Financial planning without any regard for the person’s dreams, values, and life they want to live is nothing more than numbers on paper.
A person’s dreams, values, and life they want to live without any regard for money is nothing more than a fantasy.
Life planning is simply connecting the client’s dreams and values with the strategies of financial planning that create the life of freedom that person has always envisioned.
Here’s what you’ll learn:
The two pieces of advice that George gives to anyone that wants to become a great listener
“The Pause” – the one skill he said every advisor should know and learn
The two things they train advisors to listen for to enhance the conversation
A deep dive into the famous three questions and the best practices for applying them
“Lighting The Torch” – the key step in the life planning process that ignites behavior change
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There is zero correlation between the size of your bank account and the overall contentment and happiness of your life.
If you’ve worked with people and their finances long enough, you’ve seen it time and time again. But, once you can align money with meaning, you have the foundation of a happy, meaningful life.
Financial advisors excel at financial strategies but often fall short at helping clients illuminate the ingredients of a meaningful life. Brian Portnoy has spent decades writing, speaking and teaching on how to map money to meaning on the path to funded contentment.
We discuss:
A real, tangible definition of financial wellness or well-being
Using the “Four C’s” of contentment and the “7 Dimensions of Money Life” to map money to meaning
The conversations to have with clients to uncover their meaning
The behavioral and psychological challenges inherent with goals-based planning and why most advisors aren’t equipped for it
The dimensions of behavioral coaching beyond keeping your client invested in the market
And more!
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The greatest barrier for every client isn’t lack of information. It’s their own mindset and behavior.
Whether it’s someone who overspends, someone who under-spends, someone who wants to sell out at the worst possible time, or even the person who never sends in the data you need, the key to changing their behavior starts with understanding their money mindset.
Sarah Newcomb, Director of Behavioral Science at Morningstar, joined the show to discuss how to better understand a client’s money mindset.
We discuss:
The framework she and her team developed to assess a client’s money mindset
The important distinction between financial and emotional well-being
The #1 predictor of savings behavior and how to help clients with it
Using a “What-If Journey” to help clients overcome their fears
How role models can play a powerful role in changing behavior and overall well-being
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Adrian Murphy is the CEO of Murphy Wealth, a multi-award winning financial planning firm in the UK. Most recently, his firm made waves throughout the industry with the announcement that they were hiring a Chief Behavioral Officer as a part of their transition to a “human-first” strategy.
We discuss:
The decision to transition to a “human-first” strategy and what the vision looks like for the firm and for clients
The importance of getting clients from a “thinking” place to a “feeling” place and how to do it
The reason he intentionally avoids starting a question with the word “Why”
The listening workshops his firm goes through to hone their listening skills
How he came to the decision to hire a chief behavioral officer
What he envisions for the role of a Chief Behavioral Officer and the ways he expects it to benefit client outcomes and the growth of the firm
And more!
To sign up for Brendan’s monthly newsletter focused on the human side of advice → Click Here
When it comes to changing someone’s behavior, much of the focus goes to persuasion and nudging techniques.
In reality, for financial advisors, the primary weapon of influence you have over someone’s behavior is your ability to communicate and connect at the highest level.
Dr. Joy Lere is a licensed clinical psychologist and behavioral finance consultant who has spent her entire career learning to communicate and connect with her clients to give them clarity, build trust, and ultimately change their behavior for the better.
We discuss:
Ways to create “space” for someone to open up and share more than they do with most people
Reading body language and posture and effective ways to address it
What Joy would tell herself 10 years ago about how to get better at reading people
A powerful questioning technique to get someone to make changes
The two points in your life that have the biggest impact on your beliefs and behaviors around money
And more!
To sign up for Brendan’s monthly newsletter focused on the human side of advice → Click Here
Dr. Moira Somers, financial psychologist and author of the best-selling book Advice That Sticks: How to Give Financial Advice People Will Follow, consults with advisors and firms around the world to deliver “stickier” advice that leads to more follow-through and implementation.
We discuss:
A specific process to use at the end of every meeting to drastically improve follow-through
The biggest mistake advisors make when trying to get clients to follow-through (also the most common)
A specific process for the beginning of every meeting to make your advice stickier
The #1 piece of advice Moira gives any advisor looking to improve their meetings, relationships, and follow-through
What studies show is the primary determinant of client satisfaction in a meeting
And more!
To sign up for Brendan’s monthly newsletter focused on the human side of advice → Click Here
Dr. Moira Somers specializes in the growing new field of financial psychology. She trains and consults with financial services professionals, helping them and their clients deal with the challenges of wealth.
Dr. Somers’ executive coaching practice emphasizes behavior change for leaders and their team members. As a neuropsychologist and unapologetic brain science nerd, Dr. Somers enjoys coaching other people who love to learn, are quick to implement, and are prepared to pivot in response to data about their performance. Her work is rooted in evidence-based findings from the fields of neuroscience, behavioral economics, management science, and positive psychology.
Her work as a keynote speaker, educator, and consultant takes her around the globe. She speaks and trains about such topics as the reasons why clients may fail to follow good advice, the psychological factors at play during major life transitions, and the hazards of mental depletion.
The perfect plan is rendered useless in the absence of execution.
Flawless technical advice minus implementation is worthless.
While you would think that providing someone a step-by-step plan to accomplish their goals while minimizing their fears would be all that’s needed to spur someone into action, anyone who works with people and their money knows that simply isn’t the case.
But, take a minute to imagine what your day would look like if every client immediately followed through and implemented your advice without having to follow up with a phone call or email.
While that might be a bit of a stretch, the quickest and most effective way to boost follow-through is by improving the “stickiness” of your advice.
