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 practice's marketing, to effortlessly attract new clients. So, what do you say? Let's jump into another amazing episode of The Ultimate Advisor Podcast.
 

Brittany Anderson:

Hello, and welcome back to your Ultimate Advisor Podcast. This Brittany Anderson, and once again I have with me Draye Redfern and Bryan Sweet. We're continuing on with the conversation of making your business stand out.

 Now, last week we referenced Darren Hardy, and a couple examples from his Darren Daily. We have no affiliation with him. Highly recommend you check it out, though, it's really good stuff, really great ideas to stimulate your brain on how you can even serve your team, your clients better. But, I wanted to continue with a concept that actually came from him, and it's the theme of today.

 That particular theme is that if you want to stand out, you want to be a mission with a business, versus a business with a mission. I'm going to say that one more time. You want to be a mission with a business, versus a business with a mission. The problem is, is that so many businesses actually do this backwards. So many businesses are like, "You know what? I've gotten to the point now where I think I can actually have a mission, I think I can have something that's bigger than what I thought originally." I think this whole methodology, or this whole mindset, is a really big shift, but I think it can be really impactful and actually help you keep your focus in your business, versus doing it the other way.

 So if you think about this for a minute. I'm going to use Sweet Financial as an example. We all know wealth management is what we do. Inspiring people to realize their dreams are possible is actually who we are. That helps us to really focus and say, "You know what? Yes, we do wealth services. Yes, we are financial advisors. But, even bigger than that, our mission is to change people's lives in the factor and the assents that we want them to reach for their biggest goals and dreams." We want to be that cheerleader for them, we want to be that person, that positive influence in their life, that helps them think about things in a whole different way. Helps them stretch their minds, help them get back to having an imagination.

 You know, I read something the other day, I think this was from our friend Dr. Ben Hardy, because we just love his stuff. But, talking about how imagination ... When you're a kid, you have big imaginations. I think about my kids, and the stuff that they come up with when they're playing house or whatever they're doing, I have to scratch my head sometimes because I don't know where they come up with it. But over time, as adults, it's actually proven that that imagination does not go away, we just find a way to stifle it, to make it be depressed, or be hidden somewhere. We become embarrassed, at some point that thing comes up. When you're five, you don't really have embarrassment in you.

 But, if you think about this, if you're really striving that's bigger than you, something that feels a little uncomfortable, something that feels like man, if I could reach this big goal, this big dream, that would be a game changer for me. So for us, our mission, our mission is to help people dream big, and to help them get there, and to give them a plan and traction to actually accomplish what they want. The business is a cool side effect. You get paid to do things that you actually are passionate about, and that you love.

 So Bryan, because you have a huge passion around this, we've had many, many ... Probably hundreds, if not thousands, of conversations over the years, just around this concept. I know it hits home for you, so I'd love for you to share a little bit about the dream architect, and what that's done for our business, and how we've really been a mission with a business.
 

Bryan Sweet:

Yeah. Excellent point, Brittany. When we created the dream architect, the purpose was really to be able to make a difference in people's lives. And maybe even take it a little bit further, and create a movement that got people thinking differently, and then consequently acting differently.

 Everything that we do, and everything that we promote, and all of our content is really relating around how do you get your dreams, how do you think about them, how do you go about engaging, and getting them accomplished. One of the things, as you alluded to Brittany, is when you're little you think big, and you can become anything you want in life. When you're little, you could be an astronaut, or a fireman, or whatever it happened to be. I'm not sure exactly what happens, but over time, we get older, and pretty soon it's the day-to-day, and trying to get through. Maybe it's the stress of daily living, but pretty soon our imagination is gone, and we're just trying to get through the next day, and try to get to the end of the week so the weekend shows up. It's really a sad state.

