Are You Being Shopped?

Most advisors have no choice in this new market environment but to adapt to this shopping process.

To break out of your prospect’s selection process and avoid being commoditized as an advisor, you must shift them out of their shopping-mode mindset.

The shopping-mode mindset comes from your prospect thinking they fully understand their issue or situation, and therefore have a sense of what they need (they think they know what they’re shopping for).

If this mindset isn’t challenged, it leads to two problems:

1. You aren’t being perceived as the expert; your prospect assumes that role.
2. You can’t assess the depths of their issues; instead, they’re assessing you.

The truth is that your prospect is operating on false assumptions.

Chances are high there are underlying factors they’ve never considered and couldn’t consider because they’re not a financial expert. But they are the root cause of how their situation has become a problem in the first place.

The traditional advisory sales process, which focuses on building rapport and trying to sell value, overlooks this fact and leaves these assumptions unchallenged.

It leaves your prospect unaware or without deep enough insight into their own situation, so they continue their casual shopping-mode approach of gathering information first, deciding later.

This is the reason for the classic indecisive response you often hear: “I need to think about it.”

To shift them out of this behaviour, you need a process that takes the focus off you and your expertise as an advisor, and places it on them and their situation.

You can no longer impress them with your knowledge.

You can impress them by using a finely tuned diagnostic process that takes a deep dive into their situation and brings any underlying assumptions to the surface, where they can be examined together.

The clarity your prosect gains from going through this leads to a very different mode of thinking. They begin to:

• think that they don’t understand their situation as well as they thought.

• feel less confident about gathering information to find a solution on their own.

• see you as someone who knows them and their situation better than they do.

You become more than just an advisor to them... you become an authority that they feel they’ve discovered and can trust.

This is what it takes to shift your prospect out of shopping-mode into decision-making mode, where they feel it’s necessary to go with you.

To learn how to reach this level of trust with your prospect in your sales process, order your complimentary book and consultation below.

Ari Galper is the world’s number one authority on trust-based selling and is the most sought-after high-net worth/lead generation expert for financial advisors. His newest book, “Trusted Authority” has become an instant best-seller among financial advisors worldwide – you can get a Free copy of Ari’s book here and, when you click the “YES” button in the order form, you’ll also receive a complimentary “plug up the holes” lead generation consultation. Ari has been featured in CEO Magazine, Forbes, INC Magazine and the Australian Financial Review. He is considered a contrarian in the financial services industry and in his book, everything you learned about selling will be turned upside down. No more chasing, no pressure, no closing.

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