9 Effective Appointment Setting Tips for Financial AdvisorsA vital part of a financial advisor's success depends on setting appointments. If you follow up, share valuable content and send gifts, and you still don’t book your prospect, you might as well have never reached out at all. Marketing 👉 Prospecting 👉 Client. Here's what we'll cover in this article:
To start things off, here are nine tips and tricks to improve your technique and set appointments regularly — and the mistakes you make that sabotage your efforts! 1. Call During The "Off Hours".This tip is especially helpful if you’re trying to reach high-level executives or business owners. These people don’t just punch in at 9 a.m. and leave at 5 p.m. like the gatekeepers do. If you want to reach one of these well-insulated executives, call early in the morning or later in the evening. 2. Use Your Marketing Leads.I’ve never understood why so many financial advisors put a lot of money and effort into their marketing, but never follow up with the people who demonstrate interest. ALSO READ: 27 Financial Advisor Marketing Tips 3. Realize That It's Going To Take More Effort Than You Think.You must be patient, professional and persistent. Success isn’t an event; it’s a process. Understand people are busy, and you must keep trying to reach them to break through the noise. 4. Always Ask for Their Time.I know some of you might disagree with me on this tip because you think it gives prospects an opportunity to shut you down. Maybe it does, but bullying past someone doesn’t exactly set you up for long-term success.
5. Focus On Just That - Setting The Appointment.Being straightforward serves two major purposes: it shows you respect your prospect’s time, and it lets you move on to the next qualified prospect in your pipeline. Get to the point quickly, set the appointment, and move on to the next one. Save stuff likeasking for referralsfor later in the process. 6. Anticipate Objections.Objections aren’t inherently bad — they’re logical responses to an unsolicited request. In other words, they’re just part of the prospect’s conversation with you, and you should anticipate them.
7. Use A Script.Please don’t wing your appointment-setting process. If you do, you will never develop a systematized process that can be tested against. For example, if I constantly winged it, I never would’ve found out that “Did I reach you at an okay time?” was the best opening line for me.This tip may sound basic enough, but you’d be amazed by how many financial advisors insist on winging their appointment setting. Your script must help you:
8. Actually Ask For The Meeting.Okay, so you’ve used your script to help qualify your prospect. It turns out that it actually makes sense to set an appointment. Great! Don’t blow it here. When asking for the appointment, be specific. Here’s an example: ❌ BAD: “Would you like to meet with me?” ✅ GOOD: “I have next Friday at 2:00 p.m. Can you do it then?” Asking to meet on a specific time and date is a commitment. It shows mutual respect for both of your time and changes the question from, “Do you want to meet?” to, “When do you want to meet?” Whatever you do, don’t use the “either-or” close. I know it’s taught in a bunch of sales material, but it makes a kitten cry every time you do it. If you don’t know what I’m talking about, it’s this: CHEESY REP: “We can do tomorrow at 4:00 or Tuesday at 10:00 a.m. What works best for you?” As soon as you do that, your credibility goes down the toilet. Every educated consumer will recognize that as a sales pressure line and react accordingly. Don’t do it to yourself. 9. Confirm Your Appointment The Right Way.I haven’t found any formal studies on the number of financial advisors who confirm appointments, but my experience tells me that somewhere around 30% to 50% of advisors confirm appointments with prospects. ❌ WRONG WAY: Are we still on for Friday? ✅ RIGHT WAY: Is there any additional information I should bring to our meeting this Friday? When you confirm the appointment the right way, you eliminate the chance of a canceled appointment and refresh yourself in the prospect’s mind. 3 Mistakes Financial Advisors Make When Setting Appointments...One of my favorite episodes of the "Financial Advisor Marketing" podcast is an episode titled, "3 Mistakes Financial Advisors Make When Setting Appointments". You can listen to that episode by using the player below... Show highlights include:
Avoid these three mistakes that cause you to miss out on appointments: 👎 Mistake #1: Overlooking Referrals To Power Your MarketingLook at your client base and your prospect list. Do any of your clients have a connection to your prospects? This should be obvious to every financial advisor, but an important part of building a referral system is to identify how you can tap into other people's networks. That’s why one of the biggest mistakes advisors make when setting appointments is you don’t leverage potential referrals. Here’s why: Everyone has a network, and that network is usually filled with people who are just like them. Beyond that, it's much easier to set an appointment with a prospect when they’re referred to you. Why try to fight an uphill battle when you can just… check for referrals? One of my Inner Circle newsletter members, for example, does a brilliant job of harnessing the power of referrals. Because he lives in an area with three major hospitals, he primarily works with nurses. Some advisors might assume industry professionals don’t hang out with each other on weekends, but you’ll miss out on a lot of money with that