As an advisor, you constantly scout for new clients. But it is possible that by dealing exclusively with the main earning member of the family who is usually an elder patriarch, you tend to ignore a captive chunk of low hanging prospects which is the children of your existing clients.
As a first step of engagement, you should involve the children of your existing clients in reviews so that you are able to win their trust too. Once they get familiar with you and start earning, it is likely that you will be their first preference to seek investment advice. This will help you get a larger wallet share from each family. Also, ultimately, the accumulated wealth would be transferred from existing clients to his/her offspring.
So how do you get started? Here are a few tips which help you to engage with the next generation of your existing clients:
Getting access to them: Try to engage with family members of your existing clients in social gatherings, meetings, etc.
Request your clients to invite their family members while setting up a meeting. This will help you engage with your potential clients. Shifali Satsangee of Funds Vedaa says, “I usually request my clients to bring in their progeny for meetings and they usually accede to my request. It’s a win-win both the ways since it’s learning for them and benefits us by allowing us to make a smooth transition from present generation to Gen Next.”
The next step is to showcase testimonials of clients of their age group to gain their confidence. Sadagopan opines that advisors should try to gain confidence of family members of their existing clients through testimonials during meetings. “One should give confidence to next generation that they are successfully handing other clients of their age,” he added.
Be visible: It’s always better to be discovered than announced. One way to do this is through media. With the help of both news media and social media, one can easily create his/her visibility. If you write blogs/articles for any publications, you can share them with your clients and their family members.
Apart from sharing articles published in media, you can upload infographics or share links of interesting articles on social media to reach out to the younger family members. Arvind A Rao of Dreamz Infinite believes that young generation clients are very active online on You Tube, Facebook and Twitter. “Advisors should try to connect with the next generation of existing clients through these social media platforms by sharing informative videos and articles with attractive headlines,” suggests Arvind.
User friendly website and SEO: The younger generation prefers doing online research before buying any product or service. If they find you through internet, the first thing you should have is a well-designed and user friendly website. The next generation clients want information on the devices they use. Thus, a basic website which is responsive only on desktop may not suffice. To make your website more compatible for other devices, you should take care of user experience (look and feel), responsive behavior (adjustable with desktop, tablet, smart phone etc.) and flash compatibility (with latest updates).
The next important step is to create visibility of your website with the help of search engine optimization (SEO). Simply put, you can make your website land on the first few pages of Google search through SEO if someone searches for the term ‘financial advisor’. This will help your clients access you quickly.
Use technology efficiently: Smart phones are for smart users. Use your smart phone or tablet efficiently by using the latest tools and application which are useful to your practice. There are many applications in the market like genius scan, scan biz cards, SIP calculator, dropbox, my contacts back up, skype etc. through which you can simplify work and expedite process.
Keeping pace with tech savvy generation helps you connect with them strongly. Lovaii Navlakhi of International Money Matters says that next generation clients are generally tech savvy. Therefore, it is necessary for advisors to keep pace with latest development and trends in the technology world.
Sadagopan says advisors should try to connect online with the next generation clients through platforms like skype.
Recruit young advisors: Young professionals may prefer to work with advisors from their own age group as they might relate with them better. “Working with young advisors makes the next generation clients more comfortable. They don’t have to think about replacing the advisor who might retire before they do,” says Sadagopan.
Key takeaways
- Encourage clients to bring their family members, especially those who will start earning soon
- Reach out to the next generation clients through social media
- Have a responsive website which can be accessed on devices like smartphones and tablets
- Hire young advisors to engage the next generation clients
