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The Advisor Solutions Podcast

The Advisor Solutions Podcast
Author: Daniel C. Finley
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The Advisor Solutions Podcast is designed to help financial advisors, insurance agents and wholesalers build a better business...one solution at a time. Daniel C. Finley is the host of The Advisor Solutions Podcast and the President and Co-Founder of Advisor Solutions. He has had over 25,000 hours of coaching sessions with groups and individuals.
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Do you ever think about your business as a journey of experiences? From the day you started your business to today, you have been on a journey to build, grow, maintain, and run your business. Each part of the journey has been an experience—whether it’s prospecting, client servicing, managing staff, managing upper management, or even managing yourself, you’ve created different experiences.
The big question is, have you created the ultimate experience for prospects, clients, staff, management, and yourself? Or are you busy in your business and haven’t given the journey, and the experience you and other people are having any thought?
Most financial advisors, insurance agents, wholesalers, branch managers, and even agency managers don’t take the time to enjoy the journey, much less create positive experiences for themselves or others! They don’t understand the process of making their business, their lives, and the lives of everyone around them better. As a result, they keep doing the same things and having experiences that are not fulfilling.
This episode shares how successful advisors and agents learn how to identify experiences to make your business more enjoyable!
Do you want to get to the next level with your business, but you are unsure how? The answer might lie in finding your business's red flags. You probably have a number of red flags or clear warning signs of danger in your business that are holding you back from reaching the next level of success. But, if you don’t know what they are, then you will never be able to overcome them.
Most financial advisors, insurance agents, wholesalers, branch managers, and even agency managers don’t take the time to unearth their business red flags! They don’t have a way to identify what is holding them back much less a way to overcome it. As a result, they keep doing the same things and they just think that it’s normal that they are supposed to have these challenges.
This episode shares how successful advisors and agents learn strategies to identify and overcome red flags.
Do you want to work harder or work smarter in your business? I think we all want to work smarter! The bigger question is, do you know how to work smarter? Do you have proven strategies that have worked for successful advisors and agents that work for you?
Most financial advisors, insurance agents, wholesalers, branch managers, and even agency managers don’t have specific strategies for working smarter in their businesses. They are so busy working “IN” their business that they don’t take the time to work “ON” their business. As a result, they keep doing the same things that they have always done.
In order to get to the next level, they feel like they have to just keep doing more of what they are doing. The problem with this type of mentality is that it just means working harder and not smarter!
This episode shares how successful advisors and agents learn strategies to work smarter in their businesses.
Do you ever feel like you have too much to do? You know that you want to grow your business, but you don’t know how to scale it as it grows.
Most financial advisors, insurance agents, wholesalers, branch managers, and even agency managers don’t have a method for scaling their businesses. They have never realized that specific strategies can create scalability. To effectively scale your business, you need the right people, products, technology, and systems in place to create the growth you want without chaos or overwhelm.
Your scalability is your ability to maintain a good performance as your business grows. You want to be scalable because it means you have the ability to attract the right talent, clients, and eventually buyer(s) for your business when you decide to retire.
Do you like a good story? Most people do! But, do you feel that you can tell a good story? Do you have a framework for telling stories that can capture your prospect’s or client’s attention, pull them into the story, and help them understand what they need to do in order to be the hero of their own story?
Most financial advisors, insurance agents, wholesalers, branch managers, and even agency managers don’t understand how to create a great story much less compile an entire storybook that they can utilize. The reason is that they have never viewed the topics of stories and storytelling as a process for adding value and helping prospects/clients understand what the advisor knows which are the solutions to challenges that prospects/clients need in order to obtain their financial goals. The best way to do that is to have an architecture for telling stories to position the advisor as the guide and the prospect or client as the hero!
This week’s episode shares how successful advisors and agents use a specific story telling framework to connect with prospects and clients to build a business storybook.
Picture this, your best friend wants to bet on the football game that you are about to watch with him or her. Neither of you is a fan of either team so it doesn’t matter to you who wins or loses. But you know one thing that your friend does not: one team is known for running elaborate plays while the other doesn’t even have a playbook. Which team will you bet on? I think it’s obvious, the one who is prepared!
This leads me to the question, do you have a pipeline playbook? Do you know exactly how many people are in your sales pipeline at any given time? Do you have a strategy (or a play) for systematically adding people to the pipeline and moving each person to the next step?
Do you have a strategy (or play) for every type of tactical situation that could happen in each stage of the pipeline? Do you know what clogs are in the pipeline and how to unclog them?
Most financial advisors, insurance agents, wholesalers, branch managers, and even agency managers don’t have a pipeline playbook! This is because they have never viewed “Building a Pipeline Playbook” as a stepwise process for knowing what to do in every possible situation and how to have a strategy to put people into and through the pipeline.
This episode shares how successful advisors and agents can utilize a stepwise approach to understanding, creating, and maintaining a sales pipeline by having a pipeline playbook.
