Read The Transcript Of The Episode:

Speaker 1: This is The Ultimate Advisor Podcast, the podcast for financial advisors who want to create a thriving, successful, and scalable practice. Each week we'll uncover the ways that you can improve your referrals, your team, your marketing, and your business operations, helping you to level up your advising practice, bring in more assets and create the advising practice that you've dreamed of. You'll be joined by your hosts, Bryan Sweet, who has more than half a billion dollars in assets under management, Brittany Anderson, the driving force for advisors looking to hire, improve their operations and company culture and Draye Redfern, who can help you systematize and automate your practices marketing to effortlessly attract new clients. So what do you say? Let's jump into another amazing episode of The Ultimate Adviser Podcast.

Brittany A.: This is Brittany Anderson here with you today on The Ultimate Advisor Podcast. I am really excited about today because we have another special guest. Joining us today is Mr. Stephen Wershing of The Client Driven Practice. Stephen, welcome.

Stephen W.: Brittany. Thank you so much for having me on. I'm really excited to be here as well. I'm excited to talk with you.

Brittany A.: Awesome. Well, you have got so many good insights, so much good stuff that we're going to dive into today. So I don't want to waste any time. I think we just need to go right in.

Stephen W.: Okay. Let's do it.

Brittany A.: All Right. So, Stephen, I want you to tell our audience a little bit about yourself and talk a little bit about the mission behind The Client Driven Practice.

Stephen W.: Sure. Well, so I've been in financial services for, it's September again, right? So for 32 years now. Yikes. 

Brittany A.: Wow.

Stephen W.: And [inaudible 00:01:57] I was a registered rep, and then was a branch manager and then went independent and then became a broker dealer executive. And after doing that for about 14 years, I decided to go and do my own thing, start my own company. And the fun part of this business, I was involved in a couple small broker dealers, so small companies, everybody has to do everything. So I've done operations, I've done compliance, but the fun part was always helping advisors build their businesses. So I wanted to just start a company to do just that, focus on that. And it's been a fun ride. So, I really focus on helping advisors get more clients, refine their branding and differentiate from other advisors. And sort of mixed into all that, I'm also known for doing advisory boards. That's kind of actually how I got my start in the consulting space. So I still do that and we do more of those than any other firm in the country for financial advisors.

Brittany A.: Wow. And I really, I want to get into more of the advisory board because I know at Sweet Financial, we absolutely believe in that concept. We've had it implemented for many, many years now and I think you have a really interesting perspective on that. So I do want to circle back to that in a little bit, but before we get into that, you were so generous. You sent me a copy of your book called Stop Asking for Referrals. So insightful. So interesting when it comes to kind of having unique process for increasing your referability, for not asking for referrals. So I want you to talk a little bit about that and share with our audience kind of what your unique method is. Maybe without giving away the farm, but at least [crosstalk 00:03:33] information that they can run with.

Stephen W.: Sure. Well, the fundamental concept behind it, did you ever read the book or see the movie Moneyball?

Brittany A.: You know, I did, but it's been a long time.

Stephen W.: Okay. So one of the big revelations in Moneyball is that Billy Beane of the Oakland A's discovered that most of the common wisdom is wrong. That he had these scouts looking for good baseball players. And what he found, by applying some math to it, was that almost everything they understood as common wisdom was totally wrong. And that's true in the financial advice business as well, is that, it's been accepted as Bible for a long time that if you want referrals, you got to go get them. Just like if you want clients, you got to go get them. In reality, that's not true. That's exactly, it's exactly wrong. And here's why, we are social animals. We refer habitually. It's part of our nature. We refer all the time. Brittany, when was the last time you told one of your friends about something that you wanted to share with them? Directed them to go someplace or shared an experience with them?

Brittany A.: Honestly, less than a week ago.

