active listening Archives - Don Connelly & Associates

First Meeting Conversations You Need to Have with Prospective Clients

May 10, 2021 / by Don Connelly / Prospecting / 0 comments

Let’s be honest. Many financial advisors view the first client meeting frettingly as an obstacle to overcome on their way to, hopefully, establishing a new client relationship. After all, the way you start a first client meeting sets the tone for how your relationship will develop—if it develops at all. Prospective clients don’t make it any easier, often approaching their first advisor meeting with an air of skepticism or apprehension. This creates an unnatural tension that crowds out trust-building. That tension must be broken at the outset, and the ball is in the advisor’s court.

The 5 Essential Qualities Financial Advisors Need to Improve Cold Call Results

May 3, 2021 / by Don Connelly / Best Practices, Prospecting / 0 comments

No one ever said cold calling was easy, but some people have an easier time of it than others. Skills have a lot to do with that. But sometimes, learning skills is not enough.

The most successful cold callers share certain qualities and traits that give them an edge over and above the skills they acquire. We’ve discussed some of these traits in past articles, including positivity, perseverance, tenacity, and resilience. These traits are critical because they can keep you in the game in the face of constant rejection. However, successful cold callers possess other essential qualities and attributes that help them up their game.

Let’s have a look at five such essential qualities and traits.

How to Succeed at Giving Financial Advice

February 15, 2021 / by Don Connelly / Best Practices / 0 comments

So, you want to be in the business of giving financial advice. That’s understandable because not only can the career of a financial advisor be financially rewarding, it can also be very fulfilling. Through a relationship that can span a lifetime, you become the essential source of advice in one of the most important aspects of your clients’ lives. There’s just one problem. You don’t have any clients—yet.

As a new financial advisor, your number one job is to find new clients. That has always been advisors’ biggest challenge but more so today due to the trust deficit that exists in the financial services industry. According to a CFA Institute survey, only 57 percent of retail investors trust the financial services industry, which is up from a few years ago, but it’s still a wide chasm to overcome. The same survey found that retail investors listed “trust” as their top consideration when hiring an advisor. Prospective clients simply won’t work with an advisor they don’t trust.

Digital Marketing for Financial Advisors – How Social Media Can Generate Leads

January 25, 2021 / by Don Connelly / Marketing Yourself / 0 comments

Financial advisors know how difficult it is to make contact with high-net-worth people through phone calls and emails. However, when they reach out to connect with the same people via LinkedIn or Twitter, they are often welcomed with open arms. From there, they simply become part of the conversation, which opens the opportunity to build relationships.

By actively participating in popular social media sites, such as Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and LinkedIn, you automatically expand your online presence while building social capital. At the very minimum, your participation provides social proof to your target market that you exist and that you might actually have something of value to offer.

How to Convince Prospects and Clients That You Understand What They’re Going through

January 11, 2021 / by Don Connelly / Managing the Relationship / 0 comments

It’s long been said that people might forget what you say. But they will never forget how you made them feel.

There’s a lot of truth to that. And one of the first things your clients and prospects should feel is that you understand what they’re going through. Before some of you were born, there was a great, great sales trainer and educator named Zig Ziglar. Look him up! He learned to sell by selling brushes. Door-to-door.

He went on more sales calls before breakfast than some of you go on in a month. And he used to say “People don’t care how much you know, until they know how much you care… about them.”

There’s two steps to that equation: First, you need to genuinely understand what they are going through. Second, you need to communicate that to them.

3 Issues Financial Advisors Should Address to Overcome the Trust Deficit in Clients

November 23, 2020 / by Don Connelly / Managing the Relationship / 0 comments

Financial Advisors face a huge trust deficit. That’s significant because who holds a more important position of trust than an advisor who can impact when people retire, how they live in retirement, and what’s their financial security late in life when they need it the most? For advisors whose livelihood depends on attracting new clients and retaining them, that’s a major obstacle to overcome every day.

Sales Jiujitsu: How to Introduce Yourself as a Financial Advisor

July 20, 2020 / by Don Connelly / Presentation Skills / 0 comments

Occasionally I get asked about the best way to introduce yourself as a financial advisor.

That’s an important skill. But in some ways, focusing on introducing yourself to other people is looking at the problem from the wrong direction. There’s always the risk that going to a business mode when the prospect is not yet receptive to it will cause them to go into “shields-up” mode.

Instead, turn that process inside out: Consider finding ways to get prospects to introduce themselves to you.

The difference is fundamental.