I Carry The Bag - Fall 2012

I S S U E 1 0 | FA L L 2 0 1 2 | W W W. C A R R Y T H E B A G . C O M

data poine 1t6 s pag

linkedin

THE OTHER EIGHT QUESTIONS

the top 5 energy drains IMPACTING YOUR PRODUCTIVITY

GREAT PRESENTATIONS,

compliantly? the heart

OF A WHOLESALER

MAKING 2012 YOUR CAREER YEAR!

good design is good business infographics + strategy + positioning publication launches + redesign creative consultation + art direction design + production + illustration advertising + sales + marketing kits special advertising sections periodicals + magazines books + newsletters brochures + catalogs custom publishing identity + branding business systems + collateral website design + seo + social media

SW!TCH studio has been specializing in the delivery of branded content for over 19 years through publication design, identity and art direction.

By providing appropriate targetspecific creative we enable clients of all shapes and sizes to reach their audience, achieve marketing objectives and improve their bottom line.

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Table of Contents

4th QUARTER | FALL 2012 | ISSUE TEN

Why Should You Want Your Firm To do More With data?

EdITOR-IN-CHIEF & PuBLISHER Rob Shore

by saadiah freeman

CREATIVE dIRECTOR Jim Nissen | SW!TCH s t u d i o www.switchstudio.com

ART dIRECTOR Elizabeth dam | SW!TCH s t u d i o www.switchstudio.com

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LinkedIn: The Other Eight Questions

20

by kip Gregory

08

The Top Five Energy drains Impacting Your Productivity

by mary allen

21

by susan roe

10

Why Should You Want Your Firm To do More With data?

Great Presentations, Compliantly?

22

23

The Heart of a Wholesaler by mark c. crowley

16

data Points by kasina and Horsesmouth

18

Life After Wholesaling

24

Ten Ways Wholesalers Can Increase Their Likeability by rob shore

do it Well. Make it Fun. The Key to Success in Connecting with Others

25

INTERESTEd IN AdVERTISING?

Please visit www.icarrythebag.com or call us at: 888-508-5010

by ron culberson

Title To Be determined

I CARRY THE BAG®

deeper dive Into RIA Pool by miles Healey

26

TO SuBSCRIBE, VISIT: www.icarrythebag.com

For address changes, bulk subscriptions, media inquiries, general questions or comments call 888-508-5010 or email icarrythebag@gmail.com

by Jeff Havens

by kathy freeman

19

There Is Nothing Sexy About Being dispassionate by anthony Iannarino

by susan Trviers

14

Great Stories Happen To Those Who Tell Them by don connelly

by saadiah freeman

12

Breaking Through the Most Common Obstacles

CONTRIBuTING WRITERS Mary Allen Don Connelly Mark C. Crowley Ron Culberson Kathy Freeman Saadiah Freeman Barton Goldsmith Kip Gregory Jeff Havens Miles Healey Anthony Iannarino kasina Susan Roe Rob Shore Susan Trivers

Top 10 Success Principals by barton Goldsmith

is published quarterly 514 San Bernadino Avenue Newport Beach, CA 92663 Tel 888-508-5010 I Carry The Bag is a registered trademark of shorespeak, L.L.C. All content in this publication ©2012 shorespeak, L.L.C. and is protected by international copyright law. All rights reserved. Reproduction in whole or in part without permission is prohibited.

Library of Congress ISSN 2157-1155 (print) ISSN 2157-1155 (online)

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Letter from the editor

if you want to build someone’s loyalty Quickly and impressively, come to their rescue. be a hero when a hero is in need.

100 years’ worth of amazing lessons.

That’s what it feels like after only 5 years in entrepreneurial America.

And the relatable message to your wholesaling practice is this: If you want to build someone’s loyalty quickly and impressively, come to their rescue.

Be a hero when a hero is in need.

The quick story: Twenty-three days before we are set to go to press for this Fall 2012 issue of I Carry The Bag magazine we terminated our relationship with our graphic designer.

In a mad scramble to find a suitable replacement we reached out to four designers.

Designer #1 – no email reply after three days.

Designer #2 – no email reply after two days.

Designer #3 – Prompt reply but wanted to upsell us for more services.

Designer #4 – Returned our outreach in under four hours, scheduled a phone call to better understand our predicament/requirements, and found a way to get our immediate need handled (at an acceptable price point) before worrying about the next phase of the relationship.

Clearly, designer #4 gets the whole “hero” idea.

So the next time you get a call from an advisor in need, see if you can be their hero.

Then watch the relationship blossom.

Rob Shore Editor-In-Chief & Publisher P.S. We hope you like the result of this designer’s efforts!

I carry THe baG | FALL 2012 | 5

PROduCTIVITY

TECHNOLOGY

by kIp GreGory

Advisors Are Asking About LinkedIn and How to Answer Them (Part 2)

i

n the Summer 2012 issue of ICTB, we looked at eight of the most frequently asked questions advisors (and wholesalers) raise about LinkedIn. Here are the answers to the other half of the list.

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are there do’s and don’ts to keep in mind when using linkedin?

The #1 thing is to focus on connecting with people you already know “offline.” Sending “cold call” connection invitations to strangers is a quick route to having your ability to send invitations restricted, or worse, being kicked off the site entirely. When you realize it takes just five people clicking on the “Don’t know” link in your invitation to automatically curtail your ability to send invites freely, you realize it’s not worth the risk.

look for situations where people need assistance and offer it to them.

The best way to develop a strong network is to upload your contacts from Outlook (or whatever database program you use) and let LinkedIn analyze those names and tell you who’s already a member of the site. Reach out to those people first and branch out from there.

Another major “do”: Think “give to get” – or just “give.” Look for situations where people need assistance (filling a job, finding a job, connecting into a company, etc.) and offer it to them. What’s the payback? Maybe nothing, but maybe a grateful contact who’s happy to help you next time you need it.

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A final tip: personalize your invites and correspondence. LinkedIn can be a surprisingly intimate tool if you use it correctly. A quick note of congratulations on a new job or an industry award can mean a lot to someone. At the same time, LinkedIn’s probably not the place for sharing views on politics, religion, or what happened at your latest college reunion. Leave that to Facebook.

10

can i hide my connections?

The person asking this question is usually someone who, before they knew what they were doing, connected with one or more competitors—and now they don’t want that competition to have access to their clients’ names. My response: yes, you can hide your connections—but you may want to think twice before doing so.

That’s because when you hide your connections, you close out the ability for anybody to see who you’re connected to— including clients or prospects that might recognize and/or be impressed by your ties to others in the community.

It’s a bit more work, but the wiser strategy may be to “disconnect” from those you no longer wish to include in your direct network than it is to throw an invisibility cloak over everyone you know.

11

ok, so how do i “disconnect” from somebody?

Hover over Contacts on LinkedIn’s main menu and click on Connections, then look for the Remove Connections link near the top right of the Connections page. Click on it and then check the box to the left of any person’s name who you want to sever a direct connection with. Hit “Remove Connections” and they’re gone

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won’t they know that i’ve disconnected from them?

No notification is sent. The only way that your now-former connection(s) will find out is if they view your profile page and notice that you are no longer a 1st degree connection (as shown in the small badge to the right of your name in your profile summary.)

13

i have duplicate accounts. can i combine them?

Yes, I’ll describe how in a minute, but let’s first look at why duplicate accounts get created.

Duplicates get triggered when someone sends an invitation to connect with you to an email address that’s not yet been associated with your LinkedIn profile. Unaware that you already have an account, LinkedIn will—if you click on

Accept in that invitation— assume you are new to the site and ask you to create a (new) profile.

You can avoid that problem by adding all your active email accounts to your LinkedIn profile (under Account Settings). Be aware that many firms require employees to list their work address as the primary email, so be sure those other accounts are entered as secondary addresses.

If you find yourself with two or more accounts already, you’re going to have to merge them manually or request assistance from LinkedIn’s Customer Support group to do it for you.

The steps to follow are outlined in the LinkedIn Help Center article at http://jmp/OUWyxs

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how do i use linkedin on my smartphone?

LinkedIn offers free mobile apps for BlackBerry, iPhone, iPad, and Android phones. You can find links to download each of them at http://www. linkedin.com/static?key=mobile or visit the online store maintained by your device’s manufacturer and search for “LinkedIn.”

15

if i look at someone’s profile page, won’t they know?

The answer depends on what kind of LinkedIn account you have. If you’re a free subscriber, you can surf others’ profile pages anonymously, but only if you’re

willing to forego seeing who’s viewed your own profile page (a feature many find useful). Free users wanting to know who has looked at their profile have no choice but to “leave their fingerprint” when visiting someone’s profile. Only paid subscribers have the option of viewing others’ pages anonymously while still being able to see who has looked at their own profile page.

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where can i learn more about the features and benefits linkedin has to offer?

LinkedIn’s Learning Center (learn.linkedin.com) and Blog (blog.linkedin.com) are great resources right inside the LinkedIn site. Another resource is LinkedIn’s Help section (help.linkedin.com), which contains a knowledge base of articles on nearly 900 topics, including answers to most of the questions in this article. Finally, you can download a copy of “How to Really Use LinkedIn” for free (Amazon charges $19.95) by visiting how-to-really-use-linkedin.com.

