How to get noticed

Sometimes the best advice comes from our peers, so we visited the advisor.ca forums to see what’s going on in the trenches. What we found, among lively debates and reaction to the latest industry news, was a veritable gold mine of guidance on what to do — and not do — to build a more successful practice.

For this month’s Final Words, we’ve featured some of these verbatim posts. Since the forums are anonymous, we don’t know who’s speaking. But we do believe these frank comments capture a universal advisor voice. Here’s what your colleagues are saying:

If I had to do it over…

“I would have hired an assistant sooner in my career, even though I couldn’t afford it. Administration can suck up so much time, energy, life force. I was busy, but not productive. When I finally did hire a good assistant, five years into my career, my income more than doubled in one year.

“The lesson I learned was to concentrate on what I’m good at — meeting clients, providing advice and service and prospecting.

“Have somebody else take care of the rest.”

Building loyalty

“Spray-and-pray advertising is useless, expensive and unmeasurable. It should be avoided at all costs. The affluent client you should be pursuing finds that new trusted person 99% of the time through their own network of affluent peers. So do great work for your clients. Reward loyalty.

“Recently, a client had a birthday. She’s from Mexico, so her birthday call was me singing happy birthday in Spanish on her voicemail. She loved it. Another client (a referral from her spouse) recently provided me with a very high-quality referral and the thank-you gift was an anchor that will last, was unique to the individual and will have traction for a long time to come. The loyalty/trust build continues.”

It’s a two-way street

“I would have made it clear right up front to my clients that when I telephone, write or email, it’s unacceptable not to receive a response in timely fashion. We are on call 24/7, yet some clients seem to feel we don’t warrant a response. Consequently, time is spent trying to obtain an answer that could be much better used on other areas of the practice. It’s their money and I can no longer be more concerned about it than they are.”

Independent vs. big bank

“As independent advisors, I believe we have a responsibility to work collaboratively to educate the investing public about the advantages of dealing with the independent channel. Thus far, the independents have been very much interested only in themselves. Operating in silos with a protectionist mentality, they don’t share information well and bicker over inane issues. To be blunt, we’ve been too short-sighted.

“While the banks compete fiercely, they’ve also set the standard for effective collaboration. Their desire to work together, share information and commit to a common strategy has served them very well. This is something we must do better.

“Barring a major shift, all but the very best independents will be out of business within 5-10 years.”

Marketing tips

“The best way to reach people is to get in front of them face to face! Print ads, mass mails, postcards, radio ads, billboards, flyers; they all have a very low ROI. Find a way to get in front of them:

Seminars, either alone or partner with a key referral centre, lawyer, accountant, life coach, personal fitness trainer, etc.

Trade-show booths — you have to talk to people though, not just sit back and expect them to approach you.

Financial workshops for different groups like the chamber of commerce or mommy and me.

“If you set up one of these speaking events, find people to attend. It definitely gives you something to cold-call about — an invitation. Basically, I found it most effective to always try to find a way to get in front of people, face-to-face.

“Keep plugging away. Keep working on your networks, on key referral centres. Try to have fun!”