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Becoming a Trusted Advisor to your Clients

Becoming a Trusted Advisor to your Clients. DZH Phillips July 2015 Presented by Art Kuesel. Art Kuesel, President. EXPERIENCE Sales Executive 3 years inside $60M CPA firm 5 years inside $25M CPA firm 6 years at PDI/Koltin Consulting 2.5 years at Kuesel Consulting EXPERTISE

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Becoming a Trusted Advisor to your Clients

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  1. Becoming a Trusted Advisor to your Clients DZH Phillips July 2015 Presented by Art Kuesel

  2. Art Kuesel, President • EXPERIENCE • Sales Executive • 3 years inside $60M CPA firm • 5 years inside $25M CPA firm • 6 years at PDI/Koltin Consulting • 2.5 years at Kuesel Consulting • EXPERTISE • Leadership and Sales Coaching • Sales/Marketing Training • EXPERTISE (Cont.) • Keynotes, Presentations, Workshops on Growth • Growth Plan Development/Implementation • Managing Partner Coaching • Sales & Marketing Recruiting • STREET CRED • Top 100 Most Influential Person in Public Accounting: 2014 • In-house and external experience • Clients include scores of T250 Firms including a third of the T100 • Frequent writer and blogger for Accounting Today • Accomplished speaker and presenter on growth trends

  3. Today’s Workshop • What’s a Trusted Advisor? • Top Client Relationship Killers and Thrillers • Building Trust with Clients • Developing More and Deeper Relationships with your Clients (and their COI) • Recognizing Clues & Triggers • Cross-Selling 4

  4. What’s a Trusted Advisor?

  5. Define it!

  6. Characteristics Include • First person who is asked for help • Respected for knowledge/opinion • Reliable • Responsive • Likable! • ____________________ • ____________________ • ____________________

  7. How can we get there?

  8. Top Client Killers

  9. DZH Phillips Client • 2012 – 2015 • R.I.P.

  10. Top Ways to Kill Client Relationships • Ignoring your gut when it tells you that something isn’t right with the relationship or client (ask the tough questions and have open and honest discussions when necessary.) • Telling a client what you think they want to hear vs. what they really need to know • Not working well or being responsive to internal accounting staff, owners, or any other party

  11. Top Ways to Kill Client Relationships • Not understanding billing needs, fee tolerance of client & doing too much too soon and ignoring client budget • Not having a relationship with multiple owners when applicable and appropriate • Being perceived as taking sides between owners/parties or multiple generations

  12. Top Ways to Kill Client Relationships • Blaming others: “can’t get this job out of QC”; mail room sent return to wrong address, having staffing challenges, deadline compression, etc. • Being satisfied with a compliance relationship • Not being proactive with ideas that can help save the client money, create greater efficiency, reduce risk, reduce liability, etc. (the client comes to you with more ideas than you bring to them)

  13. Top Ways to Kill Client Relationships • Making repetitive mistakes, being late with deliverables, last minute deliverables, being late for meetings, using electronics during client meetings, bad body language such as poor posture and a weak handshake • Poor internal communication among team • Fail to acknowledge a question or inquiry • Not knowing and having a relationship with the client circle of influence

  14. The Number one Way to Kill a Client Relationship? • Not knowing or understanding the expectations of the client!

  15. Top Client Thrillers

  16. DZH Phillips is AMAZING!

  17. Top Ways to Thrill your Clients • Taking client to lunch, coffee, drink, etc. • Seize opportunities that arise from client life situation (marriage, divorce, anniversary, birthday, birth of child) • Do things without charge that add value and “claim” credit • Meet on nights, early am, weekends, whatever is necessary to accommodate their schedule

  18. Top Ways to Thrill your Clients • Remind them about due dates • Be proactive with ideas that can help save the client money, create greater efficiency, reduce risk, reduce liability, etc. and quantify the value of those ideas • Know what is important to them professionally (know their strategic objectives, plans, goals, etc.)

  19. Top Ways to Thrill your Clients • Know what is important to them personally! • Know and have relationships with their circle of influence (banker/financer, attorney, professional advisors) • Be hyper responsive, acknowledge questions and inquiries quickly • Deliver on-time every time

  20. Top Ways to Thrill your Clients • Send them notes/emails with articles, newsletters, and other items that show that you are invested • Make the client feel important in front of his/her family (tickets to special events) • ID future problems, help save them from themselves • Take responsibility for what goes wrong

  21. The Number One Way to Thrill a Client? • Under Promise and Over Deliver!

  22. Action Plan Development [A] • Can you thrill one client a week this summer? • Who is it and what will you do over the next several weeks?