Kip Gregory is the founder of The Gregory Group, a Washington, D.C.-based consulting firm that helps wholesaling organizations and their distribution partners improve sales productivity and profitability by unleashing the power of resources they already own. You can reach him at kip@gregory-group.com or connect with him via LinkedIn at linkd.in/link2kip © 2012 Kip Gregory, The Gregory Group. All Rights Reserved. Used with permission.

I carry THe baG | FALL 2012 | 7

by sUsan rose

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i

f you are like most busy professionals, the approaching winter means your stress will be getting more intense and your energy will be dropping at an alarming rate. Maintaining high levels of productivity when you are stressed, tired, and feeling lackluster is impossible.

What if you could reclaim your energy— throughout the holidays, the winter, and the entire year? It is possible, and it’s not all that hard to do. Now is the time to look at the things you do every day that drain your energy and impact your ability to perform at your peak. Eliminate these top five energy drains and soon you’ll have plenty of energy for your work and your family.

1

caffeine

It seems counterintuitive that a stimulant would actually drain your energy, but it does for three reasons.

First, while caffeine in coffee, tea, soda, and energy drinks can give you a temporary boost to get you through a slump, it disrupts your sleep.

If you don’t sleep well, you won’t be rested, and you’ll repeat the low-energy cycle the next day.

Second, when your caffeine boost wears off, your energy levels come crashing down.

This crash leaves you anxious, nervous, and restless. Why? Because caffeine doesn’t instruct your DNA to make more energy; it tells it to activate your nervous system, a process that expends energy.

Third, too much caffeine can dehydrate you rather than quench your thirst. Dehydrated bodies are headachy, listless, and spacey.

Drink water instead. Our bodies are made of water, and we need it to stay hydrated.

Drink it and your body will thank you with energy and focus—a much healthier energy boost than caffeine.

2

sugar and poor diet

Like caffeine, sugar doesn’t really give you an energy boost; it only appears to. Unfortunately, the standard American diet is very high in sugar and other chemicals—both of which drain your energy. Whether you’re eating sugar in candy or consuming it in the form of high fructose corn syrup and other additives in packaged food and fast foods, it will slow you down. These sugars have little to no nutritional value, so they

now is the time to look at the things you do every day that drain your energy and impact your ability to perform at your peak. provide empty calories that your body can’t use to refuel and re-energize itself.

Why does this matter? Because nutrientrich food is the fuel needed for every function of your mind and body—thinking, moving, healing and physical growth. A diet rich in vitamins and minerals will help you reach optimal performance physically and mentally. You will find these vital nutrients in whole foods, especially organic or locally grown, not in fast food or packaged meals.

3

lack of eXercise

When you’ve had a hard day at work, the last thing you want to do is exercise. Getting up early or taking a break in the middle of the day isn’t any easier. But sitting still isn’t going to give you the energy you need to get things done. Nor is it good, refreshing rest.

Getting up and moving will actually make you feel more energized. That’s because exercise increases the amount of your body’s serotonin and dopamine—chemicals that make you feel good.

If you dread the thought of going to the gym for hours, or don’t know how to work exercise into your busy travel schedule, don’t worry. Studies show that smaller bursts of movement can have a profound effect on your fitness and energy. This means taking the stairs at work, walking around the block for 15 minutes, or doing chair yoga at the office.

Just get moving.

4

lack of sleep

Sleep is critical for good health and vibrant energy, but it’s something people give up to fit in all the activities of life. This is a mistake because it is during sleep that the mind and body repair themselves. In addition, a lack of sleep actually increases your stress and anxiety.

For maximum rejuvenation, most people need at least 8 ½ hours of quality sleep—sleep that is solid and uninterrupted. Therefore, if you have to get up at 6:30 a.m., then you

should go to bed by 10 p.m. To find out how much sleep you really need, for several days wake up without an alarm. Note what time you went to bed and what time you naturally woke up. Over the course of a few days, you will notice a consistency to how long you naturally sleep. That’s how much sleep you need.

5

multitasking

Multitasking may seem like an odd candidate for the top five energy drains, but it definitely belongs on the list. The reason is that when you are multitasking you are not really focusing on any one thing—you are too distracted by all the other things you’re trying to do. Your mind reads distraction as chaos. Chaos is energy-draining and that negatively impacts your productivity.

There are some simple things you can do to focus on one task at a time, such as making a daily to-do list, setting specific times of the day to check e-mail, and turning off your Blackberry/Smartphone during meetings. These things work because they help you focus on the task at hand and help you stay focused and alert. You will be surprised by how much you accomplish, and how much more energy you have, when you start single-tasking.

go ahead, get energiZed

Are you ready to reclaim your energy and tackle this winter with good humor and joy?

Start working on eliminating these energy drains today and see how quickly you are able to relax and rejuvenate.

Susan Rose is a health coach and owner of Gutsy Health, a health and wellness company focused on helping women over 40 reclaim their health and energy, transform their lives, and prepare for a healthy future. Her online self-study program 12 Gutsy Steps to a Healthier You helps busy professionals—men and women—make small changes that result in better health and vibrant energy. She also offers 1:1 personalized health and wellness programs. You can e-mail her at susan@gutsyhealth.com.

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b y s a a d I a H f r e e m a n , d I r e c To r , k a s I n a

c

ollecting customer data is hardly a new concept. Every wholesaler knows how important it is to understand as much as possible about their advisors – what matters to them, their investment philosophy and outlook, and how they run their businesses. Historically, wholesalers had to depend almost entirely on their own information-gathering skills (and those of their internal sales teams) to figure out which advisors to meet, when to meet with them, and what to talk about in each meeting. However, while it is still critical for wholesalers to collect and record key information about their clients, product distributors are now able to gather advisor data from more sources than ever before.

More importantly, advances in data analytics are now enabling smart firms to help their wholesalers sell more effectively and build even deeper relationships with their advisors.

So, how can data help firms drive sales and improve customer relationships? Consider some examples of great customer service that you may have experienced personally. That free Starbucks coffee on your birthday, the hotel chain that remembers your preference for a room near the gym, the department store email letting you know your favorite shirts are on sale – none of these interactions would be possible without sophisticated data analysis. In distribution, leading firms are now starting to combine data from multiple sources within their CRM system to develop a much more complete view of their clients and prospects. Third party services from providers like Coates, Broadridge, Market Metrics and DST can help firms augment the information collected by their own sales and national accounts teams with important additional statistics, such as market share and rep-level wallet share data. And, increasingly, behavioral data from email campaigns and advisor website activity can provide firms with an even more nuanced view of advisors’ interests and preferences.

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financial intermediaries in the usa

assets managed by us financial intermediaries

34.4% Support Hogs

09.1% Support Hogs

65.5% Other Advisors

90.9% Other Advisors

All of this is good news for wholesalers.

Advanced data analytics can help give you the information you need to manage your territory and your clients more effectively in several important ways:

1. be smarter about which advisors you’re meeting.

Many firms expect wholesalers to meet activity metrics, most commonly a minimum number of advisor meetings per day, week or month.

Given the challenges involved in getting meetings on the calendar with so-called ‘corner office’ advisors, the temptation to call on advisors simply because they are eager to meet with you can be a strong one. However, research conducted by kasina earlier this year indicates that meeting with these advisors may not always be the best use of a wholesaler’s time. 1 By conducting cluster analysis on a representative sample of advisors, taking into account many variables including advisors’ AUM, industry tenure, and preferences, kasina identified five distinct segments of advisors, including one group which we labeled ‘Support Hogs.’

Support Hogs, who can be found across all channels, comprise 34.4% of all financial intermediaries in the USA, but only control 9.1% of total assets. Although these advisors typically have small books of business and use products from a relatively narrow range of asset manag-

ers, they are very receptive to wholesaler meetings and are delighted to take advantage of all the support you are prepared to offer. Despite the fact that these advisors offer limited upside, many wholesalers are still spending considerable time meeting with them. In fact, on a per AUM basis, Support Hogs received more wholesaler visits in 2011 than any other advisor segment.

Intelligent data analysis can help firms segment advisors effectively to identify less valuable advisors, enabling wholesalers to focus their time on advisors who are likely to generate more profit for the firm – and, of course, more revenue for the wholesaler. In addition, data analysis can help to uncover hidden gems – like the advisor in your territory who’s only ever dropped small tickets with your firm, but actually has a large book of business and has recently started opening email campaigns promoting one of your firm’s flagship funds. The more information firms have about advisors, the more they can help wholesalers make smart decisions about whom to meet.

2. figure out the best time to meet with advisors.

Imagine if you could know exactly when an advisor in your territory was feeling dissatisfied with one of your competitors’ funds? A well-timed call or meeting could help convince that advisor to switch her clients out of that fund and into a comparable product offered by your firm. On the flip side,

imagine if you could know when one of your clients was thinking of switching out of one of your firm’s funds? Again, a thoughtful communication at the right moment could help to mitigate the redemption risk with this advisor. While data can’t equip you to read your clients’ minds – at least, not yet – analysis can help firms identify advisors who are more likely to either purchase or redeem, based on recent behavior patterns. Analytics vendors like Lattice Engines conduct statistical analysis of sales data to predict which advisors are more likely to invest in the near future, as well as identifying advisors who present a higher than average redemption risk. This kind of information can help wholesalers maximize sales opportunities and head off possible redemptions at the pass.

