns to keep up with the mar­ket (even if it’s with lower volatility).

If you stand for process you are a tech­ni­cian. If you rep­re­sent a solu­tion, you will attract clients and refer­rals who need a prob­lem solved.

    Lat­est Advi­so­r­An­a­lyst Prac­tice Growth Sto­ries

Tags: Answering The Question, Benefit, Corporate Executives, Financial Planning, Legacy, People, Point Of View, Portfolios, Possibilities, Proprietary Protocols, Prospects, Raising Kids, Referral, Referrals, Relationships, Retirement Plan Distributions, Right Choice, Target Client, Target Market, Worry
Posted in My Practice | Comments Off

Warren Buffett’s Strategy for Effective Client Meetings

Wednesday, September 14th, 2011

Last week I spoke to an investor who got a call from his advisor’s assis­tant about sched­ul­ing a time to review his portfolio.

“I had the same reac­tion as when I get a call from my dentist’s office” said this investor, whose account was worth over $1 mil­lion at the end of 2010. “I rec­og­nize it’s impor­tant and some­thing that I have to do, but also know it’s not likely to be pleas­ant, so put it off as long as I can.”

For many clients, the regret­table real­ity is that meet­ing with their advi­sor is no longer an uplift­ing expe­ri­ence. Instead of antic­i­pat­ing meet­ings with enthu­si­asm, they look to meet­ings with fore­bod­ing. Instead of walk­ing away opti­mistic about pos­si­bil­i­ties, they leave bur­dened down by limitations

This sit­u­a­tion is unhealthy and unsus­tain­able for both clients and for advi­sors. Here are three steps to make client meet­ings a more pos­i­tive expe­ri­ence, includ­ing an idea bor­rowed from War­ren Buffett.

Step one: Be upbeat

For many advi­sors, the chal­lenge of cre­at­ing pos­i­tive client meet­ings starts with being pos­i­tive your­self. Unless you’re upbeat, there’s no chance that your clients will be.

Mar­kets like we’ve seen of late can obvi­ously make this a chal­lenge, but that doesn’t make this less of a pri­or­ity. Being pos­i­tive doesn’t mean that you’re obliv­i­ous to the chal­lenges we’re fac­ing — clients are look­ing for real­is­tic opti­mism, not some­one with a “don’t worry be happy” view of the world.

In Jan­u­ary 2009, I wrote about 12 ways to stay pos­i­tive. Some sam­ple strategies:

- Start by rec­og­niz­ing how impor­tant this is; being pos­i­tive is the nec­es­sary first step to effec­tive inter­ac­tions with clients

- Exer­cise at the start of the day to give you a boost; even a short brisk walk can help

- Find ways to fight fatigue and renew energy dur­ing the day; get some fresh air at lunch, and through­out the day take energy boost­ing snacks like fruit

- Take short breaks; sched­ule a short walk out­side between client meetings

- Be alert to signs that your energy level is drop­ping; before mak­ing a call or going into a meet­ing, take 30 sec­onds to focus on lift­ing your mood

- Seek out pos­i­tive col­leagues who give you energy, avoid neg­a­tive ones who suck it away

Step two: Look past the bad news

It’s hard to main­tain a pos­i­tive out­look when you’re drown­ing in a sea of neg­a­tive headlines.

When meet­ing with clients, start by acknowl­edg­ing the real chal­lenges faced by global economies.

Don’t let the gloom wear you and your client down. Intro­duce some off­set­ting good news. For exam­ple, point to three or four qual­ity com­pa­nies whose prices have been beaten down and shift the focus of the con­ver­sa­tion to the value in rec­og­nized mar­ket lead­ers like Shop­pers Drug Mart, TD Bank or Telus in Canada and McDon­alds, Nes­tle or Wal-Mart out­side Canada.

Step three: Focus on what you can control

War­ren Buf­fett is a name who inspires con­fi­dence among aver­age investors; look at what hap­pened to Bank of America’s share price after his invest­ment was announced. When he dis­cusses the per­for­mance of Berk­shire Hath­away in his annual report and his investor meet­ing each spring, he never men­tions the share price, focus­ing instead on its book value. In essence, he changes the score­card by which his per­for­mance is mea­sured, shift­ing from share price to some­thing he has more con­trol over.