mindset. Not only do the nurses he works with spend time outside of work together, but they also share details of their lives, which is all the more reason to do what my client does: If he has a nurse prospect in his pipeline, he does some research to find out if they’re connected to any current clients. That way, he can talk to the client and score an introduction to the prospect instead of reaching out cold. Easy, right? And this works for any profession. Simplicity is key, folks. When people have a complex problem, they look for a complex solution. But in reality, the rule of thumb is to go with a simpler solution if it exists. This is all just one more reason why you should have a niche target market — the chances your prospects know someone you already work with is significantly higher. Don’t waste any time: Go through your client’s networks, and see who they know. If you have a prospect in mind, try to figure out if they have a connection to one of your clients. Maybe they work together, golf together or just have mutual friends; any connection is worthwhile. Plus, if you can't find a connection and you strike out, you're no worse off than you were before. So, just do it. You’ll be surprised at what you find and how easy it is to set the appointment. 👎Mistake #2: Pursuing All ProspectsTrying to set appointments with prospects who don’t match the type of people in your target market is a dead end, so always remember this: It’s easier to channel demand than it is to create demand. Let’s use my Inner Circle newsletter member for another example. His business is set up to capture nurses, so how do you think he’d do if he suddenly tried to target corporate executives? For starters, he’d (rightfully) get a lot of resistance. That’s why you should stay in your own lane. Your job as a prospector is to figure out who’d be interested in working with you, then you amplify that interest. Because some financial advisors think they can rescue prospects, it might tempt you to set an appointment with people who tell you, “I’ve never thought about planning for retirement,” or, “I don’t like to save.” However, save yourself the time and take their words at face value — the truth is these kinds of prospects aren’t interested in hiring a financial advisor. You’re better off trying to sell a watch to a person who has five than someone who has none. Why? Because they’ve done all the hard work for you. The person with watches has demonstrated they find your product valuable, and they’ve proven themselves to be likely to do business with you. Plus, you'll be happier working with them. 👎Mistake #3: Getting Too Technical, Too SoonJust because you can decode industry jargon doesn’t mean your prospects will — in fact, it only confuses them. Unless you want to scare prospects away, don’t get too technical too soon with them when setting appointments. Trust me, they don't want to know everything right away. That means when you offer prospects a free portfolio analysis or a retirement income audit as you try to sell them the appointment, they’ll appreciate the gesture, but you might as well be speaking a different language. 🔑 Oh, and that brings me to this point: Never say “audit” when you approach prospects about their finances. It’s a scary word that’ll have them wondering what they signed up for. When prospects ask what you’ll discuss during the appointment, don’t take that as a green light to unload technical terms like, “Identifying gaps in your insurance planning,” “High expense ratios” or, “Triple tax-preferred health savings account.” Sure, you want to use that opportunity to leverage your education and experience and show that you know your stuff, but you’ll do nothing but lose them that way. Remember: The only thing you need to do is get the appointment. A better way to frame the conversation? Be casual. Get to know them and learn about their needs to see if you’re a good fit — that’s it; no pressure and nothing too technical. Look at it this way: Some of the best financial advisors out there don’t even use computers on their first meeting. Instead, they leave the computer behind, and all they bring is a pen and paper, or they have an information packet for the prospect to take home. They intentionally keep things as simple as possible, and they don’t get super technical. And it works. Setting an appointment is all about learning whether your prospect is a good fit. If they’re not, don’t be afraid to let them walk — that’s not your cue to lean in further with jargon. How To Get Prospects To Eagerly Set Appointments With You...In this example, I’m going to talk about email marketing, but these truths can apply anywhere in your marketing. 💡 If you want in on this secret, I talk about it in-depth in my free webinar, which you can register for here: |
9 Effective Appointment Setting Tips for Financial Advisors (2024)
Table of Contents
9 Effective Appointment Setting Tips for Financial Advisors
1. Call During The "Off Hours".
2. Use Your Marketing Leads.
3. Realize That It's Going To Take More Effort Than You Think.
4. Always Ask for Their Time.
5. Focus On Just That - Setting The Appointment.
6. Anticipate Objections.
7. Use A Script.
8. Actually Ask For The Meeting.
9. Confirm Your Appointment The Right Way.
3 Mistakes Financial Advisors Make When Setting Appointments...
👎 Mistake #1: Overlooking Referrals To Power Your Marketing
👎Mistake #2: Pursuing All Prospects
👎Mistake #3: Getting Too Technical, Too Soon
How To Get Prospects To Eagerly Set Appointments With You...
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