If using technology to build better relationships with your clients sounds like an oxymoron, here us out.
You wouldn’t send a robot to a job interview. Afterall, the only reason for a job interview is so the interviewer can get a sense of who you are as a person and whether you’ll fit in as a member of their team. All a robot can do is tell them your credentials, and they already knew those before calling you in for the interview.
What a robot can do is help you gather information on the company and its culture so you know what they’re looking for when you go in for the interview. It can help you put your best foot forward so you can start building rapport with the interviewer as soon as you walk in the door.
Technology can help you in a similar way when it comes to preparing for client meetings.
Understanding Your Clients
The first step to building a relationship with anyone is getting to know them.
Technology can do a lot of the legwork for you by gathering information on your clients and prospects.
Some options include:
Social Listening Tools
These are tools you can set up to “listen” for certain trends or keywords being discussed on social media. Anytime a phrase related to the services you provide is mentioned, you can take a look at the account that mentioned it, see what else they’re posting about, who they’re following on social media, who’s following them, etc.
This enables you to understand what your audience cares about, what interests they have, and (most importantly) what questions they have around your industry.
It also gives you a chance to understand the language they tend to use. That way, when you sit down to have a real-live conversation with them, you can be sure to use their own language when explaining to them what you can do for them.
When you use the same language as the person you’re talking to, not only does that help them understand you, it helps them trust you. It’s a way of signaling that you’re a part of their tribe.
This is especially true in the world of financial services where we are often in danger of talking over our clients’ heads without realizing it.
Automated Surveys
Asking people questions in person is great, but there are few things more tedious than asking the same questions over and over again.
To a certain extent, that’s unavoidable. The same questions have to be asked every time you meet with a prospect or a client.
But what if you could ask all your clients the same list of questions with just the push of a button?
Our modern technology gives you the chance to put together a list of questions and send it out to anyone you like as a survey.
With email automation, you can even send out the survey automatically every time someone subscribes to your newsletter or schedules a consultation with you.
Share Information About Yourself
With the rise of social media and everyone and their aunt having their own website, it’s easier than ever to gather information on just about anyone.
But the best way to gain someone’s trust is to share information about yourself first. Let them get to know you.
Technology lets you share information about yourself with the world. You can publish your bio on your website so people know, not only your credentials, but how you got started in this business, what motivates you, and what you do in your free time.
You can post on social media what you’re doing at any given moment so people can see a version of you that is relaxed and carefree. That way they get to know you’re not just someone in a suit talking numbers.
If you don’t care for social media, you can share information about yourself in an introductory email that goes out to everyone who signs up for your newsletter or schedules a meeting with you. That way they know what to expect before the meeting, which helps make them feel more at ease.
What Is Authenticity?
People won’t trust you if they don’t feel like they’re seeing the real you, either in person or online. And the more time we spend online, the better we get at spotting a phony.
At the same time, there’s been so much talk about “authenticity” lately that the word has become overused and lost much of its meaning. So, what does it mean to be “authentic”?
It means you don’t put something online (including in your newsletter) that you wouldn’t say to someone when you’re in person.
It means, if you make a claim online that you hold certain values, you then have to stand by those values in every aspect of your life, both online and off.
It means the person your prospects see online is the same person they’ll get when they meet with you in your office. You might be a more professional version of yourself in the office, but you’re still yourself.
Measure Your Results
We often think something we’re doing is working, when the fact is it’s not doing us any favors, and might actually be working against us. Other times we’re sure something is no good, when in fact it’s driving positive results for us.
The only way to know for sure is to measure your results.
Technology is at its best when it’s gathering and analyzing data.
So use technology to measure all your results.
Things you can measure include:
- How many calls you made
- How many of those calls resulted in another conversation or a request for more information
- How many leads you generated in a given time period
- Where those leads came from
- How many leads you followed up with in a given time period
- How many of those leads turned into clients
- How much time you put into marketing and/or sales
- The ROI of each of those marketing/sales efforts
As someone who works in financial services, you know better than most that numbers tell a story. The numbers of your business are no different. Technology can help you track those numbers and crunch them to help put a spotlight on the story those numbers are trying to tell you.
Don’t Rely Too Heavily on Technology
As tempting as it can be to offload all our tasks to our computers, there are some things only a human can do.
Yes, you can use technology to get to know your clients before you sit down with them, and to keep yourself top of mind and continue the relationship, but at some point, you’re going to have to sit down and talk with someone, even if it’s just over Zoom.
The more our lives have migrated online, the more we crave true connection, even if it’s just a handwritten card or a thoughtful gift. So, take advantage of that to delight your clients when they least expect it.
Use technology when it makes sense, but never underestimate the power of the personal touch.
At Vertex, we have integrated technology into every aspect of our business so we can, not only provide the best services for our clients, but also build meaningful relationships with those clients.
Technology enables us to earn their trust by communicating with them early and often in a way that matches their communication style. Technology also enables us to keep their trust by providing the highest levels of security and transparency in the financial services we’re providing for them.
If you’re interested in learning more about what it means to be part of the Vertex family, this page should answer all your questions.
