Tag Archives: prospects

Prospecting more effectively in four easy steps — co-written with Rosemary Smyth

By Aaron Hoos on May 11, 2013 in Finance, Portfolio

This article was co-written with my friend, Rosemary Smyth, an international coach to financial advisors. The article is also posted on her website.

The success of many of the top-earning financial advisors hinges on their ability to simply get more clients. Although exceptions to this rule exist, the advisors who outlast their peers and are nearing retirement with a big book of business are usually those who did more prospecting (and more effective prospecting) earlier in their career. They are also more likely to have maintained the practice even when other advisors stopped.

Most advisors follow one of two routes when they go out prospecting. The first route, especially for new advisors, is to go after anyone you know or meet. Everyone gets a business card or three and a follow-up call. The other route, especially for professionals with a few years under their belt, is to follow the money by contacting whoever has the most likely access to investable capital.

We know that prospecting is essential. So how can an advisor – whether they are brand new to the business or trying to elevate a seasoned career – prospect more effectively in today’s marketplace? Just because the “tried-and-true” prospecting methods of yesteryear don’t work as well today, that doesn’t mean advisors should scrap everything and go all-in on the marketing flavor of the month. You might be surprised at the answer.

If you want to make your prospecting easier and more effective, and ultimately generate more clients for you, here are four steps to find the perfect prospects faster and more effectively:

Step #1 – Look in the mirror:
If you want to find your perfect prospect, the best way to get started is to look inward and figure out who you are and what’s important to you. How would people describe you? How do you like to spend your time? What values do you adhere to in your own life? What are your talents? What sets you apart from other advisors?

Once you’ve made this inward look, the next step is to look outward for prospects who might possess those same qualities. Where do they work? Where do they spend their free time? How can you connect with them?
People enjoy interacting with others who are just like them. Your prospects will see you as an ally who understands them and faces the same joys and struggles in life.

Step #2 – Look at your client list:
Your existing clients provide an excellent clue into who your perfect prospects are (even if you’re a new advisor with only a small handful of clients).

Look at your client list and identify your favorite clients – the ones you love to work with the most. This doesn’t necessarily mean that you’ll be looking for the ones with the most assets or the ones who generate most of your revenue. Instead, find the clients who you simply like to spend time and the ones who you really connect with; identify the ones who leave you feeling energized and valued as a professional.

Once you have a list of your favorite clients, determine what characteristics are common among all of them. Check for demographic characteristics, personality traits, aspirations, and values that are shared among a majority of your favorite clients.

Also look at what solutions you are providing for your client’s biggest problems. Does your experience with certain products or services make you an expert in working with those types of clients?

This step is critical because it starts to paint a picture of your favourite clients – the ones who give you a reason to get out of bed in the morning and face the day. Think about what you enjoy most about being an advisor and how your favourite clients make you feel.

Step #3 – Paint a picture:
Based on your findings in step 1 and step 2, describe what your perfect prospect profile is like:

  • What is important to them?
  • Who is important to them?
  • What values do they possess?
  • What motivates them?
  • How would you describe them demographically?
  • What personality traits do they possess?
  • Where do they spend their time and money?
  • Where do they typically work? Where do they typically spend their time when they are not working?
  • What events in life are they facing now or will they be facing in the near future?
  • What needs and challenges do they face that you can offer valuable insight into?

Craft an outline of what that person looks like and be able to describe that person if someone asks you who they can introduce you to.

Step #4 – Figure out where that prospect is and go to them:
Take a look at your perfect prospect profile and determine where they spend their time.
Review available prospecting methods against the picture you developed of your prospect profile. Do your prospects even see or hear your prospecting message and is it something that resonates with them? Are there specific prospecting methods you can adopt (and adapt, because it’s never one-size-fits-all) to reach deeper into that pool of prospects?

Bonus Step – Segment your client list:
As you add more clients to your business, you may want to revisit the level of service you provide to each client. By segmenting your client list into three simple groups – top tier, middle tier (who might possess some qualities you prefer and have the potential to become top tier clients), and bottom tier clients (who are definitely NOT your favourite clients!). Create service level agreements for each tier that ties into your marking plan and budget. Provide a richer, more valuable experience with more frequent connections to your top tier.

