What about…

  Prospect- "So what do you do"  Me- "In regards to money... I help people help themselves."   Never used it but I have been trying to come up with something short and simple but yet raises their curiosity.   What better place then here to get it bashed!

Make a real effort to be personable, but professional.  If you try and become buddies with these new people, it might put them off.

Clients want a trustworthy, genuine advocate to manage their serious money - not a drinking buddy.   Let's say investments DON'T come in conversation (the highly unlikely, worst case scenario)...if the evening goes well, drop a note thanking everyone for a fun night - do it on company-headed paper with your contact info, but DON'T mention anything about business on the note!   If the friends haven't contacted you within a week or two:   1) if you feel you can pull it off (and it's appropriate), call and say "I really enjoyed meeting you the other night; I was wondering if you'd be open to a coffee and allowing me to introduce myself on a professional level too?"   2) Call and personally invite them to your next seminar.  You could even play it down and say you've already paid for the food, but have seats to fill.           

Update - non prospecting event was last night ..........   Went well. Dinner was relaxed, no talk about business whatsoever. Everyone had a good time. The two guests (friends of my clients) were a CPA, (managing partner at a 4 partner firm - solid practice) and a corporate mid level employee. On the way out of the restaurant i just casually asked the CPA for his card and gave him mine, he was good with it. This guy and i got along pretty well, he's my kind of person, around my age, grew up in the same kind of enviroment/neighborhod as me, big sports fan,e tc. The other guy was very low key, nice guy, appreciative of my inviting him and doing this, but very low key, not as much in common with him. I asked him for his card as we were leaving the game, he didnt have one, i gave him mine and just said "if you ever want to talk market, or talk about any issues you have, feel free to give me a call.   During the game, i got into a conversation with the CPA. He started it, and i dont remember how it started but at one point he said something like "i don't mean to degrade the value of what you guys do, but....." I let it go, and let that particular conversation end   . Then a few minutes later, i started a new and more focused conversation, by turning to him and saying, "so i guess you dont exactly hold Financial Advisors in high regard??" I said it in a half jokiing tone, so it wasnt confrontational. He said, "well, i'll tell you, i can't retire any time soon because my 401k is down 50%. My advisor kept me in kept me in. Then i made a move to another guy, same thing. ........   BINGO. Found the hot button. The conversation went on for a few minutes, not long, and i ended it, by saying, hey, we're at a basketball game, lets enjoy it.   So i think i accomplished something here. We'll see how receptive he is when i try to call him. I didnt ask for permission to call him and talk about it some more, maybe i should have.  But all in all, i think i have a decent prospect to at least drip on and hopefully talk to.

Maybe an opener like this could work...   "Mr. CPA Dude, I can't stop thinking about why your advisor would have your portfolio that correlated to the market if you were going to retire soon. Let me take a look at what he is doing and I will give you a second opinion. If his ideas have not produced this year you will need to move one more time..."    

Bob, for me, CPAs are mainly hopeless. I've known one for years, who even got himself in and out of the asset management business, who is still an investment moron. The obstacles are embedded in the brain of the CPA, not yours. Some referrals come, but without a revenue sharing agreement in place, I have learned not waste time, money and especially stature to pursue indirect business or referrals, in any manner.

In my experience, the best results have come almost from a combination of almost mocking or challenging and then educating CPAs about how real advisors manage money. If they feel a little insecure, they'll pay attention.   " Mr. CPA dude, you're the tax expert, I depend on you. With respect, I don't see where you have experience or perspective on portfolios - this is about protecting client's money, and growing it a little to keep up with inflation. Over the years, I've learned some techniques, and when I'm sitting in review with clients, I focus on things like yield and interest and dividends, even off the blue chip stocks - I point out how these accumulate in the sweep account, and folks understand how you can make money even when the market is going sideways, like it has for the past ten years."   "What I'm saying is, I'm being paid to wrap up this portfolio management for a flat fee, inclusive so I'm on the same side of the table with our client, not calling them up and making trades so I can make a few hundred bucks in commissions - I work like you do.   But what I need from you is the tax piece, and the year end tax planning for capital gains, and retirement plan distribtutions, running proformas to tell us how to maximize the lower tax brackets and such, so that's going to be more billable hours for you, and we need to tie up these relationships, so my assistant can get the information over to your office in an an efficient way...   And if I'm going to be sending you a few new clients this tax season, then I'm going to be needing a few referrals from you, good accounts with some money to manage and meet my minimum, so we can keep this thing going. "

[quote=Sportsfreakbob]

