You're listening to Financial Adviser Marketing, the best show on the planet for financial advisers who want to get more clients without all the stress. You're about to get the real scoop on everything from lead generation to closing the deal. James is the founder of TheAdviserCoach.com, where you can find an entire suite of products designed to help financial advisers grow their businesses more rapidly than ever before. Now, here is your host, James Pollard. [00:31.7]
James: Welcome to part three of the Financial Advisor Laws Of Power Series. If you haven't listened to the first two parts, go back and listen to those. Obviously these podcast episodes have been inspired by Robert Greene's the 48 Laws Of Power. He's got several books, all of which I recommend by the way, but I like the 48 Laws Of Power the most. Although like in the laws of human nature is a close second. I like that a lot, but the 48 laws of power, it's more specific. So I recently re-read the book and I was thinking that some of the laws apply to financial buyers far more than others. So I decided to pick out those laws and turn them into podcast episodes. Now power is such a weird thing. So in science power is about energy being transferred. When you power on your cell phone, energy is being transferred. When you charge your phone, power's being transferred, energy is being transferred. It causes it to operate. It causes it to turn on. It causes it to do certain things. [01:26.1]
I looked up the word power in the dictionary and I found this definition. So the definition of power from the dictionary is the ability to act or produce an effort. In sociology power is about being able to realize your wishes. It's about producing the results you want to produce. It's an important part of the human experience, because we all want certain things. Now, of course, in the show, I'm going to talk about Financial Advisor Marketing and getting more clients, growing your business. So the laws of power discussed in this show will be viewed through a financial advisor marketing lens. They're about producing the result of more clients. So let's get into it. The next law I have in this series is law 28 from the book it's, ‘Enter action with boldness.’ [02:14.1]
People admire the bold. They love it when people take action; they boldly go in the direction of their dreams. This is why you shouldn't half ass things. It kills me when financial advisors try certain marketing strategies; some people would tell me they're going to try email marketing, but like Yoda said, do or do not. There is no try. I mean, why would you even try email marketing? It's been proven to work. It works. It works better than virtually everything else I've ever seen from financial advisors. So saying you're going to try is like saying, you're going to try to eat healthy. You are admitting to yourself right then and there that you're just going to go back to the Twinkies and the ho hose. You'll just give it up. Right? You're going to try. There is no fricking try. And the book talks about how almost no one is born bold. It's a habit that needs to be cultivated. And that's great news because it means you can teach yourself to become more bold. A lot of people get when they hear like, Oh, well, I'm just not born this way. And a lot of people weren't born that way. Well, okay. But you can teach yourself, right? You can improve yourself. You can practice it. [03:20.8]
But the reverse is also true. Being timid is also a learned skill. So if you act timidly, you're reinforcing it. You're making that habit stronger. You've got to be careful there. So think of any athlete you admire. Michael Jordan, Kobe Bryant, Tom Brady, Joe Montana, Mike Tyson. I don't care. Just think of someone. I bet that person wasn't timid. Mike Tyson's not timid. I'm looking at, I watched some YouTube videos, Mike Tyson bogging down to the ring. I just give me a little bit pumped up sometimes. Just like that dude was never timid. He knew he was great and he acted boldly. You could see it in his eyes. Like he's sitting there in the black, he’s standing there in the ring and the black trunks, just watching, observing his prey. He knows he just going to destroy whoever, it doesn't even matter who it is. Doesn't matter. It could be anyone on the planet. And he knew he was going to take his knuckles and he was going to put them six inches into the person's face. He knew it. Now a lot of times he won the match before it even started. He was bold while his opponent was timid. So he entered action with boldness, Mike Tyson did it. [04:29.6]
Tom Brady does it. Every superstar, mega star, awesome record-breaking athlete does this. But in Financial Advisor Marketing being bold separates you from the herd. Now from a purely marketing standpoint, bold marketing pieces tend to work better. So do something bold with your marketing. This is like an action step. So a lot of people are like, Oh, I'm looking, I'm looking for value in the podcast, I am looking for nuggets, here's a nugget. Do something bold. Send a prospective client, a coffee mug, ask for meeting over coffee. How about that? Don't just stick with LinkedIn message. I love LinkedIn. I love messaging on LinkedIn. I love direct outreach. I love seminar marketing. I love all this stuff, right. Everything works if you do it correctly and you do it properly, but try something bold. [05:17.2]
Instead of messaging somebody on LinkedIn and say, Hey, you have time for a 15 minute meeting, if you don't. It's okay. Sorry to bother you. Find their address. Send them a coffee mug. Say, I want to meet with you. It's going to be my treat. Okay. Here's the mug. Fill it up with coffee and get onto zoom at this time and we're meeting. [05:36.0]
Jonathan: Hmm.
