This month we’ll tackle the challenge of organizing your practice to deliver the right service to the right clients. We’ll help you determine the level of service to give to your best clients, how to deliver it, what kinds of service to deliver to your other clients and how to communicate to both groups.
Week 1: Identifying a ‘platinum’ level of service
Week 2: Delivering ‘platinum’ service
Week 3: Creating service levels for second- and third-tier clients
Week 4: Communicating your service levels to clients
Last week: We created a “platinum” service level for your top clients and now it is time to build out a plan for your lower-tiered clients. Once you have completed this week’s levels you will have a three-tiered service-level system with automated communications for the lowest tier. Here is an easy way to decide which clients belong where:
• Platinum – The top 20% of your clients, by assets or fees.
• Gold – The next 30% of your clients.
• Silver – The lower 50% of your clients.
This week: Creating service levels for second- and third-tier clients
Take three or four hours this week to identify these services and assign the responsibilities for them to your staff. Commit to services you can deliver and feel free to use the examples below, which largely are automated solutions that have worked well for other top advisers. We’ll define the services this week and create the communications to explain them next week.
The first step in defining second- and third-tier services is to examine last week’s platinum service levels and see which elements you can offer on a group or automated level. Often, service to your lower client tiers will be similar to what you offer your top clients, minus several personal meetings and reviews.
Here were some of the platinum-level services mentioned last week:
1. Meeting with clients’ attorneys to make sure wills and trusts are in order.
2. Holding an annual insurance review to check coverage and beneficiaries (perfect for a mid-summer review — and don’t forget to send a copy to the estate executor).
3. Sending investing updates from top money managers.
4. Providing a quarterly or semi-annual newsletter or update alternating market/investment news and lifestyle interests.
5. Providing client input through a client advisory board.
Elements of gold-level services
1. Appoint a junior partner or a client services assistant to be the point person for these clients, and inform the clients that this person will be a direct resource for them.
2. Conduct two financial reviews per year — a mid-year review done over the phone that can include a tax update and a lending and insurance review, and a yearend in-person review. Look for ways to automate follow-up communications by including a pre-written and approved e-mail to present clients after the review.
3. Distribute a quarterly client investment newsletter provided by a product company with a note from you, the gold-service team leader and your entire team.
4. Send a lifestyle communication and consider holding an event, such as
Gardening Is Golden.
5. Hold an annual seminar. Since you don’t want to miss tracking your clients’ progress toward retirement, consider conducting an annual retirement checkup with a social event afterwards. Again, this can turn into a client referral opportunity and can be held several evenings in a row. Have each attendee bring a statement from their plan.
Elements of silver-level services
1. Appoint a junior partner or a client services assistant to be the point person for these clients, and inform the clients that this person will be a direct resource for them.
2. Conduct an annual financial review in October over the phone. Automate follow-up communications by including a pre-written and approved e-mail to present clients after the review.
3. Distribute a quarterly client investment newsletter provided by a product company with a generic note from your office — do not encourage phone calls.
4. Hold an annual retirement seminar like the one for gold-level clients, but don’t ask silver-level clients to bring guests — you want to duplicate your platinum-level clients, not the silver ones.
5. Encourage use of your website and provide instructions so that silver-level clients can access their accounts online. Have your assistant offer a group webinar or conference call training session with them.
While it may not seem necessary to let clients know what to expect, it is imperative to help your team stay focused on the most profitable clients and automate working with the rest. Don’t set expectations you can’t deliver.
Next week: Communicating your service levels to clients.
Maureen Wilke has helped thousands of advisers increase the value of their businesses and now offers The CONNECTED Advisor: 8 Steps to Building an Extraordinary Practice (www.connectedadvisor.com) to distribution firms, wholesaling teams and advisers. She has spent nearly two decades in wealth management, marketing, sales and wholesaler training at firms including Nuveen Investments, and can be reached at Maureen@connectedadvisor.com.
