Over the last 20 or more years, I've studied a lot, taught a lot and written a lot about building high-trust client relationships. Lately I've found myself saying to advisors, "Trust is not the objective; trust is a byproduct of the other things that you do, like your behavior, your communication and the quality of your work."

I've come to believe that if gaining your clients' trust is your objective, you're focusing on the wrong thing: you. Your agenda is likely this: "I have to get them to trust me-so they hire me, so they give me assets; so they buy my product or idea. Etc, etc. etc."

Instead the focus should be on them, and your point of view should be this: "I am going to show up relaxed, be authentic, behave with an extremely high level of professionalism, ask great questions, listen with empathy, be well-organized and be respectful of their time by not bragging about myself or my company or boring them with over-explanations of financial concepts and ideas. I'm going to be selective and only let people who fit join my community of clients. If I behave this way and they trust and hire me, fine. If not, that's OK too."

Some advisors try to force things to happen with everyone they meet by using persuasion tactics to "close the deal." This is akin to a woman desperately seeking a husband because her biological clock is ticking, instead of looking for a partner with similar goals and values as hers, someone who is best suited to create a life of happiness and fulfillment with her.

I'm in the business of helping successful advisors double to quadruple their business revenue in four years or less, so I'm not just talking about altruism. You may be concerned that relaxing or abandoning a more intense sales focus will diminish your results.

Think of each client relationship more like a professional marriage. You want people to have the best possible experience with you, whether they become your clients or not, and you only want those who are the right fit to become clients.

Here are a few time-tested rules to create trust (and a few thoughts about how you erode it):

1. Find the clients who fit. In other words, you should avoid the mentality that says "those people have money, therefore I want them." Create an ideal client profile where the personalities of the people you meet are equally important to the money element. Notice how different it feels when you invite people to do business with you rather than just try to close a deal with them.

2. Ask your clients good questions. Ask the clients about their values. (For instance, "What's important about money to you?")
Then ask them about their goals. "What are your tangible goals that require money and planning to achieve? How much do you want to have for that goal? When do you want to have it? What are two or three words that describe what you are thinking and feeling once you have achieved that goal?"

Ask them if it appeals to them to have a comprehensive financial plan-one that would make it more likely they would achieve their goals and fulfill their values. Then you can ask them if they would like to join your client community so you can do this work for them.

3. Listen to your clients with empathy. Advisors have a tendency, especially when meeting clients for the first time, to always think ahead to a question while their clients are still answering the last one. When you do this, you don't really hear what they say, and it's hard to be empathetic when you aren't fully present mentally. The solution is to have your questions memorized so you don't have to think about what you are going to ask next. This allows you to be a much more empathic listener.

4. Record your client meetings, especially the initial client interview. I've written before about recording client meetings, but to save you the trouble of searching back issues, I've written a script that you can use when you're introducing the recorder:

"I appreciate the investment of time and effort you made to be here today. The fact you have done so tells me you must be serious about your money. Is that true?" After they answer that question, follow up with this one: "You'll notice that I'll ask many relevant questions and take copious notes, and I also record the meeting." This is when you acknowledge the tape recorder. "The reason I record is that I'm very thorough. Do you know how you can watch a movie a second or third time and see things you missed the first time?" Again, let them answer that question. "Well," you continue, "giving you advice about your money so you can achieve your goals is obviously much more important than a movie, so I want to make sure our advice is right for you. If we choose to work together, I'll listen to this recording at least one more time to make sure to get it right. "
This is a good speech to give them before you ask your good questions.

5. Give advice with conviction. Salespeople tend to offer alternatives and let the prospect or client choose. Trusted advisors, on the other hand, gather all the information they need, consult with other experts where appropriate, and give the best advice for the client ... with conviction.

6. Tell the truth, even if doing so jeopardizes the relationship. Serious and successful people don't want to pay good money for a rubber stamp, yes-person kissing their butts and telling them only what they want to hear. It's your job to tell the truth, especially when it's what they need to hear, not what they want to hear.

7. Avoid direct statements or implications that you can do the impossible. A good example is by not promising to beat the market. The bottom line is that there is no guarantee about the market. The best you can do is help people get their entire financial house in order, make the best choices possible at the time, and be in the strongest position possible to adapt to whatever uncontrollable events occur. Your job is much more about managing your clients' choices and actions than it is about managing their money. The less you play the predict-the-future game, the more credible you are.

8. Be inspiring. Help people create a compelling vision for their future and then become a bridge to make it happen. Creating a vision for them will build much more trust than being a problem solver.

9. Avoid the use of the old-school greed appeal. Don't say, "Work with me and you'll get a better return because our guru has a better black box to beat the market."

10. Avoid the use of the old-school fear tactic. Don't say, "Buy gold (or whatever) now because the big deficits and weak dollar mean inevitable inflation coming to erode your buying power! You could outlive your money and end up a burden to your family, living off community handouts or on the government dole. How would that make you feel?"

11. Be a comprehensive financial professional. It's interesting that most financial advisors claim to be comprehensive. But what does that really mean? What are "comprehensive financial services?" At the very least, comprehensive implies "everything." Do you really help your clients take care of everything related to their money? How many things is that? I know of one advisor who has done such a great job of defining comprehensive financial services that many advisors look to him for leadership on this subject. Check out www.trustedadvisortoolkit.com for the best information I know of about delivering truly comprehensive financial services.

12. Put the client first. Duh. I know. It sounds so obvious that it's a cliché. And yet there is a lot of controversy among regulators about what a fiduciary standard is. Am I the only one who finds it absurd that legislation is necessary for our industry to step up and adopt a fiduciary standard? Doesn't it simply mean always-in all situations and under all circumstances-putting your clients' needs ahead of your own? Isn't that what you already do? Do you really need a law for that? Apparently the industry does. The good news is that your competition needs somebody else to define integrity for them. And speaking of integrity ...

13. Have no conflicts of interest when you run your business. Notice I didn't say simply "disclose" your conflicts of interest, but that you should have none at all. Why should there be any conflicts of interest to disclose?

Keep in mind that these are not "tactics" to build trust. These are the powerful behaviors of financial professionals who are very good at what they do and who genuinely care about helping people get their financial house in order, achieve their goals and live up to their values. When you behave with a very high level of professionalism, trust is a byproduct of that behavior.

The bottom line is that you can't "technique" your way to trust. You earn it by who you are and what you do.

Bill Bachrach, CSP, CPAE is a very popular keynote speaker, best-selling author, and the creator of the Values-Based Financial Planning turnkey business model, which helps advisors create their ideal life in four years or less. Go to www.billbachrach.com to learn more.