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Marketing & Sales
October 31, 2024

We talked with Ellie Alexander and Josefina Terrera about:

  • How simple website upkeep can keep your inbox from going spooky silent 
  • Haunting compatibility issues and how keeping up with today’s “digital hygiene” like routine backups and testing can keep you from spooky surprises 
  • Cross-platform compatibility and how to keep your brand materials looking their best no matter what program they’re viewed in 

About Ellie and Josefina:

At Out & About Communications, Ellie and Josefina are dedicated to guiding clients to achieve their brand and digital goals. As design director, Ellie collaborates closely with clients to refine their brands and showcase what makes them unique. Her background spans traditional ad agencies, in-house branding, and boutique marketing, all of which have shaped her expertise and approach. Josefina serves as senior developer, crafting visually appealing and functional websites to meet client needs. Together, they bring creative precision and dedication to Out & About website projects, helping clients stand out and connect authentically.

Featured Resources 

Enjoyed This? You’ll Also Love:  

Full Audio Transcript:

00:00:00 - 00:22:21

Lauren Hong

All right. Welcome. We have a spooky on purpose podcast today for Halloween. Ellie, you are dressed very much in color. And Josephine, you’ve kind of got it going on. Maybe we should have worn costumes; that would have been fun.

00:22:21 - 00:25:25

Josefina Terrera

I was going to bring a flashlight and a hoodie but decided against it.

00:25:25 - 00:48:25

Lauren Hong

I've got a lot of princess gear around the house with kids. So many ways to dress up. Okay, so speaking of Halloween, we have seen some spooky things. We have some spooky case studies regarding website design — all kinds of things where you're like, oh, I didn't want that to happen.

00:48:28 - 01:09:20

Lauren Hong

We're going to talk through some of those and how we can avoid them. So, Josefina, I'm going to pass it over to you because you have a pretty meaty case study you were able to pull up that I think really helps to connect the dots. If you're a small company or if you're a pretty large organization, you can be in the way of a digital threat.

01:09:20 - 01:13:21

Lauren Hong

So, you want to share with folks?

01:13:28 - 01:39:11

Josefina Terrera

Yeah, sure. Well, for me, I guess the spooky part is the things we cannot control and in our websites we cannot control what other people are doing. So I was howling about this story that happened in 2016, and I knew about it because it was all over the media. It involved many presidents and prime ministers.

01:39:13 - 02:06:00

Josefina Terrera

It's called the Panama Papers Breach, and it's the largest breach documented, because it involved 11 million documents. I just read about it at the time and how all these people were involved with tax evasion and offshore activities. But as you know, I was reading recently that everything started with a WordPress website, from a law firm in Panama.

02:06:02 - 02:33:03

Josefina Terrera

They had an outdated side and the plugin Slider Revolution, which is what you would use for your slideshows. And hackers were able to enter the site through that plugin. But it didn't stop there. They didn't have the 11 million documents on the website. They had them on the server, which they were sharing with the website.

02:33:05 - 02:58:01

Josefina Terrera

Well, everything else is history. People went to jail and whatnot. But it does leave some very important takeaway lessons from other people's mistakes. Number one, keep your website up to date, keep your plugins up to date. Plugins are somebody else's code and you don't know what they're doing.

02:58:01 - 03:29:18

Josefina Terrera

You don't know they're maintaining it. Personally, I don't even like to use that many plugins. I trust some basic building blocks — HTML, CSS, JavaScript — and use as few plugins as possible because you know you're giving too much control up to other people. Keep your themes up to date. Number two, practice some digital hygiene where you keep your website in one place and your sensitive data in another place.

03:29:18 - 04:03:00

Josefina Terrera

Be very cautious about what data you're taking from your clients. We're dealing with financial companies. People are very cautious about their data. So treat it with respect. And then I think number three is to have a password manager, which seemingly contradicts digital hygiene because you are having all your passwords in one place. But password managers work all day, their brand is working all day to keep your passwords safe.

04:03:02 - 04:38:25

Josefina Terrera

So I guess also encrypting your passwords, suggesting hard to guess passwords and everything they can do in terms of security they're going to apply because they're training for that all day. So I would say if you have a password manager just memorize that password or maybe you can write it down in your one safe spot, have two-factor authentication, and as an extra level of precaution sign in from a browser that doesn't have any Google extensions.

04:38:27 - 05:10:18

Josefina Terrera

Because somebody could sometimes inject malicious code. I think if you do all of that, you should be relatively safe. I have other stories too. I just don't want to take over because we have not experienced some serious hacks in our websites. I do remember at some point we had a situation that is very common in WordPress where things just get abandoned.

05:10:21 - 05:37:00

Josefina Terrera

So you buy a theme, you build the whole website around the theme but then the developer decides it can’t be yours. Then the theme is there but you still have to update WordPress and the plugins and it's like WordPress goes this way and your theme stays here, and they're just not synced anymore.

05:37:03 - 06:08

Josefina Terrera

What happened to a website was that every time we would do an update, we would risk having all these shortcodes and gibberish appearing on the website, and we had to recreate components. That's something to think about when you're building with WordPress. Eventually there was a happy ending; they didn't get hacked, fortunately.

06:08 - 06:26:05

Josefina Terrera

And they got a new website. But you have to be very vigilant. Don't depend so much on plugins. I guess if a plugin has one million installs, it's steady. You can trust that plugin because then you only know that one million people will have your same problem. But you don't need a plugin for everything.

06:26:07 - 06:36:19

Josefina Terrera

I'm very adamant about adding things that later on, you just have to deal with, all that junk on your website and you don't know why.

06:36:21 - 06:50:06

Lauren Hong

Yeah. And we should run quick introductions too. So for folks who are listening and aren't familiar with your background, you might just share a quick intro and then Ellie we’ll pop over to you to do a quick intro. And then unpack some stuff because I'm sure you're like, yes, I've seen this and I've seen that.

06:50:06 - 06:56:10

Lauren Hong

So yeah. Josefina, you might just do a quick intro.

06:56:12 - 07:13:10

Josefina Terrera

Well, I'm Josefina and the developer here at Out & About. I'm based in North Carolina. I love geeking out about this stuff.

07:13:12 - 07:33:12

Lauren Hong

Totally. And you are so well versed in a number of different things. You’ve worked on a number of different backends. You're not platform agnostic. And you also know a number of different languages, website development languages. So you've seen a lot over the years.

07:33:14 - 07:52:03

Josefina Terrera

Yeah and over the years you just develop your preference and your way. It's not even your preference, oh, I like to do things this way, I find it more sustainable doing things this way or that way. But I know from experience.

07:52:05 - 07:53:24

Lauren Hong

Ellie.

07:59:29 - 08:19:09

Ellie Alexander

I'm Ellie, I'm the design director here at Out & About. So my specialty is a little bit more design focused and broader. Josefina knows much more of the technical background, like web development stuff. And my purview is more of the design side, the esthetics, and the brand.

08:19:11 - 08:32:03

Ellie Alexander

I've been in the industry for, gosh, about like 15 years now. And I've worked in small agencies, corporate, all over the place and I still see the same issues pop up, the same spooky things over time.

08:32:06 - 08:38:10

Lauren Hong

What kind of spooky things are we seeing? I feel like we need some intro music.

08:38:12 - 08:59:04

Ellie Alexander

Yeah, I know. So one of the most serious ones — none of mine are as serious and catastrophic as Josefina’s example — I guess that's since I'm coming more from the design side. But one of the more serious ones I have seen is not having your website at least somewhat accessible. 

08:59:06 - 09:11:26

Ellie Alexander

And to be accessible in this context means for people who might be hard of sight and have to use a screen reader, or for people who might have other disabilities that make it difficult to interact with websites.

09:11:28 - 09:12:06

Lauren Hong

Yep.

09:12:14 - 09:33:05

Ellie Alexander

And at its best, it can simply be that the text is too small. And if you're someone who even just needs reading glasses, you pull it up on your phone and you're like, well, I can't read this. Thanks, guys. This isn't helpful. Or not having good enough contrast, like if the text and the background are too close in color or tone it can be really difficult for certain people to read.

09:33:08 - 09:49:29

Ellie Alexander

And including text in your images is another thing I see a lot that's just a big no no because then it's completely not screen reader-enabled. Or if someone just even happens to be on a bad broadband connection, the image just won't load and they might miss a really important piece of what the content of your website is.

09:50:01 - 10:12:06

Ellie Alexander

But worst-case scenarios, especially for midsize to large organizations — and I've seen this happen at past workplaces — there are predatory people whose whole job is filing predatory lawsuits on companies whose websites aren't accessible, and they just scour the internet for websites they can think they can file a reasonably founded lawsuit.

10:12:06 - 10:36:09

Ellie Alexander

And it's just unfortunate because in these cases it's not coming from anyone disabled who is actually impacted by it. It's just people looking for people they can sue to make money. So that's one of the more serious ones I've seen. But other ones are just not having your website optimized for mobile. That's gotten a lot easier over the last couple of years, since now drag and drop platforms like Squarespace and Wix will let you do more customization for mobile.

10:36:16 - 10:54:24

Ellie Alexander

But if you don't take that into consideration, you could just end up with content that's out of order and no longer makes sense. Or as I mentioned before, is simply too small to read. So in this situation, it's more just usually like it makes your website look awkward and not as professional. That's usually not a catastrophic issue, like a lawsuit or a breach or something.

10:54:27 - 11:14:16

Lauren Hong

Totally. In going back to Josefina’s point, I've literally seen websites on the brink — they look great on the outside but on the backend it's a hot mess. So I really appreciated your takeaways too about how we make sure we're keeping up the backend so it doesn't fall apart on the frontend.

11:14:20 - 11:41:12

Lauren Hong

And what you're saying too is like on the frontend that it's accessible for people if they're on mobile, if there's like you were saying, a challenge with being able to see or access the website from a variety of different angles. So any other like spooky situations or things you guys can think of that we run into or things to avoid?.

11:41:14 - 11:59:22

Ellie Alexander

This is one actually. It honestly just popped into my head while we were talking, and it's more from a consumer angle. I've actually taught a couple of my friends this. There are so many borderline, questionable e-commerce sites that pop up these days. Say you get an ad on Instagram and you're like, oh, this looks cool.

11:59:24 - 12:04:00

Ellie Alexander

And this is why it's spooky. Because the websites can look pretty legit.

12:04:02 - 12:09:19

Lauren Hong

Definitely, like Tiffany and Company. I’ve totally seen fake websites like. 

12:09:21 - 12:25:17

Ellie Alexander

That's spooky. Yeah, that's really scary. You’re usually like, it must be a small startup I've never heard of but no — and then you've got the product and it's complete garbage. There are ways that people who are really savvy at doing that can make it extra impressive.

12:25:17 - 12:45:13

Ellie Alexander

But a really good way to tell is, especially if it's a retail site, look at the photography and see if the photography is all done in the same style. That's one way I've been able to get them and teach my friends about them. If you look at all the clothing and one photo is done on a white background and one photo is in nature and another one is very bright and another one is very dark.

12:45:13 - 13:11

Ellie Alexander

If the photography is all over the place, it's probably because they stole the pictures from different websites. So that's a big red flag. If the photography on a website, especially their product photos, is not consistent, unless you know it's legit, probably don't trust it because they're probably just stealing those images.

13:14 - 13:12:03

Lauren Hong

Yeah, totally. I know we do a lot of website backups too. I don't know if you want to talk to that because that's another preventive way to avoid issues or just the importance of digital hygiene.

13:12:05 - 13:40:29

Josefina Terrera

Yeah, just do regular backups because sometimes malicious code is just so hard to take out or whatever, just having previous versions of it and an external backup. Many hosting companies provide you a backup for 30 days but sometimes it's hard to know when things happen. One code gets injected.

13:41:01 - 14:11:16

Josefina Terrera

I mean, what Ellie was saying about sometimes what they do — there was like a famous case of pharmaceuticals where hidden things get injected into the website and people pressed a link from the pharma website, and then they go and buy something on a counterfeit company. So you don't know what may have happened over 30 days ago.

14:11:16 - 14:40:01

Josefina Terrera

So it's good to just keep those regular backups outside of the hosting and going back to that ecommerce website like Ellie was saying, I am very cautious with my credit card. At this point, I don't pay anything unless it has PayPal, Stripe, or Apple Pay. You know, I just don't trust your website.

14:40:08 - 15:13

Josefina Terrera

I don't trust it. Random websites holding your credit card data is not safe anymore. And you know there's safer methods to do it. So if that's a product I like and they don't offer alternative methods of payments, I'll just learn to wait.

15:15 - 15:26:29

Lauren Hong

Totally fair. And I think that's also a good reminder. If you are looking to take digital payments, make sure you have a secure methodology to be able to take that payment in. I totally hear you. Ellie, you were going to say something. Do you agree? You had mentioned earlier before we started, one thing I think is super spooky and very real — broken forms — so that's a very real thing.

15:26:29 - 15:30:24

Lauren Hong

What was it? The other thing that you said was a snag.

15:30:27 - 15:39:07

Ellie Alexander

It is a snag. I don't remember the thing I said. There was a snag in the contact form; maybe you can remember while I'm talking. So I don't recall. Yeah.

15:39:07 - 15:40:04

Josefina Terrera

Yeah.

15:40:06 - 15:53:24

Ellie Alexander

The contact form, especially for small businesses. I definitely think people are like, oh, I'm just surprised we haven't gotten leads in a couple of weeks. Why? What's going on? Maybe we need to do more in a marketing push. Well, have you checked your contact form to make sure it's still working? 

15:53:24 - 16:15:14

Ellie Alexander

It could be a WordPress plugin issue like that plugin is no longer supported. So the form is simply not working. Or did the person who used to get your inquiries leave the company and we forgot to set the contact form to redirect to somebody else? Or did you, as an organization, change the format of all your email addresses?

16:15:14 - 16:29:27

Ellie Alexander

And that didn’t get updated. There's lots of reasons why a contact form can just not work — if it's just being sent to an old inbox or not going through. So just check that, especially if it seems like you're getting a lot lower level of leads recently; just make sure the contact form is working.

16:30:00 - 16:48:28

Lauren Hong

Totally. It's basic. I've also seen hackers input malicious code through contact forms too, which I think is another good thing to know. And Josefina, to your point earlier, keep those plugins updated and it's so easy to do shortcuts. So I'm going to throw another plugin on the site, I'm going to do this, I'm going to do that.

16:48:28 - 17:05:18

Lauren Hong

And then you forget about it. And then you go to the backend of the site and you're like, oh my gosh, there's like 50 plugins here. We're only using five of the 50. Those other ones need to just say goodbye to, so just that idea of hygiene. I don't know, Josefina, if there's anything more you want to share on that too.

17:05:21 - 17:31:21

Josefina Terrera

Yeah, it's definitely a very important step. Like being on top of what’s in your house. What happened? What is all this stuff in the closet? It’s good to always be checking. The more familiar I am with a website, the easier it is for me to maintain that hygiene, because it's like, okay, I know this.

17:31:21 - 17:56:06

Josefina Terrera

I know when this was inserted. One common thing I like to do is deactivate things, keep them deactivated for a while. Nothing happens. Then we consider deleting them. There're many WordPress plugins that have to do with searching or nothing that will affect your frontend; they are just tools.

17:56:13 - 18:18:15

Josefina Terrera

So those are the easiest ones to delete. And then there's one like Slider Revolution that goes with a slider somewhere. Because I've learned many stories start with Slider Revolution. I for one don't like sliders and don't like plugins for sliders. 

18:25:29 - 18:52:17

Josefina Terrera

And as far as forms, I'm very attentive to forms because it's what the whole marketing effort is about, from beginning to end. You want to reach people. You can have the most awesome website but if you have a form that hasn't been set up properly, the whole thing feels incredibly frustrating.

18:52:17 - 19:21:25

Josefina Terrera

So, I'm very intentional about it. I know with our own website, we even have a backup because ours is with Webflow. So even if we miss some submission or whatever was to happen to our integration, Webflow will say whatever was submitted. So that's my favorite platform; I always feel safest with that one.

19:21:28 - 19:46:21

Josefina Terrera

You can still get hacked with a Webflow website because there's always the possibility that you can add a third-party library. You can always inject some code or there's always the login credentials, everything is vulnerable. But at least with that, it is a hosted platform. So everything that's a plugin, even HubSpot.

19:46:21 - 20:17

Josefina Terrera

I don't like HubSpot but it is a hosted platform. So they are going to handle security stuff with WordPress. Sometimes it does feel like the wild, wild West, so you have to be very diligent. 

20:20 - 20:24:10

Lauren Hong

Yeah, yeah. Different people maintaining different code, which is not bad. Actually there's a beautiful thing about it, right? There's an art to being able to pull these pieces together but you just want to be smart about how you do it. I think just another takeaway, as you guys are talking, is that these things, why they seem simple are never really simple, because like you were talking earlier about, well, I'm going to take a plugin away and I'm going to wait to see if it impacts anything else.

20:24:10 - 20:39:24

Lauren Hong

Sometimes there's domino effects. So just being really cautious about changes that are being made, and taking those backups and just that overall digital hygiene is important as you proceed forward. So any other thoughts guys?

20:39:26 - 21:13:09

Josefina Terrera

Yeah, I mean there's a lot of spooky things. We were talking about CSS stuff. Fortunately many of those things have been solved with time but it used to be the worst thing having to deal with Internet Explorer. Because let's just say, I used to create websites for pharmaceuticals and many boomers use IE.

21:13:12 - 21:35:14

Josefina Terrera

So you have to be building for IE. So let's just say you have something, some component that's working perfectly in any browser but it's not working in IE8. But then if you Google analytics I was like oh, I guess people are still using IE8. You know, you call your doctor.

21:35:16 - 21:38:23

Josefina Terrera

I used to be using IE.

21:38:25 - 21:41:26

Lauren Hong

In finance too, which is crazy. 

21:42:03 - 21:49:04

Ellie Alexander

So secondly, I thought what you were talking about was AI. I was like, I'm embarrassed to ask. That is oh my gosh, Internet Explorer. That's a throwback.

21:49:06 - 22:10:05

Josefina Terrera

Yeah. But this wasn't so much way back. Let's just say 2018, 19. And yeah, what was interesting is sometimes you had that dilemma and fixed it at IE but it looks a little bit more messed up now in Chrome. I'm making compromises for the sake of IE.

22:10:07 - 22:38:22

Josefina Terrera

Even Microsoft has said we stopped supporting IE, so it's like you were really on your own. Or they would stop supporting older versions. They were using Edge. Eventually Edge started using Chrome. So it just became a more homogeneous environment that (       ) and different browsers, videos, we use BrowserStack, which solves a lot of these issues.

22:38:22 - 23:01:26

Josefina Terrera

So it's like a virtual computer that allows you to login to your website on any computer, on any device you can think of. Let's say you run your analytics and you realize many of your clients use Android, then maybe you want to focus a little bit more on Android. it's worth it.

23:01:26 - 23:23:15

Josefina Terrera

So those are some other spooky things. There’s a lot of things you have to keep in mind when you're building components and yeah, with CSS, all kinds of fun things. 

23:35:21 - 23:46:27

Ellie Alexander

This is borderline website related but something you just said Josefina about things being updated and new versions of things aren't supported anymore.

23:48:28 - 24:06:01

Ellie Alexander

One thing that just drives me crazy is, especially now with cloud storage and like, some organizations use Google Drive and they use Google Docs and they use that and some organizations use Microsoft programs, and you think, oh, I can just put one into the other. 

24:06:01 - 24:36:26

Ellie Alexander

Especially if your organization is using both or people in your organization are using different versions of those, it can really mess up your documents. Because a lot of our work focuses on business to consumer materials but we also do a lot for just organizations internally. And so if you're even making your email signatures, if you create a beautifully designed email signature but then you send it to someone in your organization who uses Outlook and someone in your organization who uses Google or Apple Mail, they could put them in and they would look completely different because those programs use different default fonts or they’re running on different versions.

24:36:26 - 24:52:23

Ellie Alexander

And it's just so spooky how you can design something like a beautiful PowerPoint template or a beautiful Word doc. But then as soon as it starts going off to different machines and gets uploaded into Google and then downloaded back and used in Microsoft again, it can just get trashed. And it drives me crazy.

24:52:29 - 25:13:10

Lauren Hong

You know, again, it's not just machines, like you're saying. Sometimes it's just because you're on an Apple or a PC or different versions or printers. Yeah, it is kind of wild and there's ways to avoid certain things but there's also system upgrades. You can get it just perfect and then it's like, whew, like email.

25:13:12 - 25:37:20

Lauren Hong

That could be a whole other podcast. So oh my gosh. So fun. Really appreciate the conversation expertise you brought to the table and to some really good takeaways. I think, like websites, all of this can totally be spooky but making sure we're a smart website with digital hygiene and backups, and not taking shortcuts on things is the way to go.

25:37:20 - 25:40:17

Lauren Hong

So thank you guys for your time.

25:40:20 - 25:45:18

Ellie Alexander

Thanks for having us.

Spooky Moments in Website Design and Development

In this episode of On Purpose, our Out & About team reveals the spooky side of web design with real-life tales of glitches and haunting compatibility issues.
Company Culture & Values
October 24, 2024

We talked with Brendan about:

  • How to listen on a level that involves engaging with empathy and curiosity
  • Why building relationships with clients should start with understanding their fundamental motivations and desires 
  • Creating deep connections by making clients feel heard and understood 

About Brendan Frazier:

Brendan Frazier is a former financial services consultant with over a decade of experience helping financial advisors across the country. Through his interactions with thousands of advisors, he recognized a recurring theme: many felt they were acting more like therapists than financial planners. This insight led Brendan to explore the often-overlooked human side of finance, prompting him to launch his own advisory business. Committed to improving his understanding of behavioral psychology and communication, he started a podcast where he interviews experts in these fields. Brendan’s passion for merging the human aspect with financial advising has created a growing community of like-minded professionals eager to learn and evolve in their practice.

Featured Resources 

Enjoyed This? You’ll Also Love: 


Full Audio Transcript:

00:00 - 00:07

Lauren Hong

Brendan, thank you for being here.

00:07 - 00:09

Brendan Frazier

Well, thanks so much for having me. I'm excited to be here.

00:09 - 00:29

Lauren Hong

Yes. And we're talking about your topic, the human side of advice. You are a podcaster, keynote speaker, going to conferences, doing all kinds of things. How did you get into this world? How did you get into the whole human side of advice? I'm just going to throw it over to you. Share a little bit more.

