Paul Lofties, CEG Worldwide
Co-host, The Preeminent Financial Advisor podcast
Cathy McBreen, CEG Insights
Co-host, The Preeminent Financial Advisor podcast
Key Takeaways:
• Clients increasingly want you to help them achieve their “best life.”
• Different generations tend to define a successful life in very different ways.
• Tailor your conversations and solutions based on your deep knowledge of each client.
As a financial advisor, you’re well aware that your clients want to achieve significant success in life. But here are a few questions to consider:
• Do you really understand what those clients want out of life?
• Do you know what “living their best life” means to each of them?
• Are you ready to help clients achieve what matters most to them?
The fact is, being wealthy is no longer enough for most clients. Today, success involves a lot more—including personal and professional achievements, a sense of happiness and a larger purpose. What’s more, the definition of a highly successful life can vary greatly depending on whether the client sitting across from you is a baby boomer, a Gen-Xer or a millennial.
The upshot: To build strong relationships, you need a deep understanding of each client’s view of a successful life. Discovering how your clients see success can potentially help you generate significant organic growth.
Face The Facts
The affluent aren’t some monolithic group—a fact that can clearly be seen when CEG Insights asked more than 1,200 of them how they define success.
1. Baby boomers value honesty and integrity. Overall, the top definition of success—cited by 44.2% of affluent respondents—was “having integrity, honesty and ethical behavior in work and life.” Drilling down, however, we see that the baby boomers (age 58 to 76) and the WWII generation (age 77+) feel much more strongly about these factors than do younger generations.
• “Integrity, honesty and ethics” was the most important way to define success for 53.8% of the WWII generation and 47.7% of the boomers.
• In stark contrast, just 31% of Gen-Xers and 21.4% of millennials agreed.
2. Gen-Xers care about working hard and finding the right work-life balance. Members of Generation X (age 42 to 57) were most likely to define success as “working hard and persevering” (22.2% versus 17% overall) and “achieving a healthy balance between family/relationships and work” (21.7% versus 16.1% overall). What’s more, these definitions of success were not shared by millennials (age 27 to 41) overall.
3. For millennials, success means personal growth and impacting the world. Millennials’ #1 definition of a successful life involves “making a positive impact on others and the world” (24.4%). No other generation comes close to seeing this as the top definition of success. Likewise, millennials are the group most likely to say that “focusing on personal growth and development” equates to a successful life (16.3%, versus 8.7% of Gen-Xers and 6.3% of boomers).
Insights Into Action
These findings have important implications for advisors—especially those of you seeking to move upmarket and deliver highly personalized and customized client experiences.
1. Know the generational differences. Don’t treat affluent clients as if they all share the same beliefs and characteristics. Seek to understand how they differ based on the generation to which they belong. Yes, clients all have unique attributes. But by knowing the various generational-based traits, you can start to get a handle on what each client likely cares about—which, in turn, can help you better advise and serve them.
2. Go beyond the numbers. Increasingly, clients want more than just financial planning from you. They want someone who “gets” them—who understands what they most want from life, and then arms them with the tools they need to best pursue those results. Helping clients live their best life as they define it will differentiate you from the pack.
3. Engage in deep discovery. When you conduct discovery interviews with prospects (or re-discovery meetings with existing clients), ask them what success means to them and why they care about the factors they do. You want to learn what is driving and motivating your clients at a core level so you can be a better advisor to them.
4. Tailor your conversations and recommendations. If you have millennial clients and you know from your discovery process that they have a strong desire to impact the world or their communities, make a point to discuss issues around charitable giving or impact investing. Likewise, Gen-X clients will likely find great value in conversations and solutions around using wealth to find a good work-life balance.
5. Revisit these topics. Over time, your clients’ values and definition of a successful life may evolve or change—particularly as they get older, have children or perhaps encounter health-related challenges. Check in on occasion to see whether there are any new developments or changes that might alter the picture of what their “best life” looks like.
Listen to the full episode here.
Catherine McBreen and Paul Lofties are leading innovators in wealth management research. Ready to become the go-advisor among affluent clients seeking guidance during uncertain times? Schedule your Play to Win consultation today to see how CEG Worldwide can help you accelerate your success and take your practice to the next level.