Whites Of Their Eyes

A really easy way to get a conversation going with your target audience is to curate quality content from other sources, be they online, magazines, podcasts, or blogs.  It’s completely OK to borrow content from other sources as long as you credit the source.

Remember, this is your industry, and you are immersed in what’s happening.  New ideas… techniques to help your clients… changes that will affect people’s finances… the landscape is continually changing.  You are on top of it, but your clients are out living their lives.  They depend on you to keep them up to date on things they should know about or find interesting.

There are many tools out there to help you aggregate good information.  One that I use is Feedly.  It is free, and you can set filters to only send you articles that meet those requirements.  Sending free information to your target audience is an easy way to stay in contact and encourage them to reach out to you with questions.

If you are looking to finally get people seeking and interacting with your website, the best way to do that is to have a retirement calculator available on your website.  You could opt for straight, plain retirement calculator… or better, use a very specific calculator.

A specific calculator could focus on one particular aspect of retirement planning, and that would make YOU the expert in that particular area, driving more people to reach out to you.

Here are some things you could focus on with your calculator:

• Lifetime income using annuities
• How healthcare costs could affect retirement
• How to use home equity as an asset in retirement
• Loss of one spouse on retirement income
• Threat of Social Security insolvency on retirement income

There are entities that have calculator widgets you can purchase to place on your website… or, you can hire designers to create a calculator specific for you.  Designing your own can cost you a pretty penny, but it will also allow you to stand out from your competition and drive people to engage with you.

First, why do you need an effective Unique Selling Proposition? Just as we mentioned in our previous article, you need to cut through the clutter… and a great USP does that.

Here are the 4 characteristics of an effective USP:

1. When a prospect sees or hears your USP, they must think, “I understand why that would help me.”
2. Then they must think to themselves, “I want that!” Your offer must include the word “get”, and it should be…
   • Relevant
   • Important
   • Urgent
3. Your prospect must also conclude “I can’t get it anywhere else but here”. Some things to consider are:
   • A very specific focus on one of your offerings
   • A unique experience that you can give them
   • An exclusive status that you can give them
   • Something they can only get locally
4. Lastly, they must think, “I believe what this person is saying”. Here are some helpful ways to accomplish this:
   • Quantify your offer. More specificity leads to more believability
   • Give them some verification with 3rd party resources

Creating an effective USP is one of the most valuable tools for building your business. Spend all the time and effort it takes to create one. If you do, your marketing becomes easy. People will continually walk through your door.

Property casualty agents are under attack from Progressive, Geico, USAA, Liberty Mutual, etc.  Everywhere people look, they are getting hit with commercials about DIY insurance companies.  Property Casualty agents are dying a death of a thousand cuts. You can help them conserve and grow their businesses… while at the same time growing your own!  I’ve put together a whole system to help you do this very thing.  I’m giving it to you, courtesy of 5Q Group.

Property Casualty Referral System

How do you get attention in today’s crowded environment?  The average American is bombarded with over 3,000 messages a day via TV, the internet, billboards, radio, etc.  How do you make your message heard?  Say something CONTROVERSIAL!

Even better, say something controversial that people will love!  A great example of that is when you should start drawing Social Security.  People want that money now, but they are being told by their advisors, experts, and the media that they should wait.  Nobody really wants to wait, so they would love to hear a reason why they should draw early.

There are lots of reasons to do so.  I listed a few I have heard of in one of my coaching calls:  https://vimeo.com/782611927, I begin talking about this subject at 7:07.

So, what if your marketing and PR revolved around it?  Would you sound like everyone else or different?  Would most people LOVE to hear why they should draw early?  Yes, they would!  Would your local news sources love to bring their viewers something they’d love to hear?  Yes, they would.  If you don’t agree with this controversy, come up with your own… but if you want to cut through the clutter, you must stop sounding like everyone else!

Fall is just around the corner.  What are your plans to leverage it to bring in more business?  This article from NerdWallet gives you 10 ideas that you can use to infuse your marketing with fun and brilliance. 

Using current events, different seasons, and holidays is an excellent way to get people’s attention and get them to take action.  If you just use a couple of the ideas presented in this article, you can see some terrific traction.  AND, most of the ideas are inexpensive to incorporate!

Find the article here: https://www.nerdwallet.com/article/small-business/fall-marketing-ideas

The new science on goals is that they are not only ineffective… but can be really destructive to success.  But… there is something that you can replace goals with that has proven very effective.

Watch this video on how to create a constant pipeline of new business like clockwork.  The step-by-step process begins at 5:30 minutes into the presentation.

You could financially improve the lives of virtually anyone who walked through your doors.  But how do you get them in?  How do you get them to respond to your marketing?  Well, the first step is to figure out why they won’t respond to your marketing.  What are they afraid of?

Think about why you don’t want to go to that free weekend at a plush resort… your only cost is sitting down with the time-share salesperson.  99% of people turn down that offer.  Why?  Because they don’t want to be pressured into buying something.

Now I know you aren’t going to pressure someone who comes to see you, but they don’t know that.  In fact, in their minds, they are certain you are going to pressure them.  So, how do you communicate that you will not pressure them?

One experiment that has been extremely successful is the one-and-done offer.  Find something simple AND FINITE that you can help people with.  The offer should make it completely clear that this is a one-time meeting… to get this ONE thing done… and there will be no follow-up beyond it.

I created a referral system for my coaching clients in 2016 using this very concept.  I created a 7-document walkthrough that they could give to their clients.  Then, after the clients discovered the value of it… my advisors offered to go through the exact same documents with their friends and family at a one-and-done, ½ hour meeting. 

It works unbelievably well.  The advisors that use this concept average one referral for every 3 clients they have in their books.  100 clients… 30 referrals.  Not bad, right?

BUT… those referrals are only for one-and-done, ½ hour meetings… so where does the new business come from?  Ha!  Well, after the advisor has completed the ½ hour meeting (and given awesome value that the new prospect is blown away by), want to guess what they ask?  They ask… “What else do you do?” 

The advisor has just been invited to discuss all the other financial help they can offer. 

So, sit down and figure out a simple, value-added item you could offer that could be done in one meeting.  Then, get that offer out there with the emphasis that there will be no pressure or follow-up (unless they ask you at the end).

Providing value BEFORE you ask people to invest with you is by far the most effective way to bring in new clients.  The good news is that it costs you nothing to provide that value.  Your value is your expertise.

Create and use a lead magnet to attract people to you and what you offer.  A lead magnet is a piece of content that could be a book, article, white paper, video, etc.  You give it to people in exchange for their contact information and permission to drip or contact them.

You can offer your lead magnet on your website, business card, email signature, and as a brochure as well. 

People are hesitant to meet with someone about their finances because they are afraid of getting a hard sell. By providing great information for free with a lead magnet, you have gone a long way towards building the trust that will get them to meet with you.

Here’s a great article to get you started:
https://blog.hubspot.com/marketing/creating-lead-generation-offers-from-blogs