00:29 - 04:01

Brendan Frazier

Yeah. So I mean really the short and sweet version of it is because I often imagined when I did these things, I always wonder how much do people really care? I want to know about the background of my journey and how much are they just wondering, what can you teach me and tell me that I can take back and use to make myself better off? So I'm going to tell this story, short and sweet. Here’s the setup. I used to be — about a decade ago, a little less than that — in financial services, working as a consultant to financial advisors. So the luxury of that or what that meant was I got to meet with, over the course of time, literally thousands of advisors around the country. So you learn a lot from that. You learn about how to do things, how not to do things, what you like, what you don't like. One thing I learned, because it came up over and over and over again, was you would hear something along the lines of, you know, Brendan, sometimes I feel like more of a therapist than a financial advisor. Or if it wasn't that, it would be, you know, Brendan, there's times where I think I'd be better off with a degree in psychology than I would a degree in economics or accounting or finance or financial planning. And so you'd hear it over and over and over again, and if you've ever worked with a human being about money, if you haven't said that out loud, you've at least started at some point. It's just the nature of the job we're in. And so I heard it over and over again, and I kept thinking, okay, what do we do about that? That's true. That's how we feel. Let's say it's at least equally important. A lot of people would say that. It feels like it's more the job. Let's say I don't believe that to be true. So let's say it's equally important. Then what do we do about it? We have trainings, designations, and certifications we can take to hone the money side and the technical side. What do we do for this human side? And then the most common response I would get was first of all, blank stare. And then second, it would be, I mean, read a book, man. Hey, is that good enough? I don't think that's good enough, right? If it's that important, we probably should be doing something more. So I started my own advisory business, got into that side of things. And so at that point in time, I decided, you know what? I want to get better at this. I know how important it is, this human side. I want to get better at it. I want to go on this journey to get better. And so why don't I start doing some research but then also start this podcast? I'll get to talk to some really cool, awesome, smart people who are experts in behavior and psychology communication. Worst-case scenario, I'll learn a lot, get to apply a lot, and use it in the work I do and in my business. Best-case scenario, it turns out there are other advisors out there who are like, you know what? I'm interested in this too but I didn't know at the time, right? So I launch this podcast. I'm learning a lot. Next thing you know, look at six months later, a year later, two years later, and lo and behold, there's an appetite for this out there. And so that's when I sort of started doubling down and went, okay, there are people who really want to know and learn this stuff. So I'm going to keep doing more podcasts, more research, more articles, speaking trainings, and all that. So it was sort of like this natural evolution of I sort of dip my toe in. I didn't know it was going to happen. I saw there is interest and demand for it. And I was enjoying learning the human side more than I was working with clients and learning the technical side. And so eventually just decided, hey, if you're having more fun, if you're enjoying it more and there seems to be an opportunity here, why not go all in and see what happens?

04:01 - 04:22

Lauren Hong

Super awesome. I hear that too. You know, like sales is all about people, right? Relationships. Like being able to pull out the nuances of conversation. That's all the people side of it. So you're right, it's not solely the things you know; it's the street smarts a little bit. Super interesting. So after having these conversations, are there any key takeaways you've had? I mean, doing this podcast and you know, giving these talks, any kind of themes you've seen across the board.

04:30 - 06:41

Brendan Frazier

So first of all, I just mentioned a second ago that I was going to go on that little rant there but also bring it back and make an example out of it. And so this kind of ties into what you just asked. But one thing we can learn from what just happened at the beginning of that conversation is you asked me a question about myself that was easy to answer. It had an emotional component. It was exciting to answer because it went back into my past and let me tell about myself in my past. And so, whenever we get to talk about ourselves, there's this part of the brain that lights up. It feels good. It's like a pleasure center. It's the reward part, the same area in the brain that lights up when you engage in sexual activity and eat chocolate. And so, as I'm sitting there talking about myself, I'm like, man, I enjoy this, this is fun. I mean, I'm not thinking it right. It's subconscious, right? But I'm enjoying it. It feels good. And what you've done, whether intentionally or not, is sort of create this conversational flow and momentum that can carry you through the rest of the conversation. And that's something you can apply to every single conversation you have, whether it's a podcast episode or just a meeting with a prospect or client. You sort of prime the pump. I'm getting a little bit out of my head, into my heart, feeling emotional and feeling good about talking. And you did a great job listening as I was talking. So, yeah. So I wrote a whole article and recorded a whole podcast episode. I now have a presentation called The Top. So sure, the human side of advice. And so what that was, was me going back and saying, we've done over 120 episodes. There's a lot in there. You could literally learn something every single episode. But what are the core themes that emerge that we can learn from, that we can take away? And most importantly, the core themes you can apply immediately in your practice that can make a big impact. And so there's 10 of them. I probably can't mention all 10 — that would take a little while — but I can pull out a few. There's one that always sticks out to me every time. And there's one that comes up over and over and over again. So it's what I've eventually decided to deem the most important skill in financial advice. So on the podcast.

06:41 - 06:44

Lauren Hong

Drumroll I feel like!

06:44 - 09:18

Brendan Frazier

Cliffhanger! I had to tease it. I know I've had the experts on and it's cool. I think back on those that are at education skills. I just had another guy on who teaches at Stanford, teaches communication skills. And everybody in the world of communications says the most important skill for improving your communication is the ability to listen but not just listen, right? But actually truly engage and listen with empathy and curiosity. And I don't even team up for this, by the way. If you had to pick one thing, we know listening is important. How important is that? It naturally comes up and also they'll just mention it. By the way, the most important thing you can do as far as communication is improve your listening skills. So it's one of those things I always knew was important, thought was important. One of the questions I ask on the podcast, to every guest, is who's the best listener in your life and what do they do so well that makes them such a great listener? But naturally this keeps coming up over and over and over again, which is just kind of cool because I believe in how powerful listening is. It's just really, really hard to do. So that's one of the main skills. And the big wrap up, time and again, is this idea of doing better planning and having better competence around money by not just focusing on their goals and what they want to accomplish financially but actually on Earth — what they value most in their life and are trying to create. How do you create a process that goes beyond what you want to do but goes into why you want to do it? Because once you know not what people want to do but what really lies behind it, the emotional motivating reason why, you really get to the point where you can align money with life, and then you take your conversations and your relationships to the next level. So some people are like, okay, what does that look like? Well, it's not the fact that I want to retire at 65. That's what I want. That's what the client wants to do. And that's good. That's fine. What do you want to do? I want to retire at 65. Okay, great. Well, behind every what lies a why. Why is it that you want to retire at 65? There's a driving force behind it. And so like one example would be, well, I want to retire at 65 because I want to be able to maximize the time I have with my family while I still have the energy and the ability to do so because my dad died when he was young, and we felt like we got robbed of time we should have had together.

09:18 - 09:19

Lauren Hong

It's the heart and soul of it.

09:19 - 10:22

Brendan Frazier

And it just changes the entire planning conversation. Now it's not like, oh, you don't want to retire. You want more time with your family. Are there other ways we could create that for you? Or is there a way you could retire now and then still do the work on the side, and you still make some money while maximizing time with family? I was talking to an advisor yesterday. He's in one of my mastermind groups and said, hey, what's going well this week? What do you guys run into? He was like, I've just been reminded lately of the power of what we do and how cool it is when I can just sit down with somebody and point out or show them, hey, I know you're planning on retiring in four years but here's a way to do it today. And they just look at me with a sense of relief. And so they're like, no way. Thank you so much. I didn't even know. What do you want to do? And have them say, I want to retire at 65, plan now and walk off. You've got to truly understand, hey, do you really want to retire at 65? What's actually the why driving the what. So those are two things are super cool.

10:23 - 11:39

Lauren Hong

It's really interesting. So we probably like a lot of organizations run a Net Promoter score. And you get the word bubbles at the end. And one of the things that always comes up is communications. And I've also had firms say to us that listening component, which is really interesting to hear, the way you pin it down because firms will say to us, you really listen to us and we're able to pin down who we are and where we want to go, not just all this kind of other stuff the world is trying to tell us. So I think applying it across businesses, right? And just relationships of really being able to listen but then being able to pull out those nuances is really interesting too. So, okay, so we covered those kinds of conversations, how to be able to stage different pieces is really key. I think you said there are 10 parts in your book or in the presentation you're doing. Are there any tips you would give to firms that go, we feel like we're doing a pretty good job with us but we want to do better, like ways to either train employees, maybe how they onboard or hire, I don't know if it's like coaching conferences they go to, just mentorship. What would you recommend to those firms that are saying we want to dial it up and aren't sure where to turn.

11:39 - 15:18

Brendan Frazier

Yeah. So real quick, I have to go back to something you just said before that question. I'll come right back to this because I think this is a really important point. You were talking about how you'll have like the call, you'll have clients say, and across businesses, one of the things they enjoyed or valued the most was that it felt like you truly helped me pin down what it was that I wanted, what it was I valued. So translation, what does that mean? It means they feel heard and understood, right? Which is what at our core, that's what all human beings want is for somebody to know you, trust you, and feel understood. And so, the “Harvard Business Review” did a study across industries where they found if you can create emotionally connected clients, if you can get to know clients and their fundamental motivations and desires, the things that truly matter to them, that creates clients they call emotionally connected clients, clients that pay more, refer more, follow through, and do what you ask them to do. And then also and for financial services specifically, they're more willing to consolidate or bring up doing more. That hey, there's this thing you can do, this method you could take or follow through and then collate assets. So you'd be like, tell me more about it. But that's ultimately what it boils down to, is creating emotionally connected clients by understanding their motivations and desires, make them feel heard. And okay, so I had to get that in there because I think it's the study that's out there that I've known about for years using a lot of my training. If for some reason it hasn't, I feel like we need to know more about it. So I just want to mention that. But yeah, so your question is what would you say to somebody who says, hey, we think we do this pretty well but what can we do if we want to do it better, do it differently? I mean, that's the fundamental question because everybody wonders if it's important. Everybody wants to know what to do about it. First thing I would say is that, just know in this realm, just like on anything on the technical side but in the realm of the human side, I've never met anybody who's nailed it to 100% completion where they're just like, we're great at it, and there's nothing more we could do to get there. It's like it's a constant practice. You have to be working on it growing over time. But I would also say I've met very, very, very few people or firms who are even really good at this stuff. So if you think you're good, maybe you are. We could be. And there's like some checkpoint assessments you can do to sort of feel that out. But I would just start that with the assumption that there's a lot of improvement to be made. So that's number one. And then where do you go from there? Why start a build? That's sort of what I started trying to focus on was to say, okay, how do we bring this to the firm so they can incorporate it, embed it, and simpler, I think it comes down to two things. At the highest level, number one is skills. So you first have to learn, know, and hone the critical skills of communicating and dealing with humans. And then the second part after skills is systems. So you've got skills and systems and systems is zero. Basically how can I apply this, embed this in my practice and my processes so it's there and it's consistent. And I'm not always wondering what I could do but it's just embedded in every part of your process throughout your practice. So now those are like the two places where you start. What skills do I need to learn how to develop? And then where can I systematize this? Where can I put this in our systems and our processes to make it a consistent, repeatable experience.

15:18 - 15:51

Lauren Hong

Are there any tips you would give to firms where sometimes certain skills are really hard to train to and sometimes people skills are really hard to train to when they're hired, like cues or red flags to watch out for, for candidates. Because there's a technical skill. But is there anything as part of the process, like questions asked when hiring or the way the job description is written to be able to pull that human side of do we have the right fit or can we further train to that skill set for the right fit?

15:52 - 17:10

Brendan Frazier

Yeah, I don't know. I've never really delved into or talked to anyone who researched how you filter and learn in the hiring process whether someone's got communication skills, right? I do think communication skills are important pretty much in any area of life, right? So they can always be honed and trained. But I think the principle that would probably apply is even if you hire somebody, if you're hiring somebody for a client-facing role, they need to have some level of skills, or they at least need to be willing to work, hone, and adapt those skills. If you have somebody you find out just doesn't have it and they don't really care, and they don't want to get you better at it, and they just want to look at spreadsheets — well, they just don't want to be client-facing because it really is that critical, right? But if they have an appetite to get better at it and learn, I think you can always hone and practice these skills. In fact, I would take somebody who as far as communication skills goes is a C but has a desire to grow over somebody who’s naturally a B but doesn't want to get any better and thinks they've already got it completely nailed down. I think the main point is to put people in roles they excel in but if you don't have these skills, they can be trained and developed. Doesn't mean it's easy, right? I guess I'll say that too. It's not easy to do but it can be done.

17:09 - 18:04

Lauren Hong

Yeah, I hear you. And I know earlier I talked about how you've consulted with tons of firms and have kind of the luxury to see the inside. I feel that too because we're consulting and working with tons of firms, and it's a real luxury to be able to do that and have that vantage point. One of the things I often see, too, is just the value base, making sure you've got that right value base when hiring, and even little things. Like for us personally, thank you notes. I know that sounds little but it's like those little extras that can make a really big difference. Just to see if that person does have that kind of extra thought to go above and beyond. Any final thoughts or things I should be asking that I haven't or any good books? You've got so many books back there; are there any good ones to read or things we should be watching out for?

18:04 - 21:29

Brendan Frazier

So I'm trying to think. I guess I would say two things. A question I get a lot of times so I know this is important is where should I go? What should I do if this is something I want to focus on, learn and get better at; where should I go? What should I do? So naturally, the answer to that question is almost always what resources are available? And that is important, and I'm going to get to that. But what I found, and it took me a while to figure this out, by the way, so I would have not have these trainings, have these advisors come in and teach the same things, you would give them the same resources, the same curriculum, same exercises, the same deliverables. And two people would get different results all over. Two people get completely different results. And so it bothered me for a while. I was like, I'm letting this other person down. And there's certainly an element of it, in terms of just like, being brought in and engaged. But it wasn't like that didn't seem to be the main differentiator. What I eventually sort of started passing out was those who got the better results. Those who truly saw the impact of embracing the human side were those who fully believed in why it was important in the first place. In other words, it's one thing to know, yeah, I think this is kind of important, and I want to try a few things here and there. It's another thing to fully embrace or have this mindset that if I embrace the human aspect, it's going to lead to better client relationships, better conversations, more levels of trust, more referrals. It's not only going to enhance my client relationships, it'll help them get better outcomes, and it's going to grow my business as a result. And so you first have to start with, why is this important? Now back to the why thing, right? What's the purpose? Why is this important? And then once you're dialed in there and you kind of have this foundation of why the human side is important, then you can go and that'll direct you in terms of now what do I need to go work on next? So now do the resources part, right? So as far as books go, “The Psychology of Money” is always a great intro, kind of a gateway book. Then another great gateway book is called “Advice That Sticks” by Dr. Moira Somers. It's up here in the bookshelf. Every time I mention that book, I always make a note to say it should be required reading for anybody who works with human beings and their money; it should be like CFP® and then “Advice That Sticks.” “Never Split the Difference” by Christopher Voss is one of the best tactical or practical books on communication skills. And then, other resources would be — I mean, I really don't want to do this because it feels awkward to say — but that's why I started the podcast; we really do work hard to try to make it the best resource for this out there. If you hear me say that and you're rolling your eyes, I got you. Don't download it. It's not going to hurt my feelings. But I think I would feel bad if I didn't at least mention it. And then, as far as trainings go, there's more and more that are cropping up. You've got Shaping Wealth and Building the Behavioral Advisor. There's the Kinder Life Planning Institute. Golden Gate University has some good programs. Money Quotient has some good programs. So there's also some trainings out there as well. And I think there's more that are cropping up. But that's where I would start essentially from the resource side. 

21:29 - 21:45

Lauren Hong

I love it. I also appreciate just directing folks to the podcast. I do appreciate it that you can get nuggets of advice to be able to take it in. Sometimes I think these things are like building habits, and being just self-aware of the things that are going on. So I like the kind of bite-sized content to be able to apply to your day to day.

21:46 - 21:58

Brendan Frazier

Yeah. No doubt. Now my podcast is not bite-size by any means but you'll definitely get good ideas from it because our whole focus is not what do you need to know but how can you apply? How do I apply? How do I apply?

21:58 - 22:13

Lauren Hong

So I really love it. Well, thank you again for your time today and just for digging into this topic and helping people connect with people. And I mean, ultimately to be able to keep business, take good care of their clients, and just help people feel heard. So appreciate your time.

22:13 - 22:20

Brendan Frazier

Well, thanks for having me and for shining a light on what I obviously in a biased way consider to be an important topic in the industry.

22:20 - 22:22

Lauren Hong

Absolutely. Thank you for your time.

22:22 - 23:26

Brendan Frazier

Yeah. Thanks, Lauren.

Why Emotionally Connecting with Clients is Good for Business in Financial Services with Brendan Frazier

On this episode of On Purpose, learn how Brendan Frazier’s human-first approach to financial advising fosters a community of advisors eager to evolve their practices.
Marketing & Sales
October 17, 2024

We talked about:

  • How to effectively collaborate with your C-suite or leadership team to ensure outsourced marketing efforts align with business objectives
  • Why providing solid input to outsourced partners is essential for integration and consistency across the organization
  • Why investing in pinpointing your ideal prospect is crucial — and how it can influence various aspects of your business strategy

Featured Resources 

Audio Transcript

00:00 - 00:36:10

Lauren Hong

We're talking about outsourced marketing. Sometimes what happens is we start an engagement and we have a client who says okay, we're ready to outsource, ready to go online and dial up our marketing. But what are we going to keep in-house versus what makes sense to be able to outsource? What are you guys going to run with and what are some swim lanes or domains that we would put up, such as it makes sense for us to keep XYZ in-house because this makes sense for us to really lean on our team for that?

00:36:13 -00:41:25

Lauren Hong

Okay. Let's share some examples. So I think it'd be really helpful to just share what we've seen.

00:41:27 - 00:52:05

Tiffany Silverberg

Yeah, I think the biggest differentiator for data points is whether they actually have someone in-house for marketing.

00:52:07 - 00:53:16

Lauren Hong

Totally. Yeah.

00:53:18 - 01:22:13

Tiffany Silverberg

If it's someone's extra job that they also do marketing. So if they have someone in-house doing marketing oftentimes then scheduling of things, calendaring of things falls to them. And then we can come in and fill in blanks where they need support, often for design or doing technical stuff like SEO research, things like that, that they're just not ready to do day-to-day.

01:22:15 - 01:31:15

Tiffany Silverberg

But if it's someone's extra job on the side, we can come in with that more stretched strategic operation, taking stuff off their plate so they can keep moving forward.

01:31:17 - 01:52:14

Lauren Hong

Totally. I can also see, okay, so you have a situation where copy, written words, is really, really close to people's hearts. And sometimes there's firms and clients we work with, their voice is what makes them different. It's their selling point, the human part.

01:52:17 - 02:09:02

Lauren Hong

So I feel if you're in a seat where you're leading the copy team and you do such a great job of helping. I feel like clients also feel like I don't have to totally give that up. My voice can still be a part of what's written without me having to literally type every single word.

02:09:10 - 02:20:13

Lauren Hong

That's another place where it's kind of like a hybrid between you kind of keep it in-house but you can also outsource some of it. I don’t know if you want to talk to the specifics of that.

02:20:16 - 02:42:15

Tiffany Silverberg

Oh yeah, I mean, it can really look different for every client. So for some clients, it really is like whoever and I’ll make up a name like Sarah here at our agency loves to write and is really good at it. She's basically become our voice. So they can write things and we can clean it up or support them.

02:42:18 - 03:02:02

Tiffany Silverberg

Templating things like this is what we need written and then we run with it because they just know it's going to feel like them. Or we're at a place where, thinking about other clients, where they have a specific voice, they can feel it. We can feel it. But they trust us to be able to deliver that.

03:02:02 - 03:24:01

Tiffany Silverberg

And so maybe they send bullet points or maybe they send recordings of their voice and things like that. And we can kind of step in and create that voice. So, like you said, it really looks different for everyone. I don't know what's really valuable to them. I mean, it's always valuable but like you said, it just feels really like this is our thing.

03:24:01 - 03:24:14

Tiffany Silverberg

This is our baby.

03:24:14 - 03:47:25

Lauren Hong

I’ll give you another example of a company we're currently working with, and they have a whole in-house graphics team that does a lot of work. But there are certain things where it's like, hey, if there's additional support that's needed, more arms and legs, we can totally help with that. I can you give another example of a firm we've worked with that's rather large.

03:47:25 - 04:05:19

Lauren Hong

They've got a whole marketing department but they just need support because their team just can't take on the project. So why couldn’t their team keep it in-house? It's a bandwidth thing too. I feel like that's another kind of great example of when we could keep it in-house but this is going to be a backburner project.

04:05:20 - 04:13:00

Lauren Hong

If it's really a priority, we've got to be able to figure out how we're going to get some fuel in the engine.

04:13:02 - 04:45:23

Tiffany Silverberg

Well, and sometimes I'm thinking of a couple other clients too, where they're a department within a bigger company. They need to get their — well, let's talk about trains — they have to get their wheels rolling on that little project. And so we can come in and use all the data, use what this marketing department has worked really hard on, to create style guides and all that, to get this off the ground because they're busy with their day-to-day, what’s happening in the next month or whatever.

04:45:29 - 04:47:21

Lauren Hong

You need a trusted agent.

04:47:22 - 04:54:12

Tiffany Silverberg

Yeah. And like you said, the volume I think that's a big part of it too, is just how much volume support is needed.

04:54:14 - 05:30:28

Lauren Hong

Okay. Another question talking about outsourced marketing. So we've seen situations sometimes where there is a CMO, an internal leader, and oftentimes we're in that role too, right? We're more in that strategy role. And you're trying to balance both the business needs but then also just the super shiny object of marketing, massive data points, different levels of understanding of what you can do with marketing, if it's digital or not or what, how marketing is connected to sales, all these kinds of things.

05:31:00 - 05:46:04

Lauren Hong

It would be kind of fun to have a conversation about how you navigate the C-suite just to make sure we're constantly connecting it back to the business strategy. And you do such a great job of that, Tiffany, being able to really hear the clients and connect the dots.

05:46:04 - 06:05:11

Lauren Hong

So I’d love to hear about some of those lessons learned along the way, not just for how we navigate conversations but also for folks who are in more strategy roles. How do they make sure they don't lose the strategic direction of the decision-makers as we're proceeding forward? 

