Hoard Client Systems CEO
Hoard Client Systems CEO's affinity for investing and financial matters began more than 20 years ago when he began investing in the stock market through a class in high school. Now, in 2006, he is being looked to for his innovation in altering the efficiency in which financial professionals communicate with clients.
HOARD Blog Entries
Would you like to receive $1,000 a week for life?
Would you like to receive $1,000 a week for life? That is a terrific headline. Why? First it talks to the prospect reading the headline (Would YOU like to…) Second it gives the prospect a reason to be interested. Whether you ladder their current investments or use an immediate annuity, people don’t visualize their current investments in terms of income. By having them look at their current situation from a view point of income vs. a pile of money doing nothing for them, you have captured their attention. And always, when possible ask a question instead of using a statement for a headline.Which professionals are worth approaching and which are not?
Which professionals are worth approaching and which are not? That at first seems like a difficult question but it is really quite simple. Approach the professionals that currently work with your clients.
Give the your clients accountant a call during their down season (May-September). Let them know that your are <client’s name here> financial advisor and that you wanted to introduce yourself and let the accountant know that if they needed any help with your client’s investment information that you would be glad to lend a hand.
How many broker’s take the time to do this with their accountants? Very few and it can really pay dividends when done regularly and properly.Leveraging Warm Prospects
The diamonds are at our feet as the old story goes. If you have been in business more than a couple of years, you should have built up quite a list of warm prospects…if you haven’t been putting those prospect’s names in a database, well that’s a whole other discussion.
When was the last time you invited that warm list to an informal get together about some technique or problem that you could solve? I have seen response rates of over 10% when advisers have sent letters inviting their old warm list to such events. Send out 200 and you have 20 units coming to a sales presentation. What does that cost? $80 maybe? Not a bad marketing coup!The Best Referrals Are Those You Do Not Ask For
So many advisers are constantly looking for new leads when what they should be chasing is the holy grail of all leads, referrals! However, I know how hard it is to ask for referrals. That actually works in your favor as the best referrals are those that you don’t ask for.Direct Mail Is Not Dead
Direct mail is not dead. Direct mail is not overused. Direct mail is a way to get a client to listen to you for more than a sound bite if done properly. In order for direct mail to be effective it cannot be sent to the masses. That doesn’t mean that you can’t send out hundreds or thousands of mailers, it just means that your mailer had better be personalized.Substance Over Style
Too many client newsletters are beautiful trash. They are beautiful to look at but boring to read. Spending a pretty penny on a newsletter because it looks beautiful and professional is probably the biggest scam going in our industry today.The best free newspaper ad
It's not a guest column, though that is a great gig if you can get it. It has just become very difficult to get a column now that everyone is begging the paper to give them one. However, there is a great, free way to get your name, expertise, knowlege and morality featured in the paper once a quarter...Thank you, Thank you
Handwritten thank you notes tell people you have style and grace.Contact and Trust
Studies have shown that 72 percent of the public looks at financial planners as product pushers instead of professional advisors...Hand-written notes still a powerful marketing tool
Customers can potentially be faced with up to 3,000 marketing or advertising messages - some big, some small - every day. And it's this that makes a high response rate from any direct mail campaign such a hard thing to achieve. So what can a business do to break through the noise and have its message read by the target audience?How to touch more clients for referrals
Interested in more referrals? Want to guarantee referral success? Here is a tip...Creating Customer Loyalty
A businessman who owns three restaurants sat down recently and hand-wrote a postcard to everyone on his customer list, inviting them to join his rewards programme. He had a 20% sign-up rate from that mailing alone...4 killer questions for direct mail
A veteran planner had been using direct mail to generate leads for his practice. He had tried all sorts of offers. He had expounded on how happy his clients were. He had tried listing all of the reasons people should work with his firm. Yet after spending thousands he had barely broke even...until he stumbled on these 3 questions.Know this one thing to dominate your market
If you know and understand just this one thing you will be able to pluck your competitor’s best clients at will. And you want your competitor’s best clients for two reasons:
- They have money. That’s why they’re your competitor’s best clients!
