Some food for thought on Friday.
I’ve been doing a “Deep Dive” into “everyone else’s” podcasts and books in the past few months. I’m guessing 100+ hours (I drive a lot) in the past 6 weeks of listening – and, I have a stack of books taller than I am that I’ve bought and read (some) in the past 90 days.
As usual in today’s world.
Some really smart folks.
Others who are good in a narrow area – and, when they try to be a generalist they fail quickly. For instance I was listening to a series of podcasts from one (likely smart & nice advisor) who seems to be really knowledgeable about online marketing – specifically google/search/content marketing who then made the mistake of talking about Direct Mail, and frankly it was embarrassing.
A lot of others who are likely really good at the “Technical Aspects” of our business. I’m sure they aced the tests for CFP and all of the other certifications and designations, but as with most really don’t understand the foundations of marketing and personal selling. That part gets painful to hear on these.
That having been said, even the worst have some good ideas buried within and, with a few that come to mind – I thought I’d share.
I don’t claim any as my own original thought, and I ALWAYS try to give attribution at least of anything smart and useful but for the moment I’ll have to apologize since it’s all run together and, frankly I don’t take notes while driving (although I do have a few copies of Wall Street Journal with sprawled notes written at stop lights.)
Anyway, A few of the good ideas to ponder.
Ok, and regardless of what I just said above – this one’s mine:
First, one very important way to maintain quality client relationships is to COMMUNICATE A LOT. With a top 1/10th or 1% Wealth Manager that I’ve worked with for years – we’re designing a MINIMUM of 26 contacts per year via direct mail. Laced with daily emails and once or more per month group “Zoom” meetings on various rotating topics.
You don’t get referrals if you communicate once a year or once a quarter and aren’t “top of mind” with relevant conversations are happening with friends and family who would benefit from your support.
In addition, you eliminate the need for as frequent of 1-on-1 meetings in order for your clients to feel a personal bond with you (as long as your “contacts” are laced with value and your “personality” – ie no corporate stuff.)
Second, and this one is from a podcast – your clients think about you only in the context of the problem you solved or, product you provided to THEM. Without ongoing education they don’t They don’t know about the range of situations and the various problems that you’re able to solve. They need to be educated. Putting a checklist of stuff you do on your website DOES NOT accomplish that – they’re not studying about you – they’re mostly not thinking about you.
My solution for this includes a variety of ways to do that and times and places. A clear script for in person 1-on-1 meetings. Webinars and live meetings with clients and their friends invited on a rotating range of topics. Specialized “small single topic books,” special reports and more.
Third, Return on investment. It’s a foundation that I’ve used for putting together my marketing for 30+ years. But on a podcast I think it was Dan Cuprill’s – he talked about that his average client spends $6,000 a year with him and on average stays with him for 10 years. If that’s accurate each new client is going to spend $60,000 over their time as a client.
Unfortunately most advisors have no idea what their client “life-time value” looks like. With my clients I often start with their gross revenue for the year and then divide by the number of new clients (not total clients.). If the business is relatively stable that gives a good approximation of that life-time value.
Then you use that as the basis for determining ROI on any and all advertising methods. In other words let’s say I’m doing social media advertising. To make up numbers let’s assume then that my cost per “click” is $20 and I convert 15% that would be $125 per completed form for opt-in, if I then schedule 30% for an appointment I’m at about $415 per appointment. If only 50% show up then I’m at $830 per meeting. Then let’s say 65% become clients I’m at $1,276 in client acquisition cost. That’s for a client using the above numbers that will spend $6,000 this year and $60,000 in life-time value.
What would your clients think if you could consistently and systematically get them 400% return in a year. I’m guessing they’d be THRILLED.
The place that as an advisor you have HUGE leverage is in your marketing. Online and off-line you can get huge ROI’s if you just have someone who really understands the details to put it all together.
I had a bunch more points, but I’ll try to share them in the next few days…. Hope some of this was helpful.
Stephen Oliver, MBA
Advisor Wealth Mastery
Ph/Text: 1-303-808-8719
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