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This episode is sponsored by Calibrate iq. First, a disclaimer. In the interest of being transparent, I created Calibrate iq. It's my app and I built it because I wasn't satisfied with any of the other risk tolerance tools on the market. I found that other tools didn't work the way I wanted them to. They focus too much on risk preference rather than time horizon. They're clunky and overcomplicated, and they're too expensive for what they do. And they aren't user friendly for clients. I designed Calibrate IQ to be simple, easy to use and low cost. It lets you send a single magic link to any client you want to survey. Clients fill out a simple survey that takes less than two minutes. Once that's done, you can automatically generate an investment policy statement instantly and deliver a beautiful branded report to the client. It lets you customize reports with your logo and brand colors, and you can even add your own custom investment preferences to the questionnaire. If you're tired of expensive risk tolerance tools that overthink the process, try CalibrateIQ. It's $9 a month with a seven day free trial. Give it a try at CalibrateIQ app again, that's CalibrateIQ app. Hey everyone. Welcome to Ops and Impact, where we talk operations and marketing for independent financial advisors building a lifestyle practice. I'm your host, Michael Reynolds, and today's topic is how to love your sales process by having no sales process. So I've alluded to this a little bit in other episodes and I've talked about this before in various communities, but I just want to share something that I think may help some of you. Maybe not all of you, but maybe some of you. And that is those of you who might be struggling with a sales process in your financial advisory firm. Maybe you're trying to figure out what process you should go through to try to convert a prospect to a client, how to run them through a process that is sales driven, that sells to them, pitches to them, gets them to become a client. And how do you do that? What's the process behind doing that? So I think a lot of us are trained that we're supposed to have a sales process. We're used to other businesses where there's proposals and meetings and all sorts of things to do to get someone to become a client. And we call it sales and it is sales. That's a lot of businesses have sales processes and they work sometimes. So that's fine if it works for you. I know a Lot of advisors who have a very detailed sales process. They do proposals, they do portfolio analyses, they do multiple meetings, and they do all sorts of things to walk a prospect through becoming a client. And they do presentations, and that's fine. If it's working for you and you're doing all that, keep doing it, great, no problem. But I also see other advisors who struggle with this. Some of us are natural salespeople. We're just good at it. We're great at the sales process. We have a knack for it, and some of us don't. We don't necessarily like the idea of trying to persuade someone to become a client. It feels icky to us or it feels uncomfortable. And I'm here to say that's okay. If you're. If that's not your style, you don't have to force yourself into a sales process. So I'm going to share my sales process, which, spoiler alert, it is no process, but I'm going to share what I do. And I know a lot of other advisors who do the same thing, and it works really well for them. And I'm hoping this kind of helps you let go of some guilt or some mental baggage or some head trash that is holding you back from embracing who you are and how you want to operate your firm when it comes to bringing on new clients. So my spoiler alert that I've already said is I have no sales process, and that's intentional. So a little bit of background. I am a career changer. I think you've probably heard this before if you've listened to me in the past. I used to own a digital marketing agency for about two decades. We were very familiar with the sales process during that time. So I. My marketing agency was very focused on bringing in leads, getting a meeting set up, doing proposals, doing presentations, doing all sorts of things to walk through a process and get someone to eventually say yes to working with us. And sometimes it worked and sometimes it didn't. A lot of times it did work, which is great. And I was used to that. And as I was working on kind of the process of changing careers and I was in the process of selling my agency, the reason I was getting burnt out is because I was just tired of doing that. I honestly didn't want to do sales anymore. As a business owner for most types of businesses, you just have to be in sales. That's just naturally what you do. And so that was part of it. I had to represent my firm and sell and pitch and do all that stuff. So I was getting burnt out on the process and I was interested in changing careers to financial planning and it has been the best move ever. Super happy with it. And one of the reasons, I guess not reasons, but one of the things I wanted to do intentionally as I changed into this career is I wanted to leave behind the need to sell. I was just tired of it. I wanted to be set up as an expert, someone that people seek out for expertise and hire because they need my expertise. And I didn't want to mess with pitching or selling or presenting or any of that stuff. So I went into it intentionally with that mindset and I think that's what led me to what I do today. And I love it. I am extremely happy with it and it relieves so much stress and anxiety from the process and helps me really just enjoy my firm, enjoy my business, enjoy what I do so much. I'm so happy with the way I do things and it just gives me fulfillment, gives me happiness. I have a lot of joy in running my firm and a lot of it's because I've left the sales process behind. So here's what I do. When someone reaches out to become a client or they a prospect, they're thinking about working with me, they reach out, they book a meeting. All I do is I send one questionnaire. I say, hey, thanks for reaching out, looking forward to chatting. Please fill out this questionnaire in advance so I can learn more about you. Most of the time the prospect fills it out, which is great. I just ask them for basic information, income, assets, comfort level with different areas like investing, estate planning, insurance, stuff like that. And then we have a 45 minute meeting. And that is a free consultation. That's what I call it. I call it a free consultation. And we just chat. I have some questions, I'll ask them based on their questionnaire, I get to know them a little bit more. I try to give them some basic feedback and education. During the meeting I try to give them some value. So often they'll have questions like, oh, I'm trying to decide between this path and that path and I'm not sure what to do about this. And so in the meeting I just provide them some general feedback like, hey, I would think about it like this. And a lot of my clients in this situation do this and we talk through different ways to think about approaching the questions they have. If they're general enough, I'll answer their questions and give them some suggestions. I don't give advice. Obviously I'm not a client, but I Give them suggestions on what they might think about doing. And I give them value and they seem to really appreciate that. I have them ask me questions, they ask me what they want to know about me, working with me, and we