Knowing what is very important to your clients offers you a perspective about how you can deliver value and demonstrates that you are indeed focused on them. It also helps you know how to best position your expertise and capabilities.
During discovery, it’s important to probe. Probing means using effective ways to get more information and usually results in greater detailed sharing. There are many ways to probe—by using such nonverbal prompts as head nodding, for instance. Verbal prompts include statements such as “Sure,” “I agree” and “Yes, go on.”
One of the most powerful probes is this question:
Can you tell me more?
Clients are often unclear, and one of the mistakes many wealth managers and other professionals make is coming up with inaccurate presumptions that may consequently be detrimental to the relationship. This question is best used often and everywhere. It is very appropriate whenever knowing more is highly advantageous.
The better your understanding of your clients, the more successful you are going to be. By prompting them to go deeper, your knowledge of their worldview and their circumstances increases. The result is a superior understanding that can readily translate into superior deliverables and greater rapport.
From the perspective of business development, discovery needs to concentrate on what matters most to the other person. What matters to you, such as providing your wealth management services and products, is rarely very important. Using the discovery process to help create optimal professional relationships is all about the other person.
Somewhat paradoxically, because discovery is all about other people, you regularly get great outcomes for your wealth management practice. Since the quality of your relationship with clients is your biggest differentiator in the wealth management business, you must make sure the other person is center stage and backlit. If so, you are likely to derive more benefits from that than any financial service, product discussion or any talk about what you do or even the value you can deliver.
Discovery is an intricate, extremely meaningful and quite often essential process to building outstanding relationships, and thus driving the success of your wealth management process. The adroit use of powerful, thoughtful questions, coupled with empathetic responding, will give you the perspectives and acumen you need to deliver outstanding significant real value to all the people you are dealing with.
Connecting The Dots
Because of discovery, you have all these dots—all these pieces of information about your clients, or about prospects, or about other professionals. What you still need to do is connect these dots to form cohesive patterns. This is where your technical proficiencies and that of your team come into play.
When you really understand your clients, you are then able to consider the plethora of wealth management services and products that can be used to help them achieve their agendas. For wealth managers who are remarkably skilled at discovery and, consequently, at building optimal professional relationships, there is usually no required persuasion.
By taking this proven approach, you are not selling anything. Instead, you are matching out possibilities to opportunities.
Russ Alan Prince is president of R.A. Prince & Associates.