 Part of it is maybe people you know are, as we like to say, shitting on you. You say you want to do something big, and somebody says, "Well, you really can't do that." Or, "What were you thinking?" We have that kind of thing going on. So we wanted to be that resource, that guide, that difference in your life that helped you get through that, and beyond that. Because as we all know, you only get one shot at this, and why not make it the best life you can possibly have? Literally, anything that you'd ever like to accomplish, just set your mind to it and make it happen. Sometimes you need some help, and guidance, and the who's in your life, versus how do I do it. Hopefully, we serve as that who.

 But, it's an amazing thing that, if you can get people to start focusing on their mission, and what's important to them, and their dreams, and their goals, some of these things just start happening to them because, one, they're thinking about it. You start finding things that help promote, and overcome some of the concerns that you've had. The more you think about it, the more you talk to others about it, the more you help them, by giving them books, or resources, or individuals that can help them move through, it's really been an absolute delight. There's no better feeling in life than to help somebody overcome that, "I can't get beyond the week," to, "I can do anything, and accomplish anything." And then, watching their reactions when those things actually occur.

 So, I would just encourage you to think a little bit differently, as Brittany alluded to, about what's the mission of your business? And then, are you telling your clients about it? And how is that explained to them? Because if you're not, you're one, not being unique and you look like every other finance advisor out in the street. And as we talk about, virtually about every time we're on a podcast, that's so important because otherwise, everything else we do is so commoditized.

 I think one thing I wanted to get Draye involved here, in that I think there's a great marketing opportunity in getting some free PR in some of these bigger callings, and some of these unique thought processes and missions that each business might have.
 

Draye Redfern:

Yeah. It's funny you say that, Bryan. There's actually a term for this, what we call in the marketing world, called cause marketing. You can use a cause, or a belief, or a benefit, to actually use that as a marketing engine to help your business.

 Some of the things that we've done, and a couple examples from clients and things, like as an organization and as an individual leading an organization, I highly benefit, and see the value in, and believe in education and knowledge. Massive benefit, it completely changed my life, how I look at things. As a result of that, one of our missions of what we're doing is that we are building a school by the end of June 2021. In less than a year, we're basically going to have all the funds in order to buy and build an entire school, with restrooms, and wells, and classrooms, and all of these things, in a third world country. It's a considerable investment, but it's something that it's changed my life so substantially that I want to be able to pay that forward, to a certain degree. That is one of the causes that we're using, that's one of our missions that we're using, to help drive the organization.

 It's literally if you've been on a Zoom call with me, if you've seen any [inaudible 00:09:33], I've got whiteboards everywhere. They're all over the office. I've lost track, how many square feet of whiteboards we have in the office, but it's a lot. On one of the whiteboards, we have very big, "Building the school," with the exact dollar amount, and we've got all the other things attributed to it, all of these sorts of things, in order to make that goal real and tangible for the rest of the team as well. Because that's outside of us, it's outside of just making money, and that directly benefits other people. That's something that we believe in, as a mission, and the business helps us to actually fulfill that.

 But I also know there's a variety of other examples like that. The Sweet team, they didn't even tell you about this ... But, the Sweet team had Chris Gardner, who you may not know him by his name, but you know him maybe by his character from the Will Smith movie, The Pursuit of Happiness. The Sweet team had Chris Gardner come out and speak to all of Fairmont, practically, in the high school gym. I don't even know, thousands of people ended up showing up, and it was a great way to give back to the community, and help inspire them. Who knows the ripple effect that something like that could have, over years and decades, and potentially even generations. It's things like that, when it's not just good platitudes, or it's not just good concepts or theories, there's are things that actually they are, and then us as well, are putting into reality and in effect.

 During the COVID crisis and craziness, there's a lot of uncertainty, especially in lower income areas with individuals who may not have access to a computer, maybe they couldn't afford a computer. So we had another client buy 500 tablets, and give them to one of the local school systems in order to help out some of the under privileged kids. That ended up getting some great PR attention, that ended up getting several mentions on Facebook, and a local news story and things that picked it up. You're not doing it strictly for that reason.

