Trending
Financial advisors compete against each themself. Your income is directly tied to the business you generate. If you work in a large organization, you often hear about the “superstar” advisors who make “Best of” list status in major publications or are publicized internally for the business they do. It can be easy to get discouraged. Let us look at twelve reasons why you should be optimistic.
1. Being an advisor is like owning your own business. Regardless the size of your parent firm, you have a practice of people you consider as “your clients” and they refer to you as “their advisor.” The paycheck you bring home is related to the production you generate. Regardless what happens in the rest of the firm, you effectively control your income.
2. You are on the revenue side of the equation. The economy moves in cycles. Companies merge or get bought out. Businesses restructure to cut costs. This can be scary if you are on the expense side of the equation. You hear about layoffs at the home office. You ring the cash register. You are usually immune from these risks.
3. Annutized business benefits you. Years ago, financial advisors were paid on the commissions generated from individual trades. It was like pushing a rock up a hill! Every year, the rock rolled down and you started pushing again. Recurring revenue from fee based income means your role as a relationship manager pays you.
4. You have loyal clients. They take your calls. Many consider you part of the family. They have not chosen the “trade for free” online route. They understand you are acting in their best interests. They have stayed with you through different market cycles. They are loyal and you return the favor.
5. You explain fees and other costs clearly. Unlike other business, you do not hide indirect costs or understate fees. You let the client know upfront how the firm makes money and by extension, how you make money. They see the relationship as collaborative, not adversarial.
6. You have kept your reputation and practice clean. Do you read the trade publications? Some advisors assault others, cheat clients or otherwise seriously break the rules. This can give financial advisors as a profession a bad reputation. This is not your problem. You have not gotten into problems with the regulators. No clients are suing you.
7. You tell clients what they need to hear. You conduct regular portfolio reviews. You talk about asset allocation and rebalancing. Some take your advice, others do not. They all remember you proactively offered it.
8. You made the effort to tell them all about 5% CD yields. Your clients were complaining about low interest rates for years. When rates hit 5% you told everyone. You did it multiple times. It came up in every portfolio review. Now the Federal Reserve has started to lower interest rates. You made sure everyone you could reach had a chance to lock in higher interest rates.
9. You have not made any stupid recommendations. You hear about people getting caught in investment scams. Some might sound like they are cutting edge. You stuck with recommendations from your firm’s research department. If they bought anything wield, it was an unsolicited trade.
10. You talked them out of weird ideas. Thankfully, many clients call you to get your opinion before they make investments elsewhere. You helped them do research to determine if the investment is legitimate or a scam. You talked many out of sending money to unknown people who contacted them over the Internet.
11. You won them over to the idea of making money slowly. There are plenty of speculative stocks out there. Their friends tend to only talk about their winners, not their losers. You made the case owning quality stocks in a diversified portfolio makes sense for the long term. Their gains might have been less than riskier investments, but their declines have been shallower.
12. Your clients send you referrals. They know you are committed to the business for the long term. They know you care about your clients. They know you want to help people and respect each client as an individual. When they see friends needing investment advice, they brag about you.
A final one, not added to the list is you are still here. You have not washed out or chosen a different career. You are good at what you do and enjoy your job. Many other people in the world cannot make that claim.
Related: How to Deliver Positive News to Clients During a Stock Market Decline