Advi­sors should try to do the same. You obvi­ously have to talk about what’s hap­pened to client port­fo­lios, but need to go beyond that to talk about things which you can influ­ence. For exam­ple, you can set a goal of a 3% annual cash return from your client’s port­fo­lio, bet­ter than what they’ll get on GICs, and as part of your con­ver­sa­tion, talk about their cash flow in the recent period ver­sus that goal.

Or you can talk about the monthly income that clients will receive in retire­ment from all sources of income, based on today’s port­fo­lio and some con­ser­v­a­tive assump­tions on future per­for­mance and com­pare it to the base case needs in their finan­cial plan. Of course, the mar­ket decline means that their pro­jected monthly income will be down com­pared to what it would have been at the start of the year, but depend­ing on how much of a buffer they had in Jan­u­ary, their pro­jected income may still be above their base needs.

If there is a short­fall, chances are that it will be less than clients fear. At least you can have an open con­ver­sa­tion about the options to close the gap, remind­ing clients that if future per­for­mance is bet­ter than the assump­tions, these may not be needed. Again, your goal is to focus on things you can control.

One final note; I’ve writ­ten in the past about the research show­ing that the most pos­i­tive impact from vaca­tions doesn’t come from the expe­ri­ence itself or the pos­i­tive mem­o­ries after­wards, but rather the process of look­ing for­ward to them. The impli­ca­tion is clear; in addi­tion to peri­odic longer vaca­tions to recharge our bat­ter­ies, we should have lots of shorter, more fre­quent hol­i­days, say a four-day week­end away once a quarter.

As part of your strat­egy to stay pos­i­tive, sched­ule these short hol­i­days — and encour­age your clients to do the same. That way, at the end of your meet­ing, you’ll be able to briefly com­pare notes with your client not only on recent trips, but also those that are com­ing up.

And for any­one inter­ested, here’s a link to that 2009 arti­cle on ten tips to stay pos­i­tive http://​www​.cli​entin​sights​.ca/​a​r​t​i​c​l​e​/​t​e​n​-​t​i​p​s​-​f​o​r​-​m​o​t​i​v​a​t​i​o​n​-​i​n​-​2​009

Last week I spoke to an investor who got a call from his advisor’s assis­tant about sched­ul­ing a time to review his portfolio.

“I had the same reac­tion as when I get a call from my dentist’s office” said this investor, whose account was worth over $1 mil­lion at the end of 2010. “I rec­og­nize it’s impor­tant and some­thing that I have to do, but also know it’s not likely to be pleas­ant — so put it off as long as I can.”

For many clients, the regret­table real­ity is that meet­ing with their advi­sor is no longer an uplift­ing expe­ri­ence. Instead of antic­i­pat­ing meet­ings with enthu­si­asm, they look to meet­ings with fore­bod­ing. Instead of walk­ing away opti­mistic about pos­si­bil­i­ties, they leave bur­dened down by limitations

This sit­u­a­tion is unhealthy and unsus­tain­able for both clients and for advi­sors. Here are three steps to make client meet­ings a more pos­i­tive expe­ri­ence, includ­ing an idea bor­rowed from War­ren Buffett.

Step one: Be upbeat

For many advi­sors, the chal­lenge of cre­at­ing pos­i­tive client meet­ings starts with being pos­i­tive your­self. Unless you’re upbeat, there’s no chance that your clients will be.

Mar­kets like we’ve seen of late can obvi­ously make this a chal­lenge — but that doesn’t make this less of a pri­or­ity. Being pos­i­tive doesn’t mean that you’re obliv­i­ous to the chal­lenges we’re fac­ing — clients are look­ing for real­is­tic opti­mism, not some­one with a “don’t worry be happy” view of the world.

In Jan­u­ary 2009, I wrote about 12 ways to stay pos­i­tive. Some sam­ple strategies:

- Start by rec­og­niz­ing how impor­tant this is — being pos­i­tive is the nec­es­sary first step to effec­tive inter­ac­tions with clients

- Exer­cise at the start of the day to give you a boost — even a short brisk walk can help

- Find ways to fight fatigue and renew energy dur­ing the day — get some fresh air at lunch, and through­out the day take energy boost­ing snacks like fruit

- Take short breaks — sched­ule a short walk out­side between client meetings

- Be alert to signs that your energy level is drop­ping — before mak­ing a call or going into a meet­ing, take 30 sec­onds to focus on lift­ing your mood.