Picture being in your parent's car at 3 years old and you drive under a green light. You notice the color green, but you don’t know what it means. But your parents know! They know that green means go, yellow means yield, and red means stop. You don’t find that out for a year later. That’s what I refer to as a GREEN LIGHT MOMENT-it’s a moment where something happens, and you know exactly what to do…
What if there are several GREENLIGHT MOMENTS in your business and you have no idea when to look for them, what they are and how to respond? Well, now you will!
Do you ever wonder what it takes to make lasting change? Do you understand the areas of your business that need improvement and how to implement changes to transform your business?
Most financial advisors, insurance agents, wholesalers, branch managers, and even agency managers don’t know how to elevate their business. I coach my clients with a step-by-step process for practicing The Principle of Strategic Replacement, a four-step process for getting to the root cause of bad habits and then what it takes to replace bad habits with good ones to create the results in your business that you’ve always wanted!
In this episode, learn what other successful advisors and agents have done so you, too, can take your business to the next level.
Do you ever feel like your pipeline is stuck? You know why prospects need to take the next step, but for some reason, they don’t seem to have any urgency to want to meet, send you their statements, or even make a decision on the recommendations that you’ve worked so hard on to help them reach their financial goals.
If so, know this… YOU, are not alone.
Most financial advisors, insurance agents, wholesalers, branch managers, and even agency managers don’t have a well-thought-out process for creating urgency in their sales pipelines and maintaining momentum!
The reason is that they’ve never really learned the processes to help their prospects want to take the next step. Rather, they accept the prospects’ start-stop mentality as a natural part of the prospecting process as well as thinking that prospecting is purely a numbers game, living by the law of averages in the percentage of people that just won’t take action.
In this episode, learn about how to create a sense of urgency and maintain momentum in your sales pipeline so that you can effortlessly add people to have move them through it.
Do you know your clients well? Sure, you know who they are and what they do. You might even know a lot about their lives and what relationships they care about the most. But do you know what their relationship is with money? Do you know their money mindset? And do you know how to help them have a healthy relationship with money?
Most financial advisors, insurance agents, wholesalers, branch managers, and even agency managers don’t understand how their clients view money. They don’t know it because they have never really learned The Psychology of Money, a fascinating field that explores how our beliefs, emotions, and behaviors around money shape our financial decisions and wealth-building choices. Also, they don’t know their clients' money mindset and personality type.
The role of a financial advisor extends beyond just managing portfolios and providing investment advice. It also involves helping clients develop a healthy relationship with money. This relationship is crucial as it influences financial decisions, impacts financial health, and ultimately shapes the quality of life.
But if you don’t understand the various ways that people relate to money, how they form their mindsets and personalities, or how to help clients have a healthy relationship with money, then you are doing yourself and your clients a disservice.
This episode shares how successful advisors and agents understand how clients and prospects form a complex relationship with money.
Do you ever feel like you over-promise and under-deliver when it comes to your client servicing system? Do you have the type of system that turns clients into raving fans? If not, then know this…you, are not alone!
Many financial advisors, insurance agents, wholesalers, branch managers and even agency managers want to service their clients in the best way possible but most fail to understand the essential “How To's”. Rather, they have a reactive client servicing system that results in interruptions and thus fractured efforts.
In this episode, learn about a process that other advisors and agents apply to create an effective client servicing system!
Have you ever sat down to do something that you feel is important, such as prospect new people, follow up with prospects stuck in your sales pipeline, or prep for an appointment, only to have the moment hijacked by client interruptions? It might start with a quick client email, then a call from a client about their portfolio, followed by a text from a client to reschedule, and the next thing you know, an hour has gone by. This process could continue, and the entire day might pass without you ever getting to the essential things you intended to do. If that sounds familiar, know that you are not alone!
Most financial advisors, insurance agents, wholesalers, branch managers, and agency managers have never learned how to master what I call a Defensive Client Servicing System, which is a set of strategies that help you protect your time, minimize distractions, while still providing clients with excellent service. Often, advisors treat each distraction as a fire that they need to put out immediately. They end up thinking a reactive approach rather than a responsive one is a badge of honor, buying into the idea that being “always available” equals excellent service. Unfortunately, constant reactivity isn’t sustainable, not for you, your team, or your clients.
This episode shares practical strategies that successful advisors and agents have used to identify, build, and benefit from a Defensive Client Servicing System, so you can control your day instead of letting others control it for you!
Do you need help with challenges in your financial services business that are leaving you frustrated? Well, I wrote a book about that topic, my inaugural book, 101 ADVISOR SOLUTIONS: A Financial Advisor’s Guide to Strategies that Educate, Motive and Inspire!
Many professional development books about financial services focus on the facets of time management, prospecting, or sales. While these books serve a purpose, if you are looking for specific areas to work on, they often fall short because lasting change requires attention to multiple facets of your business, as they overlap and don’t operate in silos.
