We don't sell. We advise.
We implement the process.
Clients today are too sophisticated to be sold anything.
There's no room for selling in this overly regulated environment.
I disagree with all these arguments. I understand completely and clearly that we are in the advice business. I realize that clients agree to pay us a fee or a commission in exchange for our advice. I simply contend that selling and advice-giving go hand in hand. We have to sell in order to survive. And people need to be convinced to take our advice if they are to have any hope of succeeding financially. And I don't just mean that we've got to overcome the usual objections of "Saving money is not fun," "There is never a convenient time to invest," "I just want to wait until things get better," etc. The hardest thing to overcome is temporal myopia, the inevitable discounting of time. How important can the future be when it's so far away? How many smokers are willing to discount the ravages of time in return for the short-term gain of pleasure? If visualizing the future were possible, or even easy, there would not be one smoker or drinker on earth.
Well, these rules are not suspended in your business. Nobody who is younger than 60 can fathom the reality of turning 60 and staring retirement in the face with inadequate funds. They have to be able to, but they can't. And all the financial advice in the world won't help. That's exactly where salesmanship comes in. And the advisor with the better selling skills wins. I've seen it demonstrated time and again over the years that the most successful advisors have the best selling skills. And those advisors who have enjoyed the longest-running, most successful relationships with their clients did so because they have dispensed nothing but sound advice all along. To have an abundance of common sense is an enormous asset in our business. To have above-average selling skills is a giant leg up. To have both is to go to the head of the class.
But in order to learn selling skills and hone them until they are razor sharp, you've got to come to grips with the idea that it's OK to be called a salesman or a saleswoman.
I have. I think it's OK to be called a salesman. In fact, I like being thought of as a really good salesman. I'm comfortable with that. And I want you to feel as comfortable as I do. In fact, I will argue that if you want to go to the top of this profession, you've got to be totally comfortable with that thought.
Do you feel tawdry being perceived as a salesman?
The first step in becoming great in this business is to overcome that tawdry feeling by getting comfortable in your own skin. If being a salesperson makes you feel second-class or uncomfortable, you will fail in this profession.
As my advisor friend at Smith Barney in Fort Lauderdale, Fla., says, the Eleventh Commandment ought to be, "Thou shalt not kid thyself." And far too many advisors are kidding themselves by thinking all they have to do in order to be successful financial advisors is to lay the advice out on the table and wait for the other person to pick it up. It is more necessary to sell now than ever. Maybe you can advise once the account is open, but how are you going to open the account if you don't sell yourself and your ideas? So if one of your long-range goals is simply to eat, let alone go to the top in this profession, you better learn to sell. Or find a new career.