Michael Lovas uses unconventional tools to show advisors how to talk with clients.
After interviewing Michael Lovas
(www.aboutpeople.com), I realized how haphazard is the process of
getting to know someone, like a prospect, for the first time. We take
in a multitude of cues from their faces, body language, speech patterns
... not to mention, what they actually say to us. With rudimentary
faculties, we try to make sense out of all these signals and figure out
how best to respond.
There's a whole science that deals with this process
called Neuro-Linguistic Programming, and Michael Lovas knows it well,
being a Licensed Master Practitioner of Neuro-Linguistic Programming,
or "NLP." The question is, how can this knowledge be used to transform
the way an advisor optimizes his communication with a client?
"In my pursuit of NLP," says Lovas, "I discovered a
very specific area called 'metaprograms,' or mental filters. I look at
any person and, either by reading certain lines on their face or
listening to language patterns, I can begin to put together a specific
psychological profile of that person. I also listen to how they talk
and then structure my communication similarly, so they can hear what I
have to say."
Voodoo meets psychology? Lovas prefers to call it
"mental marketing," which he elucidates through his People Map concept.
"Visualize four circles inside each other that, together, represent the
psychological makeup and behavior of your client. The big outer circle
is Cultural; the next circle is Generational; then there's
Professional; and the innermost circle is the Individual."
Explaining the cultural aspect, Lovas says, "If
you're an advisor in Flugerville, Texas, with its large German and
Polish population, the thinking of people there will be different from
the thinking of people in Austin, just 20 miles away." As for the
generational aspect, Lovas and I discovered we were both in our late
fifties, meaning we're on the leading edge of the baby boomer
generation. "We think differently than boomers just ten years behind us
because our life experiences were different."
Professional differences factor in because different
professions have a different psychology than other professions.
"Loggers think differently than neurosurgeons. In fact, neurosurgeons
think very differently than dentists."
And, finally, each individual is different. "Once
we've established that our client is a 59-year-old German dentist, we
then look for the personality type and mental filters of the
individual." Lovas discovered that certain personality types often have
similar facial lines. It works like this: "The face is a map of the
facial expressions one has made over his lifetime-habituated based on
the individual's attitude or mood. So, if he's very analytical, he may
have a single vertical line between his eyebrows because, as the
analytical person ponders things deeply, he brings his eyebrows
together. Beyond the age of 30, these lines will have etched themselves
into his face."
Once an advisor understands his client's personality
type, he can grasp the client's mental filters that control how the
client hears messages. "We have a client in the wilds of the Pacific
Northwest, Jeff Moormeier, who works with locals-commercial fishermen
and loggers. Jeff gave us a description of his clients and we built a
profile from that. These people are a freedom-loving, don't-fence-me-in
kind of people. They want options, and they want to work with someone
who understands and holds their values."
Understanding these qualities, Lovas built a Web
site and white paper with which Moormeier could market himself. "All
the language patterns therein are based on the profiles developed from
Jeff's clients." Adds Moormeier, "Everything on the 'About Us' page of
my Web site (www.quantum-advisors.com/about.html) is Michael's. With
Michael's help, I don't have to change who I am; I can be myself and
the right clients will be attracted to me."
Here's a passage Lovas wrote for Moormeier's Web
site: "When I look at that beautiful night sky atop the Cascade
mountains, I see my childhood. Growing up here in Seattle in the 1950s,
I developed a passion for the great outdoors and respect for the people
of the Pacific Northwest. Freedom and choices are huge parts of who I
am. I am a traditional guy committed to delivering those same values to
my clients." The passage is accompanied by other text and by photos
that express similar concepts-a comet in the night sky, a photo of
Moormeier as a kid and as an adult, with his wife, Jean.
Moormeier says he could have spent his seed money on
lots of things but chose to spend it on his work with Lovas, and Lovas'
wife, Pam Holloway, also part of the AboutPeople team. "I've gone from
operating out of my basement to a practice in which I have real
credibility," says Moormeier.