Stephen W.: Yeah, and most of us do it like every day. Right? You know, it's, "Oh, you've got to see this movie. You've got to try this new restaurant. Oh, you're looking for a doctor? I've got somebody for you. You're looking for somebody to cut your lawn. I've got somebody for you." You know, we refer all the time. It's social currency. It's how we strengthen relationships. And if you're not getting referrals, it's not because people aren't interested in referring. It's because you're doing it wrong. And if we did things the right way, then people would refer us. People want to refer us, it's their habit and all we have to do is help them do it a little bit better. The problem with asking for referrals is that it's all about you, the advisor.

 Would you share with me somebody that I could do business with? Could you tell me about any of your friends who need what I do? That's all about you. Everything in our industry should really be all about the client. And clients refer because they get benefits from it. And so if we can just help them understand who can benefit from what we do in a unique way, then they'll do it because they get that benefit. They get to be the answer person for their friend. They get to help a friend solve a problem. They get to introduce their friend to a great experience. So they'll do it if we can just sort of clarify for them how.

Brittany A.: Yeah. You know, you brought up something really interesting that we've touched on in, in actually multiple different podcast episodes and that's how one of the biggest mistakes that we have seen advisors make is they make their marketing, they make their processes, whether it's referrals, whether it's trying to put their message out there, they make it about themselves. And that's dangerous, right? Because it's great. There are so many talented people with so many [inaudible 00:06:36] that you can hardly list all of them, but as soon as it becomes all about you, the client tunes out, the prospect tunes out. So, that's one mistake that we see being made that can absolutely be easily overcome. It's just a shift in mindset. So, I wanted to ask you, what is, let's just say one thing that you're seeing some of the top advisors do as marketing their practice that is in fact successful?

Stephen W.: Well, I think because of what's changed in the world, it's even more important now than ever. And I think the thing that the top advisors are doing is differentiating themselves. The challenge that we have in marketing professional services, and financial advisors specifically, is that we all sound alike. We're all saying the same things. And one of the interesting paradoxes that I see because I work with hundreds of advisors and I can tell you that a lot of them are really different. There's a wide spectrum of skill levels. There is a whole spectrum of different kinds of services that are available. And yet when advisors talk about themselves and what they do, we all sound alike. We all use the same language, we all say the same things. So the really top firms, the firms that are crushing it are ones who have figured out a way to describe what they do so that when people hear it, they're like, "Oh, now I get why you're different. That's something I haven't heard before." That's, I think, the biggest thing that the top firms are doing.

Brittany A.: Yeah. And we kind of like to look at things in old world versus new world, right? Kind of how things used to be. And how they are now. An dI think you're absolutely right. If you do a simple Google search, you can see so many different financial advisors use the term financial future, planning for your financial future. I mean that is everywhere. And again, that's not really speaking to the need of the client or of the prospect. So I just, I love what you said there and I think that it's absolutely relevant and absolutely true. And we're seeing the same thing in our business where the top, the ones, how you said, they're crushing it, they're killing it. They are absolutely different.

 And so another thing that I think is absolutely a differentiator when it comes to some of the top advisory practices, the top advisory businesses that we're seeing out there is that they are implementing the concept of the client advisory council. So I would love for you, because as we mentioned at the very beginning, you have kind of a honey hole here. Like you have got an awesome process for this. You speak to it a bit in your book. So I would love for you to share just your insights. What's that format look like and how can it actually be leveraged?

Stephen W.: Yeah, well, what it addresses is that we spend a lot of time designing a client experience. We spend a lot of time trying to make sure that we provide good service and do things that are relevant. And so few advisors have actually asked their best clients to find out what that experience is like from the other side of the table. A lot of it is, "Well, we dreamed this up and we think this is really good and so we're going to promote it like crazy." That's great, but why don't you ask your best clients how they experience working with you. That's why the company is The Client Driven Practice, is if you can find out what about the experience that you provide really engages them, really interests them, that they find really valuable. And just as important, what parts of your process really they don't care that much about or where they can sort of take or leave.

 I mean you can, by learning what it's like from their side of the table, you can refine that service model that you provide and make it really compelling and find out, you know, what is it, what parts of that are what they talk with their friends about? What parts of that get them really excited? And that's what an advisory board is all about. And an advisory board is an ongoing facilitated conversation with about a dozen of your ideal target clients to find out what it's like from their side of the table and how you can improve it. That's what a board is.

