6 Ways to Deepen Client Relationships
Enhancing existing client relationships has always been a top priority for advisors. Developing new client relationships is usually a close second. Interestingly, the best way to achieve the second is to be good at the first.
This is particularly important to understand if your goal is to deepen your existing client relationships and create lasting business-social relationships.
A client in a business-social relationship is usually a great referral source, someone who is eager to suggest your services to family, professional contacts and members of their social circle.
To deepen existing client relationships, implement these six simple tips into your interactions with clients:
Increase the number of client touchpoints
One of the simplest ways to improve client relationships is to reach out to them more often. Research reveals a direct, positive correlation between the frequency of advisor contact and the level of overall client satisfaction.
The frequency of your contacts is actually more important than the duration of your communication. Even a quick phone call or personal email can be enough to strengthen a relationship with a client.
Listen more, talk less
Studies show affluent clients want deeper discussions, even if those discussions are difficult. Yet advisors are generally reluctant to initiate conversations involving important, yet potentially sensitive, topics.
Deepening any relationship has a lot to do with listening. Advisors who talk less and listen more tend to leave clients feeling valued and understood. If a client trusts you, they are generally more willing to open up and talk about topics that might otherwise not be discussed.
Don’t just talk about their accounts
Be proactive and start taking an active interest in your clients’ lives. Ask open-ended questions. This gives you the chance to explore what a client likes and dislikes, and what common ground you share.
It should come as no surprise that advisors usually have a lot in common with their clients outside the office. Unfortunately, most never learn this because they tend to focus on the business aspect of the relationship.
Be unique
Focus on making connections in unexpected, more personal ways. For example, instead of sending out holiday and birthday cards, consider other recognizing other important days. For example, what if you reached out to your client when there is a birth of a child, a graduation or a wedding milestone? In each case, the response could be overwhelming because the gesture was thoughtful, heartfelt and unexpected.
Connect with your client’s families
Connecting with clients’ families is another simple way to strengthen relationships and expand your practice. Whether you simply reach out more often, cultivate deeper discussions or initiate new relationships with clients’ families, the key to more meaningful relationships is honest conversation. When you provide the opportunity for clients to speak sincerely and openly about their goals, their families and even their legacies, you’re creating a unique, special bond.
Set goals
Studies consistently show most clients don’t set any financial goals. It’s not that they don’t have financial goals; it’s just nobody has ever asked them to actually set any specific objectives. Why are recognizing and recording goals important? Because goals give you purpose, they give you accountability, and when successfully achieved, goals give you momentum.
Whether they’re short-term or long-term, you need to understand a client’s goals, then put in motion a strategy of how to best achieve those objectives. Setting goals is a great way to demonstrate that you’re committed to a client’s success.
Contact Iron Point for a no-obligation coaching call to learn more ways that you can help deepen your existing client relationships.