- Seek out pos­i­tive col­leagues who give you energy, avoid neg­a­tive ones who suck it away

Step two: Look past the bad news

It’s hard to main­tain a pos­i­tive out­look when you’re drown­ing in a sea of neg­a­tive headlines.

When meet­ing with clients, start by acknowl­edg­ing the real chal­lenges faced by global economies.

But don’t let the gloom wear you and your client down — intro­duce some off­set­ting good news. For exam­ple, point to three or four qual­ity com­pa­nies whose prices have been beaten down — and shift the focus of the con­ver­sa­tion to the value in rec­og­nized mar­ket lead­ers like Shop­pers Drug Mart, TD Bank or Telus in Canada and McDon­alds, Nes­tle or Wal­Mart out­side Canada.

Step three: Focus on what you can control

War­ren Buf­fett is a name who inspires con­fi­dence among aver­age investors — look at what hap­pened to Bank of America’s share price after his invest­ment was announced. When he dis­cusses the per­for­mance of Berk­shire Hath­away in his annual report and his investor meet­ing each spring, he never men­tions the share price, focus­ing instead on its book value. In essence, he changes the score­card by which his per­for­mance is mea­sured, shift­ing from share price to some­thing he has more con­trol over.

Advi­sors should try to do the same. You obvi­ously have to talk about what’s hap­pened to client port­fo­lios, but need to go beyond that to talk about things which you can influ­ence. For exam­ple, you can set a goal of a 3% annual cash return from your client’s port­fo­lio, bet­ter than what they’ll get on GICs — and as part of your con­ver­sa­tion, talk about their cash flow in the recent period ver­sus that goal.

Or you can talk about the monthly income that clients will receive in retire­ment from all sources of income, based on today’s port­fo­lio and some con­ser­v­a­tive assump­tions on future per­for­mance — and com­pare it to the base case needs in their finan­cial plan. Of course, the mar­ket decline means that their pro­jected monthly income will be down com­pared to what it would have been at the start of the year, but depend­ing on how much of a buffer they had in Jan­u­ary, their pro­jected income may still be above their base needs.

And if there is a short­fall, chances are that it will be less than clients fear — and at least you can have an open con­ver­sa­tion about the options to close the gap, remind­ing clients that if future per­for­mance is bet­ter than the assump­tions, these may not be needed. Again, your goal is to focus on things you can control.

One final note. I’ve writ­ten in the past about the research show­ing that the most pos­i­tive impact from vaca­tions doesn’t come from the expe­ri­ence itself or the pos­i­tive mem­o­ries after­wards, but rather the process of look­ing for­ward to them. The impli­ca­tion is clear — in addi­tion to peri­odic longer vaca­tions to recharge our bat­ter­ies, we should have lots of shorter, more fre­quent hol­i­days, say a four-day week­end away once a quarter.

As part of your strat­egy to stay pos­i­tive, sched­ule these short hol­i­days — and encour­age your clients to do the same. That way, at the end of your meet­ing, you’ll be able to briefly com­pare notes with your client not only on recent trips, but also those that are com­ing up.

And for any­one inter­ested, here’s a link to that 2009 arti­cle on ten tips to stay pos­i­tive http://​www​.cli​entin​sights​.ca/​a​r​t​i​c​l​e​/​t​e​n​-​t​i​p​s​-​f​o​r​-​m​o​t​i​v​a​t​i​o​n​-​i​n​-​2​009

    Lat­est Advi­so­r­An­a­lyst Prac­tice Growth Sto­ries

Tags: 1 Million, Brisk Walk, Challenges, Client Meetings, Dentist Office, Effective Meetings, Fatigue, Foreboding, Fresh Air, Investor, Lunch, Optimism, Possibilities, Priority, Scheduling, Short Breaks, Signs, Snacks, Three Steps, Warren Buffett
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Are Your Client Meetings Like Going to the Dentist?

Thursday, September 8th, 2011

Last week I spoke to an investor who got a call from his advisor’s assis­tant about sched­ul­ing a time to review his portfolio.

“I had the same reac­tion as when I get a call from my dentist’s office” said this investor, whose account was worth over $1 mil­lion at the end of 2010. “I rec­og­nize it’s impor­tant and some­thing that I have to do, but also know it’s not likely to be pleas­ant — so put it off as long as I can.”

