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 TheAdvisorCoach.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: Financial advisors, welcome to another week, another episode of the Financial Advisor Marketing podcast. I have been doing a lot more, not a lot more, but a few more guests shows recently. We had Taylor Sheltie recently, we've had coach Joe Lukacs. We have Samantha Russell in the past Jack singer, but the person that I have on you're going to see you obviously see his name in the show titles. I'm not going to like hype it up or anything, but it's Derek Notman. And I explained to him before we went on the air that I don't think I've ever seen anyone really add value to the financial advisor community in the way that he does and the, he generated a following for a reason because his message resonates with people. And it seems as if it's needed now more than ever, because he is the hands down expert on having a virtual financial advisory practice, running a virtual financial planning firm. He's been all around the world. I've listened to some of his other podcasts. He's been on talking about bullet trains, Starbucks in Ireland, it beaches in South Africa. So, like he's living what he talks about. So, without further ado, Derek, you got a hot mic right now, so introduce yourself. [01:37.7]
Derek: Hello everybody. Yeah, James. Thanks, man. I appreciate it. It's awesome to be here. Love chatting with you and just excited to you know just share a little bit more about my journey, my insights, and hopefully people can learn some cool stuff, you know, along the way, but yeah, thanks a ton for the opportunity and stoked to be able to do this today.
James: I know a lot of business books and the self-improvement mentors and whatnot talk about finding your why. And one of the things I like about you is did you always bring a positive energy, you're contributing to other people you're so generous, not only with your time, but with your knowledge and your expertise. I'm very curious, this is like a selfish question, but what is the why behind what you do? Like what fuels you to help other financial advisors? [02:20.8]
Derek: I would sum it up in a couple of words to help advisors live their best life today and tomorrow. That's it.
James: Absolutely.
Derek: Right, because what has happened with me, I'll tell you the why behind that Why. For since ever financial advisors have been taught to go and help their clients realize their hopes, dreams, and goals through the thing that we know best money, right? Well, what we're not taught, what we're not told is that we have to put our lives on hold to do that. Never made sense to me. Why should I work 70, 80 hours a week? Why should I deal with rejection? Why should I have any consistent paycheck only just to help my clients have an amazing life that doesn't make sense. It should be mutually beneficial. And if the advisor has an amazing life and is happy and fulfilled, and they're going to be that much better than an advisor for their clients. [03:12.1]
James: One of my friends is, it's going to seem like it's off topic to the financial advisors, but I promise I'll bring it back. She is someone who basically helps new mothers connect with their children. It's postpartum depression kind of thing. And it's weird for people who've never experienced, but they're like, look at these women and they're super depressed. The advice that she gives is to focus on yourself first, not your child, because if you can make yourself happy and you can live your best life as the mother, then it's going to reflect in the child. It's going to help the child. And I've always seen that metaphor with financial advisors as well, that’s exactly like you said. If they can get their business right, if they're happier, they're more productive that's going to transfer over to the clients. It's going to benefit them in the long run. [03:54.0]
Derek: No question about it. It's exactly true. That's a great analogy. I've used the, I mean, I've, I fly so much, I've used the analogy and we always hear the safety announcement. Hey, put your oxygen mask on before you help the person next to you. It's the same thing, right? If you haven't taken care of yourself, how are you going to help anybody else?
James: Can you tell me a little bit more about the, your travel? Like are you're the frequent flyer? I remember you; did you have a million miles that you traveled? Total or.
Derek: Yeah. So, I just hit a million-miler status with Delta in December. Right.
James: Wow.
Derek: So, so I'm officially a million mile or now. Yeah.
James: That's nuts. So, I'm by the Philadelphia and BWI airport. So, there's not as many Delta flights to go in and out of those airports, but I wish I could have that. That sounds super awesome.
