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Let’s begin with a fairly obvious statement: The financial advisory business is based the one, simple idea that people will entrust the management of their money to someone else, hopefully to you.
There’s a lot to be said for being skilled at all the complex number-crunching involved in managing that money, but if those wealthy people don’t trust you in the first place, all that management skill is for naught.
Again and again, the question is: How do you persuade wealthy people to trust you with their money? And why should they trust you, as opposed to someone else?
One common answer is that you should manage their money because you are smart. After all, you study constantly, think hard and fast, went to school a long time, and know a lot. It seems eminently logical that you can spur more sales by impressing potential clients with your intellect. This will make them want to hire you, right?
Not so fast.
On closer inspection, that answer doesn’t hold up. If people are hiring you solely because of your superior intelligence, the moment they find someone smarter, they will immediately dump you and hire that competitor. And emphasizing how smart you are can actually work against you.
“Smart,” after all, is not a scientific term. It’s subjective, and it really refers to your relative social status. If you emphasize how smart you are, you run a substantial risk of making a potential customer feel relatively “dumb.” Part of your clients’ sense of social status and importance is how well they have managed their lives to date. If you challenge their sense of achievement by saying you know better, well, no matter how much good you can ultimately do them, this challenge will very likely make them want to avoid you … no matter how smart you are.
But surely you can’t risk looking dumb; that would be a total disaster, right?
Well, again, not so fast.