James: I, I don't know how to say it any more clearly. If you're in my inner circle newsletter, I've given you a ton of ideas on how to be bold with your marketing. So that's why inner circle members do so much better than everyone else. I mean, that was one of the many reasons is because they're just bolder, that's really it. Like I'm giving you the value right here and the value of the podcast like one of the reasons why inner circle members are crushing it and every compared to everybody else is just because they do bolder stuff. That's really it. There's not much of a sexy marketing tactic and strategy and all this other stuff. It's not like super, super, super well thought out. It's just, I want a meeting. I'm sending you this coffee mug. Here you go. Just substitute coffee mug for anything else. If you've ever read the book, how to get a meeting with anyone and I'm going to butcher the guy's last name. I just say it's Stu right? How to get a meeting with anyone by Stu. He got a lot of meetings by being bold. [06:32.6]
He wanted to have a meeting with someone or his prospects wanted to have a meeting with someone that people that he helped get meetings for. I hope hopefully, hopefully that makes sense. But he would send like a prepaid cell phone and a note that would say, pick up this phone at two o'clock on Wednesday and they would call and they would have the appointment. That's super bold. So just think about that. I just want to let that sit with you financial advisors, and maybe we'll talk about it a little bit more in the future, but that is one of the laws of power. [07:02.2]
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Head on over to TheAdvisorCoach.com/coaching to learn more. [07:24.6]
James: Now, the next law I want to discuss is law 29. And it says plan all the way to the end. So when you plan to the end, you see different possibilities that could prevent you from reaching your goal and you can adjust accordingly. That's where the magic happens when you plan all the way to the end. It's not necessarily just give patting yourself on the back and putting your plan together. I mean, plans are useless, but planning is everything. And I like doing this with money-based goals. I even did an entire podcast episode on this. I think it was called, ‘How financial advisors can get to a million dollars a year,’ which used this law. This is the law that I use when helping financial advisors put together their income goals. When you start with the million dollar goal, that may be a lot to some people that may be chicken scratch to other people's listening to this. But when you start with that goal, you can work from there. You can see how many clients you need, which tells you how many appointments you need to set, which tells you how many prospective clients you need. [08:26.6]
And then it, you see everything, it starts filling it in and you can reverse engineer everything. It allows you to see more clearly, and it allows you to see the obstacles that can get in your way. And then you can handle them from there. Some people are, they're just too trapped in the present to create their future. They're too busy reacting to all of the stuff that's happening when they could be proactively setting goals and planning to accomplish them, they could be proactive, but instead they're living in a reactive reality. Not living in the present, “living in the present.” It's been a hot buzzword over the past few years. People say all this stupid stuff, like be present, live in the moment, make sure you're experiencing this. Like I understand and yes, there's a value to living in the moment, all of it as well and good, I get it. But you still need to plan for your future. You cannot be 100% in the moment. Just like you can't be a 100% in the past. [09:17.4]
A lot of people criticize other individuals who are living in the past, it’s was like, why are you being a history major, bro? You’re living in the past. That was seriously, but you, you need to plan for your future. Now I think a good balance with this is to plan all the way to the end and then concentrate your forces. Hmm. Sounds familiar. Maybe you've listened to this series. So plan all the way to the end and concentrate your forces on what you need to do in the present to execute your plan. So live in the future for a little bit, but don't stay there. Now, next law in the series is Law, number 34 and I like this one. This is one of my favorites. It's, ‘Be royal in your own fashion, act like a King to be treated like one.’ Now I already know that some people are going to misinterpret this. I said at the very beginning of this series in episode number one or part one of the series that a lot of the stuff can be misinterpreted as Machiavellian or arrogant. It's just Robert Green style. [10:22.6]
So when he writes this out, he's saying, be royal in your own fashion act like, a King to be treated like one. Just like, act like you're the big deal that you are. If you have confidence, continue to have confidence. If you're confident in your ability to just keep it going, keep moving. But some people are going to say all well that too cocky, but it's a law of power for a reason. If someone fell off a cliff and fell all the way to the ground and just splat splattered, would you get mad at gravity? Hmm…no, because gravity just is. Just like, this is a law of power. It just is. So act like a King or queen. You are financial advisor loyalty in your own fashion. It's absolutely critical for you to carry yourself with self-respect with confidence and with dignity. This applies everywhere in your life. But especially when building your practice. If a client disrespects you, fire that client, if a prospective client treat you poorly or fails to show up for a meeting like three times in a row, don't grovel, don't beg. [11:24.3]
Would a King do that? Would a queen do that financial advisors? You are royalty, act like it. If you believe yourself to be destined for greatness, you will radiate that belief. Now people disrespect the King, off with his head. You've you're not doing that in 2020 or 2021. There is no guillotine for you to just roll in your office, but you can say you're fired. You can get rid of people. So allow me to let you in on a little secret financial advisors. Now, producer, Jonathan, I want you to let, let me know if you agree with this?