 But, there's also PR about the Sweet event, with Chris Gardner. Other people start writing about these things, because if you make big moves, as our friend Brittany mentioned earlier, Dr. Benjamin Hardy ... If you make power moves, other people see that, and they see you being a leader, and they want to latch onto that, and they want to write about it. Or, they want to be a part of it, or they want to attend it. It just creates cause marketing, where your cause, your mission can help to obviously fuel your mission, but also help your business at the same time.

 So huge fan of it, I believe in it, I think it's something that really is one of those drivers, or strategies inside of business these days that isn't talked about enough. But, I think it really can be a massive needle mover for you, your business, and your community. Brittany?
 

Brittany Anderson:

You know, I think this just brings up a really interesting point. Draye, as you were talking about some of these bigger missions that pull on the heart strings, basically, that come deeper than just surface level, the thing that I want to make crystal clear here is that you have to truly believe in the mission. You cannot just do this because of the PR, because of the recognition, because of being seen or being known. I really want you to dig down, and really figure out what it is that drives you. What are the things that have contributed to, maybe it's your own success? Or, what are the things that you've experienced in your life that maybe you could help others to not experience the bad, or experience more of the good? Those are the things I really think you should get to the core of.

 One of the things ... I'm going to give you an actual example of Sweet Financial. Gosh, this was probably late last year, or maybe even early the year before. We sat down and did, basically, a mapping of the future. We used a particularly system, it's called the Entrepreneurial Operating System. You can check it out, but they have all kinds of tools on really planning out your vision. One of the things that we wrote down is that, for us, our mission is to truly impact lives when it comes to helping people fulfill their dreams, and helping people realize what's possible. Part of that is that we want to be nationally known for the dream architect process, which is our planning process at Sweet Financial. Not because we are so proud of ourselves, not because we're just the best thing since sliced bread, but because we've seen the impact it makes on people. We've seen the shift in how people even behavior, or live their lives, or carry it out, after they've gone through it.

 For us, we're actually accomplishing this in a really different way than what we originally thought. Yes, we're able to do this with our clients, but we're actually working behind the scenes, as we speak, at creating this thing, this dream architect process, where advisors across the US can actually plug into it, and they can help people live their dreams as well. We understand that we can't serve all of the millions of people across the globe, but you know what? Others can reach more.

 For us, we're sitting here, I think about the conversations we've been having in our mastermind recently, our two-day session in August, that was a huge, huge topic of conversation is the best of the best advisors want to do more for people. They want to be that mission. The common theme that comes out is they want to help people accomplish what matters most. We got to thinking. We're like, "Well, rather than having people reinvent the wheel, let's give them what we've already created. Let's make this available to people so that we can indirectly impact more lives." This controls every decision that we make now, it's crazy.

 I think too, Bryan, you have established the Marilyn Sweet-Borchardt Education Foundation. Bryan was raised by a single mom and he looks at it and he's like, "My goodness my mom, she made sure I had everything I needed. You know what? I don't know, she never complained, but maybe she sacrificed, maybe she didn't get to accomplish all of her dreams that she maybe wanted, because she cared about me so much." Now, Bryan's able to turn around and give money to single moms who are busting their butts, who want to put their kids in college, and he's able to do a giveback. That's something that, as a mom, ... I'm no single mom, I'm married and I'm fortunate in that regard, but I look at my kids and I'm like, "My goodness, having them go to school, and to really shoot for, and aim for what they want ..."

 I'm the same as Draye when it comes to education, that's a huge thing for my life to this day, I don't think education ever stops. So Bryan's able to take this, and give back to people who are maybe in a spot in life where dreaming big and seeing that happen maybe wouldn't feel as real if he wasn't there to help.

