By Helen Thompson
If you think you’re ready to compete in the affluent marketplace, you need to prepare yourself. It’s a tough market to crack because affluent prospects aren’t going to give you their business until you demonstrate that you meet their high standards. And after all, every other advisor in this market is trying to get an audience with the clients you want to work with.
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To get past these clients’ well-honed defenses, you have to work to establish a relationship of trust with them to win and keep their business. |
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Richard Manchester, president and CEO of Wave Wealth Management in Laguna Beach, Calif., specializes in working with affluent Baby Boomers. Most of these clients, he notes, got their wealth from an inheritance or from being business owners. He’s also noticing
a trend—the spouses of these affluent Boomers are looking for financial advisors as well. But whether you’re dealing with experienced businesspeople or spouses newly aware of their wealth-management needs, Manchester says that affluent clients won’t hesitate to leave the second they smell something wrong.
To get past these clients’ well-honed defenses, you have to work to establish a relationship of trust with them to win and keep their business. Their expectations are high, and you need to deliver. Manchester offers these tips that will help you build trust and loyalty with affluent clients:
1. Communicate effectively and often. Think of affluent clients as “the boss.” By maintaining an open channel of communications, they’ll be able to stay in the loop and know they are front and center on your priority list. If you’re calling them too often, they’ll let you know.
2. Be available. Affluent clients don’t have needs only between 9 a.m. and 5 p.m. Return their calls as quickly as possible, and when you can, take their calls immediately. Even if you’re tired, it’s best to take that midnight phone call from a client who’s vacationing in Hawaii.
3. They want your guidance and counsel, not your sales techniques. Affluent clients will resist a product pitch and move on if they feel that they can get a wider array of products elsewhere. Your best defense is to familiarize yourself with different solutions and offer your clients choices, explaining the pros and cons of each. “We’re trained from a sales perspective to lead people to the conclusion that we want,” Manchester says. “Most affluent clients don’t want to be led anywhere. They want to draw their own conclusions.”
4. Be their advocate. One problem you might face as a result of their independence is that when they’re dead-set on a bad idea, it may be hard to talk them out of it. “They have to be told frequently when something is really not in their best interest,” says Manchester, adding that they also sometimes need your help in pushing away other parties trying to get their piece of the pie. “Every affluent person has friends and family members trying to get an audience with them, and you may need to act as [your client’s] gatekeeper,” he adds.
5. Look at your business model. Consider becoming a fee-based advisor so that you can avoid being perceived as product-focused. “These clients are willing to pay for the right advice,” says Manchester, noting that affluent Boomers want to make purchases, not “be sold” to.
6. Team up with other professionals. If you specialize in life insurance, you have a unique opportunity within this marketplace. Partner with a wealth-management firm and become its insurance point-person. Manchester notes that this arrangement will only work if you and the firm have the same goals for the client. The other benefit of going this route is that you’ll get a lot of experience working with high-net-worth clients, and are more likely to succeed if you decide to take it to the next level and expand your offerings as a wealth-management professional.
May 2007
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Get Your YAT On
Talking to Seniors
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