3. know what to say when you meet with advisors.

In addition to predicting which advisors are most likely to invest or redeem in the near future, sales analytics can also help firms identify the ‘next best fund’ to pitch to advisors, based on their recent sales history. However, data gathered from a firm’s digital marketing activities, including email campaigns and advisor website traffic, can also provide important insights into the investment

themes and products that advisors are researching. For example, imagine if you knew that a top advisor in your territory had been spending time on your firm’s website reviewing information about your global fixed income products, and that he recently opened and read your firm’s thought leadership email bulletin on emerging markets debt opportunities? It’s a likely bet that your next conversation with that advisor wouldn’t be focused on domestic equities.

Even more powerfully, if your firm has a tool that advisors can use to compare funds against one another, you may be able to find out which competitor products they are evaluating against your firm’s funds. If the advisor already sells your firm’s fund and has been spending time comparing it against a competing product, this knowledge can help you prepare more effectively for your next conversation with talking points comparing your firm’s fund to the competitor.

Similarly, if an advisor is using your firm’s online tool to compare one of your funds that she doesn’t currently sell against that of a competitor, chances are that she is considering a switch out of the competitor’s fund – again, information that can help you have a much more targeted interaction with that advisor next time you meet.

conclusion Although today’s asset management firms have the ability to obtain more data about advisors than ever before, gathering, storing and analyzing data still requires a significant commitment of time and resources. Back-end systems need to be designed and built so that multiple data feeds can be integrated in one place, usually the CRM system. Sophisticated data analysis needs to be carried out on an ongoing basis, either by in-house statisticians or by external vendors. Digital analytics need to be tracked and monitored. If third party data feeds are used, budget needs to be available to pay for that information. And, as always, wholesalers will need to keep collecting and recording key data points about their clients in the firm’s CRM. As a wholesaler, you may not be in a position to control your firm’s overall data strategy, but you can certainly make the most of any data your firm currently has, and potentially advocate for more investment in this important area. Although most asset managers are nowhere near as advanced as consumer-focused businesses when it comes to data analytics, leading firms are beginning to leverage the power of data to help their wholesalers sell more effectively. By enabling you to be smarter about whom you meet, when you meet them and what you talk about in those meetings, data can give you a powerful competitive advantage in today’s increasingly competitive sales environment.

The Five Advisor Segments: A New Approach to the Intermediary Market. Kasina, 2012.

1

Saadiah Freeman is a Director in kasina’s consulting practice. She advises asset management and insurance executives on distribution, marketing and digital strategy. Saadiah has extensive multi-national experience in the financial services industry, spanning strategy consulting, investment banking and law. She joined kasina from Boston Consulting Group (BCG), where she advised Fortune 500 clients on a range of strategic issues. She is a graduate of the University of Sydney, and she also holds a qualification in Applied Finance and Investment from the Financial Services Institute of Australia.

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PRESENTATION

SKILLS

by sUsan TrIVers

i have a dream.

- martin luther king, jr.

mr. gorbachev, mr. gorbachev, tear down this wall.

- president ronald reagan …are two very famous excerpts from speeches that led to changes that one could have hardly imagined before these words were spoken. These were ideas voiced by passionate speakers that caused audiences to respond. They were not ‘talking points’ or reflections of policy that had been prepared by officials and speech writers.

As wholesalers your presentations, often written to satisfy the marketing and compliance departments, can make you feel limited in your approach. And creating your own slides is a career ending alternative.

So how can you effectively engage your audience of financial advisors while using these slides?

My three-step approach will help you tap into the emotions and desires of your audiences while remaining within compliance requirements.

that the slides are the slides.

1 accept

Start by grouping slides with different characteristics: facts, trends, research, projections, risk analyses, and regulations. You’ll be writing your presentation from the end (your call-to-action) back to the beginning (attention-getting opening) using these various groups of slides as follows:

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CALL-TO-ACTION (CTA): This tells the financial advisors what steps to take after listening to you. Examples: • “Offer (product X) to your clients who (have investment goals Y).” OR • “Describe the outcomes of product X to your clients who (have Z risk tolerance).”

KEY POINTS (KP): Key points are a series of short sentences (5-7 words) that drive the audience to your call-to-action. A key point allows the audience to say, “Yes, I see what you mean,” or “I understand,” or “This is great, what is next?” You’ll have to write your key points on your note cards (see Step Two).

HIGH IMPACT CONTENT MIX (HICM): Most of your slides will fall into the category of high impact content. However, they will only make a high impact if you reorganize them and use them as the background for your speaking.

ATTENTION-GETTING OPENING (AGO): You craft your opening last, after you’ve crafted your CTA, written your KP and organized your HICM to lead up to the KP.

The AGO is about the audience, not about you, your company or what you’re going to talk about in the coming minutes. While you may project slides about the history, mission and vision of your company, what you say is very different.

Grab their attention with a story or example of how similar advisors faced client challenges, took steps to address the challenges and enjoyed the outcome. Or pose a challenging question, asking the audience of financial advisors what they would do in that situation.

2 craft your speaking notes.

You’ll make notes for each of the elements of the presentation as above. These notes will focus on what your audience cares about and will keep the speech or presentation lively and engaging.

Speaking notes must be handwritten on index cards. The act of writing by hand helps you write and sound more conversational, less technical, and more in touch with the audience. Also, you’ll need your handwritten note cards for your practices.

Write on your note cards what I call “trigger words.” These are single words that extract the essential idea from each slide, put that idea in clear relief for you, and free you from the dense and technical language and visuals on your slides. They allow you to speak personally to your audiences. You can also include an occasional delivery style directive for yourself.

Begin with a fairly dense first set of note cards (one card for the ideas related to each slide), then informally talk aloud through your ideas. While listening to yourself, weed out extraneous material and perhaps add points that strengthen the message. The great benefit of index cards is that they’re cheap and so easy

to replace. Make two or three successive sets of note cards, each time refining the notes to work better and better for you.

Your note cards should include 3 elements: • What’s most meaningful to the audience about the topic on the slide? Obviously this does not follow the left-to-right or vertical order of the content.

• Highlight the idea or element that is connected to the upcoming key point (see above).

• Bring it all together with a benefit they can share with their clients. You’re speaking to help them advise their clients on products appropriate for their portfolios.

3 be yourself, polished.

Once you’ve got great content and you’ve worked through your notes to ensure that they serve you well, it’s time to improve your delivery style.

My concept of “Be Yourself, Polished” emphasizes that each speaker must remain true to the conversational style and the facial expressions, gestures and body language that come naturally to him or her. There is NO SINGLE perfect gesture, power position or preferred body language. Don’t let anyone tell you otherwise. You will want to eliminate style elements that distract the audience, such as aggressive pointing of a forefinger.

Once you’ve learned your content pretty well in the process of crafting your speaking notes, it is time to move on to rehearsals. Rehearsals get you ready for the audience.

Set up a room to resemble as closely as possible the one you’ll be speaking in. Do not rehearse in front of a mirror or speak to a video camera.

Stand up and speak. Use your full voice, make eye contact with chairs or lamps and imagine a very positive audience that’s interested in how you can help them. Visualize some people nodding in agreement with you and others who are eager to ask you questions.

The more real you make your rehearsals, the more they will help you.

How many practices and rehearsals? There’s no exact number. I can tell you that it’s more than most people tend to think, maybe ten times before each presentation. You won’t know in advance how many rehearsals you’ll need until you keep doing them and experience the difference the umpteenth one makes.

Apply these three steps to your presentations and inspire financial advisors to sell your products: • Organize the slides you’re given to make them work for your audience.

• Craft your own personal, meaningful speaking notes.

• Practice and rehearse until you are confident that you will Be Yourself, Polished.

Susan Trivers is known as America’s Great Speaking Coach (www.greatspeakingcoach.com). She works with licensed professionals, CEOs, business owners, sales teams and individuals who know that speaking is the professional skill that most effectively reaches their target markets, increases revenues, and enhances reputations. Susan’s presentation skills coaching is based on current communications trends that are engaging people both in and out of the presentation experience. All of Susan’s work is customized to the specific needs of the audience and the speaker. Visit www. susantrivers.com to learn more about how Susan can help you “Inspire Them First…Inform Them Later.”

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by mark c. crowley

my life profoundly changed soon after washington mutual bank failed and was instantaneously sold to jp morgan chase.

In the summer of 2008, I was in charge of Sales Leadership, Marketing and Communications for WaMu Investments, Inc. My division had achieved record revenues and profits the year before, and I’d been named its Leader of th e Year.

While it was clear to anyone with a pulse that WaMu was in serious trouble, no one I worked with was imagining what inevitably occurred. Seeing loan losses accelerating, depositors fleeing and a stock price plummeting, federal regulators seized the bank to the shock of us all.