Update - non prospecting event was last night ..........   Went well. Dinner was relaxed, no talk about business whatsoever. Everyone had a good time. The two guests (friends of my clients) were a CPA, (managing partner at a 4 partner firm - solid practice) and a corporate mid level employee. On the way out of the restaurant i just casually asked the CPA for his card and gave him mine, he was good with it. This guy and i got along pretty well, he's my kind of person, around my age, grew up in the same kind of enviroment/neighborhod as me, big sports fan,e tc. The other guy was very low key, nice guy, appreciative of my inviting him and doing this, but very low key, not as much in common with him. I asked him for his card as we were leaving the game, he didnt have one, i gave him mine and just said "if you ever want to talk market, or talk about any issues you have, feel free to give me a call.   During the game, i got into a conversation with the CPA. He started it, and i dont remember how it started but at one point he said something like "i don't mean to degrade the value of what you guys do, but....." I let it go, and let that particular conversation end   . Then a few minutes later, i started a new and more focused conversation, by turning to him and saying, "so i guess you dont exactly hold Financial Advisors in high regard??" I said it in a half jokiing tone, so it wasnt confrontational. He said, "well, i'll tell you, i can't retire any time soon because my 401k is down 50%. My advisor kept me in kept me in. Then i made a move to another guy, same thing. ........   BINGO. Found the hot button. The conversation went on for a few minutes, not long, and i ended it, by saying, hey, we're at a basketball game, lets enjoy it.   So i think i accomplished something here. We'll see how receptive he is when i try to call him. I didnt ask for permission to call him and talk about it some more, maybe i should have.  But all in all, i think i have a decent prospect to at least drip on and hopefully talk to.[/quote]   What happened to making casual... why are we handing out business cards?   Every time someone hands me a business card, I look back at them and wonder "seriously".... It reminds me of my days back in the chamber leads group... Schmucks handing everyone they know a business card.   Why not just ask him if he wants to get together for lunch next week, you have some tax issues with your clients that you need help on(or they might need help on)

[quote=DeBolt]

Maybe an opener like this could work...   "Mr. CPA Dude, I can't stop thinking about why your advisor would have your portfolio that correlated to the market if you were going to retire soon. Let me take a look at what he is doing and I will give you a second opinion. If his ideas have not produced this year you will need to move one more time..."    [/quote]   Yeah sell on performance, that never backfires

Personally,

  If I'm going to talk business in anyway or hand out a card to people, I let them know ahead of time it's a business meeting. If it's not known ahead of time I never bring it up.   My experience is that the more I get to be 'friends' with someone before we talk business the harder it is to transition to business.   Friends like to debate or discuss subjects. They have opinions on things. That's great for discussion but not the relationship I want with my clients.   I don't discuss with my Orthopedic Surgeon or debate with him about my patella tendon. I say, it hurts, he says then we need to do _____.   That is how I treat my clients. They say, I want to do this or that at age 60 and I have X dollars now. I say, ok, we need to do this ____. It isn't a discussion.   Bottom line is that if you made friends with the CPA at the game great but I wouldn't have traded cards or talked shop in that setting.    

[quote=chief123][

What happened to making casual... why are we handing out business cards?   Every time someone hands me a business card, I look back at them and wonder "seriously".... It reminds me of my days back in the chamber leads group... Schmucks handing everyone they know a business card.   Why not just ask him if he wants to get together for lunch next week, you have some tax issues with your clients that you need help on(or they might need help on)[/quote]   Chief- I think i kept it casual. I asked for his biz card, and did it on the way out of the restaurant, an almost "by the way" comment. Made sure not to make it a spectacle at the dinner table.   We'll see if he's amenable to getting together in the next week, or after the holidays. Its possible that he's so agnostic after a bad experience that there is no shot.   I think in a worst case scenario here, at the very least, i strenthgened my relationship with the two clients i had there, who are both A+ clients of mine. So nothing lost. Hopefully it will be more than that. Its always good when you let them see you as a human being instead of a person behind a desk or at a meeting discussing business. To me, even if i dont get new clients out of this, it was well worth the few hundred bucks i spent. And it was my first one, i'll get better at it as i do more of these, whether its Basketball games, Baseball, or playing a lot of golf with clients and friens which i will do next summer.

he doesn’t that is why he failed out of Jones.

  Agree with bio... for a certain prospect or percentage of a clients portfolio they work great.. Way better than the 1% CD the bank is offering. My client got 7%(contract year ended last week) and the year before when the market crashed, my client kept everything..   Not for everyone, but for some people or a % of the portfolio it does what it says it will do. And that is all you can ask for

So what is the plan of attack on the CPA? Sounds like you have no idea, on are wavering on even contacting him again.

  Call him up setup an appointment make sure he knows its about business. Talk about referrals or his account or his retirement plan or his business

Squash why do you think i have no idea?   Plan of attack is emailed him yesterday, thanks for coming enjoyed meeting, blahblah blah, and will call and suggest we meet. Plan to call this coming week.