September 15, 2014 / by Don Connelly / Managing the Relationship / 0 comments
By now you know my belief about gathering assets. If someone likes you, trusts you and thinks you are smart, you get the assets. If another Advisor ranks higher in those categories, he or she gets the assets.
Follow the Golden Rule and you will be likable. Simplify the business so that your listener can understand every word you say and you will be perceived as smart.
Do what you say you are going to do and you will earn the other person’s trust.
Like most things in life, the solution to each of these perceptions is simple. It’s not easy, but it is simple.
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Three Stories about Trust to Use with Prospects and Clients
February 22, 2021 / by Don Connelly / Managing the Relationship, Storytelling, analogies and power phrases / 0 comments
The most fundamental principle of building a clientele is understanding that people do business with people they like and trust. While it’s easy for many advisors to be likable, trust has to be earned—quickly and often. As an advisor, you can never lose sight of that because trust not only binds a client to you but it also enables them to follow your guidance with confidence and conviction, which is critical to their long-term success.
If you’ve been following this blog for any length of time, you know I believe in the power of storytelling to drive home concepts and change a client’s perspective. I offer these three stories about trust to you as an advisor to drive home the crucial role trust plays in your client relationships.
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Never Forget that Clients and Prospects Are Real People with Real Concerns
September 5, 2016 / by Don Connelly / Managing the Relationship / 0 comments
Clients and prospects are real people so the best way to reach out to them and win them over is to appeal to their humanity – not wow them with financial jargon.
People won’t warm to you simply because you know your way around the stock market. Your prospects and clients make their decisions based on whether they like you and trust you – not on your ability to make the numbers add up. People overwhelmingly tend to make decisions based on emotions rather than on hard rational thinking. So put away your graphs, numbers, pie charts and statistics and convince people to trust you rather than the numbers.
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How to Win Over Clients by Becoming More Likeable
June 22, 2015 / by Don Connelly / Marketing Yourself / 3 comments
People will only do business with you if they like you and trust you. Human decisions are generally subjective. Even if you are the most professional financial advisor out there, if people don’t warm to you they won’t commit to you. Prospects will not choose you simply because you are competent; they will choose to do business with you because you are competent and likeable.
By becoming likeable you will stand head and shoulders above other advisors. And you don’t need innate talent to become more likeable. You can learn how to radiate confidence and charisma.
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How Much Value Do You Bring as a Financial Advisor?
February 12, 2015 / by Don Connelly / Don Guest Authoring at..., Managing the Relationship / 0 comments
What determines your value is not up to you to decide. It is left for the client to decide. And that decision is a lot simpler than you might think.
When selecting an Advisor, three things are of value to a prospective client.
That person must like the Advisor, that person must trust the Advisor and that person must think the Advisor is smart. There is very little else to factor in initially.
Prospective clients generally are not looking for more information.
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How Interpersonal Relationships Lead to You Being Trusted
September 15, 2014 / by Don Connelly / Managing the Relationship / 0 comments
By now you know my belief about gathering assets. If someone likes you, trusts you and thinks you are smart, you get the assets. If another Advisor ranks higher in those categories, he or she gets the assets.
Follow the Golden Rule and you will be likable. Simplify the business so that your listener can understand every word you say and you will be perceived as smart.
Do what you say you are going to do and you will earn the other person’s trust.
Like most things in life, the solution to each of these perceptions is simple. It’s not easy, but it is simple.
Read more
How to Use Stories and Analogies to Influence and Persuade
July 28, 2014 / by Don Connelly / Storytelling, analogies and power phrases, What's New / 0 comments
During our latest monthly webinar, held July 24, 2104, we discussed the importance of speaking in such a manner that our listener understands everything we say. It is the Advisor’s job to influence and persuade and it all begins with communicating clearly. “We want to go home and think it over” is often code-speak for “We don’t really understand you.”
When you give a good presentation full of sound advice and people choose not to act, what went wrong? Why did they choose not to do business with you? Why did you fail to move them?
There really aren’t that many possible answers to this question.
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Communicating as Intended Is Vital to Your Success
July 14, 2014 / by Don Connelly / Presentation Skills / 0 comments
Since it is your job to influence and persuade, what you say is not nearly as important as what the other person hears. To be successful, you’ve got to communicate as intended.
When folks say to you that they want to go home and think about what you proposed, they are most likely telling you that they haven’t fully understood what you said. They aren’t rethinking their decision to retire comfortably. They simply don’t want to buy into what they don’t understand.
Why are we misunderstood and what can we do about it?
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