06:05:13 - 06:32:09

Tiffany Silverberg

It feels like that's the case with so many clients. So some clients are the founder and CEO and that's our main point of contact. So that's a little different conversation. But oftentimes our day-to- day point person is someone in the business or that marketing person, and they really do have that tough task because at the end of the day, everyone wants leads, which equals sales, right?

06:32:09 - 06:56:25

Tiffany Silverberg

Everybody just wants more clients. And so trying to figure out how to connect those dots. I think we've spent a lot of time in conversations just turning down the noise but calling our focus down because there's just so many data points. And I think this marketing world is just so like data, data, data.

06:56:25 - 07:20:13

Tiffany Silverberg

And there's so much data available. And I feel that's been kind of the buzzword of late that every data point is promising something. But I think just again, just focusing it down to okay, if we know this is going to be presented — I'm thinking of a few clients that tell us every year at this time, I have to give a marketing presentation.

07:20:15 - 07:28:22

Tiffany Silverberg

How am I going to help connect those dots? So it's again, it's helping them say, okay, you need five leads or whatever it is.

07:28:24 - 07:29:18

Lauren Hong

Right?

07:29:20 - 07:47:20

Tiffany Silverberg

So your lists have grown or this many people are coming to your site, not even your site but this particular landing page we've built for this project. I think zeroing in a little bit is the answer because it's just so easy to kind of go all over the place..

07:47:22 - 08:04:11

Lauren Hong

I feel like there's like 1,000,001 dials you can turn, which is very easy to do in marketing. Because we get all the noise, right? So I totally resonate with what you're saying: okay, let's not turn up the volume on everything; let's just turn it up on the right piece.

08:04:11 - 08:13:25

Lauren Hong

That connects back to the business strategy. And that's where we really need to turn up the focus and the noise. And then we can turn it down there or we keep it in whatever kind of state it is and then turn it up elsewhere.

08:13:25 - 08:40:03

Tiffany Silverberg

And again, thinking of a couple specific clients, here's the buzzword but it's also the target market or the niche. It helps if they can say in those marketing meetings, presentations, if they can say, well, here's the — I don't want to say growth — but here's the activity we've seen in this particular area.

08:40:05 - 08:58:16

Tiffany Silverberg

And this particular thing we all know as a company is so important that we're hitting this client right now or this cross arena. I think that kind of helps too, so that it's not just so broad — everyone's like we need to reach these 500 million people and we're all going to Zoom.

08:58:16 - 09:29

Tiffany Silverberg

It's just that.

09:01:01 - 09:21:06

Lauren Hong

And also just to underscore all this, I think we can't take away from the fact that obviously you've got to be light on your feet, right? And they're in a meeting. But the prep that's required, I'm thrilled to do that and turn over all those stones and really be able to make sure we're helping the team navigate that so we're not saying you need to flex and bend, right?

09:21:06 - 09:31:22

Lauren Hong

As an organization, you're always evolving but you're not deviating so much that you lose sight of the bigger picture between those reporting kind of meetings or conversations.

09:31:24 - 09:56:01

Tiffany Silverberg

Yeah. And really again, when you're zeroing in on the data points, making sure they are really strong data points. I think marketing can also get a bad rap for making up the numbers along the way. And so I think that's where it can get tricky. For those who are in that CMO sort of role, they don't want to feel like they're just bringing in numbers for the sake of it, you know?

09:56:01 - 10:04:28

Tiffany Silverberg

So I think, again, zeroing in and really having hefty, meaningful data points. Yep. There's a lot to that.

10:05:01 - 10:11:10

Lauren Hong

All right. Ready for another question.

10:11:12 - 10:15:02

Lauren Hong

I can throw it out, okay. You ask me..

10:15:08 - 10:33:29

Tiffany Silverberg

Yeah. Actually, I have a good question for you. So, talking about outsourcing, we were just talking about sometimes they keep copy in-house or sometimes they only keep this or that in-house. So there's probably different levels of outsourcing people can go to. Can you talk a little bit about that and how do they know what they need?

10:34:02 - 10:52:25

Lauren Hong

Oh my gosh okay. So I can think of a company, they were about, I don't know, maybe 150 employees at the time. And they had a situation where their Salesforce, which was their CRM, needed to be customized so they could tweak and turn the dials. This isn't really related to marketing but it's an example of “we need something done quickly.”

10:52:25 - 11:12:25

Lauren Hong

So they went on, I think they ended up finding someone through Fiverr, somebody to stop the bleeding, just help us turn these little tweaks and dials so we can make the output stronger. And they're a big company, right? But they just needed to find a trusted agent to be able to slowly kind of adjust the styles as they proceeded forward.

11:12:27 - 11:34:16

Lauren Hong

I can think of another example if you go up the food chain, going from a one-off quick piece to now we want to get really specialized. There is another client I can think of where they realized strategically they really wanted to work on SEO but they wanted to be in the thick of it.

11:34:18 - 11:53:12

Lauren Hong

Like they wanted to see the backend of all the data and the numbers, and they wanted to help with the manipulation of it and really unpacking all of it. And so they worked with an outsourced SEO team that could literally take them in the kitchen and show them around; this is how we make everything.

11:53:12 - 12:15:04

Lauren Hong

And these are our processes and that kind of thing. So there's kind of that one-off, I need a quick provider. It could be a freelancer engagement. It could also be like a very specialized kind of partner. And then a lot of our clients are like, okay, we need a whole marketing department but we're not ready for that yet.

12:15:10 - 12:33:16

Lauren Hong

But we need strategy and all the other parts and pieces of marketing. And so that's a good fit for an agency. Or you might have a marketing team of maybe two or three people, and you need additional support both on strategy and implementation, or you have a whole marketing department but you just need a little bit more, like an agent,

12:33:21 - 12:53:00

Lauren Hong

a trusted agent that can help you with a project. So it kind of depends, honestly, where you're at and you can outgrow your provider. Or you could sometimes work with multiple providers at one time but it really depends. There's a lot of things you can outsource and a lot of different ways you can outsource.

12:53:00 - 12:54:24

Lauren Hong

So feel free to jump in.

12:54:26 - 13:16:01

Tiffany Silverberg

Maybe we can chat about the difference between that specialty provider and an agency. So like you were talking about the SEO provider. So how does someone know when it's like, I just want to focus on this thing, like I said, I want to know the nitty-gritty versus I need everything.

13:16:01 - 13:36:18

Lauren Hong

Okay, so this is kind of like a catch-22 because you could go with an SEO provider, let's say I'm just going to specifically work with an SEO provider. But if you're leading that engagement, you're also helping with the input to make sure it connects not only with the business goals but then the umbrella of all the other marketing.

13:36:24 - 14:03:14

Lauren Hong

So you just want to make sure if you're leading that initiative, either you or the individual who’s leading it is seeing how those efforts kind of sweep across the company at large, and likely that provider and your resources are really going to be like a deep dive on that particular specialty. We're on the agency side; we act as that umbrella to see how everything is integrated across the board.

14:03:17 - 14:25:03

Lauren Hong

But then we would have those deep dive conversations with an SEO specialist or developer, someone who just does video, all these other kinds of facets — graphic design, website development — those facets of it. So we kind of work as I'll call it that strategist, to be able to connect the dots, manage the projects, and then implement them and bring in the providers as necessary.

14:25:06 - 14:39:18

Lauren Hong

So this is a different kind of engagement. And if you're going to do just a specialist — I shouldn't say just; it's a left right. If you're going to engage with specialists, you just want to make sure that the input is solid so the output can be solid as well.

14:39:21 - 14:49:14

Tiffany Silverberg

Yeah. And what about, I don't know if we talked about a business consultant or a CMO sort of role. How would that differentiate?

14:49:17 - 15:24:15

Lauren Hong

That's a good question too. Okay. So feel free to jump in here. We have seen situations where a business strategically may need to have an offsite to really unpack everything, pull back layers of the onion and put it back together. And an offsite would be a great opportunity for a business consultant to be able to come in to support with that and might be behind a particular initiative, like a target market: where are we going to go after and what does that look like, and how are we going to put our efforts behind it?

15:24:18 - 15:48:07

Lauren Hong

It could be conversations around strategic goals and mission, vision, value statements, maybe unpacking that a little bit more. And it could be a reshaping of understanding — how does the business strategy specifically connect with the marketing strategy and help identify needed campaigns or what have you, before you even bring in a team?

15:48:09 - 16:25:19

Lauren Hong

And those conversations are usually had in a little bit bigger organizations. And they oftentimes kind of unpack things related to fee structure or your service offerings. It could be, gosh, it could go a number of ways. Your target market, your culture. So those offsites more are the business consultant, marketing consultant sometimes while you zero in on hopefully a key project you might want to focus on, which is then going to help all your other efforts when you actually get to the implementation side of it, be that much more successful.

16:25:19 - 16:34:14

Lauren Hong

So feel free to jump in. I feel like that was a long-winded answer to basically say it's more of like leaning on the business strategy.

16:34:16 - 17:05:01

Tiffany Silverberg

Yeah. And I think like the question earlier of how do you know when you need each thing. But I think that's the kind of stuff that if those are the pieces that are missing, it has to sort of happen before you bring in a marketing team because you don't want to be operationalizing, putting calendars together or things like that, but still not really knowing who is our target market or like you said, even more, like what sort of offerings are we even providing, what makes us different?

17:05:01 - 17:24:11

Tiffany Silverberg

Those sorts of things. I think when you don't have that clarity and we see this time and again when you're sort of trying to figure out clarity in the midst of strategizing it gets tricky. And I guess I go back to the earlier question too, about keeping everyone focused when everybody knows what the goal is.

17:24:14 - 17:31:21

Tiffany Silverberg

And we're not still trying to do development midway. It's so much easier to get everyone to that same page.

17:31:23 - 17:37:15

Lauren Hong

Yeah. I totally like what the goal is and why that goal. 

17:37:18 - 17:46:18

Lauren Hong

Not just we want to grow. Because as I was saying earlier, why do we want to grow? How is that going to impact the company? How is that going to impact the team? And what's the heart and soul behind that?

17:46:18 - 18:12:03

Tiffany Silverberg

So yeah, absolutely. Okay. One more one more question. Or maybe there's more. But so this kind of ties into something you said earlier but now it ties into this question too. So marketing, marketing and sales always sit together. We talk about that. But marketing also is involved cross- departmentally and it impacts other things, especially when done really well.

18:12:03 - 18:17:19

Tiffany Silverberg

So I don't know if you want to sort of touch on that.

18:17:22 - 18:40:28

Lauren Hong

Oh my gosh. Yes. So you really feel this when the company gets bigger. So you start to feel it if the employee count is around a dozen. Because what happens is marketing is your face to the world, right? It's a reflection of, ideally, your mission, vision, values, your business strategy, where you want to go.

18:40:28 - 19:04:09

Lauren Hong

It's kind of that first interaction someone's going to have with the brand. But if you're at that dozen employee-ish place, you probably have a CRM in place, or you might have onboarding materials or ways you hire people, like job descriptions, things like this, right? And all of these are going to require considering how does the company sound, like in a job description?

19:04:09 - 19:29:18

Lauren Hong

What's the voice and tone of the company? We're going to have our logo out across our CRM. And what does our training look like? And does that feel like the brand, the voice and everything kind of exuberate through all these other parts of your business. And so that's when you start to see marketing really plug into other parts of the business.

19:29:18 - 19:52:08

Lauren Hong

And then as you grow. So now let's say you’re at 75 employees, 150 employees. Marketing is connected across departments because what happens is you're going to have one department, any department, it might be HR. And so they're going to have all kinds of communications that are going to go on just within their department.

19:52:13 - 20:12:29

Lauren Hong

There might be another department that's working on webinars that are externally facing. There could be another department that has regular communications that are really timely that need to go out. And so marketing acts like the glue for all of that but it's making sure the brand doesn't lose its essence as it grows, because that's so critical, frankly, to the value of the company.

20:12:29 - 20:25:01

Lauren Hong

If you're going to value the company. And then as you're hiring, you want to make sure people really exuberate in the brand personality. So who the brand is and how they show up. But you can totally talk more to this.

20:25:02 - 20:44:07

Tiffany Silverberg

Yeah. And I was thinking of one particular client who, I don't know their employee count but I think it was around a dozen and they were struggling to hire. They weren't attracting the right people. And it was having those conversations with us, the marketing team, where all of a sudden it was like, this is what makes you really special.

20:44:07 - 21:06:22

Tiffany Silverberg

You need to go positive with those things that are making you really special. And then everything trickled down, the visuals became really obvious for social media posts around that hire, the job description, everything just became really clear because everybody knew this is what your brand is about. So yeah, it definitely matters cross-department.

21:06:25 - 21:11:28

Lauren Hong

Totally. Okay. Any other things with outsourcing we should chat about?

21:12:00 - 21:13:02

Tiffany Silverberg

All the things.

21:13:04 - 21:15:09

Lauren Hong

I feel like we could do this for a long time.

21:15:12 - 21:16:19

Tiffany Silverberg

Yes.

21:16:21 - 21:18:29

Lauren Hong

Okay. Plus rapid-fire questions.

21:19:02 - 21:19:29

Tiffany Silverberg

Yes, okay.

21:20:01 - 21:26:15

Lauren Hong

We're talking big picture. What's the best way to identify your ideal prospects?

21:26:17 - 21:28:13

Tiffany Silverberg

So that's a rapid-fire question?

21:28:16 - 21:45:02

Lauren Hong

Yeah, sorry, I know that's not a very good rapid-fire question. I should be asking you something really simple that you can respond to. Like where is your favorite place to vacation? Okay. So let's just unpack that a little bit.

21:45:05 - 22:10:09

Tiffany Silverberg

Now that's a really good one. Because we were saying earlier, if you're going to work with a business consultant, a big part of it is kind of figuring that all out. But even in the marketing level, the best answer to the rapid fire question, the best way to identify your ideal prospects, I don't know, who do you love to work with and who's bringing in good money?

22:10:11 - 22:26:20

Tiffany Silverberg

Which is not always the same. So we'll start with the first one. Who do you love to work with? You want more of those. There's all kinds of tips out there about putting them all on a spreadsheet and how much money they bring in and which are the ones you want to call more.

22:26:23 - 22:47:06

Tiffany Silverberg

But that's really the answer. Who you really, really are good at serving. There's data points you can look at too. You have a starting point of who your ideal clients are — maybe we'll use the obvious one.

22:47:06 - 23:09:26

Tiffany Silverberg

Retirees. You can start to look at your data and see popular blogs the people are reading. Which newsletters are my clients actually opening? Those sorts of content data points can help kind of go, okay, we tend to track that. I think that's happened with a few clients too, where they're like, we've been writing a lot about this particular thing.

23:09:26 - 23:28:27

Tiffany Silverberg

We have one client in particular who had one person in there — I'll be vague about this; I don't call them out — but one person in their firm had a previous job where there was an obvious connection there of the kinds of people they could serve. It just became obvious, so we put stuff out.

23:28:27 - 23:39:09

Tiffany Silverberg

Everybody loves it. Well, we should just put more of that out and make that a target because people eat it up every time we post it. So I think that can make it obvious.

23:39:15 - 23:57:16

Lauren Hong

There's so many ways I'm like that. I'll just say I'd encourage folks, if you're going to narrow a target market, spend the time on it because it's one of those forks in the road with your business, where then you get behind it and there's a lot of effort, so you don't want to just kind of do this stuff like willy-nilly.

23:57:16 - 24:21:27

Lauren Hong

You really want to take the time to invest in it as a team. And if you're smaller, then you're in more of a decision-making hat and you can have those tough conversations but then act accordingly. But it's worth the time and energy to put it behind either hiring a consultant or doing an offsite or working with an agency, whatever kind of makeup that looks like.

24:22:01 - 24:28:28

Lauren Hong

But to really kind of unpack that because then you start aligning everything behind that strategic decision.

24:28:28 - 24:46:19

Tiffany Silverberg

So, yeah, like you said, if the whole team can be behind it, that's the best because I just gotta say we've seen it get a little tricky when some people are super excited, some people are not. The flip side is I'm thinking of one particular client, they have a new target market and everyone's excited.

24:46:24 - 24:54:13

Tiffany Silverberg

The website's going to be about it. Social is going to be about it. So the opportunities are immense because they're ready to go all out.

24:54:15 - 25:12:11

Lauren Hong

What I was going to say too is like, sometimes it's really scary to get behind a target. Especially if you come from a second generation of owning a company. You don't want to ruffle feathers. If you have a lot of different stakes in the game, like a lot of different players.

25:12:11 - 25:32:11

Lauren Hong

But part of that leadership we see that's so successful is when you do have a team or an individual who gets behind that and invests in it, and that's really where you start to see that traction. It's a hard call to make but it's one that when you make it, it's kind of where it all starts to funnel into.

25:32:13 - 25:52:17

Tiffany Silverberg

So yeah. And one more thing: it doesn't always have to be like a demographic, right? So you’re like we have to go after dentists or whatever. And then especially bigger firms, they're like, well we're not all going after the dentists. So they start to know our clients are just into this kind of investment or they like this kind of philosophy.

25:52:17 - 25:57:17

Tiffany Silverberg

How we serve them is different. And I think that can absolutely be a target market for them.

25:57:18 - 26:14:28

Lauren Hong

Yeah, even to the bigger firms, like sometimes how the targeting starts to happen is by geography and locale. So it just depends where you are and kind of the bend of the strategy. So okay, we could talk about this for a whole other thing but super fun.

26:15:00 - 26:20:29

Tiffany Silverberg

Yeah. Thanks.

FAQs: When to Engage and How to Navigate Outsourced Marketing in Financial Services

In this episode of On Purpose, we explore when to bring in an outsourced marketing partner, the level of support you need, and aligning business goals.
Marketing & Sales
October 14, 2024

We talked about:

  • How no campaign is truly isolated — exploring how the CFP Board recruiting ad campaign reached unintended audiences and the unexpected consequence that followed
  • Why staying true to your brand’s identity, values, and mission is key to creating marketing campaigns that resonate and deliver the outcomes you want
  • The surprising silver lining of the marketing misstep, and how it gave the financial planning community an opportunity to showcase its passion and profession in a new light

If you enjoyed this episode, you will also like: 

Full Audio Transcript:

00:00 - 00:28

Lauren Hong

All right. Tiffany, so we’re doing this recording to talk about the CFP Board and the recent campaign that came out. It's a tricky topic. There's a lot of emotions and feedback, right? Where do we start? 

00:29 - 00:48

Tiffany Silverberg

Well, like you said, it's very tricky. And we're not on the inside. We saw it come live, just like everyone else did through so many LinkedIn posts and people sharing and the reactions. So we've talked about it a lot internally. We want to make sure we're not being reactionary because again, we weren't there.

00:48 - 01:00

Tiffany Silverberg

We didn't get to make the decisions. But we're also seeing kind of how it's impacting people. And just kind of want to have a conversation about that and about how marketing means something. Marketing impacts things.

01:01 - 01:28

Lauren Hong

So it does and it has a domino effect, intact or not. And that can happen internally with an organization or externally as well. So to be a little vulnerable here when this campaign was released, it reminded me of a campaign that came out about five-ish years ago. I'm not exactly sure.

01:28 - 01:51

Lauren Hong

And the reason it feels vulnerable is because it's a campaign that was really close to me. So I'll just kind of share this to maybe help frame it. You know I love my undergrad, Drake University — I've sat on boards, I've flown back. I mentor students. All these things. It's a place that helped me grow up, right?

01:51 - 02:09

Lauren Hong

And they came out with this campaign, and like I said, about five years ago, they did all the research. It was a campaign that was to help recruit new students to come in. They did research. They spent budget. They tested it. They did focus groups. They came up with all kinds of ads.

02:09 - 02:34

Lauren Hong

But when it was released, it didn't sit well. Drake University starts with the letter D. It was D+ for a collegiate university focused on education, a grade with a D+, or that's how it was perceived and did not sit well with those who received it. But the concept was supposed to be, okay, you come here and you're going to get this.

02:34 - 02:57

Lauren Hong

Like first you have these experiences, you get this plus this. And so part of it was to send this out to all these new students to let them know, okay, you've been admitted and you get this and you're going to have a plethora of experiences and things you can dip into to explore. But the messaging and the way it came off from an alumni standpoint was bad.

02:57 - 02:59

Tiffany Silverberg

It was that you chose poorly, right?

02:59 - 03:20

Lauren Hong

Yes.

03:20 - 03:03

Tiffany Silverberg

You could have gone to the A school but instead you chose the D school.

03:03 - 03:26

Lauren Hong

Yeah. And we're all like, oh my gosh, this is not the intended message. It just didn't sit well. And especially an organization that you take so much pride in and helps you to be able to stretch your own wings. And so messages from alumni were flooding inboxes and there were conversations and there was social media, public comments.

03:26 - 03:57

Lauren Hong

And, the university rallied behind the messaging. And it helps to explain the why for what had gone on. But part of it, for lack of a better word, is a little bit of damage control. To be able to really help put things in place. But I think one of the takeaways for me was kind of what you were just alluding to earlier, too, that marketing does touch everyone, even if it's just related to this particular demo or graphic, we feel it in different ways.

03:57 - 04:07

Lauren Hong

Yeah. So I don't know what your thoughts are on that. But that was one of the things I was like, okay, do you want to pull up those skeletons again because it feels personal, right?

04:07 - 04:28

Tiffany Silverberg

The skeletons came out for you. It felt like you were living it again. Well, and I think it's a good similarity to this situation because as things came out, it became very obvious this campaign was meant to be, well, interestingly, the same thing, a recruiting campaign meant to be very siloed.

04:28 - 04:46

Tiffany Silverberg

And I think, again, I'm sure they did all the research. I'm sure they did all the focus groups and things like that. But I think the idea sometimes is that, well, it's all going to be okay. I'm sure everyone thought it was a great idea but it'll be okay because it's a separate thing.

04:46 - 05:13

Tiffany Silverberg

It's a separate audience. It's going to be on a different platform. These guys probably aren't going to see that but that's the way the digital world works. And we have a colleague who we were hoping could join us but it didn't work out who always shares this phrase and I'm going to butcher it. But basically the marketing either adds to your brand or it takes away from your brand. Everything that goes out is either going to add more to your brand or it's going to take away from it.