As a rare example of the government’s capacity for efficiency, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation found a buyer, and handed over the keys – all on the same day it declared WaMu insolvent. It was like watching your mother suddenly die and be replaced by a new stepmother, in just a twenty-four hour period.

It was a surreal and distressing experience.

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For a lot of reasons, most notably because the leading role I had at WaMu disappeared, I decided the sudden career crossroad I faced was a sign from the universe to change directions and go do something else.

After leaving Chase, I passed on a few immediate offers to return to investment sales management. The opportunities were great, but I knew I didn’t have my heart in them.

Instead, I took a few months to decide my next move and finally began telling close friends and family that I planned to spend the next year writing a book.

The truth is I’d been dreaming about writing a book for a long time. More specifically, I wanted to write about certain uncommon leadership practices that I’d discovered had an incredible effect on people and upon their job performance.

From my own direct experience, I’d learned and refined four disciplines that had the effect of driving unusual commitment and productivity.

Collectively, they influenced people to be more loyal, more engaged, and routinely more highly achieving than their peers. I wanted to share all I’d mastered in my book.

I spent nearly nine months building a clear outline for the book and it was exciting to see the organization unfold. But I remember working one day and having the thought that I needed to fully explain why these practices were so effective – why they worked for me, and why they would work for others. In that moment, I realized my book could be perceived as entirely anecdotal without that thorough explanation.

My first subsequent insight was that I’d spent over two decades successfully managing people without ever giving that question much thought. I took all the success as validation that I was doing things right and probably left it at that. But my second insight had the potential of ending my hopes of writing a book. One morning it just hit me that what I’d been doing all along was affecting the hearts of people. How I made people feel, in other words, was the secret sauce. My employees could tell that I genuinely cared about them, their growth, and their personal contributions and, for all that, they rewarded me with consistently amazing results.

Gaining this clarity might seem to be good news, but it actually made matters worse. I knew that the idea of bringing any degree of heart into leadership was perceived to be laughable by many people in business. We’ve all essentially been taught to believe that leading with heart is a feel-good approach to management that only ends up acting like kryptonite on performance.

Honestly, this new insight had me thinking that my book writing days were over. I started playing out in my mind how I would tell all my supportive friends that I was giving up the project and effectively had wasted a year of my life. A book about leading from the heart, I was convinced, was dead on arrival.

But a few days later, I had a sudden fantasy that there might be some research or even science which could help confirm what I already knew to be true. So I went looking. Almost immediately I found astounding validation and became inspired to uncover even more. I dedicated almost a full year more to this quest – a year, it turned out, very well spent.

Tied to all I learned, the book I ended up writing now has the very real potential of changing workplace leadership as we know it. If you haven’t guessed it yet, my prime conclusion is that truly effective leadership requires a balance between minds and hearts. It’s simply irrefutable that the reason leadership is failing in the U.S. (55% of

One morning it hit me that what I’d been doing all along was affecting the hearts of people. How I made people feel, in other words, was my secret sauce. all workers hate their jobs and the percentage of happy and engaged people has fallen every year for a generation) is because it lacks heart.

If you’re interested in learning more, or even reading the book, there’s a link to more information via my website below. But knowing most of you reading this are professional wholesalers, (sales leaders) I want to share the main discovery I made and then list a few ways you can immediately apply this knowledge to drive up your production:

The Heart is Intelligent and Greatly Influences Human Behavior For 300 years, science believed that the human heart performed one and only one job– it acted as a blood pump. This conviction inherently ignored hundreds of metaphors in our language that have endured for centuries and imply the heart is a source of great intelligence.

We say, for example, “Learn it by heart;” “Change of heart;” and “Follow your heart.”

It’s only recently that medical science has discovered it was wrong. New research proves the heart has its own “brain” that informs the mind.

What people feel in their hearts, therefore, has enormous influence on human motivation and performance. The grand conclusion is that appeals to our hearts and not our minds inspire our greatest achievements. Consequently, leadership gestures that affect the heart have the utmost impact on employee performance.

3 Ways You Can Put This Information to Immediate Use:

1 Build Personal Relationships With Your Brokers — I’m not suggesting you have them over for Sunday dinner, but spend time learning about what makes each rep tick. All human beings – including fully-commissioned sales reps – need and want to know that the people their efforts are supporting have a genuine interest in them and their success. So, make time to understand what motivates every person and demonstrate that you authentically care about more than your commissions.

2 Remember, Money Is No Longer Our

Greatest Motivator — Yes, of course, money is important to all your brokers and earning as much as they can is a big reason they chose their profession. But don’t be confused that this is the only reason they work. The best reps I ever worked with had far higher aspirations. They wanted to change their clients’ lives, to build broad and deep personal competency.

They sought to teach and develop reps under them to grow and perform. How can you help every broker that you support find fulfillment in his or her work? This is a question you should be asking every day of the week.

3 Thank Brokers Constantly for the

Sales They Bring You and Ensure They Always Know How Much You Value Them —This idea probably sounds like Sales 101, but the truth is that recognition is the heart’s currency. If I’m a broker who just sold your product, I love knowing you are pleased and grateful. But when I don’t hear from you, I start believing my work doesn’t matter much to you. My experience is you can’t thank people enough. And tied to all you learned about each rep individually (#1 above), the more personal your form of recognition the better. If I did something special and you sent me a new Van Morrison CD, a Padres’ t-shirt or almost anything related to New York, you’d impress me greatly that you knew what I loved and thought enough about me to take the extra step to get it for me. I will remember that a lot longer than a steak dinner, I promise you. Your brokers will too.

Mark C. Crowley is a graduate of the University of California, San Diego, in addition to the Pacific Coast Banking School at the University of Washington. He holds five investment securities licenses (Finra Registrations) and also is a licensed California Real Estate Broker. Born and raised in Garden City, New York, he now lives in La Jolla, California with his wife and son. He’s a devoted fan of Van Morrison, great books and the San Diego Padres. Follow Mark on Twitter @markccrowley or visit his website at www.markccrowley.com.

I CARRY THE BAG | FALL 2012 | 1 5

by kasIna

europe debt concern

42.0% 28.1% 05.6% 14.5% 42.0% of advisors believe the European Debt Crisis will have the biggest impact on their portfolios, followed by 28.1% who believe the U.S. Presidential election will have a biggest impact. Only 5.6% thought oil prices would be the most impactful, with 14.5% choosing unemployment.

not all thought leadership is the same

51%

51% of advisors prefer ongoing market driven commentary

average advisor purchases $8.4 $3.6 $14.4 $7.9

13.8% 00 01 02 03 04 05 06 07 08 09 10 11 12 13 14 15 16

The average advisor made $8.4mm in mutual fund purchases in the last 12 months, $3.6mm in ETF purchases. Advisors within the RIA channel made the most purchases in the last 12 months spending $14.4mm on mutual funds, $7.9mm on ETFs 16 | FALL 2012 | I carry THe baG

13.8% prefer guidance on portfolio construction

16.6%

current events impact allocations

13.3% 13.2%

08.9%

16.9% will increase alternative investments 13.3% will increase cash 13.2% will increase equities 08.9% will increase fixed income

model portfolio usage 63.3% 70.5% 46.4% On average, 63.3% of advisors used model portfolios; advisors within the insurance channel had the highest usage (70.5%); RIA had the lowest (46.4%)

46.7% of advisors prefer to communicate digitally (via email or web) with an asset manager, up from 36.5% just 6 months ago.

growing digital preference source kasina and Horsesmouth kasina’s FA Vision (in partnership with Horsesmouth) is the industry’s most comprehensive and frequently conducted survey of financial intermediaries.

Our data-driven analysis of the behaviors, preferences and opinions of financial intermediaries helps firms make tactical improvements to their brand, product and distribution.

To learn more about FA Vision, visit www.kasina.com or call 212.349.7412

I carry THe baG | FALL 2012 | 1 7

careers b y k ath y f r e e m a n g o d f r e y

i

n this rapidly changing world we live in, it’s not at all uncommon to hear discussions surrounding career growth or flexibility from the direction we’ve chosen.

As wholesalers, just as with any career, there are always options worth considering. If the time has come for you to ponder what life looks like after wholesaling, then let’s explore how to think about alternative career tracks.

A good start is to consider how you ended up as a wholesaler to begin with. What was attractive to you about this role in the beginning? Were you an internal wholesaler attracted to all the glamour of travel?

Perhaps you still love the travel or perhaps it is now not at all glamorous. Did you find the opportunity to forge new relationships with successful advisors compelling? Today you may find those same advisors aren’t as engaged in their own careers coming out of the market downturn and therefore they are not as compelling to work with. You may find that you want to call on an audience who is more energized about their own career choice. Perhaps you are in wholesaling because you were brought in by a mentor or an inspiring sales leader. If that individual is no longer with your firm to inspire you, you may be feeling a bit uncertain about your future path.

