There is a guaranteed way to help uncover client needs and deliver innovative new ways of solving client problems
Expanding into new markets is a common way in which practices can generate new lines of revenue and diversify their client base. Whether you are aiming to provide new services to existing clients, or existing services to new clients, I have found that there is a three-step process can assist you in developing new markets:
1. Solve a problem (‘find a need and fill it’). You probably use velcro – it’s the great invention that resolves issues with laces, buttons and similar annoyances. Your handheld phone and electronic notepad elegantly simplify issues that clutter daily life. All clients for financial services have issues that need to be fixed, solved, made good; in some instances they can articulate exactly what they need and in others they don’t yet know. So how do you find out? We’ll come to that in a moment.
2. Define the pleasure your solution brings (clarify and emphasise the benefit). Once you have created a solution to a problem, define it by giving it a name. When most people vacuum their carpets, they Hoover them. When you look something up on the web, you Google it. In short, a named solution has value – not just to the clients who use it, but also to the practitioner who creates it.
3. Make a promise about your solution (and how you deliver it). Make all clients aware that you stand behind the solution you bring and the pleasure it delivers. The Queensland Tourist board promises ‘Beautiful one day. Perfect the next.’ One of marketing’s best promises – and its most effective – is ‘Satisfaction guaranteed, or your money back’. When you see the word ‘guarantee’, you tend to feel confident about the service.
Innovative ways of solving client problems takes you into a new zone of business and, notwithstanding the initial stages of acclimatising, it doesn’t take long to become comfortable in servicing it, especially when clients express their pleasure and then pay you for delivering it.
If you feel inclined to follow these ideas up, here’s a guaranteed way to uncover client needs. I’m giving you two questions to ask that never appear on any standard fact-find (I checked). The first is this: “If you had a magic wand, and you wanted to fix a niggling issue in relation to your overall financial situation, what would you wish for?” And the second question is: “Is there anything in relation to your financial or family affairs that keeps you awake at night?”
Ask enough clients, and you listen very carefully to the answers you receive, and you’ll hear so many ideas for problems to solve, you won’t be able to keep up. Judicious pruning will lead to at least one new market within which you will feel so comfortable you’ll wonder why you never thought of doing this before.
Try it. I guarantee (that word again) it will work for you.