Brittany A.: You know, there's an interesting concept that we've really been focusing on at Sweet Financial and helping some of our financial advisory clients with, is the whole concept of how it's so important to fall in love with your clients and not your message. Right? So you get, and we talk about this quite a bit in our podcast about the shiny object syndrome, right? How it's so easy, especially if you're an entrepreneurial minded financial advisor, where you're like, "Oh, squirrel, there's another good idea. There's another good idea." You know, what happens is, is before you test it, and I think you brought up such a great point about how it's important to actually put it in front of the people who are going to either use the process, use the methodology or not, and see if they care about, see if they like it even.

 So I think that that is absolutely a key point here to drive home, is that if for nothing else, creating and developing a client advisory council so that you can test your methodologies, you can test the new ideas. I think that is so important. And oftentimes when people are putting together an advisory board or an advisory council within their business, they get a little bit leery on, "Well, what the heck are we supposed to talk about?" Right? Like what are we going to put in front of them? What constitutes a good use of their time versus a not good use of their time, et cetera and so forth? So I think that to drive your point home, if for nothing else, you're just constantly testing material in front of them.

 And I think, you'll be amazed to find what the comments are and I'm going to share an actual example at Sweet Financial Services that we've actually come across is that, we were asking clients, "When you talk about us, like what do you say? How do you share our message? Like what are the things that you're saying?" And again, these are people that are our ideal. They absolutely fit every aspect of what an ideal client would be. They're delegators, they're happy, they're fun, they're nice to be around, they have a certain asset level. Yes. But that's actually the least important when it comes to just wanting to work with really good people. So it was interesting, is the comment that was made is we're thinking, "Oh, they're going to talk about how our process is just second to none or we're just such nice people." And what was said is they're like, "Gosh, we really can't even put it into terms other than you just have to experience it. You just have to experience how different it is."

Stephen W.: Right.

Brittany A.: I would have never guessed that.

Stephen W.: That's a marketing black hole.

Brittany A.: Yeah.

Stephen W.: If there is no way to communicate what's valuable about your process and why you're different, you just have to experience it, then you're sunk. There's no marketing that's going to work for you. And by the way, you're totally wrong. There is no experience that can't be described.

Brittany A.: Right. And it's funny, because that helped us to really hone in on what the process is, what the methodology is. So it was just so interesting and that's actually what helped to evolve our marketing process and really put names to it and be able to help create that. So again, it's interesting the things that come out of those types of conversation, just really neat and absolutely helpful in ways that you would never, ever believe or never dream.

Stephen W.: Yeah. And I'll go back to one of the points you made before too. It's a horrible expression, but in marketing we say you have to be willing to kill your children. And what that means is that you can never be so married to an idea that you're not willing to discard it and move on to the next idea. And advisors fall into that thing. Advisors spend, they spend a lot of blood, sweat and tears designing the experience that they want to provide their clients and they can't let it go. I'll tell you, there is a comment that an advisor will make to me every once in a while and I, as soon as they do, I can tell them that their client advisory board experience is not going to be worth the investment they make in it.

 And that is, "Oh, we're not going to do that." You know, if they're willing to take the feedback from their best clients and just throw it away like that, there's no point to any marketing. You're going to have to rely on selling. You're going to have to rely on your own personal persuasion to bring in all those clients. If an advisory board brings something up, and this is an important point, some advisors are worried about doing an advisory board because they fear that, "Well, what happens if they suggest something that we don't want to do?" That's fine. You're not promising to do it all. You're just promising to listen.

 And if they bring up some kind of a, you know, an idea that is either illegal, impractical or that you just don't want to do, the secret to that is, "Well, what about that is important to you? Let's see if we can figure out something that we can do that helps you get what you want." So you don't have to do exactly what they say, but it's important to listen to them. And so it's really important to think about, "Well, this is what they told us. Either we can't do that. It wouldn't be practical to do that. It would be too expensive to do that. Or it's not really the direction we want to go in. But what is the kernel in there that we can explore? And let's dig into that and see if we can find something that will give them what they want." That's how you increase client engagement.

