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184: *Free Download* Client Intel Process · The Efficient Advisor: Tactical Business Advice for Financial Planners

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: I've talked about having a client intel process before.
• 0:03
  Speaker 1: I have mentioned it in a couple of different episodes, but today I'm going to lay it out for you.
• 0:08
  Speaker 1: Start to finish.
• 0:09
  Speaker 1: What is a client intel process?
• 0:12
  Speaker 1: Okay, so you know, every advisor, coach, guru, business strategist, thought leader whatever you want to call us says that you need to capture information about your clients personal information about your clients so you can use it to create a customized experience.
• 0:28
  Speaker 1: You've heard this before and if you're like most advisors, you're thinking okay, cool, cool, cool, but what information do I actually need to know?
• 0:36
  Speaker 1: Where do I actually store this information?
• 0:39
  Speaker 1: How do I capture it in a way that's not awkward or interviewee?
• 0:44
  Speaker 1: And what the heck do I then do with this intel?
• 0:49
  Speaker 1: How do I actually use it in my business to drive a customized client experience?
• 0:53
  Speaker 1: So today I am introducing you to the start to finish client intel process and, yay, giving you a free download that you can use, starting tomorrow, in your business.
• 1:05
  Speaker 1: It's done and ready or you can obviously use it as an example and then customize it for yourself.
• 1:13
  Speaker 1: So let's dive into this client Intel process PDF and, most importantly, how to actually integrate it into your business.
• 1:31
  Speaker 1: And before I dive into the client intel process.
• 1:34
  Speaker 1: I want to invite you to come hang out with me.
• 1:37
  Speaker 1: You know, in the past I have partnered with retirement tax services on some tools and some things, but I am super fired up to announce that I am going to be giving a killer keynote on creating processes around tax planning for your clients at the RTS Summit this September 26th and 27th in Tempe, arizona.
• 1:57
  Speaker 1: I've got a link for you and if you're coming, use my link, because when you sign up through the link that I have for you, I will be notified and you will be invited to whatever special hangout it is that we are doing.
• 2:09
  Speaker 1: Still haven't decided on what the format is just yet.
• 2:13
  Speaker 1: Depends on the numbers and registration and all of the things, but some sort of free speed coaching, one-on-one time together, some sort of small group thing.
• 2:22
  Speaker 1: I'd love to know actually what you'd like to see, since I kind of get to do whatever I want and there will be two days of amazing tax planning lessons to really really level up your financial planning offering.
• 2:34
  Speaker 1: And if you're not doing tax planning for your clients right now, even if you're with a broker dealer I was with a broker dealer and you are able to still do some sort of tax planning within the compliance requirements and restrictions, but you are putting yourself at a huge competitive disadvantage if you're not doing some of the basics.
• 2:51
  Speaker 1: So there are conference add-ons and all kinds of other cool things that you can do, but plan on hanging out with me in Arizona September 26th and 27th.
• 2:59
  Speaker 1: You can find the registration link and more details on my website.
• 3:03
  Speaker 1: There's a little banner up at the top or in the show notes for this episode.
• 3:07
  Speaker 1: Would love, love, love to see you guys there, especially at our special hangout.
• 3:11
  Speaker 1: And also in the show notes is going to be the PDF download for this episode so you can grab the exact PDF of the client intel process that we are going to talk about and go through today, of the client intel process that we are going to talk about and go through today.
• 3:29
  Speaker 1: So what is a client intel process and how do I actually gather this level of detail about my clients without it feeling awkward, interviewee or just plain random?
• 3:38
  Speaker 1: So really, the idea behind a client intel process is to have information so that you and your team really know your client deeply and that that comes across in the relationship.
• 3:52
  Speaker 1: Our clients want to be seen, they want to be heard.
• 3:56
  Speaker 1: They want to be known.
• 3:57
  Speaker 1: That is the foundation for the human condition and what we want to have is a customized experience for our client.
• 4:08
  Speaker 1: We talk all the time here at the Efficient Advisor about how everything comes back to the client experience and how your clients feel in working with you.
• 4:17
  Speaker 1: If you want to build up to be a referral only practice, it is not until we took client experience very, very seriously and built processes to support all of the things that we wanted, right.
• 4:29
  Speaker 1: So everybody wants to know their clients and remember all of the details.
• 4:32
  Speaker 1: We want to remember that Jim is really into the Cincinnati Reds and that he loves golfing and fly fishing and pickleball and then he had a knee replacement seven years ago and that you know he gets his athleticism from his dad and his favorite restaurant is this and his favorite coffee.
• 4:48
  Speaker 1: We all want to know that information.
• 4:50
  Speaker 1: And it was really easy back when you had just a few clients.
• 4:54
  Speaker 1: And, as you know, as your business grows, like in the beginning, it's like, oh, I can just remember all of these things.
• 4:58
  Speaker 1: And as your business grows and as you gather more clients and you get more and more information pushed into your brain and the advisor ADD sets in and becomes more real and your business gets bigger and bigger and everything is on fire all the time.
• 5:12
  Speaker 1: It's hard to remember those details.
• 5:16
  Speaker 1: So when I say you want to build a process so that you care, it's because you care.
• 5:23
  Speaker 1: So that you care, it's because you care, it's a way of capturing that information so that you can use it later, not in a manipulative way or as in like a sketchy way.
• 5:33
  Speaker 1: But I know for me and I know this is true for a lot of advisors that I coach is you really do care, you want to know all of those details.
• 5:40
  Speaker 1: It's just not humanly possible for your brain to remember all of the things all of the time about all of the people, so you can express your caring.