Derek: Yeah. I mean, it's a lot of flying. Don't get me wrong. It took years, about six years to hit it of consistent, flying, but there was a ton of fun. It, it scratched my travel edge. I love to travel, it's a passion of mine. And it also really had a lot of ancillary benefits for my businesses too, which has been pretty cool. [05:00.2]
James: So, the financial advisors who are listening to this show, I haven't done an official survey and I probably should. And it's a good idea to put on my to-do list, but I would estimate that maybe 20 to 30% of them right now are still not operating virtually. And they're not, they haven't really jumped into the water. They're adamant about not doing it. They think that we're, we're eventually going to go back to the way things were. I, I don't necessarily agree with that. I think the world has fundamentally changed forever, but those of the financial advisors who don't have an idea of what a virtual advisor is, can you explain that like a day in the life of a virtual advisor to give them an image of it? [05:39.3]
Derek: Yeah. Well, I'll tell you what, it's, it's so much more than just a Zoom meeting or boosting a Facebook post. Okay. And it’s so much more than that. And I agree with you, the world has changed. Human behavior has changed. We are not going back to the way things are. Plain and simple! And there's a ton of data back that up, if anyone's interested and wants to know more, a brutal advisor is someone who simply delivers markets, delivers and services their clients, okay virtually. They've changed the medium, they've swapped out the conference table or the kitchen table for a virtual meeting. Being a virtual advisor, doesn't mean you're only a virtual advisor, right? There are going to be situations where you still need to be in person, that's fine. But we're, let me ask you James, where do you go when you want to search something, when you want to learn about a product or service, whether it's the best cheeseburger in town or a new service, where do you go first? [06:37.3]
James: I go to a ye old internet.
Derek: There you go right? That's where people go. They're not looking in the yellow pages. They're not driving around town, looking for a store. They're looking online. So, part of being a virtual advisor is having a robust digital footprint and that's, that's just, you have to be there. If you're not there, you're going to miss out on those opportunities. So being a virtual advisor, there's so many components to virtual sales process, marketing staffing, all of these different things come together. And even if you just embrace the digital marketing aspect, you're way ahead of the game. So, if you're one of those advisors who hasn't jumped into this new world yet, please do. It's going to be only a benefit for you and your clients and your life's going to get a whole lot easier. [07:25.1]
James: What about the advisers who seem overwhelmed by the digital marketing process. They think it's too much too soon. They don't want to have a Tik TOK and Instagram and LinkedIn and Facebook and a Twitter. Is there a way that they can dip their toes in the virtual?
Derek: Yeah totally.
James: Wires.
Derek: One that can do it for free. They don't need to worry about spending money on ads at this point, if you're just dipping your toes in, don't do that. To me, its a waste of your time and your money. You're going to get frustrated. You're going to have a bad experience. And this goes to some deeper, deeper things for the advisors what they must think about is it's centered around who they are as an individual, what their own personal dreams and goals are. Sorry my dog's in the background. [08:05.6]
James: We’ve got a dog on the show.
Derek: Yeah.
James: A dog.
Derek: It also goes to their Why, and then the why, and all these other things helped drive the ideal client. So, once we figure those things out, then we have an idea of where they are hanging out and then we should go, and then this is the oldest marketing trick in the book. And I didn't make this up. I learned this from someone else who's smarter than I am, but go where people are, already are and then just be present. So, for me, I knew LinkedIn was a great place to be, to drive in new potential clients for both of my businesses. And so that's where I went and I just started creating content. So, you don't need to sign up for 18 different social media platforms. You don't need to hire these firms to do all of this marketing for you initially. Just go there and start having these conversations. It's like a digital networking event and it's super easy and it's free and you can do it from anywhere in the world. [09:04.7]
James: Your content is killer because I look at it and it's done so well, but it's not done from a pure marketing lens. I hope that makes sense. It, you can tell that you didn't sit down and say, okay, how am I going to make the perfect headline with this perfect thing? It looks like that. But there's sense of it, you're just being yourself. You're being authentic. That's super important too. [09:30.3]