Brittany A.: I think that's so good. And again, if you're just starting to create your own advisory board, your own advisory council, I think another thing to think about is when you're going into it, don't get caught up in the idea that you have to present to them. Right? The methodology that we like to go into is that we want them to actually do 80% of the talking. We want to throw some ideas out there. We want to strike conversation, we want to have prompts for conversation. But you want them to do the talking. You want to allow them to speak and actually hear their thoughts because you bring up a great point. They're there for a reason, right? You want them to give those ideas so that you can find those nuggets. So I think that's another important concept is don't get hooked in the presentation. Be willing to have it be conversational.

Stephen W.: Yeah. That's such an important point. And any time that you spend presenting in a client advisory board meeting is time that you're wasting and time that you're wasting for your clients. You've got what, a dozen or so people there? Whatever you present, you're probably going to want to get out to everybody. Not to just those 12 people. But the opportunity is you've got these 12 people here. Let's listen to what they have to say. So you're exactly right. You know the time should ... What I tell advisors is, "I want you to participate in the meeting. I want you to be talking and when you're talking I want you to be asking questions. Don't make statements. If you can spend the entire time asking questions, you will find it a very profitable hour spent or a couple hours spent."

Brittany A.: That is excellent advice. If you are listening and you didn't write that down, I think that's important. If you're talking during a client advisory council, make sure that you're asking questions, not making statements. That is a huge, powerful thing. So, we keep talking about the ideal client and we're using it in the context of the advisory council. Something I found that was interesting about you, Stephen, is that you have a keynote called Striking It Niche. So when we talk about niches, that's something that we have explored before on previous podcast episodes, but I want you to talk about the importance of finding your niche and why it's actually especially important in our world in the financial advisory practices.

Stephen W.: Yeah. Well, this has been true for a long time, but it's even more true now because the biggest change in the last decade or so, you said it before, Brittany, is the internet. You said Google. It used to be that if you were the financial person in town, you were the financial person in town. And that's not true anymore. And then we went to providing advice. But now lots of people provide advice. So that's not going to ... There's a group of us called The Third Wave Collaboration. We believe that there's a third wave coming in financial advice. The first wave was product access. The second wave was information access and access to advice. And the third wave, we don't really know what that's going to be, but now you can get advice in a lot of different places and you're no longer competing just with folks in your town. You're competing with people all over the country.

 And so it's more important than ever to be able to say succinctly and clearly and sensibly in a way that a prospective client would find valuable why you're different. There is a question that we all have to answer when we meet somebody new. Sometimes the person can articulate that question. Often they can't, but the question is not what can I do with an advisor? What can I expect from an advisor? How is an advisor going to charge me? The question is why should it be you? I have thousands of advisors I can choose from. Why should it be you? And the answer to that is niche. The answer to that is what unique thing do you do? What unique niche do you occupy?

Brittany A.: You know, that brings up such a good point. Something that we have actually asked some of our clients and we've asked other advisors to ask of their clients is, the big question of why did you come to us? Why are you even talking to us? So if it wasn't a direct referral, and even sometimes in certain cases you can ask this of a direct referral, because there's still kind of that gray area like you could have been referred to anybody. You have other friends, right? You have other friends who have other financial advisors. So why are you having that conversation with us? And it's interesting because when they come from an advisory practice that does not have a niche, that does not have a specialty that they speak to, a lot of times what we're hearing these prospects and new clients saying is that, "I guess I don't know what I don't know. I don't feel like I really know that my advisor specialized in anything."

 There was actually, this is really interesting and I wish I had the statistics right in front of me, but Ron Carson, he is the creator of Carson Wealth. There was a study done under him, and they talked about what the statistic is for the number of financial advisors who say, believe, and think that they do a comprehensive, in-depth wealth planning. And then they did the same study with those advisors' clients. And it was alarming at the difference in the statistics. So the number of advisors who think that they're clearly articulating what their message is, they're saying, "Hey, yep, I'm a comprehensive wealth advisor. I do this, this and this. I work with this person, this person and this person."