For many clients, the regret­table real­ity is that meet­ing with their advi­sor is no longer an uplift­ing expe­ri­ence. Instead of antic­i­pat­ing meet­ings with enthu­si­asm, they look to meet­ings with fore­bod­ing. Instead of walk­ing away opti­mistic about pos­si­bil­i­ties, they leave bur­dened down by limitations

This sit­u­a­tion is unhealthy and unsus­tain­able for both clients and for advi­sors. Here are three steps to make client meet­ings a more pos­i­tive expe­ri­ence, so that they’re not seen as akin to a visit to the dentist.

Step one: Be upbeat

For many advi­sors, the chal­lenge of cre­at­ing pos­i­tive client meet­ings starts with being pos­i­tive your­self. Unless you’re upbeat, there’s no chance that your clients will be.

Mar­kets like we’ve seen of late can obvi­ously make this a chal­lenge — but that doesn’t make this less of a pri­or­ity. Being pos­i­tive doesn’t mean that you’re obliv­i­ous to the chal­lenges we’re fac­ing — clients are look­ing for real­is­tic opti­mism, not some­one with a “don’t worry be happy” view of the world.

In Jan­u­ary 2009, I wrote about 12 ways to stay pos­i­tive. Some sam­ple strategies:

- Start by rec­og­niz­ing how impor­tant this is — being pos­i­tive is the nec­es­sary first step to effec­tive inter­ac­tions with clients

- Exer­cise at the start of the day to give you a boost — even a short brisk walk can help

- Find ways to fight fatigue and renew energy dur­ing the day — get some fresh air at lunch, and through­out the day take energy boost­ing snacks like fruit

- Take short breaks — sched­ule a short walk out­side between client meetings

- Be alert to signs that your energy level is drop­ping — before mak­ing a call or going into a meet­ing, take 30 sec­onds to focus on lift­ing your mood.

- Seek out pos­i­tive col­leagues who give you energy, avoid neg­a­tive ones who suck it away

Step two: Look past the bad news

It’s hard to main­tain a pos­i­tive out­look when you’re drown­ing in a sea of neg­a­tive headlines.

When meet­ing with clients, start by acknowl­edg­ing the real chal­lenges faced by global economies.

But don’t let the gloom wear you and your client down — intro­duce some off­set­ting good news. For exam­ple, point to three or four qual­ity com­pa­nies whose prices have been beaten down — and shift the focus of the con­ver­sa­tion to the value in rec­og­nized mar­ket lead­ers like Shop­pers Drug Mart, TD Bank or Telus in Canada and McDon­alds, Nes­tle or Wal­Mart out­side Canada.

Step three: Focus on what you can control

War­ren Buf­fett is a name who inspires con­fi­dence among aver­age investors — look at what hap­pened to Bank of America’s share price after his invest­ment was announced. When he dis­cusses the per­for­mance of Berk­shire Hath­away, he never men­tions the share price — rather he focuses on its book value. In essence, he points to some­thing he can control.

Advi­sors should try to do the same. You obvi­ously have to talk about what’s hap­pened to client port­fo­lios, go beyond that to talk about things which are in your con­trol. For exam­ple, you can set a goal of a 3% annual cash return from your client’s port­fo­lio, bet­ter than what they’ll get on GICs — and as part of your con­ver­sa­tion, talk about their cash flow in the recent period ver­sus that goal.

One final note. I’ve writ­ten in the past about the research show­ing that the most pos­i­tive impact from vaca­tions doesn’t come from the expe­ri­ence itself or the pos­i­tive mem­o­ries after­wards, but rather the process of look­ing for­ward to them. The impli­ca­tion is clear — in addi­tion to peri­odic longer vaca­tions to recharge our bat­ter­ies, we should have lots of shorter, more fre­quent hol­i­days, say a four-day week­end away once a quarter.

As part of your strat­egy to stay pos­i­tive, sched­ule these short hol­i­days — and encour­age your clients to do the same. That way, at the end of your meet­ing, you’ll be able to briefly com­pare notes with your client not only on recent trips, but also those that are com­ing up.

