Canterbury discussed one of the biggest challenges with Brent Slinkard: building a process for getting a steady stream of qualified prospects. Slinkard is a consultant to independent financial advisors. Slinkard says that everyone wants such a pipeline, but there is “no magic formula.”

“Generating quality leads requires a systematic process over time,” he says. “If you look through the optics of an investor, it is about communicating properly, informing, educating, and nurturing over time to a point where you can ultimately convert that prospect to a quality client… I assert that it is absolutely based on a systemic process that allows you to nurture leads over time and bring them in, in an intelligent way to your advisory.

Tom Hardin, Chief Investment Officer at Canterbury Investment Management, notes that when trying to retain and nurture clients “one of the biggest mistakes that advisors make is scheduling these quarterly or semi-annual meetings where they take this performance monitor, and they compare the performance of their portfolio to either an index or combination of benchmark indexes.”

He says that approach puts the client in the "left brain" where they begin to worry about the comparisons. They may even question the process if the performance lags an index in a quarter. Hardin says he focuses on the “right brain” and teaches concepts that reinforce the process.

“I want them to begin to connect me and my expertise to their dreams and their goals and make the connection that I can help them get there,” he says
Read the full conversation from ETF Trends.