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Not even online or any website. In
fact, you won't get this information from top financial advisor
performers, but you will find the idea where you work. It will change
the way you think. It will change your business strategies. It will
make you take a close look at what your doing right and what you need
to improve on. The idea will help you grow, develop and build your
practice to heights you thought weren't possible. It will make you
understand your business better, even more than hiring a consultant.
It is a marketing idea which is investing time energy and imagination
into your business. This one idea may change your business in 2020
and beyond. Once you start to apply the idea over and over, your
clients will see tremendous value in you.
If I was Asked to Give
Only One Idea to Build and Scale a Financial Advisory Practice, this
Would be the Idea.
Create a board of directors with your top clients and
centers of influence. Ask them for feedback and ideas on every aspect
of your business from advice to marketing, client appreciation, and
client communication. Invite from six to ten of your top clients in
one meeting for an hour and get valuable feedback on your image,
identity, business, and marketing. Two things will happen at the
meeting. First, your ideal clients will give you valuable feedback on
the future direction of you and your practice. Valuable feedback on
marketing, communications, and value-added processes that only they
will see value in. Second, you will teach them how to refer and give
you favorable introductions. Imagine doing follow up calls and
getting referrals? That is exactly what happened when I did this with
my ideal clients. Not only did they refer names to me, they asked me
to join events where I might meet more people like them.
Your Network of
Professionals Luncheon
Hold a second meeting for your top centers of influence
or referral sources. Hold these meetings three to four times a year
and buy your "network of professionals" lunch for giving
you valuable feedback on all areas of your business. It will cost you
less than $200 and a few hours of your time. Each time you are
creating formal feedback for your business. The most amazing thing
happens when you tell people you are working on your business. When
you do the follow-up phone call, your clients already have someone in
mind you should talk to. Within 30 days you get referrals to more
like-minded people and gain additional top clients. This is how you
clone your best clients.
Case Study
It is gutsy to ask for feedback from your clients since
they have given you all their trust. At the core of trust is your
client’s desire to help you and your business. For example, if I have
never experienced being one of your clients for a period of time, how
can I give you long-term valuable feedback on what you are doing, how
you communicate with people and how your business is perceived? It is
this valuable feedback from your top clients and centers of influence
that is going to give you the edge over your competitors.
Create an Agenda
Plan to spend an hour discussing your business and items
you are working on. When I first did this, I asked my clients about a
golf appreciation day I had planned. I wanted to hire a golf pro,
offer lessons and hand out golf balls and prizes to say thanks to my
top clients. At the feedback meeting, most of my clients liked the
idea, especially the golfers. But one of my clients made an
interesting comment. He said, “Not everybody golfs, so for the
clients that don’t golf, why don’t you get a hanging basket of spring
flowers, drop by to have a coffee and say thanks.” My response was to
thank him for the great idea. The following week, I picked up some
hanging baskets of flowers and dropped by my top clients to say
thanks. A week later a top prospect comes into our office to see us.
We asked how they came across us. The client said, “We went to visit
our friends down the street and asked where they got the nice hanging
basket, and they raved about you and your firm, so here we are.” They
became one of our ideal clients through our ideal clients.
Grow Your Practice By
Asking for Feedback
Try it once and you will get feedback on your business,
as well as referrals. Once advisors discover how powerful this idea
is, and how easy it is to do, they will want to create groups of
client feedback forums. They will deliver more value to their clients
and attend events with clients and get favorable introductions. They
will get referrals from the Network of professionals and all they did
was start with feedback.
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