Some of the benefits of working with your top tier are:

  • Less stress as you are working with clients that you like
  • Stream-line your business as you work with similar clients
  • Focuses your marketing campaigns
  • You are seen as an expert
  • More revenue opportunities
  • Your time and effort is respected and valued

Finding perfect prospects ensures a stronger, enjoyable and a longer-lasting career as a financial advisor. Follow these four steps to find more perfect prospects.

Rosemary Smyth, MBA, CIM, FCSI, ACC, is an author, columnist and an international business coach for financial advisors. She spent her career working at leading investment firms before pursuing her passion for coaching. She lives in Victoria, BC. Visit her website at www.rosemarysmyth.com. You can email Rosemary at: rosemary@rosemarysmyth.com

Aaron Hoos, MBA, has worked in the financial industry since 1997. Formerly a stockbroker, insurance broker, and award-winning sales manager, today he writes for the financial and real estate industry as an educator and marketer. He is working on his second book. Visit his website at AaronHoos.com and follow him on Twitter @AaronHoos.

4 marketing strategies to use when your prospect’s PERCEIVED needs and REAL needs aren’t the same

By Aaron Hoos on April 16, 2013 in Business

Henry Ford famously said, “If I had asked people what they wanted, they would have said ‘faster horses’.”

fasterhorse

Ford was thinking about meeting customer needs with a horseless carriage but if he had stopped to ask his customers what they needed, their best answer would have been a modification of something that already existed.

Henry Ford’s comment is funny but it illustrates a very serious problem that many businesses face: There is a difference between customers’ real needs and perceived needs. This is a problem for businesses because people buy things based on their needs. So if they are buying based on perceived needs, they might buy the wrong thing.

As a marketer, how do you address perceived needs versus real needs?

  • Sell to the perceived problem. Instead of trying to fight the current and bend the prospect to the marketer’s will, flow with the current by building marketing content around the problem your prospects and customers THINK they have. It will take some creativity to achieve and you need to make sure you can do this ethically but it can be done and it’s a way to position your product or service attractively.
  • Position both problems together. In your marketing, try to handle both problems together, linking them in your content to link them in your prospect’s mind. This is sort-of educational and it’s sort-of a branding effort. You want your prospect to think of their perceived problem and the real problem as being closely associated. This can be hard if the perceived problem and the real problem are quite far apart. However, the advantage to this method is that you’ll increase the sense of how dire the situation is and that increases the urgency to buy.
  • Position the real problem as being an even bigger threat. Show your prospects how the problem they think they are facing could potentially be eclipsed by an even more serious problem (the real one).
  • Educate buyers about the perceived versus real need. Show your prospects that the perceived need they have is not really the need that must be solved. Show them that the real need is the need to be addressed and then connect that real need to the product or service you sell. This option is very challenging for marketers to do because you could run the risk of insulting your prospects. That will annoy prospects and send them off to your competitor who will be all too willing to take their money. Avoid insulting your customers by taking a very neutral, educational tone. Bring in respected experts. Treat both as actual problems but simply highlight the one problem that most people address with your product or service.

(Image credit: Curufin)

Who are your ideal customers?

By Aaron Hoos on January 19, 2013 in Business

Your ideal customers are the ones who will suffer if they don’t buy what you are selling.

Your ideal customers are the ones who will lose money because they haven’t invested in your solution.

Your ideal customers are the ones whose lives will be worse because they haven’t met with you or agreed that your product or service can help them.

Your ideal customers are the ones who are held back because they haven’t gained access to your offering.

Your ideal customers are the ones who haven’t yet figured out that they have a problem… and their quality of life is lower because of it.

Your ideal customers are the ones who are struggling with what they currently do.

Your ideal customers are the ones who are suffering because their existing choices aren’t meeting their needs.

Your ideal customers are the ones who don’t just have wants and desires and dreams… but a real and substantial and costly problem.

Your ideal customers are the ones who have the most to lose.

The needier your potential customers are, and the costlier that need is in their lives, the better.

Find those people, show them the costs of their existing situation, then reveal the fastest, easiest, most painless, and the very best way to invest in a new solution — YOUR solution.

(PS, If you don’t believe your solution is the fastest, easiest, most painless, and the very best solution then improve your solution or find a new one or get out of the business).

100 small business strategy questions

By Aaron Hoos on May 18, 2012 in Business

Many small businesses are fueled by passion. They start because an entrepreneur has an idea (or is sick of working for a boss), they grow because their ideas solve a problem and somehow that solution is communicated to the marketplace.

