South Africa is Under-Insured by more than R17 Trillion.
Financial Advisors, The Time is Now!
by Wouter Snyman
There’s a worldwide stigma that Financial Advisors are glorified Insurance Salesmen. That should be enough motivation for you to kick things up a notch in this career you’ve chosen, but if you consider that South Africa is R17 trillion under-insured, I can’t help but wonder what you’re still waiting for.
Perhaps you’re working above the safety net of some big corporation because… well, it’s safe. After all, they must be doing it right. Now consider the millions spent on billboards and traditional advertising every year. Think of the telesales employees who will soon be extinct due to new laws surrounding data protection. If the large corporations were doing things properly, wouldn’t that deficit be a lot smaller and wouldn’t you be bringing in more clients?
Even if you were going it alone, there are a number of reasons you might not be hitting the mark and I want to help you.
So why should you listen to me? I’ve published eight books on business, three of which were Amazon best-sellers and I’ve founded multiple businesses, but more importantly, in my 25 years I’ve started and failed enough times so you don’t have to.
GOLF CLUBS
I started my journey in the financial services industry more than 25 years ago, I started my career at Discovery Life in 2000 and was fortunate enough to be one of the original 11 Founding Franchise Life Directors.
During this time I started learning the industry from an insurance perspective. It was always something I had been passionate about and I worked my way up through the ranks in business. I suppose within that journey I realised I wasn't really a corporate animal. I always had the desire to become an entrepreneur. I wanted to own my own business and I suppose the luxury of running your own franchise within a Corporate was running a business with a big daddy supporting you.
I looked at financial planners with a bit of an arrogant view at that time; I saw these guys just running like hell on a hamster wheel, flogging policies left and right. I realised the problem was mainly because they didn't have a business model as such. They never knew how to brand themselves. More crucially, they misunderstood the fact that clients didn’t want a life policy. People don’t wake up in the morning with a burning desire to get a life policy. If they do, perhaps they’ve been diagnosed with something incurable and now it’s too late.
So with this belief I took it as a sign to try impact a universal industry problem. I thought, ‘I'll just teach them some simple principles over the next few months, because I have read every book on the topic, and then I’ll go play golf’. Suffice to say, I eventually sold my golf clubs because I couldn’t remember the last time I had used them. The dilemma was not an overnight fix, and still is not.
THE DILEMMA
How should the Financial Planner’s position themselves from a business perspective? If done correctly, the answer is easy. YOU must become the brand.
Ultimately people do business with people they know, like and trust. For me, the biggest challenge is that the industry teaches financial planners how to sell products. Although a harsh statement to make, this is it essentially.
What’s missing? In general, Financial Planners are not taught how to do business with people. In 2011 attooh! was born of this need and many others. Firstly we built a value proposition our Financial Planners to reposition them as the trusted brand.
For a Financial Planner, having a website that has no powerful content which can generate interest or sales because of your expert status means that you still stuck. You basically have a nice online brochure. Without doing more, you’re still on that hamster wheel.
Many financial planners have call centres that cold call people. They use that data to make their connections and actually can find success, but in my experience there’s a crucial element missing from the process, ….. a solid relationship.
In the last couple of years we've built tools to help advisors enhance these relationships through newsletters, value added services, educational tools as well as a practice management toolkit.
Even with our help, not all financial planners in South Africa will grasp this methodology or make use of this kind of advice. My ideal clients are men and women who want to learn how to run their financial planning practices as a business and build businesses that can positively influence South Africa. What I’m offering is the chance to tap into the R17 trillion gap. As a business we assist with a cradle to grave solution stack and provide risk, health and wealth solutions. We specialize in helping individuals and companies realize financial independence status with our unique Ordinary Millionaire Academy and journey.
But I’m offering is the chance to tap into that R17 trillion. Beyond that we provide risk, health and wealth solutions, and specialize in helping individuals and companies realize financial independence status with our unique Ordinary Millionaire Academy and journey.
Five Benefits to my Mentorship:
- Understanding the foundations of a proper business
- Identifying and targeting your ideal clients
- Implementing the right strategies for your ideal clients
- Becoming a referral magnet
- Standing out from the crowd
THE X FACTOR
You’ve heard of the term ‘X Factor’… that elusive essence that means one man can do something the other can’t. It’s what separates the winners from the losers, right? Yes, but also no. Consider that there are thousands of Financial Planners in South Africa. Perhaps only 5% of those individuals would benefit from our tools. These are the go-getters, those with the X Factor. The other 95% will look down at the answers and find every excuse in the book as to why it’s not working for them. That is to say, the 5% don’t carry an X Factor at all, but a willingness to keep going.
This is why I aim to hire value over cost. At attooh! we strive to do more that teach. Because knowledge is not power, knowledge in action is power.Our value proposition:
Our business philosophy has always been one to equip our advisor with the right tools and support to enable the transitioning from just being a financial advisor to building a business of value.
THREE CRITICAL COMPONENTS OF YOUR JOURNEY
- Mindset
The most important aspect of all, and mostly overlooked in all the Financial training programs we have seen. Having a positive mindset is one of the most critical components to your continued success and ultimate victory.
- Strategies and Tactics
Without execution the greatest ideas will come to nothing. In line with the above, your success in any area of your life is dependent on the quality of the questions you ask.
- Systems
Successful people make use of systems to ensure a predictive outcome. It is apt that systems can be applied to the following acronym – Save Yourself Some Time, Energy and Money. Systems, once learned, can be duplicated and almost be a guarantee for ultimate success. The most successful businesses in the world such as: McDonalds, Starbucks, Apple, Uber, Airbnb, and countless others are almost guaranteed success as a result of systems that has predictable outcomes.