• 5:51
  Speaker 1: If you want to build a client Intel process at all, it's because you care and you want to use that information to be able to express your caring.
• 5:59
  Speaker 1: So we need to build a process to customize your client experience and you know I talk all the time about template, template, same, same process, process.
• 6:07
  Speaker 1: But about 80% of everything that we do is the same for our clients and about 20% is going to be really like.
• 6:15
  Speaker 1: So this is for my ideal practice.
• 6:16
  Speaker 1: About 20% is going to be customized for those individual clients.
• 6:20
  Speaker 1: So think of it like your recommendations template.
• 6:24
  Speaker 1: 80% of the template is going to be the same.
• 6:26
  Speaker 1: Your rationale on why they should or shouldn't have something, the way that you calculate life insurance needs, let's say your thoughts or feeling around socially responsible investment, all of that stuff's going to be the same.
• 6:39
  Speaker 1: And then you're going to detail it to that particular client.
• 6:44
  Speaker 1: So let's say your template is hey, I've got these 10 tax saving strategies that we use for most of our clients.
• 6:52
  Speaker 1: Seven might apply to me and my family, six might apply to that family and another family, and then there might be a couple of one-off things that you would suggest for each of us.
• 7:00
  Speaker 1: So 80% template, 20% custom same thing with the client Intel process you are going to want to have.
• 7:10
  Speaker 1: Like you're going to want to gather.
• 7:11
  Speaker 1: About 80% of the information you're going to want to get from all your clients is the same Cause you're gonna be able to use it in a lot of different ways.
• 7:16
  Speaker 1: And then there's always going to be those like a couple of random oddball um fun facts about your clients or like off the wall facts about your clients that you're going to want to remember too.
• 7:25
  Speaker 1: So for the vast majority of our clients, it's going to be the same types of information that we're gathering, and by not just capturing the information, and what we're going to get into in this episode is how do we actually store it and use it and use it well in our business, but getting this information and then actually using it allows you to make those relationships with your client deeper and more connected.
• 7:49
  Speaker 1: People's favorite topic is typically themselves and, even if it's not right, people love to feel like somebody cared enough to remember a detail.
• 8:01
  Speaker 1: And you do care, right, you do care.
• 8:03
  Speaker 1: That's why you're building a process for this.
• 8:04
  Speaker 1: A detail, and you do care, right, you do care.
• 8:05
  Speaker 1: That's why you're building a process for this.
• 8:06
  Speaker 1: And you can use this information when you're prepping for meetings, before client callbacks.
• 8:11
  Speaker 1: Um, you know, like.
• 8:16
  Speaker 1: So if your team is going to call a client back, they can peek at this sheet really quick and be like oh hey, I saw you're a huge Michigan fan.
• 8:19
  Speaker 1: That was so cool that they won the Rose bowl.
• 8:22
  Speaker 1: Blah, blah, blah.
• 8:23
  Speaker 1: Did you get to go?
• 8:24
  Speaker 1: Did you watch it?
• 8:25
  Speaker 1: You know, there's ways for you to utilize this information and I'm going to get into that here in a minute.
• 8:30
  Speaker 1: We talk a lot in the onboarding episode that I did for this podcast.
• 8:35
  Speaker 1: It's called the first 100 days.
• 8:37
  Speaker 1: I believe it's episode number 44.
• 8:39
  Speaker 1: I will double check and link it for you in the show notes.
• 8:41
  Speaker 1: But one of the things we talk about in onboarding is, within that first 100 days, solidifying to your clients that you are so much more than any other advisor that they've ever worked with, that you are paying attention not just to their financial plan but to the details of who they are as humans and people.
• 9:01
  Speaker 1: People want to know that you care also.
• 9:03
  Speaker 1: You know and this is true I've done some.
• 9:05
  Speaker 1: You know we've done oh my gosh, we've done five rounds of the group coaching now.
• 9:10
  Speaker 1: And every time it never fails that someone says to me, when we're talking about onboarding and we're talking about ideal client avatars and we're talking about this Intel process and there's no judgment here but every now and then, or ever really, every time somebody says, oh, I'm doing this ICA worksheet, libby, and I don't know my clients as well as I thought I did, or I'm trying to come up with a fun custom gift for my top 10 clients and I realized like I don't have this kind of information.
• 9:42
  Speaker 1: There's no shame, there's no judgment here.
• 9:46
  Speaker 1: Make a plan to get these details from them and change, change it, do it.
• 9:52
  Speaker 1: Let's make it moving forward.
• 9:53
  Speaker 1: And it's not awkward and it's not weird to gather this information halfway through.
• 9:57
  Speaker 1: So if you're sitting here just thinking like, oh gosh, I don't know this kind of information or I feel like I should know my clients better, you're not alone.
• 10:05
  Speaker 1: Okay, we're so busy being great planners that this some you know this stuff sometimes feel like it's just on the peripheral.
• 10:12
  Speaker 1: Okay, so we're going to want to plan to get these details from them in a way that doesn't feel like an interview.
• 10:19
  Speaker 1: And there's a couple of ways to do this.
• 10:21
  Speaker 1: And there's a couple of ways to do this so you can engage your team.
• 10:31
  Speaker 1: So if you are lucky enough or blessed enough to have a team, you can involve them in the process and you can have them have certain roles and goals within the relationship.
• 10:39
  Speaker 1: So let me give you an example In our office.
• 10:47
  Speaker 1: Let me give you an example In our office.
• 10:48
  Speaker 1: My front office gal, lisa.