Dr. Moira Somers, author of the best-selling book Advice That Sticks: How to Give Financial Advice People Will Follow, discusses:
The parallels between medical and financial advice and what medical research can teach us about the challenges and improving “adherence.”
How much responsibility falls on the advice-giver when advice isn’t implemented (Hint: It’s way more than you think!)
How improving follow-through and implementation benefits both your clients, your business, AND your well-being
A proven method to help get through the friction of the data-gathering process
The most important role an advisor plays in improving future behavior
To sign up for Brendan’s monthly newsletter focused on the human side of advice → Click Here
Dr. Moira Somers specializes in the growing new field of financial psychology. She trains and consults with financial services professionals, helping them and their clients deal with the challenges of wealth.
Dr. Somers’ executive coaching practice emphasizes behavior change for leaders and their team members. As a neuropsychologist and unapologetic brain science nerd, Dr. Somers enjoys coaching other people who love to learn, are quick to implement, and are prepared to pivot in response to data about their performance. Her work is rooted in evidence-based findings from the fields of neuroscience, behavioral economics, management science, and positive psychology.
Her work as a keynote speaker, educator, and consultant takes her around the globe. She speaks and trains about such topics as the reasons why clients may fail to follow good advice, the psychological factors at play during major life transitions, and the hazards of mental depletion.
You’ve heard countless trainings and presentations on the power of referrals and how to get them. In this episode, we’re approaching referrals in a new way: through the lens of psychology.
Imagine being able to get inside the minds of your clients to better understand what they think about referrals, how they feel about referring, how they would prefer you to bring it up with them, and maybe most importantly, what they identify as the most common barriers to referring more often.
That’s exactly what Dan Allison did. Relying on his background in clinical and behavioral psychology, Dan interviewed thousandsof clients, asking them those exact questions to help better understand the psychology of getting more referrals.
We discuss:
How to bring up the referral conversation in a comfortable way based on what the clients wants
The big mistake most advisors make (but don’t realize it) when asking for referrals
The one question that every firm should ask to instantly boost their referability
How to ensure you get referrals when someone passively hands out your information
What 60% of clients say when asked the reason why they don’t refer and what they say when asked why they do refer
To sign up for Brendan’s monthly newsletter focused on the human side of advice → Click Here
Dan Allison is a speaker and the founder and President of The Feedback Marketing Group, a consulting firm helping large organizations and individual professionals implement a system to duplicate their top clients and attract more quality prospects. Dan has drawn on his background in psychology to gain an understanding of thousands of the kinds of clients all financial professionals would like to work with. This has made him one of the industry’s leading authorities on referral behavior.
Imagine how much easier it would be to get someone from prospect to life-long client if you could look into their mind and know what they value. Or how much easier it would be to get a client to follow through on the advice given if you knew exactly what was going on in their mind?
We’ve been given those answers, and in this episode, Evan Beach and I discuss the specific ways Evan and his firm have evolved their processes, systems, and conversations to deliver what clients actually want.
We discuss:
The 5-minute exercise their firm uses that converts nearly every prospect into a client
The changes Evan made to his meeting process to focus on what clients want that led to a massive boost in new assets
The exact question his firm asks everyone in their first meeting that lays the groundwork for success
The reason why he encourages clients to state their goals publicly as many times as possible
Why Evan strives to make sure stories are an integral part of every conversation and presentation
The stories he’s learned to tell that resonate the most with clients and prospects
To sign up for Brendan’s monthly newsletter focused on the human side of advice → Click Here
Evan Beach is a Certified Financial Planner and wealth manager at Campbell Wealth Management in Alexandria, Va. Evan and his team are well known throughout the Capitol region. His expertise and practice is focused around comprehensive financial planning for seniors, retirees, and those approaching retirement. Evan is a graduate of the University of Delaware, The College for Financial Planning, and Georgetown University. He currently resides in Washington, D.C. with his wife, Ali and dog, Tenley. Securities offered through LPL Financial, Member FINRA/SIPC. Investment advice offered through Campbell Wealth Management, a registered investment advisor, and separate entity from LPL Financial.
Evan Beach is the Director of Wealth Advisory for Campbell Wealth Management, an RIA firm in Alexandria, VA that oversees around $800 million AUM almost exclusively for clients over the age of 55.
Most recently, Evan wrote an article discussing how to tailor everything in your practice or your firm around what clients want (and not what we think they want) based on what research tells us and shares the tremendous growth their firm has seen as a result.
Imagine how much easier it would be to get someone from prospect to life-long client if you could look into their mind and know what they value.
We’ve been given those answers, and in this episode, Evan and I discuss how to take those answers and apply them to your practice in a way that will deliver better client outcomes and boost your new asset growth.
We discuss:
The behavioral reasons why Evan decided not to charge for financial plans
The moment Evan realized that his whole onboarding process was designed around what he thought was important instead of what clients wanted
The importance of a “test driving experience”
Why positioning your value around behavioral coaching can actually work against you
To sign up for Brendan’s monthly newsletter focused on the human side of advice → Click Here
Evan Beach is a Certified Financial Planner and wealth manager at Campbell Wealth Management in Alexandria, Va. Evan and his team are well known throughout the Capitol region. His expertise and practice is focused around comprehensive financial planning for seniors, retirees, and those approaching retirement. Evan is a graduate of the University of Delaware, The College for Financial Planning, and Georgetown University. He currently resides in Washington, D.C. with his wife, Ali and dog, Tenley. Securities offered through LPL Financial, Member FINRA/SIPC. Investment advice offered through Campbell Wealth Management, a registered investment advisor, and separate entity from LPL Financial.