- They like advisers. They aren’t do-it-yourselfers since they currently have an adviser
****What is it you need to know?
In CEG Worldwide’s study of 512 advisors and their 1,417 clients they found that this one thing helped advisers to receive more than 10 referrals from their clients in a year…
There is only one type of marketing guaranteed to work
Numerous direct marketing studies have shown it takes 7 or more exposures of a marketing message before a consumer makes a decision to buy. (Exposure means that the message has been seen and read. If you send a mass mailer piece or form letter that is trashed and not read, that does not count as an exposure.)Directly affecting Mail
We have all experienced the onslaught of junk mail, but is direct mail dead? Dead? No. Ailing? Maybe.
Still according to the Direct Marketing Association, each $1 spent on Direct Mail made on average $11.65. Now there’s the catch…”on average.” That means some people’s Direct Mail made them nothing and others made them $30 per $1 dollar spent
What makes direct mail successful?6 Lead Generation insights for 2007
I’m always on the prowl for marketing techniques that are working for our clients. Those ideas may be new or maybe old with a new twist and sometimes even old and nearly forgotten as we’ve found lately.
It never ceases to amaze me how many successful people find something that works…AND THEN STOP DOING IT! (Yes, myself included). So let’s take a look at the top 6 trends in marketing in 2007:
Satisfied clients will kill your business
Most advisers ignore the one thing that is easy, simple and sets you apart from your competition, the handwritten note. Do so at your own peril...see what can happen without a nurturing program for you clients...
Chase referrals first...leads second
Referrals are no longer a luxury but are becoming a necessity. They are important for many reasons:
· There is no more effective way to see a prospect than from a referral. They are already pre-sold on you thus making the sale much more likely and the process, from start-to-finish, much faster.
· They are
Good Leads are MADE not Born
Great Leads are MADE not Born (good leads are born)
Good leads can be generated by coming up with a catchy headline or a neat idea. A good lead will get people calling you about your nifty idea, they’ll want more information.
Great leads create a relationship with the receiver. They will demonstrate that you care (saying you care is worthless, it must be shown.) That demonstration is in the universal show of caring…contact.
Learn how to create great leads in this article!
Common courtesy is money in the bank
Common courtesy seems to have been misplaced in today's fast paced world. The good news is that for those that practice courtesy, it is easy for them to stand apart from the pack.How does your Marketing measure up to the top advisor's?
It ends up the marketing plan for successful advisors is pretty simple. It also ends up that the marketing plans for the bottom quarter is almost the polar opposite. You just need to do a few things to market like the top to bring you to the top. See how here.This one marketing problem can put a strangle hold on your business
The biggest marketing problem most professionals have is…Getting stuck. Stuck in the muck. Stuck in the muck that suck…s them down into sameness. They cannot take the step to do something different then either they have been doing or someone they know has been doing.
Use the 6 Principles of Influence to make marketing easy
There are 6 basic principles of ethical influence; Reciprocation, Scarcity, Authority, Consistency, Liking and Consensus. The success of any marketing or sales system can be accurately predicted based on how closely it adheres to these principles. Here's how they work...Once is not enough
Prospects have learned to ignore those messages. In order to grab and hold a prospects attention a lead has to be credible. What is one of the best ways to create credibility? Through consistency. Here's how you do it.Market Like an Egyptian
For 12 years I was making no more than $50,000 a year. The system I am going to tell you about catapulted me to collecting $33 million in new money and making $1 million a year of income in just two years! How? Take a look.Home made leads cost less and make more
Think about these numbers. A lead generation company will send out 1,000 mailers to the general public offering some sort of FREE information, report or trinket. So out of 1,000 mailers, they’ll get say 100 people saying they want something for free…mind you, NOT to talk to someone… but that they want this FREE thing that is being offered.
So the lead generation company spent
There is more than one way to skin the marketing cat
How do you get yourself in the Media? Same way you get into a prospects life. Create a relationship. The best tool for that is the handwritten note. Here is the 6 step process to getting into the Media:Be “Unprofessional” and watch your business soar!