• 10:49
  Speaker 1: She would welcome the clients in.
• 10:50
  Speaker 1: You know she, her office or desk was situated right in the lobby.
• 10:52
  Speaker 1: She would be the one that would greet the clients.
• 10:54
  Speaker 1: She'd get them seated in the conference room and part of her job and her requirement was to chit chat with our clients as she got them seated right.
• 11:03
  Speaker 1: I never wanted our clients.
• 11:04
  Speaker 1: So let's say we had two conference rooms and the way that this operated is, I, kind of bounced back and forth.
• 11:12
  Speaker 1: So conference room A, the clients would be getting set up and seated.
• 11:14
  Speaker 1: I'd go in, do my thing while I was wrapping up with them.
• 11:17
  Speaker 1: Clients were getting seated in conference room B.
• 11:19
  Speaker 1: I'd pop over there, I'd do my thing with them and then I'd pop back to conference room A all day long.
• 11:26
  Speaker 1: And you've been to the doctors.
• 11:27
  Speaker 1: You know that moment when they take you to the little back room and you're kind of like yay, my appointment's coming, and you're wearing the paper robe and you're just kind of sitting there on the chair and you're like just waiting and you're alone and it's really quiet.
• 11:43
  Speaker 1: And then you're like I guess I'll just get on my phone.
• 11:44
  Speaker 1: Remember before we had phones.
• 11:45
  Speaker 1: What did we do?
• 11:46
  Speaker 1: What did we do during those few minutes?
• 11:47
  Speaker 1: Think about deep thoughts or something.
• 11:50
  Speaker 1: But you know, you know that moment.
• 11:51
  Speaker 1: It's awkward and it's quiet and it feels like forever.
• 11:55
  Speaker 1: So one of the things in our office is we didn't want that awkward, quiet like just thinking moment for our clients, so Lisa's job was to get them seated.
• 12:02
  Speaker 1: Moment for our clients?
• 12:06
  Speaker 1: So Lisa's job was to get them seated, bring them beverages and chit chat with them.
• 12:10
  Speaker 1: And especially in our prospect to client process.
• 12:11
  Speaker 1: So the the you know the point where a prospect called us and said, yes, we'd like to meet with you to potentially interview you to know to be a planner or whatever.
• 12:19
  Speaker 1: All the way through the point you know we did the planning for them and they said, yes, we want to work with you guys on an ongoing basis.
• 12:25
  Speaker 1: As we started that process, lisa had specific questions that she was kind of finding out details for and we had specific things like hey, the goal is, every time a client comes in, we want to find out one or two things that we can add to our client Intel sheet about these clients.
• 12:50
  Speaker 1: So you know, when, let's say, client walked in the front door and they had a coffee cup in their hand already, um, let's say it was a paper coffee cup and it's from a local place, you know her job would be to notice that and say, oh my gosh, where is that from?
• 12:55
  Speaker 1: Is that from mile 42?
• 12:56
  Speaker 1: Oh, I love mile 42.
• 12:58
  Speaker 1: My favorite drink there is a bumblebee latte.
• 13:00
  Speaker 1: What's yours right?
• 13:05
  Speaker 1: What is it?
• 13:05
  Speaker 1: What do you typically get?
• 13:06
  Speaker 1: Oh, you're a boring coffee guy.
• 13:06
  Speaker 1: Okay, you know.
• 13:07
  Speaker 1: And documenting those details, or, as they're ordering coffee, right, like, hey, we had in our office, we just had a simple Keurig and we had a whole bunch of flavors and we had, like, cappuccinos and we had you know all the things.
• 13:19
  Speaker 1: And it was just documenting what they were drinking and asking oh, cappuccino, is that something you typically get or is this a special treat, you know?
• 13:26
  Speaker 1: And just gathering some of that information, you know she was to look for one or two things each time and do what we called double-clicking.
• 13:34
  Speaker 1: Double-clicking meaning don't just take it at face value, but literally double-click on it and ask more questions.
• 13:40
  Speaker 1: So, for example, if our clients were tea drinkers, you know Lisa might say something to them to the effect of oh, you're a tea drinker, how did you get started on drinking tea?
• 13:50
  Speaker 1: Oh, it was your grandmother.
• 13:52
  Speaker 1: Did she drink tea growing up?
• 13:54
  Speaker 1: Oh, she was from England, like you know.
• 13:55
  Speaker 1: Just getting more detail.
• 13:58
  Speaker 1: So, instead of just allowing your clients to be like I'm not a coffee person, I'm a tea person, and letting them get away with that as the final answer.
• 14:05
  Speaker 1: It's oh, how did you become a tea person?
• 14:07
  Speaker 1: Oh, how long have you been drinking coffee?
• 14:09
  Speaker 1: Um, you know, finding ways to to double click.
• 14:14
  Speaker 1: So if a client walks in with a, a Yeti mug with a particular team on it, instead of just letting that slide being like team on it, instead of just letting that slide being like oh, I see you have a Cincinnati Reds Yeti, are you a big fan?
• 14:28
  Speaker 1: Oh, do you get to games often?
• 14:30
  Speaker 1: You know, because that can determine like no one of my kids just gave me this, you know, for a Christmas present.
• 14:38
  Speaker 1: I'm not really like a big fan, right, we're now, if you just wrote it down, like, oh, huge Reds fan versus like the oh my gosh, I can't get enough of them.
• 14:44
  Speaker 1: We have season tickets.
• 14:45
  Speaker 1: We're massive fans, you know.
• 14:51
  Speaker 1: Did you know?