05:13 - 05:42

Tiffany Silverberg

And I think that's what we saw here is I know the idea was that it was supposed to be separate but everyone else felt it. And especially, again, alumni or those who hold the CFP®; there's so much pride there, there's so much identity there that when they see something they feel is taking away from what they've built internally, what's so much a part of them, I think that's where a lot of it came from.

05:42 - 05:59

Tiffany Silverberg

It's not that it was necessarily a bad idea, I mean, maybe it was or maybe it wasn't, but not to pick on the idea or the creative but it's just the feeling that it took away from something that I hold dear. 

05:59 - 06:19

Lauren Hong

And that was kind of the parallel with how I felt too, and even feel that kind of vulnerability of being able to kind of pull up those skeletons, right? Because the way it came across wasn't the perception of how I think others perhaps saw that, even though that wasn't the intention behind it.

06:19 - 06:36

Lauren Hong

But yeah, shoutout to Jimmy, our colleague, who has that great quote of everything you're doing is either adding to the brand or taking away from the brand. And so I think it's almost like a good buffer to say, is this helping us along our mission or is this deviating from those pieces?

06:36 - 06:45

Lauren Hong

And how do we react in times where things might feel like they're a little bit off course, right?

06:45 - 07:09

Tiffany Silverberg

So yeah. And that's kind of the thing about the silo, because it can be easy to just connect the dots. I mean, we talk about connecting the dots all the time — we want this piece, whatever this campaign is, to hit these targets. We have these goals. We want people doing these things. But again, I think it's just like looking at the big picture.

07:09 - 07:32

Tiffany Silverberg

How is it just going to make people feel? Is it reflecting the greater part of what we're trying to accomplish? Does it reflect our mission statement? So, just let the cat out of the bag, like we always talk about when we put a brand book together or a strategy document, it's got all the pieces: mission statement, vision statement, values, and brand personality.

07:32 - 07:50

Tiffany Silverberg

What do we want people to feel when they interact with us? And all those components are kind of the filter for anything we design or any words we put out. And it's always like it. It has to stay within those guardrails. Anything outside of that is just not going to work. It might be fun.

07:50 - 08:03

Tiffany Silverberg

It might be creative. And I think especially in a TikTok world where new trends are happening, it's like, we should go do that. But if it's not within our values, it doesn't mean they're bad. It doesn't mean that thing outside of it is bad.

08:03 - 08:04

Lauren Hong

It is judging, right? And simply.

08:04 - 08:18

Tiffany Silverberg

It just means it's not us and while we might all like it, some of our teammates are going to be like, oh, that wasn't us, because it's not in those guardrails, that fence.

08:18 - 08:45

Lauren Hong

I love that. That's a really good analogy. The guardrails. And I feel like it's what helps keep you along that path. And from a business standpoint, like you mentioned earlier, mission, vision, values; I love the brand personalities we put together. I feel like that really helps to exuberate in a word or two, what's the energy we want to really channel through those guardrails.

08:45 - 09:05

Tiffany Silverberg

And that's kind of what the two examples we're talking about — it was the energy that was missing. That's not how we want to be perceived in the world. That's not the energy we want to put out. And so it's not that it wasn't clever. Both of the examples — it wasn't that they weren't clever or even potentially even potentially even hitting those goals.

09:05 - 09:22

Tiffany Silverberg

Yeah. But openly, it's not putting out the energy we want to be perceived like. When we talk about personalities and just the whole brand, whether it's somebody picking up the phone talking to you or a social media post, we want them to feel the same energy.

09:22 - 09:44

Lauren Hong

That's right. And that's easy to be able to pull out through every visual piece or how you're hiring or training or keeping that momentum going. But it gives you that. Again, you said like those guardrails to be able to go back to. And I also think in challenging times, I mean, we see this with all kinds of situations, right?

09:44 - 10:27

Lauren Hong

I feel like there can be unexpected things that happen or clients have to really kind of pull back. I think it really helps you keep on pace amid the unexpected — I don't even know if I want to use that or crisis. But sometimes in a crisis just to be able to say, okay, if we're showing up in every day, this is how we're showing up in every day but how do we show up to be able to keep that energy along those guardrails so that it's a calm, cool, and collected or if it's we've got your back or whatever that message might be, that there's that continuity.

10:27 - 10:58

Tiffany Silverberg

Exactly. We talk about that in voice guides all the time, right? That there's going to be a tone that might have to shift, maybe something's more urgent or it's left less urgent. Maybe it's a social media post versus a memo but the voice is always going to be the same. And I just thought of a great example of a wealth management and planning firm we work with, and they brought out the point that they're coming from a place of trust — that's a core part of their personality.

10:58 - 11:18

Tiffany Silverberg

And so they're like, well, we could play outside of that and we could play on fears but that's never going to feel authentically us. Every time we show up, it should be promoting trust. It should be building on that. Like aspiring to more and more, trust me and take it down a notch and kind of play around with that.

11:18 - 11:20

Tiffany Silverberg

But it just will never feel right.

11:20 - 11:23

Lauren Hong

It's sort of going against the grain.

11:24 - 11:36

Tiffany Silverberg

Yeah, yeah. And I think that's where even situations like this one where it was supposed to be funny, if it feels so opposite of what we've built, then I think that's where the problem can come in.

11:36:24 - 11:44:04

Lauren Hong

Yeah. It was the deviation. It's just too far. Too far off.

11:44 - 11:53

Tiffany Silverberg

Yeah. Or maybe not even that. It was too far off but it was literally the opposite. And now that's what I'm working against. 

11:53 - 12:14

Lauren Hong

Sort of scribbling against those guardrails or it's growing outside of the lines of what's been established. I think of another example, there's a firm we've worked with for a number of years now, and very much has that calm, cool, and collected feel. But they had a totally unexpected issue that happened.

12:14 - 12:32

Lauren Hong

It might have been last year. And part of it was a crisis situation. Not going to go into all the specifics but it was almost like externally you don't want to have that sort of Doctor Jekyll, kind of like Mr. Hyde. Like you’re flipping from that work of calm, cool, and collected. We got it.

12:32 - 12:54

Lauren Hong

You know, there's that trust like you were alluding to earlier, in these kinds of pieces. And then all of a sudden it's like everything's untangling. And so part of it on the inside, which people don't always see, is to take that stress anxiety out, right? Because they're trying to do the right things for their clients or trying to take care of things, make sure things are buttoned up, and people are well taken care of.

12:54 - 13:18

Lauren Hong

But trying to take all that energy and then saying, okay, let's return back to our brand. Like you said, we can slightly adjust the tone. I mean, not even slightly, right? But we're adjusting the tone enough so there's that constant, like, we've got it taken care of, right? And we recognize what's going on but we've taken this step that is consistently aligned with how we show up every single day.

13:18 - 13:19

Lauren Hong

So yeah.

13:19 - 13:31

Tiffany Silverberg

The same firm I'm thinking of also just won a pretty great award. So obviously when they're posting something about that the tone is going to be different than having to put out a memo communicating about that serious thing.

13:31 - 13:32

Lauren Hong

Yeah.

13:32 - 13:52

Tiffany Silverberg

But we're about, like you said, trust and confidence. And if they had put out something that was anxiety-ridden in that first one, it's kind of like we said, everything adds to or takes away from the brand. And it would communicate to clients that, oh gosh, if things got crazy on my end, like if I was in a crisis situation, they're going to panic.

13:52 - 13:54

Tiffany Silverberg

Like, that's who they are.

13:54 - 14:16

Lauren Hong

So yep, it's so true. So another thing that personally helps me is I like to get a lot of big ideas. And they're not always realistic, right? Sometimes you think, I'm going to do this project, it's going to be no big deal. And you're like, okay, let's take a minute back to see where does that fit in?

14:16 - 14:36

Lauren Hong

And I think to connect the dots here is this idea of are we adding to the brand or are we taking away from the brand allows us to take ideas and say, that might be a great idea but that's not the right idea that's going to propel the company forward for the the business objectives we're trying to hit.

14:36 - 14:42

Lauren Hong

So it does help to be able to keep within that one line.

14:42 - 15:01

Tiffany Silverberg

So yeah, I think that's what we saw too with people reacting to the CFP campaign. Or again, I know there was something strategic, we're hoping to get these outcomes. But I think a lot of people felt like the way we got to those outcomes, and even the outcomes themselves might have deviated from what they felt was the business goal.

15:01 - 15:20

Tiffany Silverberg

And that's a big disconnect too. I was thinking about it. It's almost like sometimes we see marketing as like the kid brother building mud pies in the backyard; it's just fine. Whatever you build, it's fine. But I don't know, probably because I'm a mom. I feel like it's more like marketing for the mom. Like she's setting the tone.

15:20 - 15:34

Tiffany Silverberg

She's setting the schedule. Not that we're running the show but setting the tone. It's not just like, whatever Bobby does in the backyard. It's not just too far.

15:34 - 15:53

Lauren Hong

The energy impacts everything, right? If you're inside of the house or not. So, yeah. So, it's keeping that constant and it's a tricky campaign to talk about because it has a lot of emotions and reactions and what have you.

15:53 - 16:04

Tiffany Silverberg

You know, there's a lot of people who were involved or weren't involved and I know a lot of people feel a lot of things about it. So that's a tough one.

16:04 - 16:30

Lauren Hong

But I also think it's an opportunity to also reflect on businesses like your own business and say, how does this impact me and how can I take lessons learned here? And then, also a reminder that we're not all on the inside, right? Not having those initial strategy conversations, what's happening, what's the direction and the thinking.

16:30 - 16:36

Lauren Hong

So really. All right. Any other thoughts?

16:36 - 16:55

Tiffany Silverberg

I think the only other great takeaway I saw happening from all this is just what an amazing community the CFP® community is and how quickly people were like, let's flip it on its head. Let's remind people of all the amazing things we do for our clients. Let's remind them of the fun stuff. You know, the good stuff we do in our free time and taking care of our community.

16:55 - 17:11

Tiffany Silverberg

And it's been really fun to see people step up and play with it in that way. You see that passion, right?.

17:11 - 17:18

Lauren Hong

Because we can all be passive and just sort of throw your hands up. But that's not been the reaction. There's a lot of heart and soul people who care, have opinions, are sharing their own thoughts, having side conversations, all those sorts of things.

17:18 - 17:37

Lauren Hong

And I felt that, linking back to the Drake campaign too. I felt that energy almost just like it's on the surface. It was like almost after a rainstorm, where they're like, oh my gosh, all these things surface. The soil’s rich and you feel that sort of piece of it.

17:37 - 17:45

Lauren Hong

And so I think that's also a reminder, like you said, just about the positive energy that's going on with the community.

17:45 - 17:47

Tiffany Silverberg

So thank you.

17:48 - 17:54

Lauren Hong

All right. All right. Thanks. Good.

When Marketing Campaigns Go Wrong: Lessons Learned from the CFP Board Recruiting Ads

In this episode of On Purpose, we discuss lessons from a marketing campaign that missed the mark and why brand alignment is crucial to achieving your goals.
Company Culture & Values
October 10, 2024

We talked with Broc about:

  • The power of authenticity and trust when cultivating long-lasting relationships
  • Digging deeper to ask the right questions when choosing an insurance partner
  • How to align values and goals to spark collaboration 

About Broc Buckles:

Broc Buckles is the co-founder of BC Brokerage, a company dedicated to serving financial planners across all 50 states. BC Brokerage focuses on providing honest, efficient, and transparent insurance solutions exclusively for financial advisors and their clients. Recognizing the challenges financial planners face with traditional insurance brokers who often push products for commission, Broc and his team offer a trustworthy alternative. BC Brokerage empowers advisors, especially fee-only fiduciaries, to confidently implement insurance plans without concerns about upselling or misaligned incentives.

Featured Resources 

Enjoyed This? You’ll Also Love:  

Full Audio Transcript:

00:00 - 20:03

Lauren Hong

All right, let's do this. So excited to hear from you today about business, insurance, online yards. You guys are an indie. Where should we start? I'm gonna throw it over to you to share a little bit about background. Like what you guys got going on over there.

00:20 - 00:46

Broc Buckles

Yeah. For sure. Well, thanks. Thanks for having me on, Lauren. Good to be here with you. My name is Broc Buckles. I'm one of the co-founders of a company called BC Brokerage, and we work all over the country — all 50 states — with specifically and exclusively financial planners to help their clients be able to implement insurance in an honest and efficient and fair way so they don't have to kind of deal with the dark side of the insurance industry.

00:46 - 1:11

Broc Buckles

I know a lot of people come from broker dealers or captive places where they're kind of pushed to do one thing, and it always feels like people are being sold one thing. And so the idea behind creating the company was really just to give advisors, who we believe are the true fiduciary, the true advisors of the world, which is fee-only, the opportunity to be able to implement things for their clients.

1:11- 1:34

Broc Buckles

But when we were talking to them early on, one of the biggest things was, I don't know what's going to happen when I ask my client to get some insurance from these random people, and a lot of times they end up selling them. And so, we really pride ourselves on being the antithesis of that. And whatever they come recommended with is the insurance they get.

1:34 - 1:52

Lauren Hong

Okay. So let’s kind of back up. How did you decide to work specifically with the advisor community? And how did you kind of navigate that path for you guys in the insurance world before? And then you kind of narrowed in here, or was it the other way around? Were you on the advisor side? And then you go, hey, you know, we see a problem.

1:52 - 1:53

Lauren Hong

How did that come about?

1:54 - 2:19

Broc Buckles

Yeah. Good question. So we started our careers — actually Peter and I met the first day of intern training — at a big Fortune 500 company that I eventually became kind of disenfranchised with. I was there for about five and a half years. Peter was there for a couple of years and kind of got on the brokerage side. Basically we met up one day, and I was like, I'm not happy with what I'm doing.

2:19 - 2:45

Broc Buckles

And he said to me, well, it's funny because there's this type of financial planner who's out there. They don't do insurance but obviously good financial planning includes insurance. And so I think there's a good opportunity out here. And it was so funny because he always said to me, you know, get the phone to ring the other way — make good B2B relationships with people and then have them call you when they need help with their clients.

2:45 - 2:50

Broc Buckles

And back then I thought he was crazy because the model we were using is you cold call everybody.

2:50 - 2:51

Lauren Hong

Oh yeah.

2:51 - 3:05

Broc Buckles

No one's going to call you. So he kind of told me about it and I said, hey, you know what? Let's run with it. And we started in January of 2020, which was a great time to start a business, right before a big pandemic hit.

3:05 - 3:06

Lauren Hong

Yeah. Yes.

3:06 - 3:18

Broc Buckles

It was rough but we were very disciplined about it. He took advantage of his operational strengths. And I love talking to people. And so it just kind of worked. And here we are today.

3:18 - 3:43

Lauren Hong

So it's a whole world, right? Like the advisor community. There's a lot of jargon, a lot of inroads to be able to figure out and what have you. How did you guys go about that? Did you or Peter come with a base or a subset of that, or how did you help to navigate this community and kind of learn to speak their language and their needs and their clients’ needs?

3:43 - 4:01

Broc Buckles

Yeah. So I mean, it came with just the very small sample size of the people in the Indianapolis area we had talked about. And then we had conversations with them and just asked them, what are your pain points? What is it you struggle with? What are the experiences, both good and bad, you've had when implementing insurance?

4:01 - 4:24

Broc Buckles

And so we took that small sample size and just very literally applied it into a national concept and just said, hey, you know what? We're going to start going to these conferences. We're going to start looking at people who are only on LinkedIn. And honestly, it started with me probably calling 10,000+ people just trying to get appointments because that's what I knew how to do.

4:24 - 4:26

Lauren Hong

Yeah. You were used to that.

4:26 - 4:47

Broc Buckles

Yeah, yeah, yeah. And so, those days aren't really here anymore. We don't really do those anymore because there's a lot more inbound stuff. But it was that. And then we just kind of started meeting with more and more people. The more we met with people, the more we actually realized it's a small but it's a large world.

4:47 - 5:09

Broc Buckles

It's a lot smaller than other parts of the industry but you definitely have everything from solopreneurs all the way up to firms that have billions and billions and billions of dollars under management. And we work with all of them, solopreneurs all the way up to the firms that have close to 100 advisors.

5:09 - 5:26

Lauren Hong

Wow. Yeah. So you really see the full spread there, what's going on. Definitely challenges of those growth periods. So I know you guys work with a lot of IT firms that are part of the Philly network. They're doing really good work out there. I'm assuming a lot of NAPFA firms.

5:26 - 5:35

Lauren Hong

We were talking right before this but just to give a shoutout to XYPN. I know you said it earlier. You're doing their conference, I believe.

5:35 - 5:57

Broc Buckles

Yeah, we're going to be sponsoring it. Shout out to the XYPN community. Awesome community. And what an opportunity Alan Moore and Michael Kitces have given to people who really want to go out and do their own thing. So it's been so cool to watch that grow. And I mean, it was going five or six years before we even started our company; to see the evolution in the five years we've been around has been huge.

5:57 - 6:07

Broc Buckles

And the people I talk to who have been there since the beginning can't believe it. It was like  one roundtable when it first started. And now there's thousands of advisors with them. 

6:07 - 6:21

Lauren Hong

Well, they tapped into a need and yeah, shoutout to Alan too. We had him on our podcast here. It must have been several months ago but he gave a really good overview of how they built that up and the communities they're building and all that. So I'll make sure to link it to.

6:21 - 6:38

Lauren Hong

Okay. So just to go back to what you were saying earlier about this subset, right? You're like, okay, like let's talk with people in our local area, figure out what their needs are, apply that at a national level. I'm sure you guys have learned a ton since then. So if you were in an advisor’s seat, right?

6:38 - 6:52

Lauren Hong

What questions should they be asking if they're thinking about working with someone like you? What are the questions, the top questions they should be thinking about asking? Maybe what people start telling them to make sure it's like the right fit for wherever they are.

6:52 - 7:03

Broc Buckles

Yeah. So I mean, there are obviously other firms out there that do what we do. But I think first and foremost, you have to make sure people have honest business practices, right?

7:03 - 7:05

Lauren Hong

So have that alignment.

7:05 - 7:24

Broc Buckles

Yep, exactly. Just mirroring their fiduciary responsibility in our own work is, I think, one of the things we pride ourselves on the most. And we encourage people to grill us and ask us questions, like why are you choosing this carrier for this client? Why are you deciding to do that? Planning this way? Why are you making this recommendation?

7:24 - 7:42

Broc Buckles

And we build a lot of trust through things like offering some free offerings. We'll review policy analysis with people. So I would say the big thing you want to get a feel for very quickly is, is this a person you're just going to send business to and they're going to make money off the clients you're referring to them?

7:42 - 8:06

Broc Buckles

Or does it really feel like an authentic partnership? And one that's going to create reciprocity and make sure you actually feel like you can lean on them not just for implementing business but also asking questions, and understanding things about the insurance world that maybe are a little bit more nuanced, that you're just not spending your day, every single day as a financial planner, focusing on.

8:06 - 8:20

Lauren Hong

Okay, so the first thing is really just basically getting value alignment. Is this a fit? How do they go about picking their carriers and making choices so they can be rolled along the way and that's okay.

8:20 - 8:21

Broc Buckles

So absolutely.

8:21 - 8:28

Lauren Hong

Any other questions that you feel like advisors should be asking when picking the right vendor to work with?

8:28 - 8:54

Broc Buckles

You know, I would say to ask them what their philosophies are on certain types of products is a really good thing to do. Like, I have advisors all the time ask me about the big, bad permanent insurance world where it's like a lot of advisors are recommending term insurance all the time but they want kind of as a test to ask why, when, and where do you recommend permanent insurance?

8:54 - 9:12

Broc Buckles

And you better have a pretty good answer for that question. There are certain situations where it definitely makes sense; if people are over $10 million net worth, they have special needs planning, if you're looking to do long-term care planning. But ask them questions that are related to not just everyday product lines, right?

9:12 - 9:35

Broc Buckles

Ask them questions about specific products and what situations you would use those products in to see if you align. Because I think you could say, are you going to be honest? Okay, can we trust you or are you going to sell our clients? And that's one thing. But if every single time you recommend something, they're trying to lead you in a different way or it's just a very hard conversation that's never going to work.

9:35 - 9:45

Lauren Hong

So are most of your engagements where you're building the relationship with the advisor, and then they're referring you to their client? Just to make sure I'm following that.

9:45 - 9:45

Broc Buckles

That's how it works.

9:46 - 10:03

Lauren Hong

Okay, cool. That's helpful. Another thing I see sometimes is you can work with a provider and everything looks great on paper with the communications. It's totally want want, like it just falls flat, you know? What do you guys do to make sure that follow-through happens, right?

10:03 - 10:13

Lauren Hong

And making sure people have what they need and the check-ins. Do you have any kind of systemized cadence you've got working with your clients? Because things can get stale, right?

10:13 - 10:34

Broc Buckles

Yeah, things can get stale. So yeah, that's a really good question. And that's more of Peter's department. He's the operation mind. But we have definitely done some things that have truly improved the efficiency and the way things get done. So one of the things was automatic email reminders, right?

10:34 - 10:51

Broc Buckles

So we have a cadence once a week from the time we're introduced. They're going to get a reminder; I would like to say we're pleasantly persistent. And so once a week, we're going to politely remind them to please fill out their intake form if they haven't done that. When we hit a month, we loop the advisor back in.

10:51 - 11:09

Broc Buckles

And then we also created a portal. You know, I think we're a very tech forward firm in the way we want to keep everybody in the loop. So it's a portal that actually talks to our CRM. And then every advisor has an account name, and all of the deals we do underneath their account name with their clients, they can follow along instantaneously.

11:10 - 11:20

Broc Buckles

So the minute we have an update about a case, there's no manual process of email, anything like that; everything happens right away. So that's cut down on processing time, which has been cool. 

11:20 - 11:36

Lauren Hong

And communications with the advisor too because they've got that transparency, the same with your system or what have you. Oh that's really neat that you guys have built that in tandem. So it's not just like a referral relationship but you actually have a portal where they can have that hub and have that transparency to develop that trust.

11:36 - 12:02

Broc Buckles

Yeah, exactly. We took a survey in the beginning, asking how are you keeping track of your clients’ insurance policies once they've been completed? And we heard way too many say via Excel spreadsheets and so were like there has to be a better way. So, when they're done and we've completed something, they can literally go into that portal, click on the policy’s tab and see every policy we've ever implemented with them.