keep it super casual and super informal. At the end, I usually don't say anything in particular. I just kind of let them drive it. And nine times out of ten they will say, okay, great, what does it look like to work together? And I will tell them, great, if you're interested, I'll send you my docusign agreement and we'll, we'll get started. It's pretty simple. And that's it. And after the meeting if they, sometimes they'll say, send me the agreement right away. And I'm like, great, I'll send it. Other times they're like, okay, great, thanks. We're going to think it over. And I'm like, yes, please think it over. Take your time, no rush. I really like to tell them there's no, no rush, no pressure. It really helps them feel better about it. And then I send a quick follow up email that's templated and it says, hey, thanks for chatting. Today was great to get to know you. If you'd like to become a client or have further questions, just reach out and that's it. And that's all I do. I do nothing else. I basically forget about them after that. Not in a bad way, like I don't forget about them but like I don't do anything else. I don't follow up, I don't reach out to ask for a follow up meeting. I just leave them alone and that's it. And most of the time, more than half the time, they reach out and become a client. Either they decide on the spot to become a client or they reach out shortly after and they want to get my agreement and become a client. Not always, but more than half the time. And that's it. That's my non sales process. So I will share some caveats around this because I don't want to just say this works in a vacuum because it doesn't. There's a couple things that really make this work for me. One of those things is my general vibe during the whole process. I have a vibe that you know what, I am not invested at all whether or not this prospect becomes a client. And they can feel that. I just go into it saying, you know what, if they want to work with me, great. If they don't, not a big deal. But I'm the expert, I am the professional. They're seeking help from. And if they want my help, great. If not, there are other people I can serve and other clients I have that I can help. And that is truly my vibe and my mindset going in. And that really drives the feel and the tone of the meeting. And again, clients can feel that. Clients can feel when they're being sold to. People in general can. As soon as they think they're being sold to, they get their defenses up, their resistance goes up. They can feel that very easily. And so my meetings are completely devoid of any kind of pressure or sales or persuasion. So that helps, in my opinion, and I think that helps me come off as an expert. When people are working with other professionals, attorneys, physicians, other types of consultants, they. They don't really go into it with a. Like they're being sold to. They go into it saying, hey, I need help, and you're the expert. You tell me what to do. And they have that tone of respect for the professional. And that's the tone I'm trying to set as well. So that's one thing to think about. The other part of this, the other caveat is I think it's really important that you have a great content marketing system set up in advance that warms them up before they get to you. So before we have a free consultation, the vast majority of these prospective clients have read articles on my website. They've seen social media posts I've put out there, they've listened to my podcast, sometimes for months or years. They've seen YouTube videos. They look through my website and see all the media quotes I've gotten and the media attribution I've been featured in. So they already see me as an expert because my online presence is so high quality and so credible and has so much social proof behind it that I'm already set up to be a professional or an expert in their eyes, and there's not much more convincing that needs to happen. So does that mean you have to have this massive content marketing system like I have? Not necessarily. You can. Depending on your target audience and how you're structured, it can look different. But in my opinion, you need to have something going on that shows that you're an expert, that you're a thought leader, that you have a lot of expertise that is demonstrated through your output, through what is visible to the world, to the public. So what can that be? That can be a. It can be one thing. It can be a fantastic YouTube channel that is so deep and so full of fantastic information that you've developed a great following and it's, it speaks for itself. Or maybe it's a podcast that's been running for three years and is really good. Or maybe it's the articles on your website that are so in depth and so useful that people really get value from them. And that can be it. It could be a combination of things. Your social media presence could be so vibrant that it really highlights your expertise. So whatever it is, I do all of those things by the way. So for me it's just be everywhere and do all of it. But as long as you're doing something a great website, obviously your website has to look really good, really professional, really highlight your expertise and external social proof really helps. Again, mentions in big publications that show that you have been featured in these big media outlets. That's a really good way of demonstrating social proof. Things like that will really help. So those things will help this process or this non process work much better. So again, great content marketing system out there that warms people up before they even get to you and a vibe that says I'm an expert, I'm a professional, I would love to help you if you're interested, but I'm not going to sell to you. That kind of vibe goes a long way as well. So that is my not sales process that I love. It takes all the pressure off. There's not a lot of time spent following up. I am focused. As soon as we're done with the consultation, they can hire me or not, but I've moved on to serving my clients and that's where my attention is and that's where I love to have my focus. So again, circling back, to use a jargony term, circling back again. If you have a sales process that's working well and you do presentations and proposals and stuff and it's working and you love it, great. Do all that and don't stop. But if you're struggling with sales and you want to take the pressure off and it's just not in your gut, it's just not something you want to do and it's just not working well, then you can try a non sales process similar to what I do and you might love it. I love what I do for not sales and it works very well for me and helps me really enjoy my firm and the work I do. So that is what I have for you today. So with that, always happy to chat further. You can find my consulting site for advisors@michaelreynolds.com There's a bunch of stuff there for you. Most of it's free, some of it is not free, but it's not very expensive. If you want to get in touch, there's lots of ways I can help you there, including my private community that is growing and I'm really in love with it. It's a great community. We've got some great people there. I restructured the events to be a little more streamlined. We do mastermind clinics that are at least once a week and you can get very detailed, specific hands on help with anything you're struggling with on the side of operations or marketing, and a bunch of other stuff too. So with that, thanks for joining me today. Have a great day. See you next time.