When it’s time to initiate a new line of thinking, I try to think in terms of simple components. First, let’s break down the 3 most important facets to the wholesaling role: • Sales • Target Audience • Education

Sales Selling skills are the easiest to transition to other industries. The biggest challenge is to find an industry that correlates closely to the type of selling that you 18 | FALL 2012 | I CARRY THE BAG

enjoy. Is your audience digesting macro issues or highly detailed content? Do you like a higher degree of transactions or are you more long term and consultative in your approach?

If you wanted to strictly leverage your success in selling but wanted to look at a new industry for a greater challenge, you might find options spanning from pharmaceutical sales, advertising sales or even aircraft leasing or sales. Of course there would be a ramp-up period in learning a new industry, but if you know how to sell, it is the most transferable and lucrative skill to have.

Target Audience If you want to leverage your existing client base, think of what else these advisors and wealth managers buy outside of investments. Products like technology and data are the first two that come to mind. Leveraging your sales skills and your existing relationships, and then morphing the product you are representing can be the quickest and most effective way to expand your wholesaling career into a different dimension.

The other component related to target audience is to choose a different audience while maintaining your investment focus. While it takes diligence and a game plan to accomplish, wholesalers have successfully transitioned their careers into retirement sales, sub-advised sales, institutional sales and national accounts. These careers are considered more institutional in nature as a result of their more sophisticated buying audience; they often require a shift in approach and a higher level of investment acumen or education. If you find one of these areas intriguing, find someone within that space and start getting an inside track on what is necessary to create the foundation for transitioning to this next level.

Education Many wholesalers that I’ve interviewed over the years have found their greatest passion in their career comes from being the subject matter expert to their advisor audience. They relish educating others even more than selling. Clearly stepping into the world of academia would equate to a huge step back in terms of income, but it is an option if you aren’t being driven by your W2.

Other ways to leverage this passion would be through consulting. There are some phenomenal organizations out there that add tremendous value to the investment industry by helping firms think around corners. It might be an opportunity to take your industry insight into a bit different direction and focus more on educating and less on selling. Training and development is another area that would leverage your expertise, but the question will be whether it contains enough challenge to keep you engaged.

Considering different options for directions in which to take your career is always a healthy process because it forces you to think at a deeper level about who you are and what you enjoy most. If you have frustrations with your current wholesaling role, you might just prefer a more sophisticated product to represent or a more advanced buying audience to work with. Don’t hesitate to isolate your preferences.

You’ll have a much more enjoyable and successful career if you focus in early on which components of what you do are most meaningful to you.

Kathy Freeman Godfrey founded her retained executive search firm in 1992, focusing her work on assignments for senior level sales, marketing and client-facing executives exclusively within the investment industry. The Kathy Freeman Company is celebrating its 20th year of successful partnerships with its clients in 2012. Visit us at www.kathyfreemanco.com to gain further insights.

by rob shore

• Allowing advisors to learn more about you via a social media channel that has more personal interaction (rather than solely business interactions), i.e. Facebook.

seven Optimistic

How likeable are you? How wide of a likeability net do you cast?

g

o out to Google right now and search for “People do business with people that they like” and then stand back. You’ll find almost 700,000 results, and there is a broad range of opinions on both sides of the argument.

Here’s what I know to be true: I can’t name one wholesaler who is at the top of their game that got there by being unlikeable. Loveable?

Perhaps not. Likeable? Absolutely.

So what are the traits that make for a most likeable wholesaler? If you were to hold a mirror up to the following attributes, how would you fare?

ONE Empathetic

Being empathetic allows you to live for a moment in the shoes of the client and their practice. It means that you take the time to develop an understanding for the inner working of the advisor’s business so you may determine how to best serve them.

It also means that you are attuned to their personal travails as the relationship deepens.

two Responsive

How many business relationships do you let into your life that are run by unresponsive people? My guess is not many. In fact, I’ll bet that you have parted company with a vendor or service provider when they have failed to meet your standard of responsiveness. With all the choices available to the advisor, why should they be any different? In a hyper-connected world, the notion of even 24 hour turnaround for returning calls seems to fall short.

three Advocative

People that have your back are people that people like. Are you an advocate for your clients when it comes to fighting the good fight, say on a home office decision that didn’t go in the advisor’s favor even though the case appeared strongly in their favor?

four Chameleon-like

One of the all-time requirements for great wholesalers is the ability to form relationships with a wide range of advisors. This includes your ability to form a working relationship even with those folks that, frankly, you don’t like. No, you don’t have an obligation to put up with abusive clients, but finding common business ground with the broadest array of sellers can only inure your value to them, which will benefit you.

five Well-mannered

One client of ours stresses the importance of the seemingly simple act of being a gentleman/woman.

He told me about the all too often overlooked notion of treating others as you wish to be treated. When I grew up my parents used to remind me to “mind my p’s and q’s.” While the origin of the expression has different theories, the one that connects to our business suggests that it was borne out of English pub owners reminding clients to watch their alcohol consumption - to mind their pints and quarts.

six Vulnerable

The notion of vulnerability evokes different meaning for different wholesalers. To some it’s an unthinkable characteristic because it can be associated with weakness. Conversely, great wholesalers know that letting their superman/woman guard down just enough to show their more human side has powerfully alluring qualities to many prospects and clients.

Here are three examples of vulnerability in action: • Your ability to say, “I don’t know. I’ll need to get back to you with an answer.”

• Having selectively personal discussions with reps about challenges or obstacles with ‘selectively’ being the operative word.

Who doesn’t get dragged down by the endless pessimist? Those influences in our lives that constantly find only the negative and are rarely willing to find the positive are vampires that suck the life out of us. Why then should we expect our clients to develop an affinity for us if pessimism is our m.o.?

In that 30-45 minute window of time that you have to spend with an advisor, do your best to be the bright spot in their day - they have enough of their own issues without living in yours.

eight Straight-shooter

How’s your b.s. detector? Chances are your reps have as finely tuned a b.s. detection devise as you.

Then why is it that so many wholesalers insist on bluffing, dancing or cajoling their way through a tough situation when the simple act of shooting straight is so much more effective and attractive?

nine Dependable

If we have said it once, we have said it a million times, “Do what you say you will do, when you say you will do it.” This may sound easy to do while you read it here, but it is actually far less easy to achieve in day-to-day business. The good news is that you have the ability to control both sides of the statement. You can make decisions about what you commit to do and you have complete control over when you have committed to making it happen.

ten Humble

Part of the DNA of all great wholesalers has to do with their egos. However, some wholesalers have a DNA strand that is misaligned. They are compelled to place themselves before all others, to sing (shout?) their own praises, and to generally bore others with their own self-aggrandizement. Quiet humility and the supreme confidence of knowing your own success will always lead others to you.

Rob Shore is a 30 year veteran of the financial services community, with 25 of those years having been spent in distribution. Today he is the Editor-in-Chief of I Carry The Bag and Founder of WholesalerMasterminds.com ©2012 shorespeak, L.L.C. All Rights Reserved

I CARRY THE BAG | FALL 2012 | 1 9

lifestyle

balance

by mary allen, cpcc, mcc

more of what is lousy. Ask an empowering question, and you’ll find your emotional state instantaneously adjusts. Choose your focus.

Choose which question you ask yourself.

It takes discipline, but it’s worth it! What emotional states of being would you like to experience? Focus on those. iii. Language — If you find yourself caught in emotions that are not serving you, look at your “internal dialogue.” Language creates our reality, and thus our emotional states. What is your internal conversation about your goals? Using powerful language will alter your emotional state.

O

PART 1

bstacles. We all have them. Learning how to break through them is essential to realizing your most important goals and living a fulfilling life. Over the next two issues we’ll explore the seven most common obstacles and how we can break through them.

1 Lack of CLARITY

To reach your goals, you must be clear about what you desire, why you desire it, and how to proceed. The first potential culprit is your degree of clarity. Think about one of your goals and evaluate the following.

DESIRE — On a scale of 1-10, what is your level of desire in making it real? Be honest. If you discover your desire isn’t really there, select another goal.

VISION — On a scale of 1-10, how clear is your ultimate outcome? What will it look like and feel like when you have achieved it? Have you written down your vision? What details are missing?

STRATEGY — On a scale of 1-10, how clear are the next three action steps? Are they scheduled on your calendar?

REMEDY — Spend time focusing on finetuning your objectives and vision. What actions do you need to take? Clarity is power.

Emotional States of Being 2 Unhealthy

If you aren’t progressing toward a clearly identified goal, your emotional state of being is another obstacle. Be wary of the impact of distracting 20 | FALL 2012 | I CARRY THE BAG

emotions. Relationship struggles, family issues, bad news, politics, and even the weather can directly or indirectly affect our emotional state.

• Are you feeling clear, inspired, excited, “in the flow,” centered, peaceful, competent, resourceful, committed, empowered, and deserving?

• Are you caught in feelings of being overwhelmed, stressed, and stuck, or feelings of frustration, laziness, turmoil, confusion, or fear?

What were your predominant emotional states last week? Write them down.

REMEDY — Learn how to influence your own emotional state. There are three key elements that contribute to any emotional state. i. Physiology — Moving your body physically is one of the quickest ways to shift your emotional state. You just have to be willing to move. Go for a walk. Sit up straight. Take a deep breath. Get a drink of water. Go work out. Smile. Stretch. Laugh. It’s simple. It’s easy. You just need to be willing to move. ii. Focus — Are you focusing on what you desire, or what is not in your life right now?

