Education, Transparency Raise Expectations, Builds Insurance Business

This is an excerpt from “Adding Alpha to Your Client Relationships,” a focus session presentation during the MDRT 2012 annual meeting in Anaheim, Calif.

By Sally W. Munford

One major area of interaction with our clients comes under the heading of “client education.” Some of this happens in educational communications between us and them.

Our broker-dealer creates a monthly market update, which is fully compliance-approved for distribution to clients and prospects. This is sent out from us via e-mail to those clients who have provided us with their e-mail address.

During times of excessive market volatility or unusual events, our broker-dealer creates other market updates, as needed, for our use with clients. An example of this would be communications created during the debt-ceiling crisis of last year.

Additionally, we have an online financial newsletter branded with our photograph and names, which goes out to the client list with e-mail addresses.

Also invaluable for client contact and education is our website, fully compliance approved. There we have a great deal of information, which includes our firm members’ pictures, my partner’s and my biographical information, a place where clients can log in to get their own account number, a financial calculation area and links to articles they may find of interest.

On the first meeting with a prospect

One of our client education efforts is actually used in our first meeting with prospects. Here we’ve created a brochure titled, “How to Choose a Financial Consultant: Tough Questions to Ask.”

Many prospects come to a meeting having already had meetings with other prospective advisors. They may or may not be sophisticated enough to know which questions they should be asking in order to make an evaluation. Therefore, for their education and review we have created the questions and, coincidentally, answers from our firm.

These questions cover such areas as our educational background, including degrees and professional designations, our length of time in the business, how many clients we have, our business continuity plan, and what services they can expect if they engage our firm.

We feel that if we deal with all these issues up front, this will create an atmosphere of transparency and trust that will be beneficial to all going forward in our business relationship.

Use events for ongoing education

Not only do we provide client education through communications, but we also have events specifically tailored to provide ongoing client education.

Four times a year, following the end of a quarter, we hold a quarterly market recap breakfast at a local Mexican restaurant. The invitations go out by e-mail to clients as well as our centers of influence. We ask that they consider bringing a guest to these events. Our broker-dealer provides the script as well as the charts and graphs, and my partner delivers the material.

We have an active question-and-answer format during which we encourage all attending to ask questions to help clarify their understanding of the financial world we live in.

Every year we hold specialty seminars that are targeted to certain client populations. For example, we have had presentations on Social Security and Medicare. These are given by the local employees of these government entities. The attendees are again encouraged to ask all the questions they want of these experts.

We have received feedback that these are some of the most appreciated events that we hold annually.

Also for our clients and their guests, we have held informational seminars at local restaurants on such topics as long-term care. Other events have included late afternoon wine and cheese gatherings to hear from some of the mutual fund families we use in our managed money format.

We’ve also had brown-bag lunches in the conference room in our office to talk about retirement issues. This last event was held over a five-week period for those who wished to participate in all the sessions.

All these events are planned and executed not only to provide another “touch” to our clients, but also to provide our clients with a financial education. We feel that the best client is a well-educated client.

Sally W. Munford, CLU, MSFS, has been in the financial services industry for 28 years and has earned 25 MDRT qualifications and three Court of the Table qualifications during that time. She and her partner, Kevin Moore, operate their own financial planning firm, where they specialize in life planning to include insurance, investment management, goal setting, retirement projections, and distribution planning. A former president of the MDRT Foundation, she has also served three years as a DVP in different divisions. Munford’s client education comments are excerpted from “Adding Alpha to Your Client Relationships,” a focus session presentation she gave at MDRT 2012 in Anaheim, Calif.