Bowen, founder and CEO of CEG Worldwide, previously worked as a financial advisor and firm executive. He served successively as CEO of Reinhardt Werba Bowen Advisory Services and Assante Capital Management.

Group Therapy

Thanks to some positive developments in the markets and economy over the last year, advisors have been able to do exactly what they need to do—move away from defensive activities aimed at retaining nervous clients and focus on offensive maneuvers designed to win new business and build their practices. One highly effective method for attracting prospects to your door is to develop and offer group presentations.

Unfortunately, group presentations are one of the most misunderstood and underused business development strategies. Research by CEG Worldwide found that fewer than 10% percent of advisors see seminars and presentations as an important source of new business.

But don't let those numbers fool you. Group presentations can work wonders when you know how to design and conduct them the right way. The biggest problem with group presentations is that advisors don't know how to deliver them effectively and don't know how to tailor them to qualified potential clients.

In our coaching program, advisors often say they've tried presentations in the past but have had no luck, so they gave up. We also hear that investors are "seminar-ed out." Without question, investors have been offered many seminars over the years. But most have had little to offer the highly affluent individuals and families that you are seeking.

A New Approach
With that in mind, we examined the group presentation methods used by advisors who have been successful with this strategy. These advisors take several key steps that enable them to create smart, easily replicable presentations and deliver them to investors who are eager to hear them. For example:

Tactic 1: Work backward. Plan your group presentation series 12 months in advance. Start with the result you want to achieve, and then move backward from there. Plan your follow-up first. Decide on the number of presentations you will offer and estimate the approximate number of prospects who will attend each. This will give you an idea of how much follow-up you will need to do. It's usually best to offer small presentations on a monthly basis. This should be the same basic presentation each month, allowing for constant improvement as you move ahead. Then you can design the actual presentation itself and plan how you will put prospects in the seats (more on those later). Once your plans for each stage are complete, set about executing them in a timely manner.

Tactic 2: Get an endorsement from a key member of your niche. As part of your efforts to drive attendance, a major goal should be making sure that the right people are coming to each presentation. Many advisors offer seminars that are open to the general public, hoping to generate interest that may lead to new business. That's an admirable goal. The trouble is, these public seminars are a scattershot approach to marketing that usually results in few or no new affluent clients. You'll probably get just enough to tempt you to keep on trying. Scattershot marketing for seminars results in good gross revenue but a very low profit margin due to the expenses associated with direct marketing.

In particular, high-net-worth individuals in your niche will not attend a seminar simply because they see a newspaper ad about it. They will, however, attend a presentation endorsed by an affluent friend or an individual or organization they trust. For example, if you have alliances with attorneys, CPAs and other professionals, this could mean getting an endorsed invitation to present to their clients. Or you might make your presentations in corporate settings, possibly with the endorsement of the director of human resources. Or maybe you could make a presentation with an outplacement group, working with the manager of that office.

One advisor we coached has had tremendous success presenting to executives at publicly traded companies and pre-transaction companies gearing up for IPOs, mergers and acquisitions. For example, one recent presentation to 15 top executives resulted in four of them signing on to his firm. His presentations were pre-endorsed by the companies' directors of human resources, chief financial officers and VPs of finance. His firm's relationships with a large team of outside professional experts—such as CPAs, property/casualty insurers, and trusts and estates attorneys—has also led to important introductions and endorsements that immediately gave his firm credibility with audiences.

Tactic 3: Bring your most satisfied clients into the plan. An often overlooked method of leveraging your client base is to hold group presentations for both your clients and their referrals on a regular basis. Consider making your presentation monthly or bimonthly. The tactic both reinforces your existing client relationships and generates a steady stream of referrals from your clients—in other words, you simultaneously get to play offense and defense.

Tactic 4: Get to know influential journalists in your niche. Part of your strategy for gaining credibility with your target niche is to get to know editors and journalists with trade publications that serve your niche. Meet with them and walk them through your presentation. Many publications will list the event in a print or online event calendar for free. In addition, articles in these publications might cite you as an expert in the wealth management field and position you as a trusted advisor to the niche.

Ideally, your presentation will be timely in order to attract attention in your niche market; for example, you might frame your presentation around the key challenges that your target clients face in today's environment, or the major issues that are coming down the road.

Tactic 5: Make sure your presentation includes a meaningful call to action. The specific elements of your presentation will depend on your overall approach and philosophy in your business, as well as the target market you're addressing. Advisors targeting affluent investors should highlight the three major components of the wealth management approach—investment consulting, advanced planning and relationship management. Regardless of the specific topics you choose to cover, make sure that your presentation includes a call to action that creates excitement and motivates participants to want to meet with you personally after the event.

The advisor mentioned previously focuses on the important decisions in each area of advanced planning—such as wealth protection and wealth transfer. His presentations focus on incentive stock options and resulting tax implications, concentrated wealth and rollovers—the true hot-button issues for his audience. Additionally, his presentations include members of his expert team with specialized knowledge, who can immediately answer questions about these topics.

Advisors focused on individual investors and families should offer participants something of real value in today's uncertain market environment—for example, a free second opinion of their current investment plans. Such an offer will resonate with many attendees: As I have pointed out in previous columns, more than 80% of investors during the downturn were considering transferring money from their current advisors. Your call to action should appear both in the invitation that you send to potential guests and during the event itself. Your strategy should be to create a win-win situation that motivates the attendees to explore becoming your clients.

Some Don'ts
Finally, keep in mind some missteps as you plot out your presentation strategy. One big mistake is not having a clear outcome in mind. As the advisor we spoke of in Tactic 2 puts it, "Our endgame is to land ideal clients."

That said, don't give attendees a hard-sell approach. Your goal is to position yourself as an expert and motivate qualified participants to work with you. It's a lot more effective for them to want to buy from you, rather than your having to sell to them. To accomplish this, you need to motivate them to take action and convince them that you're the one they can turn to if they're qualified for your service. As the advisor points out, "Nobody wants to be sold—in fact, the people you need to endorse you, such as the head of HR at a company, won't let you get in front of an audience if you come across as a salesman."

Reprinted from: Financial Planning