Are you focused on what you can control, or what is outside of your control? Are you focused on what is right, or what is wrong? Are you focused on what you appreciate, or what is irritating you? Are you focused on the reality that you are always at choice? Notice that whatever you focus on affects your emotional state of being and questions direct your focus. Ask a lousy question and you’ll discover

3 Time Wasters

There are numerous activities that can dominate your time and distract you from progress. Which of these do you indulge in? Email, TV, smoking, personal conversations, gossip, unhealthy snacking, interruptions from others, feelings of being overwhelmed or stressed, Facebook or the news. What time wasters would you add to this list? Be honest. Once you’re aware of where time is going, consciously choose to eliminate or reduce your time wasters.

REMEDY — Identify the top two “time wasters” that apply to your life, and determine one action you can take to lessen their impact in your life.

Examples: 1. Checking email throughout the day. Solution—Only review two times a day.

2. Too much TV. Solution—Limit TV to two favorite shows per week.

3. Personal interruptions. Solution—Set aside “sacred time” and let others know not to interrupt you. Don’t answer the phone during this time.

We’ll cover the remaining ways to break through obstacles in our Winter 2013 column.

Mary Allen, CPCC, MCC is one of the most well-known life coaches worldwide, helping clients enjoy greater success with inner peace in all areas of life. For over 13 years, her clientele have included busy professionals, and even a couple of billionaires. She is author of the acclaimed book “The Power of Inner Choice: 12 Weeks to Living a Life YOU Love.” She leads The Inner Peace Immersion Retreat annually. Receive 26 Inner Peace Tips & 2 Free Chapters from her book at www.lifecoachmary.com

b y d o n c o n n e l ly

j

argon is industry-specific. All specialists, including wholesalers, use jargon in a well-meaning way to facilitate communication. Occasionally the jargon gets overused and devolves into buzzwords. What once was a very specific meaning becomes an unclear meaning.

The phrase ‘Best Practices’ comes to mind. At one point wholesalers who were known for superior performance, for best practices, raised the bar for everyone else. Eventually their best practices were copied throughout the industry. Best practices were no longer the best practices; they were the norm. The phrase lost its meaning.

The same thing is happening to the phrase ‘Help the Advisor grow his or her business.’ It has lost its meaning. It’s perceived as insincere.

“Do business with me and I’ll help you grow your business” is now a vague concept uttered by every wholesaler on the planet. The offer is no longer thought of as special. Instead it is a vague promise that comes across as a shallow form of caring.

But suppose you truly could enhance an Advisor’s ability to open accounts and gather assets in a way that no other wholesaler in your territory could come close to matching? How valuable would the Advisor consider you to be? How fast would your reputation go viral? How seriously would you be taken?

I can think of a few ways you can do this, but I am going to focus on one: Help grow your Advisor’s business by helping improve his or her communication skills. Become a great storyteller and then teach your Advisors to become great

storytellers. It is the function of a wholesaler to be understood. If everyone in every meeting understood everything you said, you would be the most successful wholesaler on earth. Unfortunately, the inverse is true as well. This applies to Advisors also. The better they are understood, the more successful they become. You can make a difference by showing your Advisors how to speak with an impact.

The best form of communication now and throughout history is and has been storytelling.

Everybody understands and remembers a great story.

Great stories compel people to act. Everyone loves a good story and everyone loves a good storyteller.

As the title of this article, a quote from Ira Glass, suggests, great things happen to people who tell stories. Teach your Advisors to become storytellers and great things will happen to them. And to you. Teach your Advisors a presentation in story form that is so powerful that prospects and clients will be compelled to take action; that is so clear that whoever hears it will completely understand it and never forget the presentation or the Advisor.

Here is a three-step presentation building process borrowed from David Ogilvy, the iconic advertising genius. Step one is to look for the one idea that best reflects the point you want people to remember. Step two is to boil that idea down to ten words or less. Step three is to build your presentation around that main idea.

And, remember, keep to the point. No verbal spamming. Only put in what is compelling. The

compelling is what people remember. Einstein urged us to find simplicity out of clutter.

Elmore Leonard is the author of Get Shorty, Mr. Majestyk, 3:10 to Yuma and many other compelling, best-selling novels. He said that whenever he writes something that sounds like writing, he rewrites it. He said he makes it a point to leave out the parts that readers skip.

In 1968, Merle Haggard recorded Mama Tried. In 1999, he was inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame. He was asked why he was so successful with that song when it went nowhere for Joan Baez, The Grateful Dead and several others. “I’ll tell you why it’s different when somebody else is singing ‘Mama Tried’: They’re reading the words. I’m telling the story.”

Stories don’t need to be long to be effective. The shortest inaugural address of any U.S. President was George Washington’s. It was a mere 135 words. The longest was William Henry Harrison’s in 1841. He spoke for two hours, a total of 9,000 words, during freezing temperatures. A month later he was dead of pneumonia.

To paraphrase Scott Simon, with 1,000 words you can have The Lord’s Prayer, The Twenty-third Psalm, The Hippocratic Oath, a sonnet by Shakespeare, The Preamble to the Constitution, Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address, the last paragraphs of Martin Luther King’s speech to the March on Washington and the final entry of Anne Frank’s diary.

Imagine the day when your Advisors can’t wait to hear you tell your great stories. Imagine the word going out that yours is the one meeting people should not miss. There are a lot of wholesalers out there. Imagine you’re the only one who says it so it makes a difference.

Realize that you’re not paid on how much you know.

You’re paid on how well you communicate what you know. The right words are out there and they’re simple.

Go find them. Be known for your plain speaking and clear understanding. Capture that ability and then pass it on. Your Advisors will love you for it.

Don Connelly - Motivator, Mentor & Raconteur As founder and CEO of Don Connelly 24/7, an extraordinary learning center and mentoring program for financial advisors, Don’s timely and provocative sales ideas and stories are available to advisors and wholesalers 24 hours a day, seven days a week. He is a guru on keeping it simple through the use of powerful and insightful story-telling and analogies.To learn more, visit www.donconnelly247.com.

I carry THe baG | FALL 2012 | 2 1

SALES

SKILLS

by anTHony InnarIno

going to excite your dream clients about their future with you, and it doesn’t build the confidence that wins deals. It doesn’t give your clients the certainty that when the bullets start raining down on them that they will find you next to them in the foxhole. It is your passion that does that.

dispassion isn’t professional. it’s anti-professional.

l

ately, I have noticed that salespeople are trying more and more to be “professional.” I put the word professional in quotes because the way that I am using it here connotes something negative. I am not writing about business acumen, professional skill sets, or the ability to deal with a complex sale.

What I am writing about here is some salespeople’s belief that they need to be dispassionate. Cold. Sober. Clinical. Dispassionate.

you are not a doctor Doctors aren’t easily affected by their work. Even though they very much want a positive outcome for their patients, they aren’t often emotionally or personally attached to them. Things are clean.

They are white. They are sterile. They are dispassionate. I imagine that the distance from their patients is part of what allows them to continue to do their job if they fail to get the outcome that they wanted for their patient.

But in sales, being dispassionate isn’t necessary and it isn’t effective. Your dream clients want to give their business to someone who is as passionate about helping them achieve the outcomes that they need as they are—or even more so.

Your dream clients aren’t looking for clinical treatment. They don’t need an impartial diagnosis and recommendation; they need a fire-breathing, passionate, true believer who is hell-bent on doing all that is necessary to produce the outcome they need—and then a little more.

you are not a trusted advisor (if trusted means impartial) I know you want to be a trusted advisor. Many of you are trusted advisors now. The role of 22 | FALL 2012 | I carry THe baG

sales requires that you have your dream clients’ trust, as well as the business acumen and situational knowledge to advise them about how to generate the results that they seek.

Being a trusted advisor has nothing whatsoever to do with giving your dream clients unbiased, impartial recommendations. I can already hear some of you yelling back at the page that if your product or service isn’t right for the prospect, you will advise them to buy from someone else, including even your competitor. This is called disqualifying the prospect. Doing so politely and in way that retains the relationship is certainly the right course of action, and it will serve you well in the future.

But a cold, sober, clinical, dispassionate approach isn’t necessary. In fact, it’s the wrong approach altogether. When the opportunity is right for you, you can be a trusted advisor while still being passionate that you are the right choice.

In fact, being in sales requires that you be extraordinarily partial to your client choosing you. You need to believe in your ability to help your dream clients exceeds any and all others.

You are as biased as is humanly possible because you believe so strongly. It means that you are personally and emotionally attached to what you do for your clients, and that you care deeply about making sure that they get the outcome that they need. That passion is part of how you sell. That passion is part of what you sell.

A boring, clinical, sober, sterile, and dispassionate needs analysis is an indication of ambivalence, and ambivalence is anything but sexy. A detached, dispassionate presentation about your company’s history, your office locations, and your solution isn’t

You owe your dream clients your best, passionate self. You owe your company your passionate engagement, too. More than that, you owe it to yourself to be passionate about all that you do, including all that you do in sales.