• 14:52
  Speaker 1: Back in the day I played baseball and I played for the Reds club team and I was trying to get up to that level.
• 14:54
  Speaker 1: You know, there's so much more information that you can gather from your clients just through observation and asking a few more questions.
• 15:02
  Speaker 1: So, going back to kind of process in this right was having intention and having your team intentionally ask questions related to whatever's on your client Intel sheet and, of course, the off the wall stuff too.
• 15:16
  Speaker 1: So you know you can also then gather that information intentionally through asking questions during your actual planning process.
• 15:25
  Speaker 1: So for us, I had questions that I liked to ask.
• 15:28
  Speaker 1: Lori was great at asking additional questions.
• 15:31
  Speaker 1: My director of operations that sat in with me on all of those meetings.
• 15:34
  Speaker 1: She was amazing at double-clicking and asking additional questions.
• 15:38
  Speaker 1: But, like, as you know, our clients would come in and let's say it was a married couple and we were asking the question well, how long have you been married?
• 15:43
  Speaker 1: Oh, when's your anniversary?
• 15:45
  Speaker 1: Are you guys good about celebrating?
• 15:47
  Speaker 1: Are you not good at celebrating?
• 15:48
  Speaker 1: Oh, what's your favorite restaurant?
• 15:50
  Speaker 1: Things that don't feel interviewee, but are just double clicking and getting to know them better and deeper and then having a place to document it.
• 16:00
  Speaker 1: So when you're talking with your clients about retirement planning and they start sharing travel information, like, oh, one of our goals is we would like $15,000 a year in retirement to take a riverboat cruise in Europe every single year instead of letting that just go as a goal right?
• 16:19
  Speaker 1: Like, have you been on a riverboat cruise before?
• 16:21
  Speaker 1: Where did you go?
• 16:22
  Speaker 1: What's the best vacation you've ever been on?
• 16:24
  Speaker 1: Are you go, go, go people, or are you relaxing before?
• 16:26
  Speaker 1: Where did you go?
• 16:27
  Speaker 1: What's the best vacation you've ever been on?
• 16:28
  Speaker 1: Are you go, go, go people, or are you relaxing people, or are you somewhere in between?
• 16:32
  Speaker 1: Do you prefer beaches or mountains, or active or laying around?
• 16:33
  Speaker 1: Like?
• 16:33
  Speaker 1: Asking additional questions and double clicking and I know for some people have natural curiosity and this comes really, really, really, really easy to you, and for other people it's more of an acquired skill that you have to have to practice and hone.
• 16:45
  Speaker 1: But that's where having something like this client Intel PDF and the objective of hey, each meeting, I'm going to try to get one or two lines of this puppy filled out and going in like I'm going to specifically look for things and ask questions to help me build out and complete this profile.
• 17:02
  Speaker 1: It is a great way to kind of force yourself to be intentional, and that's really what a process is right Is, how do we create an intentional way of doing the same thing over and over and over again?
• 17:15
  Speaker 1: So, by being intentional every meeting of hey, I'm going to try to grab one or two things for this client Intel sheet, looking at it briefly before they walk in the door here's the things that we do have, here's the things that we don't have.
• 17:26
  Speaker 1: I'm going to be intentional about getting that information, having other people on your team be intentional about getting certain pieces of information, or anytime that they hear something unique, interesting, fun from a client, marking it down and if you're like Libby, I'm not naturally good at that kind of stuff, I kind of suck at having intentions.
• 17:43
  Speaker 1: That sounds like something I would love to do, but I'm not is just be obvious and tell them exactly what you're doing.
• 17:50
  Speaker 1: I mean, I wouldn't sit down with this profile PDF that I'm giving you and be like, okay, today's session is finding out your favorite sports teams and what kind of drinks you prefer and what charities and hobbies you're involved in.
• 18:04
  Speaker 1: Right, we're not going to go through it, you know, step-by-step, but you could realistically be like, okay, for this round, let's say, you do surge meetings.
• 18:13
  Speaker 1: For this round of surge, one of the things on my agenda is just going to be asking my clients for what kind of hobbies do they have?
• 18:20
  Speaker 1: What kind of clubs or activities are they involved in?
• 18:22
  Speaker 1: You know, and, and finding out.
• 18:24
  Speaker 1: Or let's say, you're doing a theme-based plan, uh, for of charitable giving this year.
• 18:31
  Speaker 1: Uh, maybe one of the questions as you start to gather intel about your clients is where do you go to church?
• 18:36
  Speaker 1: Who do you give to?
• 18:37
  Speaker 1: What are the charities that are involved?
• 18:39
  Speaker 1: You know that you're involved in, if you're not terribly involved.
• 18:43
  Speaker 1: If you had more time, who would you want to be doing stuff for and with?
• 18:46
  Speaker 1: When clients are talking about, oh, in retirement, I'd love to give more of you know, my resource of time.
• 18:51
  Speaker 1: Oh, what would you do with that?
• 18:52
  Speaker 1: Who would you work for?
• 18:53
  Speaker 1: What kind of things are you passionate about?
• 18:56
  Speaker 1: And you could be really intentional about just straight up asking clients this year.
• 19:01
  Speaker 1: Hey, here's some things I wanna know about you that I don't think I've ever.
• 19:04
  Speaker 1: If you've mentioned it, I haven't written it down, and I'd love to know more about X, y and Z.
• 19:09
  Speaker 1: Again, you could be super obvious or you could be a little bit covert.
• 19:14
  Speaker 1: Whichever one works for you.
• 19:16
  Speaker 1: But those are the different ways that you can kind of intentionally gather this type of information.
