Читать книгу The Magic List - Brandon Gadoci - Страница 7

“What has changed is that the population has become increasingly numb to previously used sales methodology, and the task of creating a need has become more difficult, especially in the world of financial services.”

This phrase, from the last chapter, couldn’t be more true today. In the subsequent years after it was written, we saw the mass adoption of social networking tools like LinkedIn, and Facebook. Whether you personally think sites like Facebook, Twitter, Myspace, and LinkedIn are silly or not, you can’t argue with their popularity. You can’t argue with hundreds of millions of people that flock to these services each month. The viral spread of these tools is is interesting to me, and something that I think happens for two reasons; reasons that connect with our inner most desires.

First, I think that the majority of the population wants to be heard. I’ve seen statistics around the percentage of people who desire to write a book in their life time. Across the board, I think it’s safe to say, that some 80% of people have, or have had, the desire to write a story. We, as a people, think that we have something important to say. It is human nature to believe that the circumstances that surround our lives are unique to us. Identifying and sharing our opinion of our life help us to become comfortable with where we are. A former client of mine, Brett Hurt’s company, Bazaarvoice, is in the business of UGC or User Generated Content. This is where the users of websites actually deliver the content. This is useful in retail business where others want know about others’ experiences. Who would have thought that people would pour their hearts out over a tissue brand, or a cleaning product? But they are. What is becoming overwhelmingly evident, is that people will spend time writing copious notes about what some people may believe to be very mundane things. For a long time I have been amazed at the amount of time people spend writing in technical forums. Why do they take the time to do this? Because we love to be right. We love to correct people, and give our opinion. The web has given us all the ability to have a voice and satiate one of the inner most desires we have.

Second, if you have ever seen the movie, Into the Wild, then you know that (according to the film) another of our core desires is to connect and share. In the movie, Christopher MCandless becomes fed up with the “establishment” and sheds all worldly possessions to move to an isolated camp in Alaska. He spends his first moments happy as a clam about his ability to exist simply and free from everything in this world. If you don’t want me to ruin anything, then stop reading here. The message of the movie is that no emotion or experience is rich, if we cannot share it with someone else. Life is about not just having experiences, but sharing them with others. Christopher McCandless realizes this as he is dying in his camp. What social networking does, is allow us to connect, and connect, and connect.

We have both the desire write and share. What these social networking sites do, at a very base level, is allow us to address these two things that are core to our existence. Business will be smart to learn to leverage this natural expression to increase productivity and employee retention. I would argue that the ability to write and share (responsibly of course) actually improve the quality of people’s lives. These are not merely fads, but an introduction of a platform that allows us to be more. They allow us to better manifest who we are. They give us a clearer understanding of ourselves, and others.

As you know, business, like much in life, is built on relationships. Sales as a profession is based on the ability to create relationships that are valuable to both parties, and to do that over and over again. The more the better. The salesperson who can do this most effectively is rewarded financially, as well as with the quality of their life. Those that fail at this task, live a life that is much harder as a salesperson. This particular profession has a big standard deviation.

Salespeople today, specifically financial advisors, are still in the business of creating relationships though methods by which they do that are becoming problematic. The consumer, in general, is becoming increasingly numb to previously used sales methodologies, as I have mentioned. Advertising and sales messages are everywhere. Here is an excerpt from a piece by William C. Taylor from Fast Company, in December of 2007, where he talks about ”Permission Marketing,” and Seth Godin, Internet Marketing Pioneer.

“Marketing is a contest for people’s attention. Thirty years ago, people gave you their attention if you simply asked for it. You’d interrupt their TV program, and they’d listen to what you had to say. You’d put a billboard on the highway, and they’d look at it. That’s not true anymore. This year, the average consumer will see or hear 1 million marketing messages - that’s almost 3,000 per day. No human being can pay attention to 3,000 messages every day.”

Financial advisors perhaps struggle with this problem for two reasons:

1 Intense regulation of communication with the public, which originated in a time when the above wasn’t the case. Advisors are forced to use antiquated methods to build their business.

2 The decision as to whether or not to use a particular advisor is a decision that involves the highest level of “trust transferring,” because of the considerable downside to ineptitude.

While the regulation that governs communication with the public has been updated over the years, regulating bodies are still trying to fit a square peg into a round hole, in my opinion. New media often falls into several of the existing categories of communication, all of which have different requirements with respect to approval, monitoring, and archiving. The most ironic part, in my opinion, is illustrated through a personal experience. I was recently asked to remove iTunes from my enterprise PC. I went to the regulatory bodies website to find out what rule iTunes may be violating and found my answer in a podcast. Brilliant.

That said, the companies and advisors that will rise to the top will be the ones who can figure out how to employ these technologies, or versions of them, despite the regulations. I am not advocating breaking the rules. The regulators will be forced to evolve their regulation, or companies and innovators will find ways to satisfy them. These people will be the winners. As you can see, these tools and trends are not merely funny words, they are real things that connect with us on a very human level. If institutions will adopt and develop the technologies to enable their advisors to use methods of creating relationships that are far more efficient and effective, this will allow them to spend more time on their practice. More time doing the thing that they told the client they would do. Raising the level of advice and guidance, and ultimately giving the clients a better experience that will generate referrals. It is entirely possible to create these workflows, checks and balances, and digital protocols to satisfy the standards.

Word of mouth advertising has been around for centuries and remains the most trusted way to create a relationship. Institutions need to find a way, now, to satisfy the regulatory standards that are prohibiting them from enabling their advisors to operate in this manner. The institution that adopts this mentality will benefit greatly in terms of client satisfaction and market share.