The Hoard “2 cent stamp card” was a huge success. We have had user after user tell us that their phones have been ringing off the hook and that one, two and up to 5 clients or prospects have called them with money to invest! Which brings up the point, “What is the best type of mailing to send to prospects and clients?”How to make sure people WANT to hear your Marketing Message
I received 197 marketing messages before I stepped out of the car to walk into work. How many of you would have guessed that many messages in the first couple of hours of the day? There's only one way to cut through that kind of noise...3 tips to high response lead generation
What do you need to get a high response to your lead generation and client mailings? It ends up being three things:- A good headline that is addressed right at your target market
- A good FREE offer
- Multiple mailings
I’ve discussed headlines before, but if I get some feedback that you would like me to discuss it again, I’ll be happy to. But for now let’s focus on the last two items.
Multiple-multiple = Success
Obviously, you do not have an infinite amount of money to spend on advertising in all sorts of media but there are some inexpensive ways you can use this concept of helping consumers remember who you are and thus increasing the response to all your marketing.3 Things to keep your mail out of the junk mail pile
So how do we utilize this much cheaper form of mailing while avoiding the hazard of having 90% of it thrown out as junk mail, by the recipient, without even a glance at it?
You have to make your direct mail offer jump out of the junk mail pile and into the curiosity pile. You have to prevent them from throwing it in the garbage without first looking at it. How do you do that?
There are a few ways to make inexpensive mail jump out at your prospects:
What gets a prospect to respond?
This week I would like to talk about a great way to get prospects and clients to respond to your direct mail.
It really is just another way of making it look different from junk mail. Junk mail is sent to the masses and for the most part has a message that would work just as well one time of the year as another or one part of the country as another. It is TOO general!
To get the biggest bang for your marketing buck you must:
Get prospects to respond
You don’t send direct mail to get it opened (though that is helpful). You don’t even send it to get read (though that too is necessary). You send it to get a response.
So how can we increase the probability of response?
Howdy Neighbor!
Well it’s time I pulled another “highly successful…rarely used” concept out of my filing cabinet for you. First put together a list of all your “A” and “B” clients. Then get a crossWake up and smell the marketing!
A recent survey showed that 70% of advisors plan to spend less than $1,000 a month on marketing. Even as 99% of advisors say they need to improve at least one of their marketing practices.
Do this and CPAs will refer
Oh sure, we maybe take a CPA out to lunch or refer a client or two to an estate planning attorney in the hopes that they would reciprocate and refer back. As an industry, we have allowed them to take advantage of us for years. We have in good faith referred our clients out for tax preparation and legal work. We have ushered client after client out our door and into theirs. We have become their main source of referrals and income. In fact, many CPAs and attorneys would find their income cut in half if it wasn’t for referrals provided to them by Financial Advisors.
Become a "must have" product
Financial Advisors are commodities. We offer the same things at the same price with the same claims to great service. You need to tattoo this fact on your brain to constantly remind yourself that you should take every opportunity to make yourself look different. Now the answer to making yourself look different is not all that complicated or difficult.7 notes to a successful practice
In any profession, it may seem like the best policy is to communicate as fast and efficiently as possible, and there are certainly times that is the best policy. However, when it comes to the overall perception we want our clients to have of us, fast and efficient can seem very cold.
The Key to referrals from Seniors
There are two kinds of people that advisors are interested in…clients and prospects. You need to understand how both of them think in order to create a trusting relationship.
Fortunately, they both want to be treated almost identically. So if you understand what they are thinking, you are well on your way to a greater number of referrals and clients.
3 Steps to getting your lead gen read
How do you create a person that wants to talk to you? Why do I use the word create? Because let’s face it, no one wants to talk to us. They don’t want to hear about our great investment or service. They are suspicious of us and our motives. Caveat emptor.
So we actually have to take someone that is skeptical and help them towards wanting to talk to you. How?
Try this Marketing Plan to generate new money quickly
The biggest mistake most advisors make in marketing is focusing on the wrong place first. When marketing, most advisors go after new people first while ignoring the diamonds they have in their own back yard. We’ll talk about prospecting next week…right now; let’s talk about guaranteed new business