12:02 - 12:17

Broc Buckles

They can actually also add policies we haven't even implemented just to have a filing cabinet system for everything insurance related. There's a note section. So it's literally everything you could want from an organizational standpoint.

12:17 - 12:21

Lauren Hong

Super cool. That's really helpful. Like that one-stop shop.

12:21 - 12:22

Broc Buckles

Yeah.

12:22 - 12:45

Lauren Hong

I also really appreciate how you guys are like, I don't know, in a high tower thinking about what people need but you're actually talking to people, like boots on ground, and then creating real solutions to be able to solve those problems. So, it's good to hear that too. Okay. So you've got the advisor side about how to potentially see if you guys would be the right fit.

12:45 - 13:02

Lauren Hong

But let's kind of flip the table. So let's say an advisor is talking with a client. And they're trying to figure out if they need an insurance solution. What questions do you often tip off to advisors to help them kind of guide them down those right questions if their client does need a service like yours?

13:02 - 13:07

Broc Buckles

So I want to make sure I understand your question. Like how are they figuring out if the client needs the insurance?

13:07- 13:09

Lauren Hong

Yep. You got it.

13:09 - 13:24

Broc Buckles

So, I mean, a lot of them, some of them come from the insurance world so they have a pretty good handle on it. Others, kind of the extent of the insurance knowledge they have is what they learned in the CFP® curriculum, which is not a ton. So there's a lot of on-the-job learning.

13:24 - 13:49

Broc Buckles

But as a general rule of thumb, most people need life insurance. It's just a matter of figuring out how much. For disability income, that's one of those things to where you probably have some through work. Most of the time it's taxed. And so we tell them, if your clients can't live on 40 to 45% of what they're making right now if something were to happen, we probably need to be having a disability conversation.

13:49- 14:07

Broc Buckles

Annuities and permanent insurance, that's getting into the weeds a little bit. So that's a lot different. But then we also recently started within the last about six months offering property and casualty, both commercial and personal, across the United States so that more or less just has to do with, hey, let's check your current coverage, make sure everything's adequate.

14:07 - 14:24

Broc Buckles

Your limits are where they should be, if you wreck into the back of a Lamborghini, you're not going to have to pay out of pocket for it. And that's a little bit more black and white but that's kind of the way we just put the things into their ears and say, here's what you should be looking at.

14:24 - 14:30

Broc Buckles

And like I said, a lot of people already know how to do it. But for the people who are kind of new in this space, those are kinds of the tips we try to give them.

14:30 - 14:36

Lauren Hong

Yeah. So here's a spread of options. Here's the key things to be thinking about when talking with clients. So they have an idea.

14:36 - 14:37

Broc Buckles

Exactly. Yeah.

14:37 - 14:52

Lauren Hong

Okay. Do you mind putting this into reality too? Can you share a case study, maybe an advisor you worked with and kind of like how that engagement went, maybe like a timeline and how things are built over time. And working with them and their clients.

14:52 - 15:10

Broc Buckles

Yeah. It's like a sample case of how we have moved forward with relationships with advisors, as I was talking about.

15:15 - 15:01

Lauren Hong

Yeah, yeah.

15:01 - 15:18

Broc Buckles

Yeah, absolutely. And it's funny how this happens, actually, we have an advisor we've worked with basically since the beginning. And in the beginning it was very much like, here's what the client needs, this is what we want. A lot of the dialog was not rigid but very specific about what the client needed.

15:18 - 15:34

Broc Buckles

And then, as they continue to work with us and we work with case after case and they knew our planning philosophy, when it came to certain product lines, was about the same as theirs was, it's been really cool because now the emails consist of, this person needs this product, take it away.

15:34 - 15:53

Broc Buckles

I trust you guys. And so it was really cool over the last several years to be able to build that relationship to a point where they just know we're going to do the right thing. And when the relationships get to those points that feels really good because that means we're all doing a really good job of making sure we're on the same page.

15:53 - 16:10

Lauren Hong

Yeah, I hear you. It's that trust component too. I think that goes back to your earlier initial question of make sure the value base is there. I mean, that's a good question for vendors in general, make sure there's a good value for it. But I think in this space in particular, like you said, there can sometimes be a bad rap that's associated with it.

16:10 - 16:15

Lauren Hong

And being able to make sure there's that alignment, that philosophy alignment and fiduciary alignment.

16:15 - 16:29

Broc Buckles

So yeah, and you have to stay on your stuff because one thing is for sure, you got to keep people happy. Because, like I said, it can be kind of a big community but it can also be a small community. So you need to make sure you're doing a good job for people.

16:29 - 16:39

Lauren Hong

That's right. That's so true. Okay. So any other final thoughts, shoutouts you want to give anything to?

16:39 - 17:03

Broc Buckles

Yeah. The thing I would say is if you have any questions about what we do, feel free to reach out to me. It's Broc at bc hyphen brokerage.com. Check out our website, BC hyphen brokerage.com. And if anybody's listening who’s thinking about starting an RIA and wants me to put you in touch with someone who's been doing it, I know a lot of people who are very generous with their time, so I'm happy to do that.

17:03 - 17:07

Broc Buckles

And if you want to bounce ideas off me, please don't hesitate to reach out.

17:07 - 17:13

Lauren Hong

Broc, thanks so much. I also want to give you a plug for your podcast as well. So is it fee-only? Is that right?

17:14 - 17:23

Broc Buckles

Only fee-only podcast. You can find us on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Those are the two main hubs.

17:23 - 17:38

Lauren Hong

Okay. Sweet. So we'll make sure to include that link below also to your website, BC Brokerage, as well. So thank you. Appreciate your time and the work you do for this community. Paying it forward. Thank you for sharing your time and insights today.

17:38 - 17:40

Broc Buckles

Yeah. Thanks a lot. Was great to talk to you, Lauren.

17:40 - 17:44

Lauren Hong

Thanks.

Building an Insurance Firm Through Authentic Relationships and Value Alignment with Broc Buckles

In this episode of On Purpose, discover how Broc Buckles empowers advisors to cultivate relationships with insurance providers and implement plans to serve clients' needs.
Hiring & Talent
September 26, 2024

We talked with Gretchen about:

  • Talents versus strengths and how to turn a talent into a strength 
  • How overusing a strength can turn it into a “weakness” 
  • If you are giving away your strengths for free 

About Gretchen Pisano:

As the CEO and co-founder of pLink Leadership, Gretchen Pisano focuses on executive coaching and leadership development, aiming to align individual and collective growth with organizational strategy. She finds joy in the challenge of guiding teams, likening it to steering an aircraft carrier—a hard but rewarding task. Her journey reflects the idea that no experience is wasted, as she believes her early career in graphic facilitation laid the foundation for her expertise. For seven years, she traveled globally, illustrating live conversations during high-level corporate meetings. This experience honed her ability to listen deeply—not just to what was said but also to what was left unsaid, across various cultural contexts. It led her to facilitate strategic conversations, where she noticed while organizations invest heavily in systems, they overlook the importance of changing how people think. This realization spurred her to pursue a master’s degree in applied positive psychology, combining her street smarts with evidence-based theories. 

Featured Resources 

Enjoyed This? You’ll Also Love: 

Full Audio Transcript:

Lauren (00:05):

Gretchen, thank you for joining us today.

Gretchen (00:07):

Thank you for having me.

Lauren (00:08):

Yes. I was just reading again, your bio before you joined, and you have such an incredible deep background of working with companies of all different sizes and cultures and what have you. I think what really resonated with me, I actually have to read the lines about when you work with organizations, the outputs around really increasing revenues, establishing honest and inclusive cultures, aligning mindsets and behaviors that really impact and foster just a positive working relationship and culture within an organization. That is not easy to do. So there are so many components, emotional, psychologically to intermix with that, not to mention just org structures and all kinds of stuff. So I want to get into some of that today but I don't want to steal your thunder. I'd love just to hear from you a little bit more about your background and how you got into the really impactful work you're doing today.

Gretchen (01:08):

All right. Well, it's a story but aren't they all, and I think this is a great example of no experience is ever wasted, how it all kind of weaves together. So early in my career I did something called graphic facilitation. And in graphic facilitation, you're literally illustrating the conversation that's happening in the room. And so large organizations use this when they're doing large-scale meetings. And all that meant was I had seven years of literally traveling around the world in different companies, working with different facilitators at the time, and listening to the way the people think. And when you're illustrating a conversation, your back is to the room. And so you're really listening not just to what people say but also to what isn't being said and breathing patterns and how that differs when you're in North America or in Asia or South America.

And so that was, I really think about that as my 10,000 hours in relation to listening to how people think. And that led me directly into facilitating strategic conversations. I was naturally good at that. We're going to be talking about strengths. It was one of my strengths and I spent a lot of time with very senior teams helping them think through strategy. And I noticed people were spending a lot of time and money designing organizational systems and they were not spending the same amount of time or money helping people think and changing the way people think and the number one obstacle to successfully executing on a great idea is people, is human nature. And so that got me really interested in the field where I am now by passion and by project. So I evolved into a master's in applied positive psychology to help me partner up my street smarts with some good strong theory and evidence to understand that.

And then I scaled that into pLink Leadership, where we do executive coaching and leadership development that is designed to be an enterprise solution. And I just qualify that because sometimes when you think about executive coaching, it's like a one-off outside benefit. And the way we approach it is that this is integrated into your strategy and the goal is to make it all fit together so people are working both individually and collectively on the things they need to be working on to be able to advance the strategy. And it is hard. I mean, it's really fun and we love doing it. I love doing it and it is hard. It's like turning an aircraft carrier to get a whole bunch of people pointed in the same direction but hard stuff is worth doing and I love doing it.

Lauren (04:08):

It is. So tell us a little bit more about the strengths component. I know you were alluding to that too. How are you, when you're working with individuals and teams, really defining strengths? You talk about strengths versus skills and how do you define those two?

Gretchen (04:26):

I mean, we go back to the theory on that—we are not the original authors of the strengths theory. Really that would be the CliftonStrengths, which roots back to Gallup. And so they are really the preeminent experts in this area. So they define a strength as a talent plus knowledge plus skill plus time invested. So what's important about that is that a talent is a naturally occurring way of thinking and feeling and doing. It's something you don't have to think hard about doing. You're just sort of drawn to it and maybe you are naturally good at it but it doesn't become a strength unless you flank it with knowledge, flank it with skills development, and then invest the time. So you can have raw talent that never becomes a strength. A strength is when you've invested that time in; it just becomes a part of who you are in terms of your thinking, feeling, and doing. And that trio is important because behavior we know is motivated by emotion, and emotion is driven by thought. So it all kind of works together to make us very good at something with less effort and a lot more enjoyment. Like the act itself delivers satisfaction, not just the output. And that's a strength, that's a strength in action. And then a skill, you can be really good at something that is not a strength. The distinction is that exercising a skill consumes energy. Exercising a strength produces energy even while it's putting it out.

Lauren (06:15):

That's such a great way to think about it sort of in simple terms. So can you maybe share some examples for how you've been able to pull out strengths among teams or skills among teams? How do you kind of slice and dice that when you get involved with an organization and being able to pull out those nuances?

Gretchen (06:36):

So it's important to know that people cannot make change successfully if they're not standing on firm ground. So we always start with helping people be sure they have a clear understanding of who they are in their current context. And that's important because context shows change. You can take a great leader in one context, change their context, meaning they go to a different company altogether or maybe their role completely changes, and all of a sudden they're starting to get negative feedback or the other way around, they're struggling over here, they get lateral and they just bloom and bloom. So the context is important. We help them to really understand who they are in that context. Strength is a big component of that; so are values. So is how you see your future best self. And so we use the CliftonStrengths assessment to get a baseline and we tell people going in, this is not truth; it's a doorway to insight. And we ask them to read through the strengths insight report and say, which of this feels most true to you? Give a blank version of your guide to somebody who knows you well and ask them which things in here stand out for you as being true, and then work with that. And then from there, we help them to think through which of these ones that feel most true—I know this would be true about myself for as long as I can remember.

And then we really move forward from there to help them understand what does that look like when it's in excellence, meaning it's serving you really well and you're using it in the way that makes sense and is productive and where might you be overusing it. I think this was one of my early really big insights, which is that oftentimes an area of development or what people refer to as a weakness. I don't like to use that language because it implies it's an inherent flaw in us when really a weakness is just something other people don't like. Just like a weed is still a plant. It's just a plant growing in a place you don't want it.

So I like the notion of an area of development or an area of opportunity, and we have these areas of development we hear all the time—you're honest to a fault or why don't you ever sit down? Or how come it's so important to you to be the architect of what's going forward? And we hear it so many times, and it's connected to one of our strengths in excess because we have to remember when we're using a strength, it feels fulfilling to us. It feels natural to us, it leaves us rewarded but sometimes we can overuse it and other people experience that as a flaw.

And so then they give us that feedback and they tell us, you shouldn't be like this. But then we tell ourselves, well, how can I not be like this? This is who I am. So then if we start to understand it's about volume, we are like, oh, we just have to learn how to modulate the volume. So if I have the strength of ideation and I love to throw ideas around when I'm hanging out with other people who also have the strength of ideation, we're speaking each other's language and we can go to town with that. But if I'm in a room full of people who maybe are in charge of making the plan real, they're more of the executing strengths. I need to temper my ideation because I'm just thinking out loud. But to them, they become overwhelmed with all the different directions something can go or how would we make that real?

Lauren (10:45):

I see that as well oftentimes, or can frankly just get off track from a strategy that's preset and making sure we are aligned, right?

Gretchen (10:56):

Totally innocently, they don't even know. We don't even know we're doing it unless we've done the work to understand our strengths and what they look like in excellence. We just pop off with an idea and then we're shocked when other people don't love that we're contributing an idea. And somebody else might say, Gretchen, we're 10 days down the path on this. We're not going to change right now.

Lauren (11:21):

Right. So when you're going through and doing these strengths assessments, are you doing this across the team or is it just within a department or a leadership team, or is it sort of case by case with the engagement?

Gretchen (11:34):

Yeah, I was going to say yes. And so if we're doing individual coaching it’s part of every coaching package but it's also not uncommon at all to start this way. If you are bringing a team together for the first time, or say you have a new leader to a preexisting team, it's a great opportunity to do a strengths inventory to understand who's on the team and help people have the conversation with each other about which of the strengths they see most present in their leadership style, in their current context, what they lean into when they need courage or when they're making a decision. We have a conversation where we ask people to share what they see as their superpowers in kryptonite. So it's not like you say, oh, my superpower is futuristic ideation maximizer. That doesn't mean any sense to anybody. It's like, wait, how does that even translate? But if you're able to say, my superpower is in really helping people figure out where they can make their contribution, or my superpower is in seeing around corners, or my superpower is in helping us think about a different way of doing something, then people are like, oh, okay, I get it.

Lauren (12:53):

I get it. It feels more tangible or real or what have you.

Gretchen (12:56):

Yeah, it's like what you see every day. So that's how a team would use it when you're first coming together and building a foundation.

Lauren (13:04):

So fascinating. So you've given the example earlier about ideation. You'd be in a work setting and there's maybe someone who's in more of a senior leadership role, a CEO or what have you, it's just they're an ideator. But sometimes those situations where they're perhaps over indexing and their strength innocently comes out in just natural ways. What role do you play—I don’t know if the right word is intervene—but to be able to help kind of coach teams along the way, and those things that are just naturally coming up through the day. Is it those one-on-one conversations? How do you be that fly on the wall to help guide the teams?

Gretchen (13:48):

Yeah. Well, I think that is different by engagement. It really depends on what they're asking you to be in there for. But the initial meeting we do, typically it's a one-day session where you've got a team together either virtually or in person, and you're doing both values and strengths to lay the foundation, and you're helping them to have that conversation with each other. We give them an artifact afterwards so they can see how the team lays out. It would also be really important for me to say out loud that just because something's not your strength doesn't mean you're not really good at it.

So a common mistake, we see people being like, this is so great. I want everybody to have a placard with their strengths, and we put that outside their office or their cubicle. And this is a terrible idea because it's like you wouldn't say, hello, Lauren. Lauren doesn't have any strategy strengths. We're just not going to invite her to this conversation. Just boxing people, boxing. And that's also not how it works. The strength piece of it is that you are more naturally good at it and you're going to be drawn toward wanting to do it. So that piece of it is different and it's going to energize you doing it. Typically, you'd also say people have a higher, faster rate of learning when they're in a strength. And people by virtue of knowledge and skill and time invested can become very skilled at something and how they recharge afterwards. That's none of our business. So I think it's really important to make sure people are clear that as an individual, it's your decision point about how you want to navigate your role and where you want to be investing yourself. What I'll say as a coach with many years of experience is that it's not uncommon to see people build entire careers on their skills because we believe we deserve to be paid for what feels hard, and we give away what feels easy.

Lauren (15:54):

Interesting.

Gretchen (15:54):

So people volunteer in their area of strength, people discount their services in their area of strength. They give it away for free in their area of strength, and then they're like, this is where I'm going to charge. And then you end up creating a structure, a lifestyle portfolio of services or clients and then you're like, why am I doing this? I'm not enjoying it. I'm really good at it, but I don't enjoy it.

Lauren (16:19):

You look around and you go, gosh, not everyone's as good at doing what I'm doing. 

Gretchen (16:25):

Right. The other things. Yeah. So I would just offer that. So going back to your question, our goal would be to equip the team to talk to each other about the strengths and then to be able to do some one-on-one coaching with, for example, the more senior people to help them to understand where they might be habitually. Part of our workshop is understanding which of the ones that you might have a habit of over-indexing on and what might trigger that.

Lauren (16:56):

Yeah, super interesting. So it sounds like bringing not only self-awareness but not boxing that self-awareness, and then along the way, helping to coach individuals so they can flourish where they might not have recognized strengths before. 

Gretchen (17:14):

Yeah, so I think in organizational development, the hardest part is you're thinking on three levels all the time, like an individual team and then let's call it mission. So you kind of have to be thinking about that all as an individual. How do I want to think about my own strengths as a leader? How do I want to capitalize on the strengths of my team? And as a person has responsibility for the mission and the vision? How are we doing moving toward that and who might I need to move around or what responsibilities might I need to move around to make that journey easier?

Lauren (17:50):

So fascinating. Oh my goodness, Gretchen, this is such a deep topic and it's so important and impacts all of us and the workplace, and so I really appreciate you sharing your insights and depth of perspective and working with teams, especially all different sizes. Are there any other final thoughts or takeaways you'd like to share with folks as well?

Gretchen (18:15):

I guess what I would end with is that we spend so much time at work. We spend so much of our waking hours at work, so why wouldn't we want that to be as enjoyable as possible? And some of that is about other people interacting with us and what we can manage and what we can't manage. But a lot of it has to do with the work we do. And so if we job craft ourselves, we don't even have to change jobs. If we just craft ourselves into a set of responsibilities that tap our strengths, it not only makes our outcomes better but it changes our quality of experience.

Lauren (18:58):

Mindset lifts up.

Gretchen (19:01):

So at the end of the day, you're like, oh, I feel filled up. That was so good, as opposed to just feeling wiped out and drained.

Lauren (19:09):

Yes. So well said. Well, Gretchen, thank you again for your time. We'll make sure to include links as well to your bio and website and what have you but so fascinating. So many great nuggets to take away. So thank you again.

Gretchen (19:21):

Good. You're welcome.

Navigating and Optimizing the Strengths of Your Team with Gretchen Pisano

On this episode of On Purpose, learn how Gretchen Pisano helps leaders align personal and team growth with strategy by harnessing their strengths.
Operations & Management
September 12, 2024

We talked with Seth about:

  • The power of content creation in business growth 
  • Key chapters in your accounting strategy you can’t afford to miss 
  • The importance of shifting your focus to the outcomes rather than on time spent or number of tasks completed 

About Seth David:

Seth David, Chief Nerd at Nerd Enterprises, Inc., has a unique journey that combines creativity with analytical expertise. After majoring in computer science and dabbling in theater, Seth shifted his focus to finance, working as a stockbroker on Wall Street. He later earned an accounting degree and built a successful career as a senior revenue accountant. Driven by an entrepreneurial spirit, Seth went on to found Nerd Enterprises, where he helps accountants, bookkeepers, and financial professionals run their businesses more efficiently. Today, he thrives as a leader, blending technical skills with a passion for business.

Featured Resources 


Full Audio Transcript:

Lauren (00:06):

Seth, thank you so much for being on the show today. I'm glad to have you here, and I feel like I kind of already know you because I've been checking out your website, watching your podcast, all kinds of stuff. But why don't you share with folks a little bit about your background. You've got a really interesting story and what you've created is very interesting as well. So I'll hand it over to you.

Seth (00:28):

Thank you. I'll try to give you the very short version of what feels like several lifetimes of a story. But yeah, real quick, I got out of high school and I majored in computer science. I was a total nerd. I liked learning how to write code. The code we wrote in those days was very, very different from now. The languages we wrote in don't even exist anymore, I don't think. At least not in their original forms. And at the same time, a friend of mine invited me to get involved in theater, so I started doing acting. But at least in my view I didn't have any talent for it but I enjoyed it and then I got better at it over time. So long story short, I got into that and then left that at one point because my interest in academics was declining and I didn't want to waste time and money on college that I wasn't really putting in the effort toward. So I left. And my goal at that point actually was to get a job, make enough money to travel across to California, and make it in the acting world. I had this grand master plan, the kind of plans 19-year-olds tend to have. 

Lauren (01:39):

Totally. I love it.

Seth (01:39):

Very, very romantic. I was going to drive across the country in a Jeep with the top down and all the stuff you'd imagine that would go around us.

Lauren (01:46):

Totally can see the picture.

Seth (01:49):

And so that didn't happen. But along the way, as the means of making that money, I figured I needed to save up 10 grand to buy the Jeep or something like that. Again, we're talking many years ago.

Lauren (02:02):

Prices were a little different. 

