Recommendations to My Financial Advisor Coaching Clients You Can Use

Recommendations to My Financial Advisor Coaching Clients You Can Use

I want to share with you a few of the recommendations I have made to my coaching clients. They likely apply equally well to your situation.

Use a 3rd Party Companies When You Can

Many of you use too many methods to chase pennies and ignore dollars. For example, in the martial arts industry monthly payments are common from clients so it’s imperative to use a 3rd party company to collect these payments. A) It saves you effort, B) It separates you from the “money” in your clients’ perspective and C) you’ll make more money because that’s their job.

This kind of company is available for medical professionals (or anyone who deals with insurance), in the legal field, and in many other businesses.

This is just one example – find 3rd parties who can do tasks cheaper, better and improve your margins!

Pricing, Programs, and Value

Rule of Thumb: You should targeting a specific income per client in your business. It’s probably too low right now. Some key points to think about…

Can you build in recurring billing? Is there opportunity for your client to pay for a regular update or for consistent service? Recurring billing is a way you can sell “one time” and have it continue forever.

Pricing: Your price point in almost any business can be increased. Price, absent other criteria, determines perception of value. This means that higher prices (except in commodities like oil, gold, etc.) will be perceived as higher status in clients mind. Which is more valuable – a Porsche or a Subaru? There are models of each with the same performance yet the Porsche commands a higher price.

Levels of Service: You should look to offer more levels of service in your business. In the martial arts industry an advanced program may be 50% to 100% more than a beginner program. In your business, where are there opportunities to increase service levels / status / value and charge more to increase income per client?

Expectations

Many of my coaching clients aspired to make $25,000 to $40,000 a month. The current standard is $80,000-or more per month in revenue. If you are struggling for small increases — or fighting the basic system — then it’s time to adopt my strategy.

The Mythology of business

Forget about how great you think your style is and how awesome your name is, your business won’t pay your bills if you think:

• The market cares about your previous jobs or professional résumé.
• Your ten or 20 years as a failing business has positioned you well for the future.
• Going it alone or doing things your way is a great idea.

During the last couple of months, there’s been a lot of time wasted on one-on-one calls with business owners with $7,000 to $15,000 businesses who brag about how long they’ve been in business, their ads, their knowledge, or their great curricula. Several of them, who haven’t done much two or three months later, complain they need more of my time one-on-one.

Here are some of my favorite quotes for you to write down and remember:

“Winners remember results—losers remember reasons.” (Source unknown)

“Most people would rather have a good excuse than good results.” (I heard this one from Dan Kennedy, quoting someone else.)

“But when I said that nothing had been done, I erred in one important matter. We had committed ourselves and were halfway out of our ruts. We had put down our passage money — booked a sailing to Bombay. This may sound too simple but is great in consequence. Until one is committed, there is hesitancy, the chance to draw back, always ineffectiveness. Concerning all acts of initiative (and creation), there is one elementary truth, the ignorance of which kills countless ideas and splendid plans: that the moment one commits oneself, their providence moves too. A whole stream of events issues from the decision, raising in one’s favor all manner of unforeseen incidents, meetings, and material assistance, which no man could have dreamt would have come his way. I learned a deep respect for one of Goethe’s couplets:

‘Whatever you can do or dream you can begin it.

Boldness has genius, power, and magic in it.‘” W. H. Murray in The Scottish Himalaya Expedition, 1951.

The accurate Goethe quote is:

Then indecision brings its delays,

And days are lost lamenting over lost days.

Are you in earnest? Seize this very minute.

What you can do, or dream you can do, begin it.

Boldness has genius, power and, magic in it.

Know Your Business Statistics!

You must gather and maintain your operational and business statistics and know your current situation every week. Are you on target to achieve your daily, weekly, monthly, quarterly and yearly goals? How many clients do you need per day, week, and month to match your projections? How many renewals/upgrades do you need? What is your target client retention rate? What are your daily break-even costs and daily profit goal?

Many business owners don’t know their basic statistics, such as intros or first meetings, conversion rates, upgrades, new monthly payments or contract amounts — and they should.

If I asked you: “What are your totals for the month to date?” Would you have to refer to a ledger or computer, or ask someone? If you do then you have a problem.

You Can’t Do Anything Without New Clients.

Your target must always be 20 or more new clients per month — every month — or 240 new clients as a minimum every year, forever. If you have plenty of cash flow, then educate yourself about copywriting, TV, radio and direct mail. Improve your marketing skills and spend more time on grassroots promotional efforts and internal marketing. My record is 35 new clients (12-month contracts, signed and down payments, collected by EFT) in one day, back-to-back. It was an amazing feeling.

I remember an otherwise intelligent business owner who joined my coaching program — with the intent of earning $60,000 to $90,000 a year in income, which is a reasonable goal, considering many business owners in my coaching program can earn similar amounts. During the first month in my coaching program, the new member sent me a barrage of emails, stating among other things:

“I’m not willing to do contracts” and “I don’t believe in ‘upgrade or renewal’ systems.”

Geez. Why not just email me the following message?

“I have decided to take a permanent ‘vow of poverty’. I will only be in this position of my business for the fun and fulfillment of working with my clients. And I have absolutely no expectation of making more than a meager income, even though I’ve devoted much of my life to learn and master the skill set I have.”

It amazes me otherwise intelligent human beings will decide to ignore intelligent business practices due to ignorance or the “unscrupulous” application of otherwise valid business systems by some operators.

If you remember nothing else, then please remember the two things every intelligent and rich business owner knows:

· Excellent customer service and retention are essential for long-term success.

· Aggressive renewal and upgrade systems account for 60-75% of all revenue of a successful business.

You will greatly improve your understanding of some of the fundamentals of “how millionaires create 75% of their incomes”, but I encourage you to keep an open mind and approach your business practices with both enlightened self-interest and the highest levels of integrity.

Most business owners who join my coaching program generated an average of $15,000 to $17,000 in gross income per month; however, after eight to 12 months of working together, that average dramatically increased to $45,000 to $50,000 per month. Be aware this three-fold increase is not magical; it requires your willingness to ’empty the cup’ and immediately apply intelligent, proven business systems to an otherwise quality program.

Stephen Oliver
CEO
Wealth Mastery
StephenOliver@AdvisorWealthMastery.com
www.AdvisorWealthMastery.com