Description

We’ve talked about creating an advice-centric practice, articulating the value of financial advice, pricing and structuring your services, and conducting your first client meeting. Now it’s time to think about how you can use systems, tools, and referrals to predictably grow your practice.

In the conclusion of my five-part series with John Page, Chairman and Chief Adjudicator of the PlanPlus Global Financial Planning Awards, we’ll be talking in-depth about the tools that you need to grow your practice. Listen in to hear John’s insights about how you can predictably grow your financial advisory practice.

Topics Discussed in This Episode:

• How to track clients from prospect to engagement to first plan to review
• What happens after the first meeting with a client
• Why you should avoid making recommendations until you’ve established yourself as the client’s primary financial advisor
• How advisors can generate referrals consistently
• How an advisor can provide clients with an opportunity to make a referral
• John’s preferred tools for his own practice
• The importance of an action plan
• 
John’s coaching program for advisors, including a new upcoming class

Links:

Email John Page at: JPage@mywea.net

John Page on LinkedIn

Quotes by John:

“I treat them as a client immediately, as soon as they declare that they are, by signing an engagement agreement, and then eventually they start acting like clients.”

“I know some advisors that get a steady stream of referrals and they never ask anyone, but it’s because of the process they’re using.”

“The reason they feel pretty good is because of the quality of the plan.”

John has talked a lot about process and systems throughout this series, and there’s no exception when it comes to predictably growing your practice. We’ll start today where we left off last episode: right after that first client meeting.

The initial assessment and evaluation

As we mentioned in Episode 4: Conducting Your First Client Meeting in a Way to Maximize Conversions, the next step after learning about a prospect’s values, goals, and financial situation is creating an initial assessment and evaluation. This gives the clients a long-term overview of where their current financial situation and habits will lead them.

People often aren’t too happy with what they see, so they’re motivated to engage you as their financial advisor to help them improve their situation.

Resisting the urge to make recommendations too early

Before you get into recommendations, however, you need to solicit commitment from the client. You want to make sure they’re engaging you as their primary financial advisor, which means they commit to talking to you before making any major decisions with financial implications.

Wh...