Derek: Oh, it's extremely important. I've said this number of times, people work with human beings, right? So, we have to show them who we are and we have to connect with on that level first. And it just goes back to the whole people don't care how much, you know, until they know how much you care. So, this is how we show them. So, you know, a lot of advisors will be like, well, maybe I should just hire someone to do all my social media, all of my blogs, you know, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And my advice, especially when you're starting is don't outsource any of it. You know, think about it, if you're going to a networking event, you know, we don't do those things anymore, but an in-person networking event, you wouldn't tell someone else to go for you and talk about you. You know, that would just be super weird, right? So, you have to be, you, you have to be there. Now we used to call this as advisors. We used to call this prospecting, right? Cold calling door, knocking, networking events, all that stuff. We just have to call it something else now, we call digital marketing. We just go there and do these things. And create your own content, don't outsource yourself. Be you, be genuine the stems from your why. Right. And then just have these conversations and it takes some time. And you're never going to get a perfect. That doesn't exist, but you'll get better at it. And it's actually a lot of fun. [10:46.4]
James: It warms my heart to hear you say, don't outsource this stuff in the beginning. I catch a lot of heat for that. And that's something I say too, like, don't outsource the stuff. Like it is not going to work as well, I promise you. And it just, like I said, it warms my heart to hear somebody else say that. But do clients, do they prefer to meet in person? I mean, what has been your experience with the client experience inside of a virtual model? [11:09.6]
Derek: It's been amazing. You know, I went virtual in 2013. I'm not the pioneer, but I'm one of the pioneers, I guess you could say, I'm one of the early adopters. There's a handful of other amazing people that I know that also went virtual around the same time, or even before I did. And it's been an amazing experience. You know, one could argue, Oh Derek, you just did this in 2020, everyone had to do it. You know, we'll get back to normal. It's not really gonna work, but that's not the case. I've been doing this; we're going on eight years now. Right? This has been a long run. I have clients I've never met in person, but they they've told me that they feel like they've known me forever. I had clients like send me like Omaha steak boxes, right. You know and, and just like these really personal things so if the infrastructure is done correctly and the messaging is done correctly, you can have amazing relationships this way. [12:02.3]
And again, it doesn't have to be all virtual. You can still go see people in person when a situation makes sense. So, it's very possible and I'll even reference some data. Mckinsey and company published a study in 2019 called the virtual financial advisor pre COVID. At that time, people were all already very ideal candidates for virtual advice. In fact, they are estimating around 42 million households would prefer virtual advice over the alternative. So, this shift had already happened. 2020 just sped it up and cemented it in place. [12:38.1]
James: Now, I've never met my financial advisor in person.
Derek: Alright.
James: I've never met my attorneys in person, never met my accountants in person. And I have three insurance agents, I've never met in person. When I tell people that there's some, believe me some don't, but it is what it is like I've literally never met them in person. And my accountant has a team, his team is growing now, but I typically work with two or three people that directly under him.
Derek: Hmm.
James: And it's just Zoom, it's call, it's text, it's Slack or not really Slack anymore, but we have never met in person. And I try to meet him in person, but he was out of town that week. So, it is interesting that I am that consumer. I am a consumer of virtual financial advice. And my in-laws they're originally from, well, not originally from Delaware, but they lived in Delaware for decades.
Derek: Okay.
James: And they moved to Florida and they continued as far as I can tell their relationship with their financial advisor, but they continued it virtually. It's not as if they stopped. It's just that they just continued. The transition went to virtual and they're happy with it. It's not as if they're going to leave their financial advisor because they can't meet in person. It's fascinating to see, but I do think there'll be more consumers like them and like me in the decades to come. [13:57.1]
Derek: No question. And it's happening faster and faster. It's so cool that you've done all that, you know, further to that point, both of my businesses I have built was entirely virtual teams who I haven't met.
James: Oh yeah, me too.