Jonathan: Okay.
James: Successful people will never put you down. When you discuss your dreams and goals ever, they will encourage you. They will lift you up because they're dreamers too. They know what's possible. Do you agree? Or do you disagree?
Jonathan: I have fired friends for bringing me down. So I agree. 100% successful people do lift you up. [12:16.8]
James: I mean, they would never say, Oh, you can't build a podcast factory. Or who are you to say that you can take time off to go to skiing or to go surfing and to do all these other cool things. It's like, well, dude, like, there's a reason you, you're where you are, you know, your friend. And there's a reason where I'm, I am where I am. And people misinterpret that as cockiness or arrogance or whatever, but it's just the laws of power. That's really it. That's all it is. If you're struggling in your life and you're not getting the results you want, it is because you have made bad decisions. That's it. Like, you're not making good decisions. You're not, well, at least not in alignment with what you want. If you want to make a million dollars a year and you're currently making $750,000, you're doing awesome by society's standards. $750,000 a year, you should be happy, but it's not in alignment with your million dollar goal. If you're not there, you've got to start doing million dollar things. You got to start having million dollar behaviors and million dollar thoughts. Like you have got to be in alignment with your goals. Don't care about what everyone else thinks. Just know that you are Royal. [13:18.9]
Now, some people will say, Oh, that's arrogant. You're getting too big for your bridges. They want to pull you back down with all the other crabs in the bucket. So if you want to be better than other people, you've got to act better than other people.
Jonathan: Wow.
James: And again, I know some people are going to confuse that with arrogance or whatever, and that's fine, but it's a law of power. And it's been used throughout history in the book. The example that I took notes took note of there's a story about Christopher Columbus. And he had a meeting with the King of Portugal where he proposed basically trying to find a shorter route to Asia. That's what he wanted to do. He wanted to get to Asia. He never really wanted to do what happened. He wanted to get to Asia. But what he did was pretty crazy by those days, standards and basically everybody's standards. He asked for 10% of all future commerce within the discovered lands. Think of that 10% of all the trade within those lands in perpetuity. So if that deal went through and the King of Portugal said, you know what? Columbus, Oh, Christopher, my boy, you got a deal. If that happened, Columbus, his family would have been the richest family of all time by a huge margin. All the commerce in Asia, Holy moly. It was a huge demand. Especially when you consider at that time, Columbus was only a merchant. [14:40.8]
He wasn't a big deal. He there, he knew very little about navigation. He never even led a group of men before. He never took a trip that he was proposing. He never did anything like that, but he acted like a King. And even though he was denied his request, what happened was Columbus raised his own status. The King assumed that Columbus must somehow be worth his price merely because he asked for it. Now I'm going to end the show here because I want you to let that sink in. Really think about what I just told you, meditate on it for the rest of the day. And that's it. [15:17.6]
Jonathan: All right. So did you do a quick recap? I don't think you did. You want to do a recap or you want to end it right there?
James: I can do a recap for the financial advisors. So to recap, there are three laws that we discussed here in part three of the financial advisor laws and power series is, ‘enter action with boldness, fortune favors, the bold’. Plan all the way to the end,’ and you probably, do this with your clients all the time, so why not do it for yourself? And then one of my favorites, perhaps the favorite of mine is, ‘Be Royal in your own fashion. Act like a King to be treated like one.’ And I will catch you next week for the final part of the series, Financial Advisors Laws of Power part four.
Jonathan: Thank you, James. Thank you, fam for tuning in and we will be back next week with the final installment of the Financial Advisor laws of power. We'll see you then. [16:10.3]
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