Seth (02:04):

But still you get the idea. I needed to save up. So I was already kind of becoming a planner, like, all right, I needed 10 grand for the Jeep and then enough money to get across the country, and then I'd figure it out from there. So as I'm looking for jobs, I was looking to work waiting tables at restaurants, and all of a sudden I noticed stockbroker trainee $10,000 a month. I'm like, done. I can be there in a month. I can have my Jeep in one month. So next thing I know, I'm in stockbroker trainee programs with a company and studying to take my Series 7 license, and I'm like, I don't know where this comes from. This totally didn't feel like me but the guy who I worked for, the first one, he was a very good salesman and he was very good at getting you to open up so he could figure out what to sort of leverage to sell you on what he wanted you to do. And so he's like, oh, this is just an acting job. You're basically getting on the phone and painting a picture that you're this Wall Street tycoon. And I'm like, oh, is that right? It's just acting on the phone. Perfect. Done. Let's do it

So I did that. And then again, very long story short, I ended up actually doing pretty well. The years went on, I was 21 now working as a stockbroker on Wall Street, and I was convinced by my then girlfriend's brother as well as my own family that I should still go back and get a degree in something just to have something to fall back on. So I left that business and went back to school and got my accounting degree. And along the way I said, well, I should give this a shot since I've just put in a lot of time and effort into getting an accounting degree and Wall Street will still be there. And so there we were. And then a very long story, very short again, and I don't know how in-depth we want to go but I'll give you the simple version for now.

I know time is limited. I decided I needed a significant change in my life. And so I ended up coming to California but for very different reasons than I originally intended and started over and worked some temp jobs and eventually landed at a very large publicly traded company, moved my way up, worked as a senior revenue accountant for them, and then I went to a CPA firm. And then little by little I started my own company because frankly I just hated working for other people. And I came to the conclusion that I was unemployable because I couldn't stand having to listen to other people, especially when I didn't agree with the way they did things. So that's how Nerd Enterprises was born, quite literally. And then I just kind of carved it out. I was like, let me figure out what I really like to do and leave out the stuff I don't like to do or delegate it. I learned that early on, do what I'm really good at and the stuff I'm really good at tends to be the stuff I really enjoy doing. And when I don't enjoy doing something, I probably suck at it anyway, so I should give it to somebody else.

Lauren (04:53):

Yeah, it's delegate or die syndrome. So I totally hear you on that. What you built is pretty amazing. I know you do a lot of consulting work for different businesses but you've also got this community. Can you tell us a little bit more about the facets of the business you've been able to build and why you've invested in these different wings of building out these offerings?

Seth (05:16):

So a lot of it just happened organically, really just figuring things out as I go. So years ago I had a guy I partnered up with and we started a website based on a course I had written. It was like a bookkeeping basics course, and he had the marketing expertise. So we came in and we started building a whole business and I developed a bunch of other courses. And again, long story short, he and I parted company, and when we did, I actually walked away. I said, you know what? You keep the business. We just did not agree on how we did a lot of things, kind of the same old story, same reason I didn't like working for other people. And I said, I can own it. Maybe it's me. Maybe I'm just not a good team player or something. So I said, you keep the business, I'm going to go do my own thing. Excuse me. This got me out of any kind of non-compete or anything like that. We didn't sign anything formally. We just said we're going to part ways so I go my way and they go their way.

And so I'm sitting here one day going, all right, I need to rebuild. I'm still going to do courses and things but I'm going to do it on my own. Question is where do I start? What do I do? I don't want to deal with all the headaches that seem to come with having a subscription-based site because I knew what he was struggling with. It was just constant, especially as the business grew and we had a lot of subscribers and I can't find my password. It's amazing to me how many people still did not know how to click that password reset link at the login screen. Anyway, so I just said, you know what? I don't want to deal with that. And I knew about the site Patreon and I said, you know what? I can kind of structure it through that. I'll create different tiers. I'll offer different course content. I'll put the videos up on Vimeo so I can make them private and only give them access to people at the right tier. And this way they handle that business part of it. If somebody has trouble logging in, Patreon handled it,

And I did that for a while until I got tired of it because obviously I was paying them a fee on top of the processing fees for the payment processors. And so eventually I said, okay, it's growing big enough that it's worth it for me to spend the time now and deal with the headache of running my own subscription site. And meanwhile, I had to establish these different tiers, one of which was based on $97 and up. I built out an official sort of name for a program that I called Accounting Business Academy but it was based on that tier from Patreon. And I kind of just ported them over and said, look, you're going to get all the same stuff but new platform and login.

Lauren (07:48):

Better bells and whistles, much better whistles and so forth.

Seth (07:50):

And the 97 please.

Lauren (07:52):

Just to break, what was the threshold that you go, okay, I know you talked about it got to big enough point to move it out. Was it based on just the volume of individuals? What was that threshold for you?

Seth (08:08):

I think the threshold was, again, very organically. It was based on a feeling like, I don't want to pay all these fees anymore that I'm paying to Patreon plus waiting for them to pay me out.

Lauren (08:18):

It wasn't a community size. It was more of kind of where you were, you saw the evolution of where it could go.

Seth (08:23):

Yeah, and I'm sure that was largely driven by the amount of people I was accumulating, and ultimately I wanted to get it on a platform I truly owned. So did it on WordPress with a subscription plugin, and eventually I was guided actually by a colleague to move it to Kajabi, which is what my site is built on now, because that's just an amazing platform that's built for course creation and just content creators and you manage the whole thing. All my emails go out from that system. It's beautiful.

Lauren (08:56):

Okay, so you've got this pretty amazing community you built, and I know you do consulting work as well. So can you tell us who is in that community? 

Seth (09:12):

It's mostly accountants and bookkeepers. I've got a sprinkling of business owners who aren't accountants per se but they just feel like they get value added but very, very minimal. It's almost exclusively accountants and bookkeepers who are looking for my guidance to help learn the tools and systems and strategies and processes to help grow and run their practices better. A lot of them have the same struggles. They're up to their eyeballs and work but aren't really making enough money. If you look at the money by itself, it might look good but when you compare that to how many hours and energy they have to put in to make it, it doesn't really feel like a lot of money. And so they want to learn how to scale and just do better and have more freedom. And by the way, the name 97 and Up just stuck. People liked it. Even my wife was like, yeah, it's a catchy name. You should just stick with that.

Lauren (09:57):

It's easy to pronounce all those things, simple. Okay. So accountants and bookkeepers, and you've got this community. Are they leveraging the content you built? It sounds like it's evergreen content from a while ago. Are you doing community groups and conversations? Is there a forum? What kind of bells and whistles are inside of the actual community itself?

Seth (10:18):

So they get access to a bunch of courses for free. That's just included with 97 and Up. They get deep discounts on any new courses. I have a series of courses called Bulletproof Bookkeeping. So these are major in-depth courses and they get deep discounts on those. We do two weekly calls. So we do a call every Tuesday and Thursday at 11 a.m. Pacific for an hour. And some of them I have open so people can just come and ask questions and we answer them. Others I have planned topics for and it's funny, bringing things forward to 2024, I'm actually using ChatGPT alot to help me outline the content. I would never dare have it write the content for me but I love having it write the outline for me because then I go in between the lines and fill in the details. Just saves time.

Lauren (11:01):

Yeah, I hear you on leveraging that. Okay. So tell me more about this community. You've got all these super in-depth offerings. You've got these calls that are going on. What are the common threads of questions you see that are coming up over the years? Is there a common set of questions folks are asking or their deep dive need? And what kind of things are you seeing as trends within the community you’ve built?

Seth (11:27):

So there's two kinds of major camps I want to put the topics in that I get asked most from the accountants and bookkeepers and the major camps are based on being in two different places. So a lot of them, of course, want more clients and their struggle is with how to get more clients. Accountants and bookkeepers notoriously I want to say rely exclusively on word of mouth and referrals. And some do very well that way. And so it works, it's fine. But in my opinion, humble or not, it's just leaving too much in the hands of the universe. And I prefer something more systematized. So I know I have a process that involves doing something to encourage the universe to drive those leads my way. You know what I mean?

Lauren (12:12):

To be able to pull them in and say, hey, I'm over here. I can do really quality work and be able to validate that trust out in the marketplace. So one camp is basically, I need more clients. How do I get more clients? I'm assuming you as well as the community itself is helping to pour into those answers.

Seth (12:30):

And by the way, it's in Slack. I've tried the experiment of using all these other platforms. When Salesforce bought Slack, I got worried they were going to kind of crush the small guy because Salesforce typically deals with such big businesses. And so I left Slack for a while. I tried Mighty Networks, I tried Discord, I tried a bunch, and I landed back on Slack because none of them quite measured up as far as I was concerned. It's funny, it's one dumb little feature that really drove me back that I really missed, which only Slack seems to have where I can go into a message and click the little ellipsis and say, remind me, and I can choose in an hour, three hours, on Monday, or customize the time I live by that I would drop so many balls if it wasn't for that feature. Discord doesn't have it. That one feature alone I think drove me back to Slack.

Lauren (13:18):

User experience. Yep, yep. Okay. So pouring into those, are there any kind of automatic advice you're giving to folks looking to get more business? I know you mentioned earlier this kind of automation, let the universe know to pull you in. What kind of conversations are you having or at-large recommendations you're seeing for folks where they are wanting to pull in that business?

Seth (13:42):

So number one, of course, and I've tried to work around this a bit because the number one way I'm naturally going to tell people to bring in clients is based on what I've done, which is produce content, videos, blog posts, podcasts. There's so many different ways to do it but a lot of accountants come back to me, excuse me, and say they're just not going to do it. They don't have the personality, they don't want to get on video, they don't want to turn their camera on. I say, fine, then keep your camera off but you can still do a screen share video and teach a thing in QuickBooks online or something. I mean, that's really how I did it initially; I took the questions I was being asked most frequently by my accounting clients and made videos about them, frankly out of laziness because I was tired of writing out the same answers in emails. So I made a video and said, here's a video. It'll do a much better job of showing you what to do than I can do in a wall of text for you.

Lauren (14:33):

Yes, I hear you.

Seth (14:35):

So anyway, you can fire up your Camtasia with your screen and don't turn on your camera. That's fine. But the other thing is the time. And that brings in the other problem. The other question in the other camp that a lot of them have, which is I'm up to my eyeballs. I can forget about taking on more clients. I need to figure out how to manage the ones I have and keep everything organized.

Lauren (14:52):

That's scalability,

Seth (14:54):

Especially in accounting, you have so many important deadlines. It's not like, look, let's face it, if a marketing company misses a deadline for producing a blog article, it's not the end of the world. I mean, it's one article.

Lauren (15:06):

It's going to be okay. 

Seth (15:08):

Yeah, exactly. But if I miss a sales tax deadline for a client, that costs the client money, a lot of it potentially. So there's a different kind of level of pressure for accountants and bookkeepers to make sure they don't drop any balls. And so that's the other camp where I work with them. And a lot of times a classic thing people will look to do, and this is not just for accountants, this is for any kind of company, is they see they don't seem to have capacity. So what do they do? They hire people. And that actually makes the problem worse because if you hire people into a non-system, all you're doing is amplifying the disorganization of that system. And so now you just have more disorganized people.

So usually the answer is not hire somebody but let's dial in the systems. Let's take inventory. I've made a very thorough study recently, actually again, of David Allen's “Getting Things Done” so I could use that to inform how I work with accountants and bookkeepers and say, first let's just inventory every little thing that's pinging and dinging at your brain that's causing you stress and let's get it out of your brain and into, I don't care if it's on an actual piece of paper, just get it out of your head. And really what that all points to is they don't have a good system, they don't have a process. And the biggest mistake they make, and I suspect this is also beyond just the accounting industry, is they get the project management app and they think, oh, now I've got the system. But the problem is the app is not the system.

Lauren (16:41):

That's right. It's the organization that goes into the system.

Seth (16:43):

Yes, the system has to exist devoid of any apps. Then you use the system to figure out how you're going to execute using the app as the tool you use to execute the system. And they miss that. So they go from app to app thinking it's the app, and yet it's that definition of insanity being in the same place and expecting different results, doing the same thing and expecting different results.

Lauren (17:05):

Yeah, I love “Getting Things Done” too. I've read it several times and one of my favorite takeaways from it is if it's going to take two minutes, just go and do it. If it's not, then put it on your list. It's just simple rules to be able to keep things going because you go, oh, this isn't going to take me that long. Two hours later you're in it, and then everything else is just shuffled around. So I want to back up. So you've got this amazing community. We've got kinds of different camps of conversations or questions that are coming out of it. You're also on the consulting end too. You're talking with businesses of all different sizes, I'm sure, different folks, and are there stair step themes you’re also seeing at different junctures of business, either from revenue size or employee count or what have you? I'd love to hear what themes you hear coming out of those consulting conversations.

Seth (18:02):

So yeah, I think this is where it gets interesting because you're right to point out the size of the business and then how that drives the nature of the question. So the smallest businesses, all they care about really is how much money did I make and how much do I owe in taxes? And I never really liked working with clients on that level. I just felt like I wasn't adding a lot of value. And so eventually I reached a point where I would interview a prospect and if I got the sense all they cared about was getting a P&L and a balance sheet so they could get their return filed, I didn't want them. I'd pass them to somebody else. 

I wanted clients who wanted to really strategically use the accounting information I could compile for them. And so that made a difference. And for that, you're talking about your micro businesses that are doing say from a hundred thousand a year maybe up to half a million gross revenue. Just to kind of illustrate the point even further, years ago I had a client at this level, she probably did just about a hundred K a year. I used to try and encourage her to look at the balance sheet with me and she's like, no, no, no, I don't care. I just want to see the P&L. I just need to know how much money I make — until she got audited. And she was just randomly selected for what they call a desk audit, which means nobody's going to come in person; they're just going to request information and we send it in.

Well, looking at the auditor's questions, it was pretty clear to me what they were questioning because she had been in business for about five years. She was showing losses each year. And their essential question — they didn't ask this directly but it was evident from the questions they did — was how are you still in business running these losses? And the whole answer was on her balance sheet, which by the way, when you're a small business like that and you're just filing a Schedule C, there is no balance sheet. So they can't see that. But if I was able to show once, it was clear to me what they were going after; she had liabilities that equaled almost to the dollar the cumulative losses year over year. So I was able to basically put the picture together, and this is the thing about numbers for businesses as they tell a story, and this told the story of how she financed these losses based on debt. It's that simple. So anyway, it's interesting in that way. And then of course she got real interested in the balance sheet. After that she was like, okay, I want to learn about the balance sheet. I didn't even bother with the statement of cash flows.

But so then you scale up in size and all of a sudden, to me, it gets much more interesting because the questions get more interesting. Now they get more interested in how do I use this information to scale and grow? What kind of decisions can I make based on this? Okay, so if I look at your financial statements month over month, which I always insisted on doing, never just running it for the year in total but month over month. I want to look at trends. I want to look at the months where we did poorly, and then I want to understand why. And the clients, as you get to the million and up level, that's where they get interested in that stuff. And by the way, that's where they recognize a lot more value in what their accountants can do for them, which is where you can command much better fees. And also you get much fewer complaints. It's always the small clients that complain the most about your bill. At this level, they're like, I don't care, I'll pay you whatever you need. Just make sure I get the information. In other words, these clients at this level really want to save time and they'll pay a lot for that.

Lauren (21:11):

Save time and resources so they can make more strategic decisions zeroed in on the numbers so they can adjust and flex. And if you're able to be there as a partner, I mean, that's tremendous value, right? 

Seth (21:21):

Yeah, that's where the value is. And I still, going back to the conversations I have with the accountants, a lot of it is they're still attaching value to the inputs of what they do. And people like me in the accounting space have been working really hard for years now to try and get them to disassociate value with the inputs and reassociate value with the outcomes. And that's so important because we were just discussing the real value is in what I can help the client do differently with their business. It's not in how much time it took to reconcile their bank accounts or how many transactions they had. I hate that. By the way, when people talk about pricing based on transaction volume, it's such a low value way to price your accounting service.

Lauren (22:02):

No, it's fair. So let me just back up again. So is your kind sweet spot in working with folks who are under the $5 million point, or how do you scale up with who you work with?

Seth (22:17):

At one point I actually established I wouldn't take on a company that wasn't doing at least a million dollars a year. But funny story, I got into e-commerce by accident. I had a client come in my door who had seen my videos on YouTube and was convinced I was the guy, even though initially I was like, I don't have e-commerce experience; there are people who specialize in that.

But he kept insisting. So I chose to take him on. When I started working with him, I want to say he was probably doing well over a million dollars a year. By the time we parted company because he outgrew me and hired his own internal accounting staff, he was doing a million dollars a month. So I mean, it's quite a range I was able to work with. But with e-commerce, that's not uncommon, especially with big Amazon sellers. So it's hard to gauge it only based on revenues. There are companies that do very high ticket deals but the transaction volume is low. So that could be a $50 million a year company and yet not a whole lot in the trenches, so to speak.

Lauren (23:23):

That makes sense. So it just really varies.

Seth (23:28):

And by the way, when you get to his level, the companies that are doing $12 million+ a year, again, the conversation changes because now you're likely dealing with a board of directors and other stakeholders where I'm answering to my client who's answering to them. And so when my client and I had this happen, I can be honest, when my client gets ripped a new one, quote unquote, because he can't explain the numbers properly, guess who else is going to have that same experience? He's going to come back to me; that's going to blow back on me. And I've had to have those uncomfortable conversations where it's like, hey, I'm sorry but let's address this and get it fixed. So now you're dealing with several layers as the accountant; you're dealing with several levels because you've got your client and then the people your client is answering to. And then at one point, I was working with companies who were going right up to the point of going public. What I used to say to them is, the day you have to do your first SEC filing, I'm out. That's above my pay grade. The buck stops there for me. I'm not doing any SEC filings.

Lauren (24:33):

That's fair. Oh my goodness. Well, this is so helpful. I appreciate you sharing, kind of like you said the mountaintops, just some of the themes you're seeing within your community, within your clients and what have you. I also just want to give a shout out to your content as well. Landing on your website, hearing your story, like I mentioned to you before, it's so human and so real. And you've got a podcast, Guide to the Galaxy, right? So super fun. I appreciate that realness. And also just you can tell there's that people-first educational piece to all you do. So I appreciate you sharing some of those lessons learned with folks.

Seth (25:10):

Thank you so much. I appreciate that.

Lauren (25:11):

And we'll make sure to include a link to your website as well. So this is great. Thank you again for your time and looking forward to just checking out all the great things you're doing and seeing more podcasts come out.

Seth (25:23):

Fantastic. Thank you.

Lauren (25:24):

Thank you. 

Business Growth Tips for Accountants, Bookkeepers, and Financial Services Business Owners

On this episode of On Purpose, discover how Seth David combines creativity and analytical expertise to help financial services professionals grow business.
Hiring & Talent
August 29, 2024

We talked with Mary about:

  • The similarities between Gen Z and previous generations and the fresh perspectives they’re bringing to the table
  • Content marketing ideas that resonate with Gen Z and speak to their key priorities
  • How financial services companies can rethink their hiring practices, marketing approaches, and other outreach efforts to better connect with Gen Z

About Mary Wisniewski:

Mary Wisniewski is the editor-at-large at Cornerstone Advisors, where she shapes content strategy. In journalism since 2008, covering banking innovation and fintech with brands such as Bankrate and American Banker, Mary offers unique insights into the evolving financial services landscape. Her most recent work focuses on how companies are adapting their strategies to connect with the next generation of under-30 investors, financial planning clients, and employees. Appreciating Gen Z’s focus on self-care, work-life balance, and pursuing passions beyond financial success, Mary recognizes an excellent opportunity for banks, credit unions, and other financial services companies to engage a generation with distinct concerns and goals. Mary frequently speaks at industry events, in the media, and as the host of her podcast, “Money I$n’t Everything,” sharing strategies and research for better understanding and serving Gen Z.

Featured Resources 

Enjoyed This? You’ll Also Love: 

Full Audio Transcript:

Lauren (00:05):

Well, Mary, thanks for joining us.

Mary (00:07):

Yeah, it's a pleasure to be here. Thanks for having me.

Lauren (00:09):

Oh my gosh, I'm so excited to hear from you. And our team was also just chatting about it. They're like, tell us more about Gen Z and all the things you're seeing in the fintech world and all these good things. So before we get into all of that, I'm just going to hand it over to you. Can you just share with folks a little bit about your background and how you got to where you are today?

Mary (00:29):

Yeah, so I hear people say this, and it's also true for me. It's been a series of accidents. The only non-accident was I pursued journalism and moved to New York City for a job in jewelry writing at the time. But one thing led to another and I ended up being a blogger covering bank innovation in 2008. From there, I jumped in. 

Lauren (00:51):

What a time.

Mary (00:52):

What a time. Yeah. It was like, oh, what's happening? No one knows what we're talking about but that's okay. It really got me interested. It got me meeting people who really went on to huge things. It's fun looking back. But yeah. Then I went to American Banker editing op-eds and covering fintech for the brand. And then from there, Bankrate, and today I'm at Cornerstone as an editor-at-large who shaped their content strategy. And I also host a fintech podcast called Money I$n't Everything.

Lauren (01:25):

Super awesome. So lots of experience in the banking world, fintech. It sounds like you've also had some really interesting conversations just from day one with your journalism background. So yeah, I love that. Well, I know recently you've put together a report specifically around Gen Z and the fintech world, and I’d love for us to just unpack that. What are you seeing in particular for the Gen Z audience? Because I feel like it's a different beast and it's a different type of communication, different ways of engaging. What is the landscape you're currently seeing out there as it relates to this demographic and then also the fintech world?

Mary (02:08):

So I like to call them the under-30s, and I'm a millennial, and so I think back to when I was their age, and some things are very similar. Just because it’s a new generation doesn't mean everything's changed. And this one's such a broad one. It's very, very, very diverse but certainly they're bringing fun things to the work world. You can hear a lot of the older people are very mystified by Gen Z, and especially in banking circles, they're like, what's a self-care day? Or whatever. But I think it's really important, and I think previous generations have not been so forthcoming about what they need for themselves to actually perform well, and I think Gen Z is bringing it just in the way they're bringing their fabulous skincare. I love it. I think it's really fun in that way. And of course they're treating work differently. You're seeing Gen Z really double up on jobs, not only for money but here's my creative passion. I'm pursuing this as I'm also doing this corporate job and work-life balance seems to be a bigger goal.