 And then you turn around and you interviewed the clients and said, "Hey, do your financial advisor specialize in this, this and this? And are they comprehensive wealth planners?" And the statistic of the clients who thought so was extremely low compared to what the advisor thought. So that was an alarming article when it came out because I'm like, "Yeah. There is a huge gap and those people are basically, I mean, they're fair game." Those are the people that are going to get [crosstalk 00:21:34].

Stephen W.: Exactly. Sure. Well, and here's what I love about that, is that comprehensive and wealth advisor are terms that aren't even agreed upon in our business. Okay, well if you're comprehensive, then you're evaluating their property casualty coverages, right? And you're reviewing their tax return, right? And you're doing all the ... well that's comprehensive. But you know, there are a lot of advisors who would go out there and say, "Yeah, we're comprehensive because we don't just manage the portfolio they have with us. We make recommendations on their 401(k) too." That to them is comprehensive.

 So there's not general agreement on that. And if we can't agree on it, clients will never understand it because they can't possibly. So yeah, and rather than be known for being comprehensive, why don't you'd be known for delivering a certain kind of experience? If it's an experience they're looking for, you know, people don't wake up in the middle of the night saying, "Where am I going to find a comprehensive advisor?" They wake up because they don't know how they're going to send their kids to college. They wake up because they don't know if they have enough for retirement, they wake up for all of their reasons. Let's talk about their reasons.

 We talk about providing fee-based advice. How about if we provide advice-based advice or client-based advice? Let's stop talking about us. Let's talk about them. And then when you can find that unique kind of an experience that you can design, that will attract some portion of the population, but a different one that other advisors provide, that five or 10% of the people are really attracted to that will set you apart. Now we're talking about differentiation. That's how you can stand out. So it's not about target market necessarily. It's about how was your experience, how are your services, how are your skills different than everybody else that's out there?

Brittany A.: Yeah. And I think you just, you bring up so many good points in that, that you could go on for days on essentially just because what you said there about, you know, kind of answering the questions of what's keeping them up at night. That's actually how we encourage a lot of messaging strategies, is that you have to be answering those questions, you want to be in their head. And this is kind of a funny saying, I believe it was Darren Hardy that said this, but it was, "Get in their bed to get in their head." [crosstalk 00:23:50] I mean it's a little risque, right?

 But what ... by that is that you've got to understand what your prospect, what your ideal client is truly thinking about. What are the things that are making them wake up in the middle of the night in relation to their financial future? Use that word, financial future. But in relation to their finances and their plan, that just has them worry, that has them stewing. So absolutely. That is so, so relevant.

Stephen W.: Yep.

Brittany A.: So, we've kind of talked about the importance of a niche when it comes to your client, when it comes to differentiating yourself. But because I mentioned the proverbial shiny object syndrome that so many advisors chase, how can having a niche, in your opinion, help to kind of narrow the focus and avoid that chase?

Stephen W.: Well, that's it. If you don't have a particular strategy, if you don't have a path that you're following, then you're going to wander all over the place. It's like that cartoon. What do we want? A cure for ADD. When do we want it? Squirrel. And so, if you're just sort of fishing around for something that will bring in new clients. And that's what you're after. You're not developing a unique experience. You're not differentiating yourself out there. You just want something that'll get new clients. Then you're going to fall prey to those shiny objects all the time. Because there's no theme, there's no strategy behind it. And so having a niche saying this is who we are and this is how we're different from other advisors, and sticking to that, you can still try new things, but they will all have a theme. They'll all be aimed at the same thing. And so, it's a lot easier to avoid those. You'll be less tempted by those shiny objects because you know who you are and what that message is that you're trying to get out to the community.