Unfortunately, many small businesses fail… even ones that are seemingly successful and make profitable sales. The reason is, they’re simply existing day-by-day, sale-by-sale, without any real strategy or long-term vision to give their existence any direction.

If you’re an entrepreneur, answer these 100 small business strategy questions. The answers will help you to highlight areas of opportunity that you can exploit and areas of concern that you can mitigate. Bookmark this page and come back to it regularly to work through these questions every 3 to 6 months.

With your answers, create a list of to-dos that you can act on until you come back to these questions again. [Note: Since publishing this list, I have written individual posts about some of these strategy questions so I've updated this list with the links to those other posts.]

  1. What does your business do?
  2. What does your business sell?
  3. What does your business stand for?
  4. What parts of your brand truly reflect your current business?
  5. What parts of your brand do not (or no longer) reflect your current business?
  6. What are the top 10 benefits your business provides?
  7. Who is your perfect customer?
  8. How are you adding value?
  9. What are your products’ or services’ biggest flaws?
  10. How do you define a lead?
  11. Where are your leads coming from?
  12. What demographic are your leads?
  13. How are you creating leads?
  14. How are your competitors creating leads?
  15. How will lead creation change for your industry in the future?
  16. How do you define a prospect?
  17. What is your lead-to-prospect ratio?
  18. What demographic are your prospects?
  19. How is your prospect demographic different from your leads demographic?
  20. How are you turning leads into prospects?
  21. How are your competitors turning leads into prospects?
  22. What objections do your prospects have?
  23. What objections do you NOT have an answer for?
  24. How do you define a customer?
  25. What is your prospect-to-customer ratio (close rate)?
  26. What demographic are your customers?
  27. How is your customer demographic different from your prospect demographic?
  28. How are you converting prospects into customers?
  29. How are your competitors converting prospects into customers?
  30. What has caused you to lose a sale?
  31. How do you define an evangelist?
  32. What is your customer-to-evangelist ratio?
  33. What is your evangelist demographic?
  34. How is your evangelist demographic different from your customer demographic?
  35. How is your relationship with your customers?
  36. What were your 3 most successful marketing campaigns?
  37. What were your 3 least successful marketing campaigns?
  38. What marketing and sales activities are you using in each stage of your sales funnel?
  39. How do you measure company-wide success?
  40. How do you measure personal and/or employee success?
  41. How are you improving your relationship with your customers?
  42. How can you improve the process for receiving and acting on feedback from customers?
  43. How are you encouraging repeat sales?
  44. How are you encouraging upsells?
  45. Who else can use your products or services that you aren’t currently serving?
  46. What is your business model?
  47. What other peer-businesses use the same business model?
  48. What can you learn from peer-businesses that use the same business model?
  49. What other businesses (in other industries) use a similar business model?
  50. What can you learn from businesses in other industries that use a similar business model?
  51. Who are your top 3 competitors?
  52. Who/what are your indirect competitors?
  53. What does the most successful businesses in your industry do that you don’t do yet?
  54. Why would someone buy from you instead of your competition?
  55. When should someone buy from your competition instead of you?
  56. What are your competitors doing differently?
  57. What are your competitors doing better than you?
  58. What are your competitors doing worse than you?
  59. How are your relationships with your suppliers/vendors?
  60. How can your supplier/vendor relationships be improved?
  61. What does your organizational chart look like and what strengths/weaknesses are the result?
  62. What are the next 3 roles you need to hire for?
  63. What was the last thing you tested in your business?
  64. When was the last time you tested a price change and what were the results?
  65. What political changes do you see affecting your business/industry?
  66. What economic changes do you see affecting your business/industry?
  67. What social changes do you see affecting your business/industry?
  68. What technological changes do you see affecting your business/industry?
  69. What financial best practices have you implemented?
  70. How have buying habits changed in your industry?
  71. What trends are influencing buying habits?
  72. How will buying habits change in the future?
  73. How has your industry innovated in the past decade?
  74. How has your business innovated in the past year?
  75. Where does your business plan to innovate this coming year?
  76. How are you investing in your business’ growth (i.e. innovation, new equipment, etc.)?
  77. What is your plan to scale up your business?
  78. If you had to get rid of 90% of your customers, what 10% would you keep?
  79. If you kept 10% of your most profitable customers, what would that demographic look like?
  80. How can you increase your ideal customer base?
  81. How can you decrease your less-than-ideal customer base?
  82. Where are people talking about your business online?
  83. What are people saying about your business online?
  84. What is your plan if your industry suddenly received a lot of bad press?
  85. What is your plan if your business suddenly received a lot of bad press?
  86. What is your plan if your marketing went viral and you suddenly had 10x the customers?
  87. What contingency plans do you a have in place for natural disasters?
  88. What would happen to your business if you were unable to work?
  89. What has changed about your business since you started?
  90. How has your income trended since you started?
  91. How has your profit margin trended since you started?
  92. What plans do you have to increase income next year?
  93. What plans do you have to increase profits next year?
  94. Where do you see your business in 1 year?
  95. Where do you see your business in 5 years?
  96. Where do you see your business in 10 years?
  97. What strengths/assets can you leverage for growth?
  98. Where are your blindspots?
  99. What are the top 3 problems keeping you from advancing to the next level in business?
  100. What about your business, industry, or customers keeps you awake at night?