Six Critical Questions to Ask Yourself
Success appears where a plan and action collides. Ask yourself these six questions to help you achieve all the happiness, health, and wealth you desire.
- WHAT do you really want? What is your vision for your life and your business? Clarity leads to power and power gives you the ability to do or act. We have seen that the number one reason most people don’t get what they want is because they don’t know what they want.
What do you want in each area of your life? The keyword here is “YOU” - what’s right for you? So many times, we see people living the dreams of their parents or someone else, instead of their own.
- WHY do you want this? What is important about it? This defines your values. If the first reason most people don’t get what they want is because they don’t know what they want, then the second reason is they don’t know WHY they want it.
Your ‘why’ is your reason, your motivation, your emotion behind your ‘what’. Without emotion there is no energy to make the changes necessary to achieve what you want.
- WHY not? Why don’t you already have it? What is preventing you from having what you want. Ask yourself what obstacles are in your path.
If we say we want something and we don’t yet have it, there is going to be an imaginary reason that your mind makes up to protect you and then there’s going to be the real reason. Uncovering the real reason is critical so that we can get to the heart of what is blocking your progress.
- HOW will you get it. What is your plan? What are the methods you will use? It is very obvious that to get from where you are to where you want to be you will need a new strategy or plan to get you there. Our habits are ingrained in us, and without a new plan we will just continue to do what we have done in the past, which means we will continue to get what we have gotten in the past.
Without a plan, we will not succeed. The good news is that your plan or strategy does not need to be perfect, it is merely the starting point to a new direction, and you will most probably need to make some corrections on the way to your new destination.
- WHEN do you start, and what’s the first action needed for you to get going? Once we know what we want, why we want it, why we haven’t got it yet, and decide what our plan is. Then the step is to simply to take action.
Action is critical if you want to be successful. The biggest problem with most people is that they think a lot more than what they are prepared to do. Thinking is mental, doing is physical.
- HOW will you KNOW that you are successful? What measurements and metrics do you need to determine whether you have achieved your goals?
Success leaves clues! Mark Victor Hansen said the following:
“Big goals get big results, no goals get no results or somebody else’s results” meaning your results are the critical final step in ensuring you live your dream life. the best metric is to use the ABC’s in measuring yourself not just against your ultimate financial goal but against your A or alignment goal, B or Beginning goal and C or Competition goal. Using this simple mechanism will ensure that you have the required metrics in place to measure your achievements.
Click here to download my book “The Ordinary Millionaire” for free, with this you will also get access to a 14-day financial freedom program I launched for our clients.
RDR - THREAT OR OPPORTUNITY.
The Retail Distribution Review aims to introduce more fairness and transparency throughout the financial planning industry. It is about to affect all of us in the industry. Whilst most advisors have seen this as a sore topic only to influence how much and the way we earn income, I believe the objective, if implemented correctly, could be a massive plus for advisors who are serious about our profession and the impact we can have. I believe the impact that we will see could be summarised as follows:
Investors are now required to agree to fees with an adviser up front. Financial Advisors will say they’re not successful because of this, but in my opinion that’s imaginary. Everyone is in the same boat. The probability is you’re treating this opportunity as a job and not a business.
RDR is the Retail Distribution Review.
It is a review of the way in which financial advice, products and services, are delivered to the general public - the retail market. The result of the review is very likely going to be significant change to financial services regulations, and this will impact on many businesses, as well as clients of financial services businesses.
RDR will affect everyone involved in financial services, but will probably be felt most by businesses delivering financial advice. For adviser firms, the impact could be the difference between surviving the changes, or not.
Some advice firms in South Africa who choose not to, or cannot adapt, are going to go out of business. For these firms, RDR represents a significant threat.
For those prepared to embrace the ideas and objectives of RDR, I believe RDR represents a major opportunity.
TOP 5 LESSONS I LEARNED THROUGH FAILING:
- You cannot be everything to everyone and expect to do the job perfectly. Not understanding who your ideal client is can be one of the largest contributors to not succeeding at your optimal level. Understanding your ideal client gives you the option to provide solutions to their specific problems and fears.
- Hiring the Cheapest Employee
What you should be doing is recruiting a world class business Unit. Hiring the cheapest employee will ultimately become the most expensive decision you made. These are not loyal employees and they will run your business into the ground apart from demanding more of your time to manage them, which is in most advisors repertoire not their greatest skill.
- Not Having A Clear Vision of Where Your Business Is Going
If you don’t know where you want to take your business, you’re likely going to end up in a different place. Understanding your end goal is like giving your GPS a destination where you want to end up. Earl Nightingale said it “ People with goals succeed because they know where they are going, it’s that simple”
- Running things like a Job, Not a Business
People with jobs are creating and fulfilling someone else’s dreams and goals. Running a business is ensuring you have the ability to leave a lasting legacy.
- Having Anything but a Positive Frame of Mind.
The new you, you adopt for yourself profoundly affects the way you lead your life. It can determine whether you become the person you want to be and whether you accomplish the things you value. The most critical way to transform your life is to change your mindset, and your mindset is made up by four components leading to the life you are currently living. Your beliefs, emotions, thoughts and habits. These four components are the driving force of all your results because it drives your actions, which ultimately determines where you are in your life and business, and where you will end up in the future. Change these and you will directly change your outcome.
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