Neuro-Linguistic Programming is an uncommon skill
for those who coach financial advisors. Lovas' path to NLP started when
he was writing marketing copy for JC Penney Financial Services. "I
asked them, 'Who buys your stuff?' information I needed to sculpt the
proper marketing message and, in spite of having tons of demographic
information, they didn't really know. Their answer was, 'People between
the ages of 18 and 80.' I was speechless."
When he moved on to working with advisors, he found
they could no better characterize their clients than JC Penney could
its customers. This led Lovas back to school for a psychology degree in
human relations in business, so he could better answer the "who buys"
question. "Let's say an advisor's clients are doctors. If I can
understand why he's attracted to doctors as clients, I can give him a
more effective marketing program."
One day a client said to Lovas, "We love what you
wrote, but the coaching you gave us was even more valuable." "I didn't
think I'd done any coaching," says Lovas, "but the questions I'd asked
forced my client to go into his client base and focus his marketing
efforts. So, I thought, 'Let me be even more specific,' and I got into
coaching."
It's my opinion that pairing NLP with a background
in advertising provides powerful tools to help someone better
communicate with his clients, whether by Web site, white paper or open
dialogue. "Marketing must be looked at as expressions or communications
from a person," says Lovas. Knowing that there are 60 different mental
filters, if Lovas can discern an advisor's client's mental filters, he
can teach the advisor exactly how to communicate with the client so the
client hears the advisor based upon the client's own personality and
mental constructs.
Steve Neff, a principal with Signia Capital
Management LLC in Spokane, Wash., found this process invaluable when he
joined a group of young CFAs to help them build a new firm. "By using
his knowledge of psychological language patterns, Mike helped us elicit
our firm's core values. He then helped us sculpt this language into our
marketing materials, Web site and oral communications. This was no easy
task, since he was dealing with four highly analytical, left-brain
CFAs."
Of course, Lovas' methods can't be expected to work
for all people. Says Mike Dressander of Dressander & Associates,
Inc. in Naperville, IL, "We had 25 of our best producers in for an
annual Top Producer Conference-typically very seasoned, professional
and successful advisors. About half the group was interested in
Michaels approach and presentation and the other half couldn't wait for
it to end."
Dressander says one group was intrigued with the
ability to quickly read a prospect, mirror his personality, and make an
instant connection. The group that wasn't intrigued simply didn't feel
that learning an approach like Michael's would help them with their
business. "In my 24 years in this business, I've never seen a group so
divided on the value of a presentation," says Dressander.
However, Elaine Christakos-another Lovas
client-wasn't divided. A branch manager and investment advisor with
Union Securities Ltd. in Kelowna, British Columbia, Christakos first
contacted Lovas after reading one of his articles. "Something in it
rang true for me. My business was doing OK, but I had recently taken
over as branch manager of my office and was struggling with the dual
goals of building a profitable branch and building my own clientele."
Upon hiring Lovas, Christakos learned how much more
there was to communicating elegantly. "In blending the personality
profiling with various NLP skills, not only am I speaking the language
of my clients, I can also help them articulate their goals better and
visualize the outcome they're seeking."
As if the mastery of NLP weren't enough, Lovas is
also a clinical hypnotherapist. "Before the age of ten or 11, we don't
have the faculty of recognizing when someone's giving us bad
information. So if a credible person, such as a parent, gives us
information, we take it in and build our mental wiring based upon it.
Sometimes it's bad stuff, sort of like building a house on a bad
foundation; I can't change the facts of the experience, but I can
change how the person perceives the experience." Christakos, says
Lovas, had been successful but stuck. "Her life purpose was obscured.
She enjoyed what she was doing in her career but it didn't feel right
to her because she didn't understand why she was doing what she was
doing." Lovas took her into a trance and then had conversations with
her subconscious mind as it relived wonderful experiences. "I captured
the language she used and the deep, core values she exposed in those
conversations." From that, Lovas built a "life purpose statement" that
now guides Christakos in achieving the satisfaction she'd been lacking.
Many advisors believe they are doing the right kind
of marketing if they have a brand and a Web site. Lovas' message is
that these tools are only as good as the language contained therein.
David J. Drucker, M.B.A., CFP, a
financial advisor since 1981, now writes, speaks and consults with
other advisors as president of Drucker Knowledge Systems. Learn more
about his services at www.daviddrucker.com.