Derek: So, you know. Okay, so you get it like, so it's possible. And then let's also think about it though, outside of this financial advice realm, we're in, we've been dating online since 2000. That's when, you know, eharmony started. Amazon was around in the nineties, right? So, we're buying our groceries online now. We're talking, my wife had a check-in. I could check up with her doctor today, virtual. Right? So, we're doing all this other stuff, banking, right? All these other personal confidential things virtually. So, it's only natural that we would do the financial advice stuff that we do virtually too. Like why wouldn't we do it right. It just makes sense. [14:49.7]
James: I think I realized Holy cow; this virtual thing is real when are two moments in my life, when I bought the house, that you see; everybody who's listening, we're on camera and it's a zoom call and I'm talking with Derek and he could see me and I could see him. But for you, it's just audio.
Derek: Sure.
James: But when I bought this house, I had to get an actual check to pay some of the fees and the closing costs.
Derek: Sure.
James: I said, can I just, not PayPal, but can I just send it to you another way? Or can I do ACH or something?
Derek: No.
James: They're like, no, it has to be a physical check. Like I don't have a physical check. Like I don't want to bank with any physical banks and I didn't. And I still don't. I used as low for business and they're closing down, so I got to find another virtual bank essentially. And then the state of Delaware sent me some weird $24 tax that I had to pay. And I called and I was like, can I just do the ACH? And like where the bank will print the check and mail it. They were like, no, you have to bring it in or whatever it was. It was like a year ago. It was weird. So, I had to go to Walmart and get a money order because I literally don't have physical checks. I just don't have them. And I remember thinking like, I wonder how many more people are out there with not just financial advisor, you're completely right with, with banking, not needing a physical branch anymore. And here we are and it's happening. [16:08.8]
Derek: It's totally happening. And you know, 2020 was tough for a lot of reasons, but there are also a ton of silver linings that happened. And I think one of them is like the work from home experiments that we all were forced into or most of us, and, and it proved that all of this stuff works so, we can, you know, the economy keeps chugging along. People can get the things that they need. I think we have Amazon deliver something at my house every day. You know it's crazy, but it works right. So, we know it works. And the financial advisor industry is just, it's old. It's slow to evolve and change. And 2020 was kind of a kick in the shorts it needed. [16:46.9]
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James: Well, it looks like 2020 for, not only for your financial advisory business, but I know that you help other financial advisors go virtual and operate well virtually.
Derek: Yup.
James: Do you have any success stories that you'd like to share or any failure stories, I guess, with people who refuse to go virtual either, one's fine. [17:25.8]
Derek: You know, I've got advisors in four different countries now that are using the system and it's been an amazing experience. I can't tell you the amount of heart felt feedback I've received. And it's kind of cool. Not all virtual, too. Like, so just for you guys listening, James sent me a physical card, right? It was just, it was so cool and different and it's a nice personal touch. And so, I, I've never received things like that from other advisors who have gotten into the system and gone virtual and yeah, they're able to make more money, spend less. They're ditching their offices. They have better life-work balance now. Like this endless list of positives. They're getting more clients. Even this month alone, I'll do a new, over a million of AUM this month for all virtually, a ton of life insurance premium this month, all virtually financial plans, like all this stuff, right? And so, I'm still an active advisor and it's all done virtually for people haven't met. So, it's amazing. What's possible I would say, you know, failures, the only failures I've seen are from the advisors who either think they know it all or refusing to evolve, that's where the challenges are. And then they just, yeah. Then they just they're right back where they started and even worse off actually. [18:49.4]
James: It's like they failed before they begin because they completely dismissed the concept. And that's dangerous because you're locking yourself into a philosophy that may not work. You have to be flexible, even though it's like an investing, you're not investing in the same exact products. And you're shifting with the times. I mean, if you're in an index fund, you do that automatically like with the S&P but times change companies come and go, trends, shift things happen. And the people who ignore that are really going to fail before they even begin, because they're not giving themselves a chance. And by extension and not giving themselves a chance, not giving their business a chance, they're not giving the clients a chance. And I think that that's really a mindset thing. And I know that you had mentioned to me that many of the problems in business are, come from mindset. That's totally true. And they just believe that things will stay the same and they believe that everything will be okay forever. And that is a mindset issue. [19:45.6]
Derek: It's a total mindset issue. And if anything, 2020 should have shown them, Hey, mindsets can change. You know, the big difference between advisors who are going extinct and the dinosaurs that went extinct is the advisors have a choice.