• 19:21
  Speaker 1: And when I say this information, right, the next question is well, what kind of information do I need to gather?
• 19:29
  Speaker 1: Libby.
• 19:29
  Speaker 1: Well, that's going to really depend on how you want to use it and what the DNA of your brand is.
• 19:36
  Speaker 1: So let's say you want to use this information to provide a more customized experience in your office and you want to have the type of drinks that they like or the type of coffee that they want, or maybe like, if they tell you something really special, like they like the bumblebee latte from mile 42, that's a real thing here in Loveland you might go have one of your teammates, go grab one and bring it and surprise them.
• 20:02
  Speaker 1: Right.
• 20:02
  Speaker 1: The goal is a surprise and delight, but let's say it's also more powerful.
• 20:06
  Speaker 1: Imagine what it would feel like as a client if you were going to meet them for lunch near their office and instead of just saying hey, where would you like to meet for lunch, saying hey, you know you mentioned many times that you love red squirrel cafe because you mentioned that there was this.
• 20:23
  Speaker 1: You know, croque monsieur.
• 20:25
  Speaker 1: That you think is the most amazing thing ever.
• 20:26
  Speaker 1: So Libby would love to take you to lunch and buy you a one of these amazing croque monsieur, and you guys can you know she wants to try it.
• 20:33
  Speaker 1: It's just so much more powerful to be able to say hey, I know you love this, so let's do that Right.
• 20:39
  Speaker 1: Think of it like back when you were dating.
• 20:42
  Speaker 1: Or maybe you're dating now and you're trying to find out their favorite candies or their favorite treats or their favorite restaurants so that you can surprise and delight them later, right, we want, just like when you're dating, you want to be paying attention to the details, right, and we want someone to know that they're paying attention to those details about us.
• 21:01
  Speaker 1: So, on the PDF that I'm giving you guys, there's a section called food and drink.
• 21:05
  Speaker 1: There's a section called hobbies, interests, clubs.
• 21:09
  Speaker 1: You know, we're talking pickleball, we're talking country clubs, we're talking knitting, we're talking all of the different types of clubs that you could potentially be built in.
• 21:19
  Speaker 1: There is a section called history and this has things like hometown, where they went to college, maybe some of the places that they've lived.
• 21:25
  Speaker 1: Especially if you have clients that have lived really interesting places and they've mentioned that they lived in Hong Kong for a while and then Singapore and then they lived in Hawaii or whatever, this is a great place to document that type of information.
• 21:38
  Speaker 1: I've got a whole section for you here on vacations, like what's their favorite type?
• 21:42
  Speaker 1: Do they have any goal vacations in mind?
• 21:44
  Speaker 1: Do they have any previous vacations that they've mentioned to you that you can bring up later?
• 21:49
  Speaker 1: What was the best ever vacation that they ever went on?
• 21:53
  Speaker 1: It's again.
• 21:54
  Speaker 1: How are you going to use this information?
• 21:55
  Speaker 1: Well, when you're doing retirement planning for them and they're talking about an upcoming trip, it's so powerful again to be able to say, yeah, but will it compare to that time you went hot air ballooning in Australia, you know?
• 22:08
  Speaker 1: And for them to be like they remembered that about us and yeah, it's going to totally be more awesome than that.
• 22:13
  Speaker 1: And here's why.
• 22:15
  Speaker 1: Then there's a couple miscellaneous sections.
• 22:16
  Speaker 1: So there's one miscellaneous section that's sport team, sports teams, current TV shows, favorite movies, favorite quotes, pieces of wisdom, obscure facts.
• 22:27
  Speaker 1: Maybe they've mentioned who some of their friends or colleagues are.
• 22:29
  Speaker 1: And then there's a whole block in here for you that's just miscellaneous, random information.
• 22:35
  Speaker 1: Maybe they mentioned the weirdest job that they ever had in high school.
• 22:38
  Speaker 1: So I had a client who, when he turned 16, and this is real and I still can't get my arms around it he drove their school bus.
• 22:46
  Speaker 1: He lived in rural North or South Carolina, I can't remember, but he, when he turned 16, he drove the school bus, and so he would park the school bus at his house and then he would get up extra early and drive the school bus this was a long time ago, um and he would drive the school bus and go pick up all of his neighbors and friends and kids and drive them to school on the bus, and at the end of the day he drove the bus home and dropped them all off, and I just thought that was so random and so fascinating.
• 23:15
  Speaker 1: So that would be an example of just like an obscure fact about a client that you're going to want to make sure that you remember, and we brought it up all the time.
• 23:23
  Speaker 1: I'd be like, well, I mean, if they let you, you know, if they trusted you to drive a bus full of children when you were 16, certainly I can trust you to stay within your retirement budget or something like that.
• 23:34
  Speaker 1: So again, it depends on how you're going to use it.
• 23:36
  Speaker 1: But for me, a couple of different ways that you're going to use it, right, um, you're going to weave it into conversations.
• 23:42
  Speaker 1: You're going to use it when you're sending custom emails.
• 23:45
  Speaker 1: You're going to use it for surprise and delight.
• 23:48
  Speaker 1: We'll get into that here in a second.
• 23:50
  Speaker 1: But where do you keep this information?
• 23:52
  Speaker 1: So, just like anything else in life, having all of this detail is amazing, but it's not so great if you can't find it.
• 24:00
  Speaker 1: So I am giving you this PDF that you can download and you can certainly use this.
• 24:05
  Speaker 1: You can type into it digitally and save it in a digital file.
