"More Top 20% Clients Now"

By Shirley Hanson
copyright 2007

Today, I've pulled a question from my email bag. I love this question because it cuts to the core of generating leads.

Question: "I have very limited time and resources.
What do you recommend for a one-man shop?"

It doesn't matter whether you are a one-person shop or a 14-year veteran with 3 other advisors in your financial advisory practice. All you need is a desire to attract more of your Ideal Prospects.

If you're hoping for a magic bullet, you'll be disappointed. There's no one answer -- nothing like do seminars, or send out a mailing, or work centers of influence, and then your Book will grow plump and chubby.

Personally, I'd love to be able to count on one super-duper marketing tool that adds Ideal Prospects all the time. Won't happen!

I do have a one-word answer for you, though.

Marketing.

Simply, marketing is where the money is.

You want more? How about 80/20 marketing? It's about setting priorities and acting on them.

Let me explain. For me the 80/20 Principle is about Doing The Right Things.

Pareto didn't say it that way when he discovered his law and demonstrated it with a mathematical formula. His formula described a recurring pattern in society: Some 20% of inputs (sometimes called the "vital few") produce about 80% of results.

Now we're getting somewhere. So in marketing where are those vital 20%?

1. Identify Your Top 20% Prospects,
Don't Bother With Anyone Else

Look at your current client list. It may be your "A" clients, those top few (20%, more or less) who bring you the majority of your results. Remember, though, it doesn't necessarily have to be your current clients.

Other places to look for Top 20% Prospects:

• Your Unique Background (Did you spend 10 years
  as an emergency room doctor? Were you an analyst? Did
  you start a business when you were 11-years-old and by
  age 13 had saved $33,000 to invest?)


• People Just Like You -- it's easy to resonate with them
  just by being yourself. It's easy to get inside their lives
  because you've been there.

2. Plan To Multiply Your Top 20% Prospects,
And Gain More Ideal Clients

Build your plan around doing this one thing: Locating and drawing in your Top 20%. It's not about marching hundreds of prospects of all types and personalities through your office.

It is about being strategic.

Your top clients can be worth a whole lot more to your practice, however you decide to measure it (assets under management, relaxed and happy days, a string of referrals, etc.) than a bushel of complaining and time-wasting clients in the bottom 80%.

3. Zero In On Your Ideal Prospects
With Your 80/20 Marketing Tools.

Where to find your prospects in the Top 20%? They could be on a mailing list. They could belong to an association. They could be members of your golf club. They could be clients of an attorney who specializes in family businesses. Or they could be looking for you on the web. Or all of the above.

There's no one answer.

Once you've found them, select the marketing tools that will snag their attention. Notice that we said tools. One is never enough.

If you want to go beyond this nutshell version of 80/20 marketing, you'll find 7 Priority Steps (the vital few that can make all the difference) at:

www.MarketingPlanFinancialAdvisor.com/sample-marketing-plan.html

Besides "limited resources" our reader with a one-person shop lists a second stumbling block: "limited time."

How To Grab Time For Marketing?

We've set priorities within marketing with 80/20 planning.

Now it comes down to setting marketing itself as a priority.

• You can designate one day a week as marketing day,
  
  
• Or you can set aside one marketing morning a week that's untouchable. It's safe from anything else that tugs on your time,
  
  
• Or you can set aside prime time in your day for marketing . . . perhaps, the first hour.

If it's at the beginning of the day, it's more likely to happen. It won't get crowded out by what's ahead of it on your schedule. Ask yourself: Do I really need to open my e-mail and answer phone calls the minute I hit my office in the morning?

It boils down to this:

Once you make marketing itself a priority, take these ideas for 80/20 Marketing and give them top billing in your day. That's how you'll generate a flow of Top 20% Prospects and add more Top 20% Clients to your Book.

We invite you to check out our updated full range of marketing services at:

www.marketingplanfinancialadvisor.com/marketingservices.html