The following is an important reality in your world of intangibles:
Clients usually don’t know what they’re getting until they realize they aren’t getting what was promised.
For the purposes of this article, rather than focusing on how to create surrogates and metaphors for tangibility, we’re going to explain how these intangible realities can be used as an effective sales tool. Your sales approach will become extremely sharp when it’s disguised as a question focused on an existing area of dissatisfaction. With this in mind, you might want to consider the following statement as your sales mantra: You must create dissatisfaction in order to sell.
An advisor who is armed with the knowledge of why affluent clients fire their advisors is extremely dangerous...to other advisors. These are the advisors who can poach top clients from their competitors.
By understanding the power of asking the right questions and knowing what to listen for in conversation (even the most remote reference to one of these five), with a bit of practice you’ll be able to customize your own questions to the specifics of the conversation at hand.
From our vantage point, there are sales opportunities galore and, going forward, you should never let one pass.
@StephenBoswell is President of The Oechsli Institute and author of Best Practices of Elite Advisors. @KevinANichols is the chief operating officer for The Oechsli Institute and author of The Indispensable LinkedIn Sales Guide for Financial Advisors.
