Not having a clear and effective message at every point along the contact continuum is a weakness that the best product or idea will have difficulty overcoming. These contact points include emails, voice mails, phone calls, 1 on 1 meetings and group presentations.
Being comfortable and entertaining in front of the room or having “good” conversations in meetings is nice, but to make money you need to be effective…that is, move advisors to action. When writing emails, you need to get advisors to open them AND act on them.
So how does intentional messaging help you do this? Intentional messaging is a 2 step process. The first step is taking the time to craft an effective talk, email or message*. The second step is to practice it enough to convey it clearly. Everyone reading this knows the words to countless songs, yet don’t memorize the words to songs that can make them hundreds of thousands of dollars.
The problem is that most of us prioritize activity over everything else. When things get busy, the first thing that gets pushed off is working on our messages or crafting great emails. THIS IS BACKWARDS. Crafting and memorizing effective messages first, meetings second.
The analogy I like to use for this thinking is replacing worn grips on a golf club. Playing with bad grips makes it difficult to hit the ball square. If you re-grip your clubs in April or August, the time and cost is the same. If you wait until August, though, every swing you take (advisor meetings) is not as good as it can be and the effect multiplies. If you get your grips taken care of in April (crafting and memorizing an effective message), every swing through the summer is that much better. Same time and effort, but exponentially different results.