Sell more by convincing prospects that they already own your product

By Aaron Hoos on February 7, 2012 in Business

In your business, it can be hard to sell something to a prospect that is reluctant to buy. It feels like you are trying to move an immovable object!

On the other hand, if the prospect wants to own your product or service, almost nothing will stand in their way of buying it from you.

Wouldn’t it be great if more of your prospects WANTED to buy your product or service from you?

It’s possible to increase sales from motivated prospects with this one simple trick (which you can use in face-to-face selling, over the phone selling, or marketing and web copy)…

Convince your prospect that they already own your product

Okay, that might sound silly but it works. Here’s what I mean: Get the prospect thinking about what life would be like when they own your product or service. Get specific. Get tangible. Get real.

If possible, get your prospect using the product or service first — before they buy — so they can see just how invaluable it is. Get them involved with the product or service and interacting with it. Make it part of their life. Most important, get them imagining how they would use your product or service.

The best salespeople who use this technique are car salespeople and real estate agents. In both cases, they have the prospect driving the car or walking around the house and while they are doing that, they are getting the prospect thinking about using the car/house in their life. For example: “The car has a big trunk. What would you put into it?” or “This house has a big yard. How would you use it?” or “The car is small and is great for parking. Where do you park your car?” or “This is a great living room. What color would you paint it?”

Notice how these simple questions don’t just have the prospect thinking about the product itself; instead, they’re thinking about what they would do if they owned the product because they are being asked questions as if they practically owned the product right now.

Your products and services need to be sold, too. And you can sell more of them by helping your prospects see themselves using your products and services.

6 quick sales funnel tips to make more money today

By Aaron Hoos on January 27, 2012 in Business

6 quick sales funnel tips to make more money todayRunning a business means managing a sales funnel. Sometimes you need to roll up your sleeves and do some serious work in your sales funnel to fix things that are broken or to optimize it for more profit. But other times, you just need to make minor tweaks to get a quick “pop” in you business.

Here are six quick ideas to get more money out of your sales funnel today

1. Draw out your sales funnel

You’ll gain such a clear understanding of how essential your sales funnel is to your business, plus I usually find that just drawing it out reveals some great opportunities.

2. Create just one clear call to action in your site

It’s easy and tempting to put in all kinds of calls to action — “Contact us” or “download this” or “subscribe here” — but if you have one offering, make it the front-and-center action that website visitors should take.

(Disclaimer: I’m not saying that you should take the other stuff off of your site. Just make one of those things the primary action).

3. Offer a dramatic one-day bonus

Create some short-term urgency by releasing a huge bonus product or service with the purchase of a a popular product or service you already have. Keep it short-term (a 24 hour period is good). See what kind of response you get. Find out if more people are being because they want the free bonus or because it’s a great deal.

4. Announce that you are about to raise your prices

Hey, we all need to raise our prices at some point and most business owners silently raise their prices and hope that there isn’t a lot of backlash. Work this to your advantage by announcing — via press releases and social media — that prices are going to rise on a specific date. (If you sell services, make sure you let people know that they can buy now at the lower rate but receive the service after the price increase).