• 24:09
  Speaker 1: You can print it off and just handwrite stuff in.
• 24:11
  Speaker 1: If you're using paper files, don't overthink it and don't think that you have to go in and make a super fancy process.
• 24:20
  Speaker 1: There's a lot of stuff that we just had.
• 24:22
  Speaker 1: So we were a digital file office, but we had paper files for everybody, just so when they came in, I could quickly glance at some stuff or, if they had some questions, I had a way of accessing.
• 24:32
  Speaker 1: We had this sheet called a client overview.
• 24:34
  Speaker 1: I'm going to be sharing that with my group coaching peeps here soon, but wait.
• 24:38
  Speaker 1: Like if you wanted to have information at your fingertips that you didn't have to like look up cause, so our computers were attached to a screen in the office, right?
• 24:44
  Speaker 1: So if I looked something up about a client, the client can see it on the screen.
• 24:48
  Speaker 1: So I didn't want to be looking up their family tree or looking at this client Intel sheet where they could then see like, okay, I just looked up their family tree and I went, oh, how is your sister Betty?
• 24:58
  Speaker 1: Right, we want to be a little bit more like slick than that.
• 25:03
  Speaker 1: So we did have paper files.
• 25:05
  Speaker 1: So you could even have this client overview in your paper file and you just write this information in, or, when somebody on your team gathers that Intel, write it in.
• 25:12
  Speaker 1: Or you could have in your digital file for each client.
• 25:15
  Speaker 1: You could have on top um, just kind of the client Intel sheet, and whenever somebody on your team finds out an important piece of information or interesting information, you could just type it into the PDF.
• 25:27
  Speaker 1: Or you don't even have to get this fancy.
• 25:30
  Speaker 1: You could literally have a frigging word document for each of your clients, called client Intel sheet, and as you learn stuff, put it in the word document.
• 25:38
  Speaker 1: I would organize it in a way that makes it easy to read and find, but you could just have a word document.
• 25:44
  Speaker 1: It does not have to be hard.
• 25:46
  Speaker 1: The other thing that you can do and I have a lot of advisors that do this, as they do some tags on the client account.
• 25:52
  Speaker 1: So let's say you use like Salesforce.
• 25:53
  Speaker 1: So we used Salesforce.
• 25:55
  Speaker 1: You could tag all of your clients that like golf.
• 25:57
  Speaker 1: You could tag all of your clients that were big St Jude's children research contributors.
• 26:02
  Speaker 1: You could tag all of your.
• 26:03
  Speaker 1: I personally would find that a little cumbersome, but it's in your CRM.
• 26:06
  Speaker 1: You can open up the file and you could see all of the things.
• 26:09
  Speaker 1: We also had a special place.
• 26:12
  Speaker 1: So you're like, okay, well, what about the not permanent stuff that you want to remember?
• 26:17
  Speaker 1: So in Salesforce we use Salesforce for our CRM.
• 26:19
  Speaker 1: We had a special notes section that we used for all of the client interactions that happened between meetings, so that my team could run a set and anything that happened with our clients between the last meeting and this meeting went in there.
• 26:31
  Speaker 1: So if a client called in and took out $5,000 to buy a new car, uh, that went in the client Intel.
• 26:37
  Speaker 1: If a client called in about something else and they mentioned that their mom wasn't feeling well great, that went in this special notes section.
• 26:43
  Speaker 1: So the less permanent stuff we could still weave then into the next meeting.
• 26:47
  Speaker 1: So the next meeting, when they came in, I'm going to ask them like oh my gosh, did you drive the new car?
• 26:53
  Speaker 1: Is it parked in there.
• 26:53
  Speaker 1: You know parking lot.
• 26:54
  Speaker 1: Does it still have that new car smell, like you know?
• 26:57
  Speaker 1: I wanted them to know that we remembered that they did that, or I could ask them about how their mom's feeling.
• 27:01
  Speaker 1: So there's that less permanent information and you can have a special location for that inside of your CRM.
• 27:08
  Speaker 1: We did.
• 27:08
  Speaker 1: I loved having it done date wise.
• 27:10
  Speaker 1: The team would put it in, date it and then we could say, okay, they were in in February, uh, last year.
• 27:16
  Speaker 1: So, run, a set of everything between last meeting and this meeting was part of our prep process and we could see all of those little interactions and those special details for those less permanent things.
• 27:26
  Speaker 1: And again, we'd also go into a meeting with the intention of trying to find one or two client Intel pieces of information that we could acquire.
• 27:35
  Speaker 1: So that's a different way that you can keep it.
• 27:39
  Speaker 1: Oh, and I almost forgot.
• 27:40
  Speaker 1: So I have a couple advisors that do a.
• 27:44
  Speaker 1: Um, you know we're talking about how like.
• 27:46
  Speaker 1: Okay, how do I ask these questions without it feeling like an interview?
• 27:49
  Speaker 1: And you can just be super obvious, you could be super covert.
• 27:51
  Speaker 1: Or I have a few advisors that in their onboarding process, one of the things that they're doing during that first 100 days at letdown period is they send their clients like a welcome packet, and in that welcome packet is like 10 fun facts about each person on your team, and then you can give the clients a document.
• 28:10
  Speaker 1: That's like we want to know the same information about you.
• 28:13
  Speaker 1: So if you'd be so kind as to fill this out and here is a pre-stamped and addressed envelope for you to stick this in and so you could just flat out ask them some of these questions, like some of these off the wall questions, some of these like hey, what's your favorite drink?
• 28:25
  Speaker 1: What's your biggest fear?