And for money. So the report you referenced, we partnered with Frich, which is a fintech company that's targeting Gen Z and pairing with credit unions to get Gen Z to them. Most credit unions don't have young members, and you see a lot of things that would be true of most people, let's say just targeted to graduating from college. They're worried about their first job. They're not, and it's interesting, one of the questions Fritz was asking the handful of Gen Z people was, what number do you think you need to be happy? And some people said a three-figure salary but others were just like 50,000 or something like that. So it's like you're in your early financial story; you don't really know what's going on yet. You're probably still getting assistance from parents maybe. And when you get that first job, it's very overwhelming to know what you're doing with that money. I didn't really have that experience. I did journalism. It was a low amount. But people pursuing higher earning jobs from when they're really young, then where do I put the savings? How much do I put in savings and so on.

Lauren (04:45):

Oh my gosh, totally. I mean, it makes sense. I can see the parallels regardless of generation but it's really interesting to hear that, especially when you talk about working multiple jobs, like you said, work-life balance and bringing that forward. I want to get into the component you mentioned about credit unions; that’s really interesting about trying to be able to engage with this group more. What are you seeing along that trend? Are there certain channels banks are using or credit unions are using? Are there communication channels or types of ways they're going about to be able to engage this audience or even their employee benefit kind of offering? Is that changing the landscape? What are you seeing on that front?

Mary (05:28):

Well, I think what I'm seeing is a lot of need to improve in this area. Definitely you need to do a big social media push for this audience. And I would say historically, less so credit unions but certainly I'd still put them in this bracket, it's just a little bit more formal, the communication, the language used, say for your retirement, all this stuff. But what's been happening, fintech has been pushing it to a more casual way on social media. If you follow Chime on TikTok for example, it's just fun. It's like showcasing three payday months or something in a fun way and giving tips. I would encourage the industry to be a little bit more casual and fun and try out some short form videos. 

Lauren (06:21):

So we have a client we worked with for a really long time, and its CPO always had this role of no boring content, and we would do stuff that was sales focused but we'd also have some stuff that was just kind of wild and out there, and it's in the financial services world. It was goofy but it was fun. It was like humanizing. What are you seeing as a line that credit unions or others are sort of toting that there's that balance for the formality because this is a really serious topic but there's also the need to be relatable and human. Are you seeing more video content that's coming out? Are you seeing more infographics? You mentioned voice and tone of the copy that's being rolled out. What kind of pieces are you seeing or would encourage companies to use to, for lack of better words, humanize or add that pizazz or that personality to the brand?

Mary (07:19):

I really do think this is just an area that needs improvement almost across the board from the financial perspective. But when they partner with fintechs, then the fintech brings playful marketing but you've got to think about stage of life.

Lauren (07:37):

Totally.

Mary (07:38):

One thing is this is something interesting about Gen Z, their openness to sharing their salaries, what they make, and just being more transparent about the numbers with their friends and family, just to what has been this secret. It's coming out. And I think that's really cool. But one of the things, topics, think about what's the average amount someone spends on a date, that kind of thing. That's money, things that would be on their mind.

Lauren (08:08):

Yep. Oh, those are such good examples. Well, just basic marketing, you meet them where they are, right? What's top of their mind and getting to know them and unpacking that more too. What are you seeing in the fintech space? Is there any just pushing the creative envelope digitally or trying to build more communities? Are there interesting things going on there? 

Mary (08:29):

Yeah. Well, some of it's just growth from what has already existed, because if you think about it, this is the generation that grew up where Venmo would have been on their phone most of their life or a cash app or that kind of thing. So those brands, which are massive brands, have a lot of this audience. But now you're starting to see some fintechs pop up and they're like, I am specific to Gen Z. So I wouldn't say this isn't so creative but it is something that's happening. They're linking up with college ambassadors to help spread the like, hey, here's this fund money up, blah, blah, blah. And I think that's cool and larger than that, you mentioned community, and that's something I've been seeing happen just across the ages actually. There's a startup called Ultra that's working to help people improve their credit scores but on its app, it has live events where people drop in to hear about important topics, and then it's like the members are sharing their money hacks with each other. So it's sort of a little mini Mint community, a little Reddit popping up.

Lauren (09:36):

A study group if you want a more formal title. But there's a transparency element that also aligns with what you were saying earlier of you just put it out there. There's not this sort of money story that's sort of in the back of your mind of like, okay, I can't share that. I don't want to be transparent but it's putting it out there in a safe way. Super interesting. As you look ahead, are there any trends, especially from this research you saw or things you see — I think about AI — how are these kinds of things impacting what's to come in the years to come?

Mary (10:13):

Well, I'll track it just from personal finance tips. So I'm someone who used to work at Bankrate, where I covered fintech, so it was a different role but they have such evergreen personal finance writing as do banks, as do credit unions. What is a checking account? And honestly, that's a piece of content you need, especially now because people don't know. But AI, oh, AI can write that in a heartbeat and maybe better. It's really dull. It's really dull writing, and honestly, it’s usually entry-level people writing a lot of the content, so the AI might actually get it better, spice it up. Yeah. It's just like the AI for FAQs.

Lauren (10:55):

Yeah, I like that. That's also good for SEO too. So a win-win from all the sides of things. And then I guess if you were to take that content and then put it also forward in more of an entertaining way or a digestible way — I think about Instagram feeds that come through. Like you said, quick tips, bulleting, those sorts of things.

Mary (11:18):

Yeah. Oh, and Lauren, one thing I'm thinking about, one thing about Gen Z is there's this return to, I don't know, nostalgia, things they never experienced. I think it started happening last year, maybe even before, but these under-30s wanting to do envelope budgeting as their strategy, like the physicality, so used to the apps. Yeah. So I think an opportunity looking ahead is like, oh, there's a lot to be commented on. What's the point of a branch, that kind of thing. But I think there would be an opportunity to bring some kind of lively event and target Gen Z specifically.

Lauren (11:58):

Yeah, that's fair. I think getting back to some of the things we've been used to, especially growing up in a generation that's so digital first with everything, missing that either human or like you said, the physical touch component.

Mary (12:10):

The physical touch. If you even look at TikTok, there's a Gen Z woman who went viral for just reading the newspaper, like the physical newspaper. I guess it's like things you might've missed.

Lauren (12:24):

Yeah, that's fair. It's like the idea of holding a book, right?

Mary (12:27):

Which I still do. I love underlining. 

Lauren (12:31):

Yeah, I totally hear you. I know. I was in a conversation with someone yesterday and we were talking about moving to Kindles, and I'm like, oh, but there's this idea of being able to write things down.

Mary (12:39):

Write things down and give your eyeballs a break from the screen.

Lauren (12:42):

Yeah. It's all these little things, so super interesting. Any other thoughts you want to share or resources for folks you think might be helpful?

Mary (12:51):

Well, I think one thing that's probably helpful to this audience is that in our research, we did discover where Gen Z is going for financial advice. And I thought TikTok would be at the top of the list but it's there, it's present. But family was the biggest category followed by friends and then followed by your bank or credit union. You could check multiple options but the family was overwhelming.

Lauren (13:18):

So that was the trusted source for going to.

Mary (13:20):

The trusted source. Yeah.

Lauren (13:22):

Oh, that's super interesting. Thank you for sharing that. Sure. Yeah, and I see that too. We work with a lot of wealth management firms and we see referrals come in. A lot of them come from family and friends and then trusted advisors, which is probably no surprise but it's interesting to see that across the board also to your comment earlier, to see across the board this need for community, desire for community.

Mary (13:45):

Yeah, especially after the pandemic. We can't all just be locked in a room. 

Lauren (13:54):

Oh my gosh, so good. Well, thank you so much for sharing these insights. We'll make sure to include a link as well below to that report you had mentioned and resources. So this was super fun.

Mary (14:05):

I was glad to, it was fun.

Lauren (14:06):

Great to hear from you and just dive into all of it. So thank you again. 

Mary (14:10):

Thanks for having me.

Reaching Gen Z: How Financial Services Companies Can Engage and Hire the Next Generation with Mary Wisniewski

In this episode of On Purpose, Mary Wisniewski of Cornerstone Advisors shares how financial services can shift its marketing and hiring to connect with Gen Z
Marketing & Sales
August 15, 2024

We talked with Angela and Elyse about:

  • Return on investment (ROI) versus Return on the moment (ROM) 
  • How to align your events with business goals to build impactful and meaningful relationships 
  • Why you should cater to the needs of your ideal audience 
  • Their Event Emergency Kit Checklist

About Angela York and Elyse Stoner:

Angela York and Elyse Stoner are the co-founders of Event Advisors, a company dedicated to transforming event strategy within the financial services ecosystem. Angela brings decades of experience in advisor and marketing implementation as well as event planning. Her journey spans over a decade of in-house roles and another decade as a consultant. During the pandemic, she met Elyse Stoner, marking the beginning of their collaboration. Angela’s extensive background in the wealth advisory space, combined with her passion for creating meaningful and strategic events, has been instrumental in their joint venture. Elyse has a rich background in sports entertainment and higher education marketing. Her experience in strategic marketing led her to question the purpose and strategy behind events in the financial services industry. Her strategic approach, coupled with Angela's deep industry knowledge, has been key to their success. Together, Angela and Elyse bring a unique blend of skills to Event Advisors, offering event strategies that are purpose-driven and aligned with business goals. Their mission is to elevate events in the financial services industry, ensuring they are not just events but strategic tools that deliver value and drive business success.

Featured Resources 

Enjoyed This? You’ll Also Love:  

Full Audio Transcript:

Lauren (00:04):

All right, well welcome. Excited to have you both here with us today.

Angela (00:08):

Thanks for having us.

Elyse (00:10):

Great to see you.

Lauren (00:11):

Well, we are going to be talking about events, probably no surprise for folks who are in the wealth management community. I'm sure these faces are familiar and specifically around why events, events with purpose, and so on and so forth. So I'm going to pass it over to you two, just to share a little bit about your background, how you got into the space, and then we'll go from there. So Angela, do you want to start us off?

Angela (00:35):

I do. My background is decades of advisor marketing and implementation in the world of marketing plan invitation and event implementation. And I did that in-house for over a decade and then was consulting for another decade. Fast-forward to the pandemic, Elyse and I met and we started colliding and comparing event planning. And back in the day, strategy wasn't really a piece of the event planning implementation in the advisor world and Elyse's background was all event strategy. So when we met it was chocolate and peanut butter. We’re better together because now we bring event strategy to the finserv ecosystem.

Lauren (01:29):

Love it. And Elyse, how about for you? Love to hear a little bit more.

Elyse (01:33):

So yeah, I was not born and raised in the financial services market. My background is in the sports entertainment and higher education marketing world. When I was in college and trying to decide what I wanted to be when I grew up, I had heard about this cool thing called sports marketing. And I spent about 10 years doing that, promoting rodeos and concerts and working for a Division 1 athletic conference where we put on basketball tournaments and everything was very strategic. You knew who your audience was, you knew how you were marketing to them. And when I kind of got out into the big wide world, I would go to these events and go, yeah, I'm not the right person to be here. What's the deal? So I started thinking about this whole idea of the event marketing strategy. And like Angela said, when she and I met, I was like, I know folks in financial services do a lot of events but why did they do them? Because their coach told them to or they're—

Lauren (02:39):

—supposed to check in the box. 

Elyse (02:41):

Yes. Exactly. And just the conversation evolved into this strategy and understanding why and understanding who you're doing the event for and talking, and we'll talk more about this, but talking to them in the channels they use. And really when we came together and created Event Advisors, it's being able to share Angela's experience in the wealth advisory space, my experience in strategic marketing, and really helping everybody in what we call the finserv ecosystem — have events that have purpose, that actually have their own sets of goals and are tied into their business strategy so they don't get a bad rap anymore. We love events. We hate that people say they're expensive and they hate them.

Lauren (03:33):

I get it. I really appreciate the background you bring. A lot of times we'll talk about how we're zeroed in on this financial services world but there's so many other amazing things happening in the bigger community and like you said, sports and other spaces out there to be able to take those best practices and pull them in. So tell us a little bit more. So you met during COVID. What was kind of the spark for where you are today, is it different kind of pre-COVID to post-COVID, and what led you to really form the entity you have?

Angela (04:07):

Well, I'll jump in there, Lauren. So I was working in the space of marketing plan implementation and event planning implementation for mostly local advisors, wholesalers, and some broker dealers. When the pandemic hit, as we all know, all events shut down. So at that point I started working with colleagues I knew across the country and advisors they worked with to help them navigate the landscape and not come to a complete halt but shift their event planning to virtual event planning. So I started working with advisors around the country to determine what virtual events made sense for their client base so they could stay connected to their clients during the pandemic. So that included your virtual wine tastings, game night, craft night trivia. As we all know from back then there were hundreds of different virtual options. And at the time that Elyse and I met, I was working in that world trying to help advisors navigate how to share the new message, how to execute a great virtual event.

And I was learning about strategic events because as we talked a few minutes ago, strategy really didn't play a big part in the finserv events. Of course, we always paid attention to who we wanted to invite, where we wanted to have it but we didn't go one layer below that, what you do with strategic event planning. So when Elyse and I were talking about event strategy and I was trying to do these virtual events and at the same time as we progressed through the pandemic advisors were asking, okay, we really like these virtual events because we are now reaching some of our best clients who aren't in our geographical area. But now that we're starting to open up, we'd like to do in-person events; how do we redo our marketing plans and our event calendars? This was a big reset in the finserv community because for so long we just kept rinsing and repeating and when everything came to a halt, it was, wait, should we re-look at this?

And how do we re-look at this and how do we integrate these new event tactics and strategies? So fast-forward, we joined forces and started working with advisors to create strategic events and strategic marketing plans where you're really looking at the business goals, looking at the event goals — they tie into each other — and then create the event based on those goals and the ideal attendee. So you look at where are they coming from, do they work, do they not, work in those little details so the event speaks to them. How do they like to receive their invitations? It's really about the ideal attendee, not about the host, the advisor, or whoever's planning the event. So that's how we started to work on these events. And then Event Advisors was born and we work with advisors around the country, wholesalers, and broker dealers.

Lauren (07:36):

I love to hear that. Here at Out & About, we often like to talk about how we want to make sure that everything that goes out, like a social media post, for example, you can connect it to the bigger picture, the why — you're not just doing to do, right? So I definitely resonate with a lot of what you're saying too, it's that you're doing this in a purposeful way and it's aligned with a bigger picture objective. Could either of you or both give some maybe a mini case study example or two that would help to narrate for those who are listening a good example of a strategic event? What does that look like? How does it differentiate itself from maybe just an event like a happy hour or what have you? I'd love to hear a little bit more about a case study.

Elyse (08:22):

Okay. I think we can give you two. I mean we could give you a whole bunch but we'll give you two.

Lauren (08:27):

Yes, please.

Elyse (08:29):

The first one is actually the very first partnership Angela and I worked on. It was an advisory firm in Texas, and they conceded that they needed to do a virtual wine tasting event, and they had three of their advisors who were teaming up and they're like, we know we need to do this thing but we have no idea how to do it. So Angela had contact with the vineyards in Northern California and again, the whole shipping wine to people's homes and all that good stuff. But what we talked about and what I came in to say is why are you doing this?

Well, we need to connect with our clients. And then we talked about which clients they wanted to connect with, sort of almost made an avatar of those people so we could think about them; literally we talked about how many squares, how many Brady Bunch boxes do you want on the screen because do you want to be able to see everybody? Is this something that maybe is a multiple choice night, right? We're doing three of these and people get to choose which night they do because it was virtual and you're giving them some flexibility. So it was a conversation along those lines. One of the places we also thrive and we know is a pain point for a lot of our clients is follow-up.

And this particular post-event. Yes, yes. Post-event follow-up. And this particular client, we spent a lot of time talking about that because what we felt was you've got everybody in their squares and they're tasting wines and they're getting educated and you talk about how you want to connect with them. We created a full follow-up strategy for them to not only say thank you and all the things we know we're supposed to do but we talked about the wine and we used the wine as what we call the positive emotional memory and said, we know when you reach out to your attendees afterwards, don't ask them, did you like the wine, yes or no?

Which was your favorite? And if you didn't have a favorite, what is your favorite wine? So you're able to capture some information that you can go ahead and put in their database to use in the future for an anniversary, for those wow moments. Just kind of a nice little twist. The other side of that twist was one of the issues the client had too was our advisors hate doing follow-up. Like, the event’s over, they don't want to do it. So we came up with what in the industry is called gamification.

Again, we'll be stereotypical, it was an advisory firm that was mostly male in Texas. So we basically said, how about a scoreboard and put it up. Some of these folks were still coming to the office. Put it up in the office and keep track who's making calls. My initial response was you could do a Starbucks gift card for the person who hits the marker the fastest. And the advisor was like, our advisors like bourbon. I'm like, bourbon sounds good. We like bourbon too. So really kind of leaning into that and they were able to connect with these folks and continue conversations and get really good information they've never really thought about when they would simply just say, y'all come and we'll have a little party and send them on their way. And then Angela, go ahead. Angela has a great example of another client who was struggling in a post-COVID manner and she can go ahead and tell the story.

Angela (12:45):

So we had a client who really wanted to reach their top A clients but when we sat down with them, they couldn't pinpoint a geographical area where these top clients were. They had some here in Southern California, they had some in Orange County, they had some in LA, they even had some in San Francisco. So to do an event, a large client appreciation event, and expect people to come from the different areas, it's not likely. So they had put a stop to that idea, they're going, we can't have one because we have clients everywhere.

Elyse (13:32):

Just so common these days.

Angela (13:33):

Very.

Elyse (13:33):

Exactly.

Angela (13:34):

And so we sat down and said, well, we need to have a different mindset because yes, you can have a client appreciation event. It doesn't need to be like the advisor next door, upstairs, down the street; it doesn't have to be a 100-person summer party, whatever it might be. So we actually sat down with a map of the different areas and had them dot the cities and the areas their top clients were in. And what we did is we created a model. We started with San Francisco because that really had the biggest cluster. And we looked at this map, physically looked at the map with the dots and considered traffic times and schedules and came up with an event and a location that would work with everybody.

Lauren (14:32):

Figuring all that out, my goodness. 

Angela (14:38):

So then what we did is we figured out where we wanted to have the event but what type of event? So we brainstormed and talked through the characteristics of the households of these clients, and you're going to think all we do is wine events but this was a common interest. They liked fine wine, they liked great food. So we came up with a small intimate wine pairing dinner up in Northern California. We had 10 people, so we're not talking large, we're talking very intimate because that's where this cluster was and everything from the personnel invitation to the follow-up confirmation to when they walked in and were greeted and sat down and who was seated next to each other. And it wasn't a sales pitch, there was no business discussed at all. It was just coming together, deepening that relationship, creating the community between the other clients.

And we were told the restaurant actually had to ask them to leave; they were shutting down. They had such a good time. They were there well past 11, and I think they started at seven. And it was just this great experience. And the sommelier had given them a gift to let them track what they liked about each wine, what they didn't like about the wine, to help kind of spur some ideas for maybe future travel. So they left with this whole package and this positive emotional memory we touched on earlier, that really created such a great experience, something they can talk about with their friends and with the advisory firm for years to come. And it's just, again, it was a positive and strong return on the moment. It was a success.

Lauren (16:39):

What I love about that story is through the narrative, you were able to identify the points of friction of like, well, who do I sit next to? Am I going to have an interesting dialog? Was it easy to get to all these kinds of things that were thought through? And as you're reducing the friction, that helps to make it much more seamless for everyone. So it's easier said than done. And then Elyse, I also appreciate the level of personalization you all are adding to those different events as well. And specifically in your story, you were like, okay, the follow-up is key but that personal follow-up is key, and we have to motivate action. And we see this too. You could have the best event, you can have the best whatever it is but if you're not getting people there and if you're not doing the follow-up, then it's going to fall flat. So it's really got to be this collaborative effort. It's like putting together a CRM. You've got to have people who buy into it in order for it to be able to take off just to create maybe a familiar parallel example for those who haven't done events before.

Tell us about, are there any other trends you're seeing post-COVID? Are webinars still a thing in these virtual events? Are you seeing an upward trend and more of these kinds of event examples, the in-person event examples you all describe? What are you seeing in today's day and age if you will post- COVID?

Elyse (18:05):

It's like a pendulum, and first there was the big swing one way — we've got to do events and we've got to bring together as many people safely as we can. And then it was like, ooh, I don't like that many people. They scare me. And then it would swing back to the other side. But what we're finding now is the trends are much more about value versus the things people are doing. We have this philosophy about, and Angela touched on this, when you're doing an event, it's not about measuring ROI, we believe it's measuring ROM, which is the return on the moment. You're creating this moment, which is like a rock in your marketing stream, and you need to set goals for that. And when you're setting those goals for judging the success of that event, one of those goals can be venue. And when we talk venue, venue can be virtual, venue can be in-person, venue can be hybrid, which is a combination of the two.

You can use that to determine whether your event is successful. So we feel like the swing is really more in the bang for the investment, because as we know as marketers, right? Again, it's a rock in the stream. It's part of this client journey. If you're trying to measure ROI, you're really dependent on somebody else taking an action to determine, well, I spent X, I made Y but maybe they're not ready to invest with you yet. Maybe this is an opportunity where it's a client who maybe has some funds someplace else and they need to get to know you better. Is that a goal and are you achieving the goal with that event? So that's more of an ROM than, because again, like I said, we hear this, I don't like the ROI of events but chicken is going to cost a certain amount, and a venue rental is going to be a certain amount. So instead of trying to measure success that way, our model is return on the moment.

Angela (20:33):

I'd love to jump in there as well. You had asked about the trends, and we actually prefer to stay away from the trends, which is actually what I don't want to say, got us in trouble for the decades prior to us implementing strategic events. But for those decades, the natural tendency, at least that I experienced, because finserv is really all I know is we were very trend driven. This advisor did that or wanted to do that, or my coach said shiny object. And so we like to steer away from the trends because it may not be a great fit for that advisory practice or the wholesalers doing an event for the advisor or the broker dealer doing a team-building for their advisors. It really boils down to the business goals. What are the business goals? Are you trying to deepen relationships with female clients?

Are you trying to do generational planning campaigns? What are your goals? And create the event goals based on that and the attendee, the ideal attendee. Who are they based on, the goals? Then you build what type of event is best for that group. Just like in the example from Northern California I had mentioned; they wanted to do a large client appreciation event because they had seen other advisors do that. But when you peel back the curtain and look at that specific practice, it wasn't a good fit. It was a trend but it wasn't a good fit for them. What was a good fit for them is what the attendee wanted, and that was intimate their local area. They didn't want to fly from Northern California to Southern California. So that's really what we look at. Do the ideal attendees, are they not in your geographic area? If so, a virtual event would be great. Do they want small? Do they want large? Do they want after work? Do they want social? Do they want education? That's really what it boils down to.

