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Here’s a sobering truth you’re seeing more of every day: Your unique status, as an advisor, is declining at a rapid pace.
You experience that when you hear this question in your initial meeting with a new prospect: “What makes you different from other advisors?”
Here’s why this decline is happening: There are more and more advisors who do what you do and they have never been more accessible to your prospects.
Not only are there more advisors in the marketplace, but the majority are focused on educating their prospects as a way to prove their worth and value.
If the majority of the profession is providing free education to their prospects, that accelerates the commoditization of that information, creating a race to the bottom.
In a commoditized profession, where information loses its unique value, educating your prospects only increases their indecisiveness: “I need to think about this and get back to you.”
Here’s the core mindset shift: Dispensing information to your prospect does not equal trust.
In fact, educating your prospect can be perceived as persuading them to see things your way.
Persuasion creates sales resistance, which creates indecisiveness.
Here’s how you overcome this: Focus on the depth of their issues, instead of educating them on solutions.
Solutions are definable in the mind of your prospect.
The future is hard for them to grasp, because their daily lives are overwhelmed with an increasing number of obstacles (prior commitments, information to process, other advisors to see and compare).
Tying the sale to your solutions ties your “value” to an outcome that is unattainable now.
On the flip side, your prospect’s problems are a clear and present danger.
By doing an exceptional deep dive into the gravity, urgency and priority of their issues, they then can then see you as different in your ability to help them see the depths and impacts of not solving their issues in a timely manner.
If your sales process can shift to this perspective, then commoditization won’t affect you at all.
Why?
Because no other advisor can give them the mind-altering clarity that you can (they can only give them information).
Your solution isn’t the solution – it is shifting to a problem-centric trust-based sales process.
To discover how you to become a “category-of-one” in your sales process, order your complimentary book and consultation below.
Ari Galper is the world’s number one authority on trust-based selling and is the most sought-after high-net worth/lead generation expert for financial advisors. His newest book, “Trusted Authority” has become an instant best-seller among financial advisors worldwide – you can get a Free copy of Ari’s book here and, when you click the “YES” button in the order form, you’ll also receive a complimentary “plug up the holes” lead generation consultation. Ari has been featured in CEO Magazine, Forbes, INC Magazine and the Australian Financial Review. He is considered a contrarian in the financial services industry and in his book, everything you learned about selling will be turned upside down. No more chasing, no pressure, no closing.
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Advisor Perspectives welcomes guest contributions. The views presented here do not necessarily represent those of Advisor Perspectives.