• 28:26
  Speaker 1: Do you have any words of wisdom that you live by?
• 28:31
  Speaker 1: What was the weirdest job you've ever had?
• 28:36
  Speaker 1: You know things that would just be helpful for your clientele.
• 28:37
  Speaker 1: You can do it that way too.
• 28:38
  Speaker 1: So it doesn't don't overthink it.
• 28:40
  Speaker 1: It doesn't have to be anything extra fancy pansy.
• 28:42
  Speaker 1: Okay, so we were getting the information, we know how to get it, we know what we're looking for, we know where to store it.
• 28:51
  Speaker 1: Now the big question what do we do with it?
• 28:56
  Speaker 1: Well, the way that I like to recommend that advisors use this intel and the way that we used it, was in lots and lots and lots of different ways.
• 29:04
  Speaker 1: I would always try to weave it into conversation.
• 29:08
  Speaker 1: So if I had a client so I had a client, nancy, and her husband Steve, they were literally my favorites and, um, they would always go on vacation.
• 29:19
  Speaker 1: So Nancy would always go on vacation with this one troublemaker friend and she always talked about how expensive it was, because her troublemaker friend always talked her into doing things and buying things, going on excursions and all these things she wasn't planning on.
• 29:30
  Speaker 1: And you know, one time they came in and they were going to stop by my office and this is just really funny from a financial planning perspective.
• 29:38
  Speaker 1: But they were stopping in my office and then they were headed straight to the casino after they left and I was teasing her, you know.
• 29:44
  Speaker 1: So it's fun to be able to be like, hey, well, as long as Katie's not going with you and overspending, I trust you and I think you're going to be allowed to do that, you know.
• 29:54
  Speaker 1: Or, like Steve, her husband used to always say, oh, I have, I have shoe money, I keep a little extra in my shoe, you know.
• 30:01
  Speaker 1: So just being able to use those little things and pull them out at the right opportunity makes a lot of sense Then, also in your client customer service model.
• 30:10
  Speaker 1: You're going to be reaching out to your clients.
• 30:12
  Speaker 1: It's going to.
• 30:12
  Speaker 1: The goal is for it to feel random to your clients, but for you it's really intentional and part of your process, right?
• 30:18
  Speaker 1: So I would periodically send to our top A and B clients a just what felt like a random email to them, although it was pre-scheduled into my calendar.
• 30:27
  Speaker 1: I would send them an email like hey, I was in your accounts today just checking on everything.
• 30:31
  Speaker 1: Everything looks really good.
• 30:32
  Speaker 1: Wanted to just see how your mom's doing.
• 30:35
  Speaker 1: Or saw the big Michigan win for the Rose bowl.
• 30:38
  Speaker 1: I bet you are just extra pumped.
• 30:40
  Speaker 1: I always tried to use like one or two things um from that client Intel sheet in those emails.
• 30:48
  Speaker 1: So let's say they had a really good year in the market.
• 30:50
  Speaker 1: I might say, hey, all this extra cash looks like that dream trip to Italy is closer than you think, or something along those lines.
• 30:58
  Speaker 1: To make it feel personalized and to be intentional, I mentioned before that I would have my team run the set.
• 31:07
  Speaker 1: So when I'm prepping for an agenda for an upcoming meeting that I could weave in a couple of personal details.
• 31:12
  Speaker 1: And then, of course, gifts, client gifts.
• 31:16
  Speaker 1: If you know me and you've heard me speak anywhere, whenever I have a microphone I tend to go on one little soapbox thing and it's that anything with your logo on it is not a gift for your clients.
• 31:29
  Speaker 1: It's marketing.
• 31:30
  Speaker 1: And I'm not saying a client does not love your Yeti.
• 31:36
  Speaker 1: I'm not saying a client does not love the custom blend of coffee that your office is sending them.
• 31:42
  Speaker 1: They love them and they appreciate them, but at the end of the day it's not a gift for them.
• 31:46
  Speaker 1: It's marketing because it has your logo on it.
• 31:49
  Speaker 1: It's a gift for you for them to be using it out in public or for them to be making that coffee with their family on Christmas morning.
• 31:57
  Speaker 1: A true gift for your client is something that says hey, I saw this and I thought of you.
• 32:03
  Speaker 1: So same thing.
• 32:05
  Speaker 1: Like I know my mother-in-law right Used to get all the the daughter-in-laws um the same present every year, like in a different color, and I loved it.
• 32:13
  Speaker 1: They were always so sweet, always so thoughtful.
• 32:15
  Speaker 1: It was even more thoughtful when she gave us the second gift and it was customized to each of us based on things that we liked or things that we were interested in.
• 32:24
  Speaker 1: So kind of that same concept of being able to say, hey, I know you love pro V five golf balls here's those.
• 32:32
  Speaker 1: Here's a box of pro V fives, I know they're your favorite.
• 32:34
  Speaker 1: Um.
• 32:36
  Speaker 1: Or fishing lures for clients who love fly fishing, all of those little things that you can customize a little gift based off of this.
• 32:45
  Speaker 1: And then this is where and we're working on developing a surprise and delight guide for you guys but where you could have categories like okay, clients who like here's hobbies.
• 32:54
  Speaker 1: Clients who like pickleball here's a few pickleball gift ideas.
• 32:57
  Speaker 1: Clients who love coffee here's a couple coffee ideas.
• 33:00
  Speaker 1: Clients who love coffee here's a couple of coffee ideas.
• 33:02
  Speaker 1: Clients who love snow skiing here's a couple of snow skiing ideas.