Lauren (22:36):

Yeah, so well said. And I think that's really easy to forget because we talked about earlier, it's easy to just do that check in the box. There's a firm we've worked with, and this was pre-COVID but I think the event is a good example. So they're in San Diego, they target biotech executives. They had an exclusive event, no sales, and it was just other biotech executives all with similar sort of job titles or descriptions. And the whole point of it was just to socialize, network. It was a sort of happy hour event but it hit those buckets, knowing your target market, adding value. And like it was mentioned earlier, it's really got to be about them and not about you. And so all of those things, it helps that, it helps differentiate you in the market but I think you just want to make sure, as you all have pointed out, that the differentiation is really coming from you defining what that is first before you just going out and doing something. 

Angela (23:35):

Exactly. And events can be used for the different targets you want to deepen those relationships with. So it doesn't necessarily have to be an advisor-client relationship. It could be a wholesaler insurance company with advisors or broker dealers with their advisors. It can be team-building, it can be all of that, and it can also be centers of influence. So if you want to develop those relationships with your COIs, if they're estate planning attorneys or CPAs or whatever they might be where you share the same client, do lunch and learns, offer CE credits, use your wholesalers for content. So it doesn't have to be a Valentine's Day event, a holiday event, an education event. You can mix and match but again, it comes down to what are your business goals and how do you tie those into events.

Lauren (24:30):

Yes. Okay. So I just want to be mindful of time as we're wrapping things up here but I would love for you all to share a little bit about more of this consultancy aspect you offer. I think sometimes when you think event planning, you're like, holy smokes, all the communication ramps up, the event itself, boots on ground, being there if it's a physical event, so on and so forth, all the posts. What is this consultancy piece you offer, and can you tell us a little bit more about that and how that works?

Elyse (24:55):

Sure. So we recognize what we're talking about is a little different. When we say event planning, there's a certain picture that comes to people's heads, and while we both have a lot of experience, it would be a very separate, different webinar if we wanted to talk war stories of what happens at events.

Lauren (25:18):

Yes.

Elyse (25:20):

And we know there's a lot of really good people in the finserv ecosystem who are phenomenal event planners. So what we're doing with Event Advisors is we're actually here to help support those people and maybe help support the people who don't either don't have somebody or they have that person who's HR and admin and the event planner and making sure the plants are watered and all of those things. By bringing our decades of event experience both in financial services and outside of financial services to help people be successful, it's this idea of, we call it collaborative coaching. It's we can do whatever you need us to do — if we need to be researching venues, if we need to be spending some time learning about your ideal client, if it's coaching your team, they kind of have it going on but they're not quite in the strategic mindset, and you want to make sure you're maximizing that ROM.

That's sort of our sweet spot. We have spent a lot of time taking the information we have gathered over the years, and for example, we've put together an emergency kit checklist. Everyone should have an emergency kit. When you do an event that's a little sidebar, we can talk. If you don't call us, we'll talk about that. But we've created this checklist that actually has live links, and you just go in and click on the links and it's everything from a first aid kit to HDMI cables to reading glasses, and most of that stuff is in there because we found we needed it. Somewhere along the way we're here to sort of help people not step in the potholes we've already stepped in.

Lauren (27:31):

I get it. Oh my goodness. We'll make sure to include that emergency kit as well for folks. Any shoutouts? If you could pick one thing from that emergency kit, do not forget at home, what would it be?

Angela (27:45):

Sharpie.

Lauren (27:46):

Oh.

Angela (27:48):

I mean, there's so many different choices. Sharpie is a great one. Rubber band is a great one. Duct tape.

Elyse (27:57):

They're all great. And things like duct tape, for example. You can use it for so many different things. Not only is your banner falling off the wall but you have a black tablecloth and it came back from the dry cleaner and it's got lint all over it. Take that duct tape, turn it inside out. It's a lint cleaner. 

Lauren (28:17):

So true. I know if you need to take that tablecloth in a little bit more, you can take that duct tape and just it's like your sewing machine onsite.

Elyse (28:27):

Exactly.

Lauren (28:30):

Goodness. Well, so fun. Thank you both for sharing your experience, your offering, and just a different way of looking at events. So appreciate your time. Thank you for being on the show.

Elyse (28:42):

Thanks so much.

How to Plan Strategic, Effective Events for Financial Services with Angela York and Elyse Stoner

Discover how Angela York and Elyse Stoner are transforming event strategy in the financial services ecosystem through Event Advisors.
Hiring & Talent
August 8, 2024

We talked with Caleb about:

  • The fluctuating talent market and the art of positioning job roles effectively 
  • A generational shift: Why is Gen Z seeking in-person opportunities?
  • The importance of precise hiring strategies and how they lead to successful placements 

About Caleb Brown:

Caleb Brown is the CEO and co-founder of New Planner Recruiting, LLC. He graduated from Texas Tech's financial planning program in the early 2000s after initially majoring in finance. Encouraged by his father to pursue business, Caleb discovered his passion for financial planning a few years into his studies and made a pivotal shift in his academic journey. Upon graduation, he returned to Dallas and secured a full-time financial planning role, where he worked for nearly six years. During this time, Caleb became actively involved with the Financial Planning Association (FPA) in Dallas. Witnessing the challenges faced by talented financial planners during a tough job market, he was driven to find ways to keep them in the profession. Caleb’s efforts through the FPA led to the creation of career day programs and internship opportunities, and eventually firms began seeking his expertise to hire the best candidates. His experience helped lay the foundation for New Planner Recruiting, which he founded with Michael Kitces. Today, Caleb continues to shape the future of financial planning by helping new planners enter the profession and connecting top talent with leading firms. 

Featured Resources 

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Full Audio Transcript:

Lauren (00:05):

Hi Caleb. Thank you for joining us.

Caleb (00:07):

Hey, great to be here. Thanks for having me.

Lauren (00:09):

Yes, and we get to go from one podcast show to another, so I know you've got a whole podcast. We'll get into that and the recruiting firm. But tell us, I'm going to hand it over to you. Share a little bit more if you don't mind about your background and working in this financial services world. 

Caleb (00:29):

I graduated from the Texas Tech Financial Planning Program a long time ago before really anybody knew what was going on. And it was the early 2000s and I was trying to get an internship in financial planning in 2001 and trying to get a full-time job in 2002. And if you studied the investment markets, that's not really when they were handing out jobs, salaried jobs at fee-only firms where I didn't have a book of clients and really wasn't going to add much value and was asking for a salary. So it was a challenging time. But my father was an engineer. I knew I liked numbers and math but I just didn't want to do the engineering and he kind of just encouraged me to do something in business that was a good fit. I started out as a finance major at Texas Tech and absolutely hated it. I was just in there with thousands of people and they were gearing me up to create TPS reports for some global goliath bank or something, and fortunately I was able to stumble upon financial planning after a couple of years in school and changed my major and never looked back.

Lauren (01:39):

That's fantastic. So a little bit of adjusting course as you go along. I think we all do that, right? A little bit of exploration and hearing what you enjoy. How did you get to where you are today though owning your own company and being on the recruiting side of things?

Caleb (01:58):

Someone asked me this the other day. I was like, well, actually I think it was one of my high school buddies. If you would've asked me 22 years ago where I could never have come up with this, I never would've come up with this.

So I went back to the Dallas/Fort Worth area after graduation, I was able to finally convince someone to take a chance on me and it ended up working out for him and worked out for me. I was there almost six years but I started as a full-time financial planner and was really heavily involved in the Financial Planning Association (FPA) of Dallas/Fort Worth. I saw a lot of just job seekers having trouble. People weren't as lucky, as fortunate as I was, and frankly, they probably were a lot more analytical and better communicators with more gravitas and more polished and they couldn't find a job. So they ended up leaving the profession and I told myself, look, it’s great that I've got a place but we can't keep losing these people I went to school with who could be really good planners. And they went to become teachers and football coaches and bankers. I'm like, look, that's all great and that's fine but we need you in our profession. Sorry I'm a little selfish but we need you in our profession.

Lauren (03:11):

And keep you over in this neck of the woods over here. 

Caleb (03:14):

Yep, that's right. 

Lauren (03:15):

You were just seeing talent.

Caleb (03:16):

So I thought, hey, what can I do going forward through FPA or whatever other channel to try to retain these people? And up at that point, everything at FPA was geared toward your 55-year-old CFP® business owner, a baldheaded white guy. 

Lauren (03:34):

Different clientele, different time in the growth of the RIA community-at-large too. 

Caleb (03:39):

I was fortunate enough to get nominated for a board position, the career development directorship, and I got elected and there was actually some age discrimination I experienced back then too. And I said, look, we're going to focus on career changers and new college grads. That's what we're doing. If you don't like it, you'll find somebody else to do this. And there's not a lot of people lining up to be career development director. So they were like, okay, do whatever you want. And in it working out, we created some career day programs and internship programs and all this do-it-yourselfer stuff.

At the end of the day, I had these firms coming to me and saying, yeah, that's great but can you just tell me who to hire? You're talking to all these people and I don't know who the best fit is and who the best student is or what the best story is, and I don't know how much to pay these people — can you just do this for me? And I was doing that on a pro bono basis for a number of years while I was helping a sole practitioner build a financial planning firm. And then I found out in 2006 or so, Michael Kitces was doing that. We met at a next-gen conference and he was doing that in Washington, D.C. So we started laying the groundwork for an entry-level financial planning recruiting firm. Everybody's familiar with Robert Half and the big headhunters out there that want to place people who are making hundreds and hundreds, millions of dollars and hundreds of thousands and millions, and then the people who want to move books of business.

We knew that was a red ocean. We were looking for a blue ocean. So we're like, look, we're not coming with this recruiting firm to try to help those people — our focus is somebody who’s making between $50 and probably $150, $200,000 a year. So that's not an executive person, and they've got probably less than 10 years of experience and we're going to help them find jobs with salaried financial planning-focused firms where they're going to learn and they get to work on their existing clients and receive mentoring from a team, and they're not just thrown out there with a phone book.

Lauren (05:40):

Yep, yep. It's such a needed space too, because I think you see a lot of firms and they have their clients, they're doing a good job, they've got them there for a long time. So you want someone who you can help bring up as part of the culture, able to really offer that to them. And that's still your focus today. I mean, I know your whole podcast is focused on that. Tell me a little bit more. So it sounds like you not only identified the blue ocean but then tell me more about how it's stuck, right? So are you seeing a growing need for this still in this, for this audience, for placement?

Caleb (06:18):

Absolutely. I remember sitting around a conference table and Michael and I were just debating and it's kind of like, well, why hasn't anybody else done this before? It's like, well, because people, they just do it on their own. They just get somebody out of college or they find they're easier to find and it's like, how are we going to get someone to pay us to do this? And then it's like, wait a minute, isn't that exactly what they're asking their clients to do with them? Their clients can do the financial planning on their own if they want to but they're going to outsource it. And frankly, the client side is never empty, because I have two pipelines to fill — the clients and the job seekers — and we've always had sort of a line of firms lined up to pay to for us to do this for them, which is flattering and also exhilarating and good job security and helped me build a career and been a lot of fun along the way.

The challenge is just finding a good match. I mean, just because someone lives in San Diego and they're in the salary range doesn't mean it's a good fit. And some of the firm is like, oh, okay, maybe I should take this a little peel back the onion a little bit more, peel back another layer. So it's just been fun to do that. We kind of have a niche carved out and we've just been doing it long enough now where the firms that want — I mean, look, you've always got those who say we don't need you guys; we'll just post on LinkedIn and we get all these people. It's like, look, if that's what you want to do, that's fabulous. You do that. That's great. That's exactly like that prospect who comes to you and says I don't need a financial planner.

I can do it on my own. All right, same thing, but we have a niche carved out. We're looking for delegators, and there are a lot of firms out there that want to delegate this hiring because as you probably run into, they're not that great at it. They don't do it often. It's very time-intensive and there is some art and some science there that a highly, highly compensated firm owner or a financial planner does not need to be doing a lot of this stuff, especially on the front and the back end, right? 

Lauren (08:18):

There's a lot. I mean, hiring's tricky. Being able to find the right fit, comb through all the resumes, do the promotions, really get a pulse. Every call you have, it can be, you want to make sure it's a good use of time on both sides too, right? So tell us a little bit more about these firms that are coming to you. I mean, how are you helping to shake out the right fit or even coaching them to go just to even make sure the job description's clear? What kind of process are you using? Are they coming to you and they're like, we know we've got this person, this is the fit. Are you working with the job description and coaching them up to that even before they open up the job? What does that whole process look like? I'd just love to hear a little bit more about the advice you give to firms as they're entertaining making a hire.

Caleb (09:06):

Sure. It is both. To answer your question, I mean, we spend a lot of time on the front end. I mean, a lot of my questions are like, okay, I'm asking them about their business: How many clients? What's the pain point? Okay, that doesn't sound right. Trying to do a lot of the practice management diagnosing, at least at a cursory level. And a lot of times, can you outsource this? Can we send it out to a remote paraplanner? Is there technology solution? So before you even get to hiring, because once you start hiring people, then now you're a business, now you're a manager and you might've just wanted to be a technician or an entrepreneur and now you're managing people. And what I've learned is a lot of the firm owners and your practitioners who are technicians, that's not their skill set. That's why they're not good at hiring. A lot of times they're not good at managing. Now, a lot of them learn to be good managers, which is because they can manage their client relationships. You can, I mean, managing people's a little different. So we're trying to help them figure out who to hire. A lot of them come in and they say, Caleb, look, I don't know what's out there. Here's what I think I want.

What do you think? Does that make sense? I love people like that versus the clients who are like, well, what do you mean that's not out there? I mean, this is what I was looking for. What do you mean? Well, I'm paying a salary. Everybody should be applying to my job and having to walk it through with them. Here's the talent market, just like this stock market. It fluctuates. I mean, it changes, it's fluid.

Lauren (10:42):

It was a very different situation when we were going through COVID and what the market was demanding compared to now too. It's interesting. I mean, on the marketing side, we see it too. We have talent conversations. I was talking with another CMO recently, and he gave this analogy about how marketing basically is that kind of glove that fits across departments and impacts the culture and how it's being shown up on the outside and all of that. So I think just to your points about, there's a lot of thinking that goes into it, and then how you're positioning the job description itself is a whole art unto itself. Do you actually help with the writing of the job descriptions and the messaging and what is your team involved with on that side of things?

Caleb (11:25):

We handle it all. We're looking for delegators. They're the final decision-makers — we're the CFOs, they're the CEOs of the situation. We're going to do all the legwork, everything, bring them awesome people to look at and have them agonize over who to hire. That's our goal.

Lauren (11:47):

It's funny, sometimes we've had firms we've worked with that have gone to look for the right messaging, and they go through all this stuff and they realize sometimes the input is not getting them the right output, which is sort of an interesting piece of it. And the other thing that some firms we worked with as well is then they go, okay, well, we got all this out there but we realize we've got a great culture and we're not showing it off. We're not telling people we've won awards, we're doing these fun things, or this is what makes us different. And I think that's one of the components to hiring too, is to be able to say how you differentiate yourself as a firm and as a culture. And if you're actually going to have success, you're not just going in and being a transactionalist, right? You're going to really be supported. And how are you working with firms to help them think about that step, even beyond just getting the job description out the door?

Caleb (12:37):

Well, candidates pay attention to that, especially, so your Gen Y, Gen Z. It's a differentiator, right? They look at that. I mean, the awards, it's like, okay, what really happened for that person to get the award? Is it one of those deals where you pay a fee? 

Lauren (12:55):

I hear you.

Caleb (12:57):

But they look at that, it's social proof. Just having people talk about their job and the day in the life at the firm and some pictures on the social media account. I think that's becoming more table stakes now; everybody's kind of like, you go to LinkedIn, you could spend all day every day just looking at new hire announcements, and it's not a coincidence that once someone did it all, they all do it. And here's the welcome package. They get their umbrella and their laptop cover and their dog leash and their…

Lauren (13:34):

…baseball hat, sweatshirt, and all the things.

Caleb (13:37):

It's not a coincidence.

Lauren (13:38):

Yeah, yeah. It's so true. It's interesting. What other things are you seeing on the market, just kind in the trends, hiring trends, things firms should be thinking about? 

Caleb (13:54):

I guess just even in today's day and age, there’s a little bit of a disconnect on the virtual thing. Frankly, after COVID, I thought the virtual thing was here to stay and we were going to just stick with it. That hasn't really panned out that way. Most firms settled on kind of a hybrid but you still have a good subset — I would say 90% of the job seekers send me something like, here's the location I'm interested in but also remote. Before COVID, they never knew that was an option.

If I'm in Austin, Texas, I'm going to have to move to Nashville if I want a job there. And now it's like, well, no, they can just do it remote. And not all the firm owners are on board with that. So there's a little bit of disconnect there on the remote piece but although the Gen Z, the people who were in school during COVID, they want the furthest thing away from all virtual they can get because it was such a disaster for them.

Lauren (14:51):

Yeah, that makes sense. I didn't put those two together. 

Caleb (14:55):

The other thing I see is the impact investing, the ESG, just the B Corporations. What else? The advice only. Those are sort of the buzzwords that catch people's attention. But also too, I think just a lot of these bigger firms that have these super high five, 10 million minimums, they're losing a lot of next-gen advisors; they call me and they say, get me out of there. Because looking to help someone go from 10 to 20 million is not very rewarding. Helping someone go from 700,000 to a million and retire, that's very rewarding. And I'm kind of more in that camp. So it's just something to consider, if you're a firm owner out there listening to this who's got the big minimums, I get it. It's great, great business but I am seeing a little bit more traction develop there.

Lauren (15:58):

Are you also seeing any unique models with how firms are structuring teams to be able to help bring up the next gen as well?

Caleb (16:06):

Yeah. Angie Herbers has done a lot of work on this, and I followed her. We kind of got started the same. That diamond team stuff. I rarely get people on the siloed model anymore. It's all diamond teams. We want to try to make sure we can keep promoting, keep replicating, and building these out — making sure there's places for people to go so they don't have to go to another firm after three years because they have to wait for someone to die or retire.

Lauren (16:35):

Along with that, are you also seeing anything when it comes to firms segmenting against a particular audience? Like, okay, this is our team for business owners. This is our team for pre-retirees, retirees, so on and so forth.

Caleb (16:49):

The larger, I would say north of 10 billion, those bigger firms are doing professional athletes. You got your entertainers, your celebrities, you got your business owners. And when they say business owner, they mean Jeff Bezos type. They'll have some specialties. But I mean, I think for the other somebody, you might have someone in a smaller firm like, hey, you're an expert in Lockheed Martin. You deal with them or you deal with Coca-Cola, whatever it is. But it's still pretty much just whoever they fit well with, whoever has capacity or whoever brings them in is kind of the mix.

Lauren (17:27):

We see a similar thing too and more of that ensemble firm size where there's, like you said, a general target, but then there are specific advisors who might own a particular audience, if you will. They've got the business owners exit planning certification or so on and so forth but it's certifications or experience or just who their network is that aligns with that particular audience, which I would assume could be an attractive growth path for someone who’s younger. If they have more of a sweet spot, they want to narrow into seeing that the firm is investing in them going after a particular demographic. So super interesting. Any other things you think would be helpful to share just for if firms are thinking to hire, things they should do to prepare for that hire or initial things to be thinking about or that window of hiring?

Caleb (18:18):

Yeah, I mean, I just look at the business. Where do you need the help and you need to get started probably before you hit capacity. I mean, that's where we see a lot of oops. I get calls like small firms, 300 million, 300 clients. There's one advisor helping an associate helping the firm. I'm like, there is no way — you're not servicing all these people and you should have hired someone a long time ago. And so that the timing but also just the clarity being very clear. I mean, when firm owners come to me or the hiring managers, whoever it is, comes to me and says they're clear on who they want, as long as it's reasonable, if it exists we can find it for them. But when they're like, we don't really know. We just need somebody up here just to try to get some plans done and get some climbing, just kind of send us some people, that never works. And that's like the clients coming to them saying, hey, I don't really have any retirement goals. I just want a big pot of money, and can you make that happen?

Lauren (19:18):

Totally fair. It's like their unicorn, right? 

Caleb (19:21):

I don’t know what to do with that.

Lauren (19:24):

I'm sure you see this too. I can say with owning a company myself, there are certain roles we hire for, and we hired more than once for them. We have certain people in a number of roles but we've learned to refine the job description over the years. And then we've also learned how long it actually takes to onboard someone for that. So that impacts when you actually go to put out that job description, how long it takes to hire. And that takes time. And so I think one of the great things your firm offers is you're having all these conversations. It's almost like you can speed that up versus going through multiple years of trying to get it right and then knowing when you should actually pull the trigger and then what to look for. So by the way, that makes me think too, we use DISC as a training tool for personalities. Are there any kind of tools you use as part of your hiring process to get the right fit?

Caleb (20:15):

There's a lot of them out there. So on the conative side, Kolbe Corp, out of Phoenix, Arizona, on the affective side, I mean, we've used Caliper in the past, StrengthsFinder, we used DISC. There's a profile, there's the culture index predicting. There's a ton of them out there. And we do see a lot of firms have their own, they probably have a consultant at some point, and they've brought in something, and that's what I recommend for firms, just make sure you're testing all areas of the mind, so the cognitive, the affective, and then the conative, and to try to get a good sense on who you're actually hiring.

Lauren (20:52):

Yep, makes sense, especially if it's someone who’s in a client facing role, right? Really owning those relationships but also supporting the work itself so it's reflective of how the business operates and shows up in the world. Not easy to find the right fit. But thank you. I appreciate your time and sharing a little bit more about what you all do. So just to direct folks to your website, it's newplannerrecruiting.com; we’ll make sure to link below. Any final words, final thoughts?

Caleb (21:24):

It's a great profession. If there's any job seekers out there, I share this all the time. I spend all day talking to people who are trying to get into this business — so if you're in it, you've picked the right one and just keep doing your thing and you'll have success.

Lauren (21:40):

Awesome. Thanks so much, Caleb. We appreciate your time.

Caleb (21:43):

Thanks for having me.

Tips and Trends for Hiring and Onboarding the Right Team in Financial Services Firms with Caleb Brown

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