 And as long as that's true, you can communicate it a whole bunch of different ways. And you can try different things. But you're going to stay consistent on what really matters. And what matters is broadcasting the message of that unique client experience. You know, here we have a ... our consulting process is called our Four D Niche Plan. And the four D's are discover, design, develop and declare. And discover is all about the target market. What are those unique needs that you can solve? That kind of thing. Design is how are you going to put together an experience that caters to those special needs. Develop is how will, what systems, skills, resources are you going to put in place so you can deliver on that promise. And then declare as the marketing plan. So as long as you're following some kind of a structure like that where the marketing plan follows and stays in line with the design of the experience, then that makes it a lot easier to avoid that shiny object syndrome and be projecting things that are consistent so they build on each other.

Brittany A.: So good. I love the discover, design, develop and declare. That's a perfect example of a uniquely defined process. I love, love, love that. So if you could give, I mean you've already shared so many good nuggets, but if you could give one thing that you would suggest an advisor implement in order to truly scale, what would that one thing be?

Stephen W.: Well, okay. So the one thing that will help you scale is focus. If everybody who shows up at your door has slightly different needs and a slightly different situation or even a radically different situation. If one person really, you know, their high school sophomore is getting ready for college and they've got to figure out how to maximize financial aid. And the next person who comes in is five years from retirement and they've got to figure out how to make the most of their municipal benefits. And if the next person comes in and is in retirement and really aggravated by the amount of tax they have to pay, there's no way you can be efficient.

 But if you provide a specific process, a differentiated experience, that kind of thing, and that's what you provide, you can get better and better and better at it. I know Brittany, you guys spend a lot of time talking about systems and efficiencies and those kinds of things, so if you have focus, then you can have systems. If you have focus, you can have efficiencies. So that one piece of advice would be focus on what it is you do and what makes you different. And that will give or that will lend the organization to a lot of the other stuff.

Brittany A.: So good. And focus is huge. There're so many great ideas. We like to say there's never a good idea that we've not liked. Right?

Stephen W.: That's right. Exactly.

Brittany A.: That's something that you just can't help it. But yeah, that focus is absolutely what can help you move the needle. So, Stephen, to round us out here, if you could give just one last kind of final piece of advice to our listeners, what would that one thing be?

Stephen W.: Well, if it's just one piece of advice, I would say write somebody a thank you letter.

Brittany A.: Oh, I love it. You're speaking to my heart there. So tell me why that's important. Let's just give a little why behind that.

Stephen W.: Well, expressing gratitude is something that goes beyond what we do for a living. And if what we do in ... what we hope to do in the longterm is develop relationships. And if what I want to help people accomplish through focus and client advisory councils is listening to the other side. Write a thank you note. One of the things it does is it builds the relationship. And the other thing it does is it gets you to start thinking about things from their side.

Brittany A.: That is so good. So Stephen, you have shared some great stuff today. If someone wanted to get ahold of you to kind of explore your process further to just kind of tap your genius a little more, how could they do that?

Stephen W.: Well the easiest way is to go to the website, theclientdrivenpractice.com, or you can listen to my podcast with Julie Littlechild, which you can find at becomingreferable.com. Or you can find it on Stitcher or iTunes or any of those other platforms. And you'll want to tune into that because in the next few weeks, we're going to have the amazing Brittany Anderson on the show. So yeah. So you can find me at the podcast, you can find me at theclientdrivenpractice.com. And you can find Stop Asking For Referrals at Amazon or wherever you buy books.

Brittany A.: Awesome and I highly recommend get the book. It's worth it. Awesome, awesome stuff in there. Stephen, thank you so much. That is going to round out this episode of The Ultimate Advisor Podcast.

Draye Redfern: Hey there, Draye Redfern here. And before you go we just wanted to say thank you for listening to this week's episode of The Ultimate Advisor Podcast. If you enjoyed this episode, then please subscribe to the show on iTunes, Google Play, Stitcher or Spotify and be sure to rate us five stars on iTunes. Because when you do, you'll be entered into a monthly drawing for our Ultimate Advisor Coaching Program, which is a $2,000 value. And if you would like to access more of the show notes, additional resources and our free premium content, then please visit ultimateadvisorpodcast.com. We look forward to seeing you in the next episode of The Ultimate Advisor Podcast. We'll see you there.