anybody ?

I was told by a co-worker that it used to take about 5-6 contacts to make a prospect a client and now a recent study has shown that it takes about 10 contacts.....take that for whatever its worth.

Remeber, its a contact sport. 

I would suggest, that you be in position, ready to go in closing the deal on the first appointment. Your entire operation must be geared for this. The first big reason is time management, the other is that the sense of urgency wears off, and you start losing the prospect. That said, I prospected my biggest account for 7 long years before he opened his account with me. When I product called, virtually every account was opened on the first try, if they left the office, I'd say my closing rate fell to something like 15-20%. I did close about 80% of my appointments. This was at a time when I had quite a bit of experience.

My initial meeting went like this. Break the ice, small talk until the client is ready to proceed. I'd restate my original offer, but suggest that I should know more about them before proceeding. I'd profile them for 15 minutes, then restate the offer and how it fit into their financial picture. The next 30 minutes were paperwork oriented. That, worked like a charm...

Completely agree.. If you can't close(account opened, acat filled out, etc) on the first appointment, then you should try to disqualify them for your next calls.(if not you will have a lot of prospects who are either not interested or not qualified)..

I work with clients that have at least $100k in the market(i would lead with this initially) people who don't have $100k will let you know..

I would say 5-7 contacts, but that includes: Original call, mailing information out, dropping something off, email, appointment, etc...

If they are unwilling to meet with you on the second call, you should be disqualifying them from your practice:

is $50K too much for you, what amount are you comfortable investing?

Is your current portfolio worth over or under $100k?

"Jennifer Nettles: from Westwood's topic had some good ones:

What will it take for us to do business?

What can I do to earn a piece of your business?

So I don't waste anyone's time, is it the product you aren't interested or the business relationship?

How about you replace one of your advisor's bad ideas with one of my good ideas? Would you consider moving 50k thats just sitting around or even worse, losing money?

A very good friend of mine, big hitter. Well, his bank branches were near one of my branches. Every once in a while, one of his 2000 clients would come to us, want to switch. My buddy was a little bit pushy, my partner and I layed back a bit. ANyways, I seriously found out, that anyone that has a decent sized account, switching reps, is most likely to be a bit of a problem account. Most advisors, with few exceptions, take very good care of their bigger accounts, 250k-500k and above. I finally, after years, just said "great, best of luck" when told by a prospect that they had a rep that they were happy or satisfied with. Frankly, it's just professional to do so.  

There are tons of folks, born to the world of liquid wealth daily, one way or another, that don't have a rep. A person with a decent amount of money, no rep, and a desire to do something ,...is ...surprise....generally inclined to talk with you. So, you just keep shucking oysters, til you find that nice pearl. The faster, the better.

I've been pleasantly surprised at how many wealthier individuals DON'T have an advisor.  This is especially true for people still working with most wealth tied up in 401K's.