• 33:04
  Speaker 1: Like different things that you could do for each category, but giving your team some guidance and saying, hey, pick something that makes sense from you know their client Intel sheet.
• 33:12
  Speaker 1: And then, of course, we're going to want to document it so you're not getting in the same thing year over year.
• 33:16
  Speaker 1: If you're doing like Christmas gifts or something like that.
• 33:19
  Speaker 1: But
• 33:19
  Speaker 1: I'm picturing like for this first 100 days, doing some sort of client like, hey, we're so excited to be working with you.
• 33:25
  Speaker 1: In fact, we were out and I saw this thing and it reminded me of you guys.
• 33:28
  Speaker 1: Uh, there's so much, there's something so much more personal and intentional when it's something like oh, they heard me.
• 33:36
  Speaker 1: Or oh gosh, I, that's so like we want it to be.
• 33:39
  Speaker 1: Like I saw this and I thought of you.
• 33:40
  Speaker 1: Oh gosh, that's so like we want it to be.
• 33:45
  Speaker 1: Like I saw this and I thought of you, that feels amazing.
• 33:46
  Speaker 1: Okay, so we also can use this information when, let's say, our clients are referring somebody to our office so we have a new prospect coming in.
• 33:54
  Speaker 1: That's a referral.
• 33:55
  Speaker 1: It is so much fun to be able to, without you know, crossing any confidentiality boundaries, to be able to say like oh my gosh, we love Jim and Jam.
• 34:07
  Speaker 1: They are obsessed with the Red Squirrel Cafe.
• 34:09
  Speaker 1: We always meet there annually.
• 34:11
  Speaker 1: Have you guys ever been with them and had that croque monsieur?
• 34:13
  Speaker 1: They're talking about that.
• 34:14
  Speaker 1: They are like in love with Um, you know.
• 34:16
  Speaker 1: So being able to show a prospect that, hey, these clients of ours are so much more than an account number.
• 34:22
  Speaker 1: They are near and dear to us.
• 34:24
  Speaker 1: We care about them.
• 34:25
  Speaker 1: We care about specific details.
• 34:27
  Speaker 1: Even if you have to look up the details about that client before those prospects walk in the door.
• 34:31
  Speaker 1: You still care enough to capture that information and to be able to use it.
• 34:37
  Speaker 1: So I love it for referral gifts, appreciation gifts, oh.
• 34:42
  Speaker 1: And if you're doing events, if you're going to do a referral event or an appreciation event, instead of inviting clients like saying I'm doing a golf pro and I'm going to invite all these clients and it turns out they don't even golf or they don't like golf, or they used to golf and now they're back hurt so they don't golf anymore.
• 34:59
  Speaker 1: Being able to customize and pick the right people for the right event.
• 35:03
  Speaker 1: Or if you've worked with me, you know what white glove referral events are.
• 35:07
  Speaker 1: And customizing an event to a client.
• 35:09
  Speaker 1: Being able to call the client saying, hey, I know you're interested in wine, coffee and tennis.
• 35:15
  Speaker 1: Here's three different ideas of an appreciation event that I can do for you and some of your friends blah, blah, blah, blah blah.
• 35:20
  Speaker 1: You know different ideas of an appreciation event that I can do for you and some of your friends blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.
• 35:24
  Speaker 1: You know this should be all um.
• 35:25
  Speaker 1: Being able to do it for them and being able to customize it to the things that they already like and love, versus being like, oh, we could do a golf pro and we could do a tennis pro and we could do pickleball and they're like I hate sports.
• 35:35
  Speaker 1: All I do is read.
• 35:36
  Speaker 1: I'd rather you do a book event, you know, being able to customize it.
• 35:41
  Speaker 1: Last one I love, as part of your client service model, emailing some of your best clients just on a random topic, nothing financial at all.
• 35:49
  Speaker 1: So let's say you find a really interesting article in the New York Times about I don't know wine drinking.
• 35:55
  Speaker 1: You might take that and send it to all of your clients that love wine, and this is where tags and things like that inside of your CRM can be really helpful.
• 36:04
  Speaker 1: But you might say hey, saw this email, thought it was really interesting and it's completely unrelated.
• 36:11
  Speaker 1: Again, it's like I saw this and I thought of you and that's really what we're shooting for when we're talking about surprise and delight.
• 36:19
  Speaker 1: Okay, that took me so much longer to explain.
• 36:22
  Speaker 1: I'm so long winded, but I love to give detail and I love to give examples and examples of how I use it.
• 36:27
  Speaker 1: So if you want to grab a this PDF, it is in the show notes or you can go to the efficient advisorcom backslash, one 84.
• 36:37
  Speaker 1: Uh, that's the episode number and you can find the download there as well.
• 36:41
  Speaker 1: I'm going to link that the webpage for this episode in the show notes for you.
• 36:45
  Speaker 1: Most podcast platforms have that where you can click the link for the episode.
• 36:49
  Speaker 1: You can click that or in the show notes themselves will be the.
• 36:54
  Speaker 1: It'll take you to that same page where you can then download the client Intel process.
• 36:59
  Speaker 1: So I hope you found this to be helpful.
• 37:02
  Speaker 1: Hopefully it answered some of your questions as to why you need it, how you can gather it, where you're supposed to store it and then how you can use it inside of your business, starting literally tomorrow.
• 37:16
  Speaker 1: Anyways, hope you guys have an amazing rest of your week and I would love to catch up with you over in the efficient advisor community on Facebook and then also, you know, I hang out on LinkedIn.
• 37:27
  Speaker 1: I hope you have an amazing rest of your week.