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Communication is the key to building and maintaining strong client relationships. Your regular touchpoints with your clients are the most vital component of successful relationship building. Skipping a check-in with a client is a missed opportunity to strengthen your relationship.
In the year's final quarter, there are several ways to help your clients and build trust. Here are four reasons to reach out to ensure you don’t miss prime opportunities to touch base with your clients.
1. Send holiday cards and gifts
Sending holiday cards is a simple but effective way to honor a relationship with clients. And snail mail is always a pleasant surprise. Yes, you’re in a business relationship, but it’s a deeply personal one. Because you’re so intimately involved with your client’s sense of security and family, you need to show up with a genuine human touch.
Send a nice greeting card for Thanksgiving or the holidays with a personalized message and consider including a family photo – “from our family to yours.” If your budget permits, take it further by sending a small, thoughtful holiday gift.
Allow plenty of lead time for printing, shopping, and mailing.
2. Plan year-end reviews
You set goals at the beginning of each year with your clients, and the end of the year is the ideal time to sit down together to review their progress. Remind them of the value you bring to the relationship and bolster their confidence in you. Don’t think of it as a transactional meeting to go over the numbers, but to reinforce a sense that they are in capable and trustworthy hands.
Ensure adequate time to give them your undivided attention in a way that puts their mind at ease. Block off plenty of space on your calendar and allow enough advanced notice for them to schedule a meeting at their convenience.
3. Provide important reminders to clients
One of the biggest benefits of working with a financial advisor is having someone in your corner to handle the details of managing finances. The end of the year comes with many deadlines. Every deadline is an opportunity for you to send reminders – reassuring them that they are being well taken care of, educating them about the item’s importance, and providing personalized step-by-step instructions to take the guesswork out of the task.
Provide reminders for the following and incorporate specific information to let them know you are paying close attention to their needs:
- Required minimum distributions (RMDs) amounts and information about penalties if they fail to meet the withdrawal deadline;
- Charitable contributions, aka, qualified charitable donations (QCDs), including any updates, reminders of what you may have discussed about charitable giving, and reminders of where they have donated in the past;
- Flexible spending accounts (FSAs), including the amount they set aside and reminders of how they can spend it;
- Capital gains distributions updates, so they know exactly where they stand for the year;
- A reminder to make additional contributions to their employer-sponsored retirement plan and to max it out if possible; or
- A reminder that the Roth conversion deadline is approaching along with education around how a conversion may be beneficial to them.
4. Update your holiday hours of operation
Everyone deserves to celebrate, relax, and spend quality time with their family and friends around the holidays – including you and your team. But if you’re planning to shut down your office, clients need to know your holiday hours and availability as soon as possible. Most people expect and respect that you’ll be unavailable, but nobody likes surprises. And don’t forget to list an emergency contact, just in case.
Ease into year-end with confidence
With careful planning, the end of the year will run smoothly and allow for plenty of downtime. But if you manage last-minute client communications on top of everything else you have going on, you will miss valuable opportunities to nurture client relationships. Holiday cards and gifts, year-end reviews, reminders, and operations updates are not just nice-to-haves; they’re essential client touchpoints you can’t afford to skip.
Crystal Lee Butler, MBA is the owner of Crystal Marketing Solutions, a full-service marketing agency dedicated to working specifically with independent financial advisors. Since 2011, she’s helped financial advisors cut through the noise to attract ideal clients and grow their businesses using proven strategies that we use with our clients every day. As your “Chief Marketing Officer,” our goal is to help you grow your business and put time back on your calendar so that you can focus on what you do best: serving your clients.
Read more articles by Crystal Butler
Advisor Perspectives welcomes guest contributions. The views presented here do not necessarily represent those of Advisor Perspectives.