James: Yeah. Yup. Dinosaurs did not have a choice in that matter.
Derek: Not at all. No, so financial advisors have a choice, not taking action as a choice.
James: So, let's say that someone wants to go virtual and there someone's listening to this show and they're like, okay, got to go virtual, things are changing. I get it. James and Derek have both hammered this into my head. Tools that are like, must haves that you recommend. [20:27.1]
Derek: It's going to be a combination of physical and digital. You got to have the right physical infrastructure. You know what, one of the mistakes I've seen a lot happen is an advisor will think that they're ready to go virtual and I do a meeting with them. I've conducted many hundreds of, of just, you know, what do they call them in law? You know, free, free meetings, right? Just, just chatting with advisors, trying to help pro bono. And you know, I'm either most of the time I'm looking up at them, I'm looking at their nose hairs. It's bad lighting behind them. No, you know, so, and then that makes them uncomfortable. And if they're uncomfortable, the client's never going to be comfortable. So, they have to have the right physical infrastructure tools in place and know how to use them, right. To really have amazing virtual media and then digital assets. You have to invest in your digital assets. And a lot of them are free. Not all of them, but like, you need to have websites and they have to be good at websites. [21:27.5]
You need to have your brand figured out. And all these other things that happen, you need to have the sales funnel, digital marketing funnel built. So, there are a lot of different things you need infrastructure for virtual staff for how you're going to service your clients, even something simple things like incoming phone calls. How are you dealing with those? Scheduling, I love Calendly for example, it's a great tool that has saved me a ton of time. So, there's, there's a lot I could go on and on and on, but I think if you break it down into those two components, physical and digital, if you can really get those things, you know, dialed in perfectly or almost perfectly, it's gonna make your life a whole lot easier. [22:10.3]
James: Just like, look good, sound good, make it comfortable for you, make it comfortable for your clients. And then that's digital too. Just like you said, Calendly. It's not just better for you. It's better for your clients. They don't want that back-and-forth phone tag and email tag. They want to be able to go to the URL, select a date, select the time, but their email address in and click submit. It's easier for them. And I think your philosophy of putting the client first, you can't go wrong with that in business.
Derek: No, no, no, you have to. But you know, I there's a balance there because I think the advisor also has to put their life or their way of things first too. And that's where it goes back to that mutually beneficial thing we talked about. If you build it correctly, that's what will happen. And then everyone wins and people want convenience. Let's face it, right? If I can book a time with my accountant or anybody for that matter, if I can buy movie tickets online, I better be able to schedule a meeting with you online. [23:07.6]
James: Now I've gotten to the point where I think I'm like moving advanced is bad. So, my I've already discussed that my accountant is virtual and I've never met him in person or whatever. So, we are at the point where I have saved his private Zoom link in my LastPass. I used the LastPass password manager, financial.
Derek: I love that, by the way. It's a great tool, yeah.
James: If you're not using a password manager, I don't know what you're doing with your life. He will be like, Hey, can we get on a call real quick? And the first couple of times he had to tell me, okay, its Zoom.us, six, eight, one a, B, C, D. And I would type it in. And I was like, there's got to be a way. So, I saved his Zoom link in, in LastPass. And now when he calls, can we get on a call? The first time I did, I was like, Oh, I already got your Zoom link, it's zoom.us/and I just started rattling it off. He was like, wow. How'd you know that? And I was like, I put it in my LastPass. He was like, that's something I'm going to tell all my clients to do. Is to save this zoom link and that not all of them are using password manager, but some of them bookmark it. [24:06.5]
Derek: Save it, somehow right? Yeah, exactly. Yeah.
James: Just make it easier for them.
Derek: Make it easier for them. They're going to want to do more business with you because if you're going to, if every time they think about having to work with you, it's going to be like a bear to get a meeting scheduled the meetings, going to not work right. Technology's messed up. They're not going to want to talk to you, which means you're not going to get more business, which means they may go somewhere else.