5. Get back in touch with old buyers

Confession: I find it pretty easy and fun to go after new business so it’s really easy for me to finish a project and then not get back in touch with previous clients. I know I’m not alone here. Lots of entrepreneurs let old customers dry up. Spend some time today combing through your past few years of business and getting in touch with your top ten customers from there. Let them know that you have some availability or extra products and would love the chance to serve them again.

6. Double your lead-generation efforts today

The more leads we generate, the more prospects we end up with and the more customers we can convert those prospects into. But sometimes, lead generation becomes a big strategic endeavor when really just a few extra minutes or hours of effort can have a dramatic, positive impact. Don’t think long-term, just go out and try to double the amount of leads TODAY.

How to find more leads for your real estate or financial business

By Aaron Hoos on January 26, 2012 in Finance, Real Estate

Real estate leads, Financial leads

In this business, your success is entirely dependent on leads. The more leads you have, the better. So where do you find these leads?

HOW TO FIND LEADS

First, start with you.
List you all the different places in life where you interact with other people. These are called your “spheres of influence“. List as many spheres of influence that you have. (By the way, you probably have more than you realize).

Some common spheres of influence include:

  • Immediate family
  • Extended family (don’t ignore family who may not live nearby!)
  • Close friends
  • Friends
  • Acquaintances
  • Current co-workers
  • Previous co-workers (list all of your previous jobs)
  • Alumni (college and high school)
  • Church (past and present religious affiliations)
  • Charity connections
  • Other organizations (Toastmasters, etc.)
  • Online connections (Twitter followers, Facebook friends, people you frequently talk to in forums)
  • People you do business with (accountant, dry cleaner, mechanic, dentist, etc.)
  • Current clients
  • Past clients (past clients at your current job and past clients at your previous job… Just make sure that you are complying with any non-compete clauses if your are still in the same industry)

Second, list names
List all of the people by name in each sphere. Yes it will take a long time but the more time you spend being thorough right now, the more successful you will be later.

Third, gather contact information
Figure out how to get in touch with the people. If you know their number or email address or postal address, great! Collect it all into one place. I suggest a database of some kind.

Fourth, identify how you can help them
This step is optional but I think it helpful. Figure out how you can help them. If you’re a real estate professional and they are renters, you’ll likely be able to help them buy their first home. If you’re a financial advisor and they are near to retirement, you’ll likely be able to help them transition their portfolio into safer, income-producing investments while minimizing tax consequences.

If you really want to improve your odds, check out this blog post: 6 sales funnel tips for real estate professionals (it applies to financial professionals, too!)

Fifth, get in touch with them
Using whatever method you have identified (face-to-face, phone, email, or postal mail), get in touch with your contact and let them know what you do and make a recommendation about how you’d like to help them.

Chances are, one of the following things will happen:

  • They will become your client
  • They will hedge a little; they won’t commit, and they’ll tell you that they’ll think about it
  • They will tell you no
  • You won’t reach them or they won’t respond

If they become your client, that’s great. Congratulations! However, most people will fall into the second category and some people will fall into the third category. In those situations, thank them and let them know that if anything changes, you’d love to help them. Ask them for permission to stay in touch and collect any contact information you don’t have (so you can email or mail them something). Don’t delete the ones who never responded; just keep them on file and from time to time reach out to them.

GET EVEN MORE LEADS

Now that you have this list started, it’s time to generate even more leads. Here are three ways:

  • Add another sphere of influence. Join a group, join the gym, get involved in a new organization, volunteer for a charity, etc.

  • For each of your leads (yes, that big list you just created earlier in this blog post), do the same exercise and write down THEIR spheres of influence. Sure, you might not know their names but just get down the spheres of influence first. Then create a strategy to approach those people and make a request like: “Can you put up my business card on the bulletin board at your work?” or “can I put on a presentation about insurance in the lunch room at your office?” Make sure to keep the request easy for them to do. Remember: They won’t agree to anything that makes them uncomfortable!
  • You probably already have a website that is geared to people who are ready to become clients. (Most real estate and financial professionals have a site like this). Move up your sales funnel and create content that is geared toward lead generation instead of prospect conversion. For example, a real estate professional might want to create content that answers some earlier stage questions like “should I buy a home right now?”. You can do this on your own site, or start another site, or use internet marketing (like articles and press releases and social media) to help you drive traffic to your website.
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