Being passionate means that you have to drop the cynicism and drink the Kool-Aid. It means you have to take off the clinician’s white jacket and get close enough to get a little dirt on you. Passion means you run the risk of being so emotionally involved that you are overjoyed by your successes and downright miserable and distraught over your failures. You have to live it.

being passionate means that you drop the cynicism and drink the kool-aid.

Pat Riley tells a story of Magic Johnson’s first professional basketball game. After winning, he was jumping up and down, jumping on the other players’ backs, and overjoyed with their first victory. He was way over the top with his passion and enthusiasm. The rest of the team thought he had either lost his mind or that he had no idea that they still had over 80 games to play. But over time, his passion infected the whole team . . . a team that went on to win the national championship behind the rookie who also won the NBA Finals Most Valuable Player award.

Magic had passion. And passion is magic.

Be professional. But be passionately professional. There isn’t anything sexy about being cold, sober, clinical, and dispassionate. That’s not what anyone wants to buy.

Anthony Iannarino is the President and Chief Sales Officer of SOLUTIONS Staffing, the Managing Director of B2B Sales Coach & Consultancy, and an Adjunct Faculty member at Capital University’s School of Leadership and Management. He writes daily at www.thesalesblog.com.

b y r o n c U l b e r s o n , m s w, c s p

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The Key to Success in Connecting with Others

efore the popularity of smart phones and digital music, I was shopping for a new CD player at a local electronics store. As I was browsing the many different models and features, the salesperson approached me and asked if I was looking for a CD player. I said that I was.

He replied, “You need this one. There is no reason to buy another one. It stores 100 CDs, has a remote control, and uses state-of-the-art technology.”

I usually interpret that to mean, “This one has state-of-the-out-of-date technology that needs to be sold so that we can free up shelf space for the newer models.”

To be honest, I had never listened to more than one CD at a time. I only had 75 and I couldn’t imagine when I would need to listen to 100 at any given time. Clearly, I did not have the forward-thinking vision to see that the future of music was thousands of songs at my fingertips - but we’re not discussing my shortcomings in this article.

Here’s the point. This salesperson was not in tune with me. He was pushing a product that I didn’t value. On top of that, he was stuffy, overconfident, and did not connect with me.

Had he spent more time understanding me and then approaching me with a fun attitude, I’d probably have a 100-CD player right now that I’d be trying to sell on eBay. Excellence and experience. That’s the philosophy of Do it Well, Make it Fun. It’s about doing the very best we can while making the process more enjoyable.

When it comes to wholesalers, I encourage you to think about this from the perspective of how you connect with your advisors. If you do a better job of connecting, it will dramatically change your results. You’ll make more sales, have more success, and, most importantly, experience more fulfillment in the work that you do.

Let’s look at how this works.

Good communication is about how we connect with others. To do that well, we need empathy, clarity, and humor. The more we understand others (empathy), the better we’re able to effectively communicate information (clarity). And if we make communicating more fun with humor, we become a more memorable person whom others enjoy.

The biggest challenge with most communication is that we don’t understand how we come across.

If I say to my wife, “When I look into your eyes, time stands still,” I have conveyed a loving sense of attraction and admiration.

If, on the other hand, I say, “Your face would stop a clock,” I’ve essentially said the same thing but the results are, well, not good.

The first step in connecting is that you must seek to understand how advisors prefer to communicate. Are they more concrete or more abstract?

Do they like to chit-chat or do they want to get down to business? Are they introverts or extroverts?

The more you know, the better you can devise a communication strategy that is congruent with what your advisors prefer. That’s empathy. It’s understanding the world from their perspective.

Once you understand someone else’s style, you can move to the next step of communicating more clearly. Clarity is a process that connects what you want to say to what is understood. It’s the in-between step of how you say something.

In the example with my wife, my intent was to say something loving. But the way I said it had a tremendous effect on what was heard. Similarly, the sales person at the electronics store said things that didn’t matter to me and thus did not connect. Simply put, perception of the hearer is reality. In other words, what is heard is reality.

The last step in connecting with others is to make the process of communication more fun. Research shows that we are attracted to people with a sense of humor. If that’s the case, then it follows that humor is an excellent communication tool.

In my job as a hospice social worker, I once went to visit a terminally ill patient. Unknowingly, the directions I was given were wrong and I went to the wrong house. I knocked on the door and when a woman came to the door, I said, “Hi, I’m Ron Culberson, the hospice social worker.”

She took a step back and said, “I have a cold, but I’m not that sick.”

We both laughed and her funny comment got us both out of a difficult communication situation.

This was reactive, but humor can also be planned. My former tennis coach became a pharmaceutical salesman. When he visited physicians’ offices, he would do funny magic tricks as a way to entertain the doctors before pitching his products.

At one office, he put a tiny foam rubber rabbit in his palm and closed his hand, and when he opened his hand back up, there were 10 rabbits. He then launched into a sales pitch for his company’s contraceptive devices!

Financial services is a serious industry. And yet, most of your advisors would welcome a balance to the seriousness. A little bit of humor can go a long way to connect you more effectively with them.

Effective communication requires connection. Connection requires empathy, clarity, and humor. That’s doing it well and making it fun.

Ron Culberson, MSW, CSP is a humorist, speaker, and author of Do it Well. Make it Fun. The Key to Success in Life, Death, and Almost Everything in Between. He is the 2012-2013 President of the National Speakers Association.

In addition to helping people be more successful through the power of excellence and humor, Ron writes humor for speakers, executives, and politicians. Find out more at www.RonCulberson.com and www.FunnierSpeeches.com.

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b y J e f f H aV e n s

title to be DEtErMiNED

i

’m supposed to write an article for this issue, but I don’t really want to. My computer is sitting right here in front of me, but all I keep doing is staring out the window at the gorgeous day I’m not enjoying.

If there are any typos in this article, it’s because I’m not really looking at the screen – and even when I do I’m not really looking at the words on it. I’m picturing the lake I could be jetskiing on, although sometimes I think instead about the motorcycle ride I could be taking.

Really the only reason I’m writing this thing now is because the deadline is tomorrow, and I don’t feel like getting yelled at for not doing something I promised I would do. I’ve been dreading writing it for weeks now.

This has been my basic business model for quite some time – put off the things I don’t want to do until the last possible minute, then rush to complete them and hope that everything turns out fine. So far it’s working great, mostly because I don’t have a lot of business.

I can’t stand the process of looking for work, so I don’t look for it. Instead I spend my time sunbathing and occasionally moonbathing too – I don’t get much of a tan that way, but I also don’t see any reason to change out of my swim trunks just because it’s dark out – and I don’t want to brag or anything, but I’m pretty sure I can beat the crap out of you in pretty much every Xbox video game there is. So far I’ve managed to fend off insolvency primarily by selling the presents people give me for Christmas and my birthday. I’ve got another birthday coming up in about a month, and this year I’m asking for a Lexus. I’d even be OK with a used one.

That’d still feed me for a few more months.

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Don’t get me wrong. There are parts of my job that I really enjoy. It just so happens that there are also parts of my job that I really don’t enjoy.

Best I can tell, that’s true of every job. Athletes don’t always want to practice, politicians don’t always want to lie, and doctors don’t always want to look at you naked. But they have to. I’m currently working on developing a business where people leave money at my door for absolutely no reason, but I haven’t figured out how to get it off the ground just yet. Anyway, I made a decision a while back that life is too short to do things I don’t want to do. That’s why I don’t eat lima beans. Just because something doesn’t kill you doesn’t mean that it’s food.

Of course, you might be tempted to wonder why I’m bothering to write this article when I already told you that I don’t want to be writing it. That’s a good question, anonymous reader. I’m glad you asked.

Well, as it turns out, I haven’t figured out how to avoid doing things I don’t want to do as effectively as I was hoping to. In fact, every day there seems to be some unpleasant yet unavoidable task that ends up demanding some amount of my attention. In fact, most days there are a handful of those things.

And best I can tell, there are really only two philosophies about how to handle those things: get those necessary evils out of the way as soon as possible so that they’re done and you can enjoy the rest of the day, or put those projects off for as long as you can.

I think we all know which path I prefer.

I have friends who operate the other way.

Studies suggest that the majority of us are most productive in the morning, and so they use their mornings to plow through the difficult parts of their job while they still have the strength and energy to do so. I see them enjoying themselves

at lunch, secure in the knowledge that the rest of their day will be fun. Their happiness annoys me.

By comparison, I prefer to spend my most productive hours putting off the things that I am dreading to do but know I’ll have to do anyway.

I’ve found that a few moments of pain aren’t enough for me; I prefer to wallow in it, savoring the endlessly draining anticipation of all those difficult tasks sitting on the horizon. Some days I don’t even get around to doing the things I knew I needed to, and on those nights I sleep poorly because I know that tomorrow I’ll have twice as many crappy things to postpone. Extended out on a long enough timeframe, I imagine my life will eventually become one of continuous frustration.

I should clarify something. When I said ‘friends’ earlier, what I really meant was ‘people sitting at the other tables at lunch.’ I eat alone.