And for any­one inter­ested, here’s a link to that 2009 arti­cle on ten tips to stay pos­i­tive http://​www​.cli​entin​sights​.ca/​a​r​t​i​c​l​e​/​t​e​n​-​t​i​p​s​-​f​o​r​-​m​o​t​i​v​a​t​i​o​n​-​i​n​-​2​009

    Lat­est Advi­so­r­An­a­lyst Prac­tice Growth Sto­ries

Tags: 1 Million, Brisk Walk, Challenges, Client Meetings, Dentist Office, Exercise, Fatigue, Foreboding, Fresh Air, Going To The Dentist, Investor, Lunch, Optimism, Portfolio, Possibilities, Priority, Short Breaks, Snacks, Three Steps, Visit To The Dentist
Posted in Dan Richards | Comments Off

Focusing on Big Problems

Wednesday, February 17th, 2010

A recent post con­tained a warn­ing from a top pro­ducer about the risks of being seen by clients as dis­mis­sive of their losses – I got lots of pos­i­tive com­ments on this article.

Last week, I talked to a thirty year vet­eran of the busi­ness who’s con­sis­tently ranked among his firm’s top ten producers.

I asked him about the sin­gle most impor­tant thing he’d learned over the course of his career – he answered with four words.

Those words: “ Focus on big problems.”

He went on to say:

“When I meet with prospects, I con­cen­trate all my time on under­stand­ing the biggest issues that they’re con­cerned about, the things that are really both­er­ing them. In my expe­ri­ence, there’s no bet­ter use a meet­ing with a prospect than dig­ging deep to under­stand their hot but­tons … the more you can get a prospect to talk about what’s really bug­ging them, the bet­ter the chances of a pos­i­tive outcome.

“And the same applies to clients.

“When I’m meet­ing with clients” he said, “I make it my num­ber one pri­or­ity to ask what’s caus­ing them the most con­cern, the thing that’s keep­ing them up at night.

“And you don’t always get the obvi­ous answers” he con­tin­ued on.

“These days you’d expect peo­ple to talk about los­ing money on invest­ments, mar­ket volatil­ity and out­liv­ing their, money …. and you cer­tainly do hear that.

“But ear­lier this year I met with my biggest client and asked that ques­tion. This is some­one with over $10 mil­lion dol­lars …. and they talked about how dis­ap­pointed they are about the lack of ambi­tion among their kids and con­cerned about whether this will be passed on to their grandkids.

“ My clients said they couldn’t do any­thing about their kids at this point … but still had hope for their grandchildren.

“We talked about what they could do about this … and ended up decid­ing to set aside some money to fund activ­i­ties for their grand­kids to open their eyes to more pos­si­bil­i­ties, things like tak­ing them to Europe or Asia on hol­i­days, maybe fund­ing sum­mer school at Har­vard or Oxford when they were in their teens, per­haps encour­ag­ing their par­ents to look at some­thing like Pear­son Col­lege on Van­cou­ver Island when the kids hit 15 and offer­ing to pay for this.

“We also talked about the clients set­ting up a trust fund for their grand­kids’ edu­ca­tion – so that they could go any­where in the world to study with­out wor­ry­ing about pay­ing for this …. but struc­tur­ing it in a way that that they couldn’t use it for any other pur­pose. While we were in the meet­ing, I actu­ally called a lawyer I work with and booked a meet­ing for them to meet with me and these clients to talk about this.”

The advi­sor fin­ished by say­ing: “Even though I’ve been work­ing with these clients for many years, this is the first time this came up in con­ver­sa­tion. And it wouldn’t have hap­pened if I hadn’t asked about what was caus­ing them the most con­cern these days.”

There are lots of things you can talk about in con­ver­sa­tions with exist­ing and prospec­tive clients. As you think about how you use the time dur­ing meet­ings, con­sider adding a focus on the really big prob­lems they’re grap­pling with to the list.

And to read the tip from the top pro­ducer a few weeks ago, dis­cussing the risk of hav­ing clients feel you are dis­miss­ing their losses, click here:

http://​www​.strate​gicim​per​a​tives​.ca/​b​l​o​g​/​?​p​=​201

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Tags: 10 Million, Ambition, Asia, Europe, Grandchildren, Grandkids, Hol, Hot Buttons, Losses, Market Volatility, Million Dollars, Money Investments, Money Market, Possibilities, Priority, Producers, Prospects, Single Most Important Thing, Top Producer, Veteran
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