James: Yeah. It's something to think about. So back to your travel thing, I've been thinking whenever I travel, maybe I'm just an inferior human being, but my productivity crumbles, I am just not a productive person when I travel. Do you have any advice for remaining productive and like actually running a business when you're on six or seven different continents? [24:54.3]
Derek: Yeah, I don't miss a beat on that unless it's by design, but it goes back to infrastructure. I have like, almost like a second kit, if you will that I bring with me when I go to work virtually anywhere. So, I can get up and running within a few minutes. And the experience for me and my clients is the same. So, having that infrastructure in place is super important. And then creating a space where you can do that. Like, this is about a year and a half ago my wife and I, son spent two weeks in Ireland and I rented a coworking space right in Dublin and just went there every day and worked for a bit.
James: Oh.
Derek: So, I could get my stuff done. I could tie right in, you know, I've worked from, as I said, the bullet train and y'all wherever I want to work I can. So as long as the infrastructure is in place, no worries. Again, that's my design. You have to, you have to have those things in place, you know, the set up so you can literally plug and play. [25:52.6]
James: I remember reading about how some people in the fire movement, the financial independence retire early, actually use travel as a way to safeguard their retirement income. So, if everything is going wrong in the US and like stocks are crashing and that they still have to spend their money to live, they will go to a place like Thailand or Mexico and ride it out. And the cost of living there is a lot cheaper. So, I imagine that you're benefiting a little bit and your own life, like personal finances from that as well.
Derek: Oh yeah, no question. Yeah, for sure. You know, depending on the countries you're in, you can really diversify that way, which is a fun way to do things. And then also just loyalty, you know, loyalty is always going to be rewarded and just, you know, being loyal to Delta and their partners has made travel a lot more affordable and a lot more enjoyable too. Yeah. So, it's just, it's just knowing what you want to do and I'm doing it right. [26:45.2]
James: I got so close to the companion pass at Southwest one year and I was like, Oh, should I take another flight? Just, I know some people do that. They just take another flight just to cross that barrier. I didn't do that.
Derek: I’ve done that.
James: So yeah. What are a few success traits that you've seen in your own life or in the best virtual financial advisors that you think have played a critical role in your success and their success so far? [27:12.4]
Derek: Well, willingness to, to evolve and adapt and learn. You have to, you have to have an open mind. You have to challenge the status quo. If you're not willing to do that, you're going out of business and do it ahead of time, right? It's the whole Wayne Gretzky skate to where the puck is headed, not where it came from, right. That's how you're successful. So constantly thinking about that, you know, stop resting on your laurels and actually get out there and try to be the change. And I think something else that really helped me was finding my voice. For a long time, I dreaded social media. Heck as an advisor, I didn't even have a cell phone my first three years in the industry. You know, I faught tooth and nail I didn't want Facebook. I didn't want LinkedIn. I didn't want anything to do with this stuff. [27:58.4]
James: Can you talk about that? I want to, I don't want to cut you off, but like, that's very important for the people listening. Why did you have that resistance and that hesitation? Like, what was that about? [28:08.3]
Derek: Well, it's not encouraged in our industry for the most part. So, you've got this, this kind of mentality of like, eh, that doesn't work. Don't use it. You know, like, like this, the old school, like door knocking and cold calling, like that's what we were taught. So social media and like cell phones eventually got into it. But you know, like all these things seems like aren’t really taught. So, it's not accepted and if you're a company that we're management is telling you, you need to do 50 dials an hour. And you're thinking, man, I want to go on LinkedIn like, it's tough. Right? You're ready, you're stuck. So, I fought it for a while too and I also didn't see the value. I'm like, well, LinkedIn is just a place to put my resume to get a job. Why am I going to go there? And it's not, these are social networks. Social being the key word. And so, you have to go there and then have a voice. Don't be a creeper. I, you know, I refer to like, you know, these, these people that are creepers and they just show up, but they don't post any content. They don't engage in conversation. They're just kind of creeping and looking at you. And that's just weird. [29:14.6]
James: Cough, cough, Edward Jones. That's who’s that's who's killing my, I asked you about the Social Selling Index, the SSI.
