/ by Don Connelly / Best Practices / 0 comments
The simple answer is easy: According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, personal financial advisors, on average, made $121,770 in 2018. Translated into an hourly figure, the typical financial advisor made $58.54 per hour, assuming a 40-hour work week.
That’s a mean average, though, which is skewed significantly higher by a few highly successful advisors at the top of the profession. The median average is much lower: $88,890 per year in 2018, or – again assuming a 40-hour work week — $42.73 per hour. “Median” means half the advisors surveyed earned more than that figure, in that year, and half of them made less.
The lowest 10% nationwide made $41,590, or $19.99 per hour – assuming a 40-hour work week. The top quartile of the profession earned $157,710.
But few of them became that successful by working a mere 40-hour work week in their early years!
Here are a few factors to consider to maximize your earning potential.
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Why Financial Advisors Quit
/ by Don Connelly / Best Practices / 0 comments
It’s estimated that nine advisors out of ten don’t last three years in the industry. That seems high for a career that offers so much promise and potential. Most people come into the business checking all the appropriate boxes for having what it takes. Still, when you consider the gap between reality and expectations of fledgling financial advisors, it begins to make sense why most choose to leave the business.
To put it bluntly, not everyone is cut out for a career as a financial advisor, even for those who do check all the boxes. However, with a better understanding of why many financial advisors quit the business, you can beat the odds by avoiding that fate.
The reasons why financial advisors quit are varied, but here are some of the most common.
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Advisors Who Don’t Want to Sound “Salesy” Need to Master Soft Skills
/ by Don Connelly / Marketing Yourself / 0 comments
Many financial advisors don’t like to be thought of as salespeople. In fact, they despise it. In part because they work hard at earning the distinction of being an “advisor.” Also, the public has been conditioned to avoid salespeople masquerading as financial advisors. But in reality, anyone in the business of building a clientele and offering services has to be able to sell.
To convert prospects into clients, advisors must sell themselves and then their solution. To make money, they must get their prospects and clients to act on their solution, which requires sales skills. Most advisors understand that, but their greatest fear is coming across as a salesperson or sounding too “salesy.”
If that is your fear, let me put your mind at ease. First, it’s important to understand what it means to be “salesy.” That term is generally applied to a high-pressure approach that makes prospects uncomfortable. People don’t want to deal with salespeople who are pushy and don’t listen to them.
That’s not you.
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Why You Should Create a Story-Benefit Matrix
/ by Don Connelly / Storytelling, analogies and power phrases / 0 comments
Recently, in my post ”Never Underestimate the Power of a Good ‘Who I Am’ Story,” I mentioned the concept of building a good “story-benefit” matrix. I wanted to take a little time and drill down that concept.
Many salespeople are familiar with the concept of a features-benefit matrix – a handy little cheat-sheet that helps sales and marketing people translate product features into benefits for the customer.
Here’s how a features-benefit matrix works in a nutshell.
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4 Reasons Financial Advisors Should Invest in Education and Self-Development Early On
/ by Don Connelly / Best Practices / 0 comments
“If a man empties his purse into his head, no man can take it away from him. An investment in knowledge always pays the best interest.”
— Benjamin Franklin
Warren Buffett is perhaps the most successful investor there ever was. Not from just one or two big hits, but from a long string of investment successes over more than six decades. But he didn’t get where he is now without studying very hard at Wharton, then at Columbia, where he studied with the legendary Benjamin Graham.
Further, like a Roth IRA, self-development pays off the most when you do it aggressively early in life. The benefits of learning and knowledge compound over time (as long as you keep learning).
Here are four reasons why you should start investing in education and self-development as early in your Financial Advisor career as you can.
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Advice for New Financial Advisors – 8 Things Veteran Advisors Wish They Knew When They First Started Out
/ by Don Connelly / Best Practices / 0 comments
“Experience is the best teacher. But only a fool learns by no other.”
This is a slight misquotation of Benjamin Franklin. But the idea is sound: We all can and should learn from the mistakes and experiences of those who came before us.
And advisors are certainly making mistakes! Somewhere between 70 and 90 percent of financial advisor trainees are out of the business by their fourth year. And too many of those who survive aren’t thriving.
So we asked some veteran financial advisors what they wished they knew when they first started out in this business, or what they would do differently if they could start over. There was a lot of variation in the details, but most of them had these themes in common.
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How Much Do Financial Advisors Make?
/ by Don Connelly / Best Practices / 0 comments
The simple answer is easy: According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, personal financial advisors, on average, made $121,770 in 2018. Translated into an hourly figure, the typical financial advisor made $58.54 per hour, assuming a 40-hour work week.
That’s a mean average, though, which is skewed significantly higher by a few highly successful advisors at the top of the profession. The median average is much lower: $88,890 per year in 2018, or – again assuming a 40-hour work week — $42.73 per hour. “Median” means half the advisors surveyed earned more than that figure, in that year, and half of them made less.
The lowest 10% nationwide made $41,590, or $19.99 per hour – assuming a 40-hour work week. The top quartile of the profession earned $157,710.
But few of them became that successful by working a mere 40-hour work week in their early years!
Here are a few factors to consider to maximize your earning potential.
Read more
5 Risks You Run If You Grow Your Practice Too Fast
/ by Don Connelly / Best Practices / 0 comments
It’s natural to strive to grow your business, but too rapid a growth can bring with it a host of problems. By taking on too many clients and ‘running before you can walk’ you might damage your practice in the long run.
“The fuel of persistence is patience, the ability to tolerate delays while persisting.”
Elite advisors all share an important trait – that of patience. It doesn’t matter how good you are at your job. If you don’t see that success requires time and effort, you will remain at a mediocre level.
Here are five consequences of attempting to grow your practice too fast.
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What Does It Take to Turn a Prospect into a Client?
/ by Don Connelly / Prospecting / 0 comments
If you’re booking plenty of appointments, that’s great news. But if you’re not consistently opening new accounts as a result, it’s a wasted effort. Read on to find out what you need to do to turn a prospect into a client.
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5 Dos of Developing Good Storytelling Skills
/ by Don Connelly / Storytelling, analogies and power phrases / 2 comments
The ability to tell interesting stories is an essential skill for all advisors. Stories are an effective way of letting people get to know the real you, and they’re also useful when it comes to educating clients.
Few of us are born natural raconteurs – but if you commit to developing your skills and practising them regularly, over time you can become a great storyteller.
Here are 5 best practices when it comes to developing good storytelling skills.
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