 You'll see, these are the things, you become this mission, and everything that you do starts to spill into this common theme. Again, you want to talk about differentiation? That's truly living with purpose, and living for a bigger cause that's much bigger than yourself, that's much bigger than offering investment advice. Because let's face it, that's a commodity. You have to do something different, and you may as well make it fun, and make it something that actually pulls on your heartstrings, and that makes you feel fulfilled because that's where the impact matters. That's what's actually going to get you further in life. The PR, and all that awesome stuff that comes with it, that's just a bonus. That's something that's just a cool thing that happens, that helps you in your business, the other stuff is what fills your cup. I think that's important to know, that's important to recognize.

 Bryan and Draye, is there anything you want to say before I round us out?
 

Bryan Sweet:

Brittany, you said pull on your heartstrings, and it made me think of having Chris Gardner. Draye, thanks for bringing that up. That was, seriously, we got so much more out of it than probably the audience. In just thinking back on that when you were talking, the kids that were in the audience that came up and met Chris, and the things that their parents told us afterwards on the impact that his message had on them, and how they were thinking different, and how they were going to accomplish things that they had never thought of before, it almost brings tears to your eyes. But, it's just one of the great side benefits of trying to add value to other people.

 If you can get people to think out of the box or think big, and you can affect one person, and they go on and do something big because of something you did, boy, wouldn't that be a great experience? This was such an impactful thing for our firm, that we made a commitment to the schools that we were going to bring in a speaker of that caliber every single year, to drill into the kids that, "Yes, you can do it. Life is short. Whatever you want to do and become, you can actually do that." Every time I think about that, I get chills because I know that's the right thing, and we're going to help a lot of people do a lot of great things that, otherwise, may never have had those thoughts. But because we're bringing this into the schools, they now have an opportunity to be much better than they were.
 

Brittany Anderson:

That is so, so good. You know, every time we talk about this stuff, I agree, Bryan. It's just goosebumps. You know, within your whole being, you know when you're doing something that is right, and that's congruent and aligned with what you truly believe in.

 I'm going to round out with a few takeaways, and really they all follow along the same theme. The first one is decide what your mission is, make that decision. Sometimes people get a little hung up on this, where they're like, "Gosh, is it the right one? Am I going after the right cause?" I've heard this when people are talking about charitable giving. "Well am I giving to the right thing? Have I done my research?" Its like, "Man, just give. Just do something." So really decide what it is that your mission is, and then make the commitment.

 I think that's really the next step, is to make the commitment that your are going to be a mission with a business, versus a business with a mission. Just having that mentality, and passing that onto your team, it just makes them feel like they are part of something much, much bigger than just a job. If you think about it from your clients' perspective, they're now doing business with something that is much, much bigger than just a financial advisor. Again, we're talking differentiation here, we're talking about how you can stand out, these are great things you can put into play immediately to really help you differentiate, and to help you feel good doing it. That's important.

 Then finally, I think just looking at it ... I love that term Draye, about cause marketing. I think that it's important, because it helps you decide what do you market, and what do you not. What do you put out there, and what do you not? If it's not tied around this concept of mission and what you're really trying to put out into the world, then why are you doing it? I think it's having a mindset there, that whatever it is that you're committing to, whatever that bigger mission is, let's talk about that. That's energy, and you're going to see that natural energy come out of you. When you're talking, when you're presenting, when you're engaging with clients, when you're engaging with prospects, if that whole mission is the center of what you build your business on, you're going to have endless energy, and they're going to feel it, and they're going to want to jump on that train. I'm going to leave it at that.

 I'm going to close out, because I think this is so powerful. But, really go after that mission, make the commitment to it. We're going to go ahead and round out this episode of The Ultimate Advisor podcast. We'll catch you back here next week.

 Hey, Brittany here. Before you go, we wanted to share with you that we are running another Ultimate Advisor Summit, coming to you September 21st through the 25th, for a mere $97. That's right, five days of killer speakers, killer content, that's going to help you to continue optimizing your practice during a really interesting year. So go head, hop on over to ultimateadvisorsummit.com, and grab your seat today.