Derek: Yeah.
James: That's whose killing my SSI score is, it would be mine at the time of this recording. Well, maybe not, but this morning it was like 79 and it was 81 and it was 79. It was 81. It was 79, but they, I have a lot of Edward Jones advisors in my network. And I love the Edward Jones advisors, but they don't like anything cause they can't. And they don't gauge because they can't and they just have so many different rules. So, you're killing my SSI score, Edward Jones advisors. [29:49.9]
Derek: That's funny. You know what, it is tough because I know we don't have to go down this rabbit hole of time. I wouldn't put it all on the advisors. Although the advisors do need to find their voice and need to be active and they need to push their home offices too, though, to say, Hey, like the world's changed. Like please work with us to evolve our guidelines so, we can be more actively engaged here. You know, like people, they shouldn't be posting like rates of return and solicitations and all that, that, that has no place there. But if they want to talk about their family or something, they learned on a trip they took or, you know, experience they add, well, why should they talk about that? That helps that that's part of the social aspect of these networks. [30:34.5]
James: Yeah. There have been studies done that show. We don't have, obviously we don't have time to get into individual studies, but just know that there've been studies financial advisors that show that when you talk about money and you're priming people with money, they're less likely to do business with you. They're less likely to engage with you because it puts them in like a give and take mindset. That's essentially what it is. I don't have time to get into it. But when you talk about money and rates of return and personal finance and your bills and budgeting, it puts people in the mindset, exact mindset you don't want them to be in.
Derek: Exactly.
James: You are much better served by talking about stories about you. Like he said, your travel maybe it works. [31:12.6]
Derek: Whatever it is, it just, just show them the human side, right. And show them lead with value. Teach them things without asking for something all the time. And if you do it right, people are going to be coming to you. That's what we want. Right? What a financial advisor doesn't want ideal clients approaching them. Right?
James: And speaking of people, approaching you, how can people get in touch with you? And I think we're going to wind the show down and I like to ask the guests, if people wanna get in touch with you, they want to learn more about what you do. They want to learn more about how you can help them, where do they go? [31:46.6]
Derek: Well, we've been talking a lot about LinkedIn, that's a good place. I'm very active there. I'm there almost every day. Weekends I take off, but weekdays am there, you can follow me. You can see my content. You can send me a direct message. I will personally respond. If you want James in the show notes, you know, you can drop my email address in there. You can put my website in there. You know, that kind of stuff, that's fine. Email or LinkedIn is probably the two best places to get ahold of me. And I am an open book. I don't have all the time in the world, but I try to help as many people as I can. So, you know, don't be hesitant and reaching out and asking a question or, you know, sharing some thoughts if you have them. [32:25.1]
James: Yeah. Be careful what you wish for some of these people will, they will message and message and message.
Derek: Which is cool you know, we're all on the same team here and you know what? I can grow my business by helping others and doing some of it by just doing free stuff. Like that's cool, man. That's good karma. It's going to come back.
James: Totally. I have that. I have that same belief. It's just what you put out. And you do a way better than I do, positive vibes and like, everything's cool. Like it's so awesome to see that you have been so generous, this has been an amazing show. I think the topic of being a virtual financial advisor is needed well really now, more than ever. And it was needed yesterday now more than ever the day before, as time goes on, it's going to be needed more and more. So, thank you. You're like the first person to come on the show. I haven't even talked about virtual financial services. I don't think at all on the show. So, this is pretty ground breaking. [33:17.1]
Derek: Awesome, man. I appreciate the opportunity. It's fun to tell the story and just, you know, hopefully we nudge some people in the right direction and we've helped them a little bit go down the path that they really want to go down. And you know, as I said, we're all on the same team. So, let's do this together.
James: You got it. So financial advisors search for him on LinkedIn and follow him on LinkedIn, connect with them on LinkedIn, check out the show notes for website and email and contact information. Derek is an open book and he's willing to help you. And with that said, I will catch you next week. [33:47.4]
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