This article’s almost done. If there were any justice in this world, I’d be able to go outside now.

But I’ve got another article due today for another magazine. I did this one first because I REALLY don’t want to write the other one. Luckily for me, I’ve only got about 19 minutes to get it done, which is flatly impossible. I’ll give them something, but it won’t be very good.

“But wait!” you might be thinking. “Putting off all those necessary evils until the last minute sounds like a really terrible strategy, not only for business but also for your personal happiness.

Why do you do things that way?”

I’m glad you’ve asked that question in such a conveniently summarizing fashion. And I’ll be happy to answer you in kind. Why do I do things this way?

Because as I’m sure you’ve come to understand throughout the course of this article, my ideas generally don’t make a whole lot of sense.

One of the most innovative speakers and trainers in corporate America, Jeff Havens helps people become better at their jobs by spending a lot of time talking about what not to do. Jeff has been featured in the Wall Street Journal, Business Week, AOL Jobs, Bloomberg, and CNBC. His latest book, Unleash Your Inner Tyrant!: Proven Strategies to Help YOU Become a Terrible Boss, is easily the most entertaining management book you’ll ever read. In 2009 he founded Big Pow! Enterprises to provide entertaining, high-content training across a variety of disciplines. For more information visit www.jeffhavens.com and www. bigpowtraining.com.

by mIles Healey

You will find that while all RIA firms are fairly different, they typically fall into three broad categories: Wealth Managers (where you will spend most of your time), Asset Managers, and Turn Key Asset Management Platforms, otherwise known as TAMPS. Since the majority of your time will be spent with wealth managers of some kind, I will give you a bit of insight on them and save the others for a future conversation.

wealth managers

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n the RIA world things are not always as they seem; there are many types of firms, different points of contact, and many ways to make an impression. Over 15 years ago when I first started working with RIA firms, I did the things that most of you have done. I went out and got a database, (if I was to do it all over again I would work with the folks at RIA Database as through trial and error I have found them to be the best) sorted through it the best I could, eliminating many large asset managers, and then started making calls. While the landscape has obviously changed, I still see the same mistakes being made. I was looking at the contact names that were listed in the DB and calling to see if I could connect with the people listed to get a meeting. Most of the DBs only listed one or two people as contacts, and these people were typically the principles of the firm who never really took calls, especially from wholesalers (most of this data is from the SEC filings and they typically only list the principles of the firm). After making many calls with minimal results, I started to take a deeper look at how these firms are structured and the process they go through to find the right managers for their clients.

It took a bit of reverse engineering to figure out how to position my products with the right people and in the right part of their process, instead of just trying to force my way in any which way. After some persistence, I was lucky to have connected with the founder of a firm that was large and well- structured. He gave me some great insight into how he ran things, which was fairly typical of most firms his size,

and I will always remember what he said to me about his view of wholesalers. He said, “Miles, I look at my firm like a pretty girl looks at dating; I can date whoever I want. It is not necessarily going to be the guy that is the most

miles, i look at my firm like a pretty girl looks at dating; i can date whoever i want. popular or the one who knocks the loudest or the most often. I want a long term relationship, not a one night stand, and my dad is a bad ass so you better obey his rules.” Funny but really true to life, in that I found that most of the larger firms want to meet with wholesalers with whom they see a good fit and whose products are appropriate to how their firm invests. They also want you to go through the right vetting process; this usually starts with an analyst whose job is to gather the information that gets pushed upstream to an investment committee or the CIO for the firm. It is a process that takes time, patience and persistence.

With this in mind, I went back to the drawing board and started looking for the right points of contact and really did my research to find out how firms are structured. Most of this information is available on their web sites; also if you make a call to the company’s main number and ask the receptionist who the primary point of contact is for investment research, they will usually point you in the right direction.

Broadly defined, these are firms that use mutual funds, SMAs, ETFs, or a combination of all three, to create a diversified portfolio for their clients. They typically do not manage portfolios of individual stocks and bonds on their own and do not position themselves as portfolio managers. WM firms can be further broken down into Active and Passive WMs. On the passive side they will use indexes for most if not all asset classes, and they believe that in the long run most active managers cannot beat their index. There is selective opportunity with the passive WMs, but if your firm has niche products in hard to index asset classes, then you may be useful to WMs in this category. Once in the door with any of these firms the key is to spend your first meeting, and time leading up to that meeting, profiling the firm. You should spend 80% of the first meeting learning about the firm and 20% giving a broad overview of your firm’s specialty and capabilities. Using some of the info that you learned in the core of the meeting, discuss with them one or two strategies that would be best fits for them to look at and those can be the focus of your next meeting. Very simple but very effective, as the key is to create building blocks and position your next meeting, both of which help grow your relationship.

Miles Healey has been in the financial services industry for the past 20 years. His experience includes wholesaling to all channels, but he has spent the past 15 years focused on distribution to the RIA and family office marketplace.

He has built and managed sales teams focused on that niche market and is currently running Interconnected Consulting Group. Interconnected focuses on helping asset management firms with distribution, sales and marketing to RIAs, Family Offices and Consultants. Miles is also an advisor to “Saambaa,” a startup mobile social company in San Diego. Check them out at www.Saambaa.com

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b y b a r To n G o l d s m I T H

10 it takes 20 years to make an overnight success.

—eddie cantor Becoming successful is an art form; staying successful takes a lot of work. Here are ten tools that I’ve seen the “best of the best” use to achieve and maintain success. Using them will help you and your team.

You have what it took to get you here. But becoming a success is easier than staying successful. Focus on the great things that you do and remember that greatness in one area spills over into other areas.

Believing in yourself is an incredibly potent force that will take you and your team to the next level.

1

Trust your gut. Relying on your instincts is what the Warren Buffets and Jack Welches do on a daily basis. Sure, you might not be right every time, but each success makes your skill set stronger.

Try keeping track of your “hunches” for a couple of weeks and follow the results.

2

You’re either green and growing or ripe and rotting. Continue to educate yourself and learn as much as you can about what you are currently doing and what you want to do in the future. Make sure that the people around you do the same.

The best way for most is reading, so always have a book with you. Then, if you have to wait for a few minutes (like for a meeting to get started), you can read and it won’t be wasted time.

3

Live life on your own terms. If you’re doing what feels right, trust it. If you want something more or different, declare it for yourself and create an

4

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achievable plan to get there. You get to decide what success means to you; no one else gets to decide that for you. The ultimate success is having the ability to call your own shots.

Realize that women and men measure their worth differently.

Think about how you would view yourself if you were the opposite gender. Stop trying to “have it all,” because somewhere along the line you will accidentally drop something very important. In addition, the stress can kill you or at least make your work and/or life a living hell.

5

Remember that money isn’t the root of all evil; people (rich or poor) are.

Wealth only corrupts the corruptible.

Money makes you more of what you already are.

If you don’t like what you’ve become, remember that you have the power to change. By the way, negative thoughts about money can stop you from making it. Be open to becoming one of the people and companies that flourish in the downturn.

6

Know when to stop telling and start asking. The best leaders ask a lot of clarifying questions and offer brilliant solutions. There’s power in knowing how to ask the right questions, and there’s a lot more power when your clients and coworkers know you care.

7

Trust your inner (hyperactive) child.

Most leaders know how to do several things at the same time and be very effective. Delegation, concentration, and imagination will all serve you well. Focus on the task at hand, but when a team member requires your attention, be 100 percent there.

Yes, you can think of and do more than one thing at a time. You wouldn’t be successful if you didn’t multitask.

8

Value people more than money.

The heart weighs more than the wallet. It’s about being able to help people with your success, not about how many toys you can buy. You can’t put a price on feeling good about yourself and how you have had a positive impact on the world and those you care for.

9

Never stop reading. Make the effort to read material that is outside your normal field of interest. Integrating what you know with new information is where great ideas come from. Always carry a book or have some new reading material on your phone or tablet, you never know when you’ll get stuck waiting, and this way you won’t waste a second.

10

The people I know who are truly successful are some of the most gracious and generous individuals on the planet. When people are truly feeling as if they are sharing their talents with the world, it gives them a good reason to help others by mentoring them and helping improve their lives.

Set a good example for how living successfully can make you, your company, and the world a better place to be.

Honored by several professional associations, Dr. Barton Goldsmith is a multi-award winning psychotherapist and a syndicated columnist and radio host, as well as a recognized keynote speaker. He has appeared on many television shows and is frequently interviewed by the national press. He was named by Cosmopolitan Magazine and in the book The Complete Marriage Counselor as one of America’s top therapists. Since 2002, his weekly column “Emotional Fitness,” has been featured in over 300 publications. Dr. G. also hosted a weekly radio show on NPR/KCLU, with nearly 90,000 listeners in Los Angeles, Ventura and Santa Barbara.

Just another great tip I picked up at Wholesaler Masterminds‌

Sweet new laptop, Johnson!

Wholesaler Masterminds specializes in peer group and individual coaching for wholesalers and managers. Our laser focus is on practice management ideas that allow our clients to realize their career, income and personal goals.

Contact us today for a complimentary discussion: 888-508-5010

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