Having a clear definition and description of who your ideal client is and learning to sack the ones who don’t fit the mould will help you be a better broker and run a more successful business, according to one award-winning broker.
Speaking in an industry leader roundtable at the
MFAA Convention in Melbourne last week, Dominique Bergel-Grant, founder of Leapfrog Financial said understanding your ideal client as much as you understand your own point of difference will help you attract and keep clients and referrers.
“Being able to actually articulate your value and understand what your point of difference is really important. The next thing is really, really clearly being able to articulate who your target client is,” she said.
“The other thing is to be really confident in what your message is. My message is going to be different to each and every one of you, so if I go in and I have a conversation with a potential referral client, it’s about saying these are the types of people I don’t want and these are the types of people I do want. This is what I specialise in; this is what I am really, really good at. Then they will start to think about names, they will start to think about real people that they will actually refer to you.”
When deciding who your ideal client is, Bergel-Grant says you have to think outside the box.
“Sit down and actually go through and think ‘who is my ideal client?’[and] describe them. Typically, we go ‘our ideal client is between the ages of 35 and 45 and they need a mortgage’. But who are they? What do they do for a living? What types of social media platforms are they using? What events are they going to? Who do they trust? Who do the listen to?"
Once you have a clear definition of who your target client is, Bergel-Grant says diversifying your revenue streams will also become easier, again allowing your business to be more successful.
“If you have all of the same type of client, then what you can do is start to build diversified revenues and products specifically for that type of client. So, if you’ve got a client that is 35 to 45 and perhaps they have just gone through their first divorce, they are looking at purchasing a home for the first time by themselves and they might have a couple of young kids they have shared custody with. What are the things that this client needs to learn? If all you do is write loans for a living … you’ll be out of a job in five years.”
But when a client doesn’t fit the definition of your target audience, brokers should not be afraid to let them go and refer them to a different broker.
“Now, we all have clients in amongst our client bases who we wish we didn’t have in there. Some of the most satisfying moments you’ll ever have are those moments where you actually get to fire those clients. And it is actually okay to fire a client and say ‘I don’t want to deal with you because you are not going to get the value from me ... but most importantly, you don’t value or don’t trust what I have to say to you,’” Bergel-Grant said.
However, when letting go of a client, Bergel-Grant says brokers should always speak to the referral partner or client who referred them before making the decision.