101 Advisor Solutions is a curation of short stories about real-world challenges and solutions. It covers eight vital elements of having a financial services industry business.
In this episode, learn about 101 ADVISOR SOLUTIONS and hear about relevant takeaways that could help move your business forward.
Are you looking for an excellent book to help you reach the next level in your business? I suggest my latest book, ADVISOR LIFE: A Business Coach’s Collection of Short Stories with Tools, Techniques and Transformational Momentum. Available for purchase now!
Most books about the financial services industry focus on one facet of the business, such as time management, prospecting, or sales. Or, the focus is on one specific topic, such as how to get referrals.
Advisor Life is unique because it is a curation of short stories about experiences with my clients over my last decade of coaching. They are arranged into three categories: tools, techniques, and transformational moments.
Why would you want to hear about my second book? If you can understand the backstory of my book, how and why I wrote it, and what other advisors and agents have done to get to the next level, it could offer you takeaways that could help you and your business.
In this episode, learn about ADVISOR LIFE, and listen to how you can get the most out of your business on a daily basis!
Do you run your business, or does your business run you? One way to know the answer is if you are typically overwhelmed, run-down, and/or exhausted at the end of the day. If this sounds like you, it’s because you don’t have suitable systems in place.
Most financial advisors, insurance agents, wholesalers, branch managers, and even agencies have never been taught best practices for how to create great business systems.
The reason is that they’ve never really looked at their business as having a series of systems. The interesting thing about that is that even if you don’t have a system, that’s a system; it’s winging it! And unfortunately, winging it doesn’t work.
In this episode, learn how to create business systems so that you can run your business efficiently instead of your business running you down and draining you.
Do you have a successful business? Do you have a way to measure your success beyond looking at your paycheck?
Most financial advisors, insurance agents, wholesalers, branch managers, and even agency managers don’t have a well-thought-out process for measuring success.
They have never learned a step-wise approach to measuring their progress instead of just measuring the ultimate end goal. In other words, if all you focus on is the destination, you won’t enjoy the journey!
Also, you will obtain more success if you measure your milestones than if you don’t. The reason is that it’s easier to hit a milestone than constantly focusing on the end goal. Each milestone you achieve carries with it a new level of confidence that you are moving further toward your destination!
In this episode, learn what other successful advisors have done to create strategies for measuring their success, establishing milestones, and how they are setting themselves up to extract the most out of their business daily!
Have you ever hit a wall in your business? Where things that used to work suddenly don’t, and your motivation drops, results fade, and you start to wonder if the effort is even worth it. If that sounds familiar, you may be in what’s known as “The Dip.”
Most financial advisors, insurance agents, branch managers, and agency managers experience “The Dip” at some point, but they don’t always recognize it. They end up quitting doing the right things, like prospecting or asking for referrals, instead of quitting doing the wrong things, like procrastination or low-payoff activities. It’s what you do during these times that makes all the difference!
This episode shares practical strategies that successful advisors and agents have used to identify “The Dip,” push through it, and learn how to quit the things that are holding you back, so you can focus on what moves you forward. These are not just theoretical concepts but actionable steps that can help you take control, regain momentum, and grow your business.
Do you ever wonder how strong your relationships are with your clients? You may have great relationships with your clients and hopefully you do. But are some of your clients' one-time customers while other clients are raving fans? If so, what makes that difference?
If you don’t know why, know that you are not alone! At some point all advisors and agents feel like they are closer to some clients more than they are with others.
In this episode, learn what to do to strengthen relationships and make a better connection with your clients.
Have you ever wondered why some advisors and agents create very successful businesses, while other advisors and agents never get past the survival stage and they wash out of the business?
Is success about luck? Or, timing? Or, a mix of many things? Maybe you are not sure.
Many advisors and agents have felt this way, that they don’t really know what it takes to evolve over the span of a career to have the most successful business possible.
In this episode, learn how to find your way by incorporating techniques that work!
Do your clients always seem to be on an emotional roller coaster ride? When the market is up, they are happy and sometimes greedy, but when the market is down, they are concerned, fearful, and maybe anxious. As financial advisors, understanding and managing these emotions are critical for maintaining long-term client relationships.
Most financial advisors ride the ups and downs of the emotional roller coaster along with their clients. The reason is that they have never realized that there is an art to managing clients when their emotions are tethered to the market.
You see, money can be a very emotional subject for a lot of people. And, when the market is volatile, emotions such as fear, panic, greed, euphoria, anxiety, uncertainty, and loss aversion can become everyday occurrences that financial advisors face. It’s not just financial advisors and their clients that have to face this type of emotional turbulence. In fact, when insurance agents are faced with increasing premiums, their clients get very emotional as well. And, when wholesalers call on advisors and agents, they feel the effects of what the advisors and agents are going through.
This episode teaches how successful advisors and agents can manage emotional client behaviors!