  23. Building Trust with Clients

  24. Trust is Scarce! • We are taught NOT to trust (if it sounds too good to be true, it probably is) • Mother taught us to be AFRAID of strangers • We are bombarded with communication and our personal filter CANNOT discern what’s accurate and what is not • Look at the rise of Yelp, TripAdvisor, and other “independent” ratings sites! • Trust takes a long time to build but can be shredded in one interaction

  25. The Speed of Trust – Stephen Covey

  26. Three Basic Building Blocks of Trust • Clients need to like you • Clients need to respect you • Clients need to have repetitive positive experiences with you

  27. Building Blocks of Trust • 1: Clients need to like you! • Find commonalities, exhibit care and concern, demonstrate active engagement in the relationship • Show loyalty – acknowledge contributions of others • Demonstrate respect – be genuine (it’s easy to tell) • Right wrongs – “service recoveries”

  28. Building Blocks of Trust • 2: Clients need to respect you! • Having broad or deep knowledge in subject matter • Introduce others of value to them – be a connector • Talk straight – be honest and call things what they are • Create transparency – be open and authentic and err on the side of disclosure • Be a great communicator

  29. Building Blocks of Trust • 3: Clients need to have repetitive positive experiences with you! • Understand where your relationship is and work to deepen it – go from a B- to an A- • Look long-term in your scope (trust is not generated overnight) • Clients need to feel that you have their best interest in mind at all times • Clients need several consecutive experiences with positive results • Clients need to see you add value to the relationship without expecting

  30. Action Plan Development [B] • Do you need to build or establish more trust with one or more clients? • Who is it and what will you do?

  31. Relationship Breadth and Depth

  32. Firm A Client Generation 1 Owner Relationship Breadth: Firm A • Partner

  33. Firm A Client Generation 1 Owner CFO Generation 2 Owner Office Manager Relationship Breadth: Firm B • Partner • Manager • IT Consultant • Accounting Services

  34. Firm A Client Generation Relationship Breadth: Firm A • Partner

  35. Firm A Client Generation 1 Owner CFO Generation 2 Owner Office Manager Relationship Breadth: Firm B • Partner • Manager • IT Consultant • Accounting Services

  36. Benefits of Relationship Breadth • Relationship Breadth: • Insulates against unfortunate accidents • Creates a stronger web between us and our clients • Increases cross-selling opportunities • Fuels more referrals • Drives greater long-term retention • What else?

  37. Common types of relationships we should seek connections with Consultants/Professional Advisors P&C Insurance Real Estate Broker Bonding Agency Key Vendors, Top Clients Who else? • Banker/Financier • VCs • Attorney – Corporate, Trust/Estate, Employment • Boards of Directors • Committees – Tax, audit, internal audit 39

  38. Asking for introductions to these people • Can you help me? • I’d like to serve you better… In order to do this, I need to have stronger relationships with your <insert types of contact here>. This could enable <insert advantage here>. Plus, if you know and trust them, I am sure they would be someone that I could benefit from a relationship with. • How have you done this? 40

  39. Relationship DEPTH: Would you fire your friend? • Q: In general, the stronger the relationships we have with our clients, the (easier/harder) it is to leave us.

  40. It’s much easier to fire your accountant, than it is to fire your friend! • Benefits of Client Friendships: • Fuels more referrals • Drives greater long-term retention • Increases trust • Insulates you against mistakes • Accelerates your trusted advisor status • What else?

  41. Action Plan Development [C] • Do you have relationships (breadth or depth) you need to target and build? • Who and where? When will you get it done by? 43

  42. Recognizing Clues and TriggersWhat are your clients telling you without telling you?

  43. Defining Clues and Triggers • If you’ve done a good job developing your client relationships, you will be in an excellent position to hear and observe clues and triggers • Clue: Something a client says • that indicates there is a need for an • additional service • Trigger: An event that happens • with a client that triggers the need • for an additional service 45

  44. Which firm Drives more Cross-Selling Growth? • FIRM A / 30 People • 3 people who recognize and understand how to capitalize on clues and triggers • 27 remaining people not really engaged in the marketing and sales process

  45. FIRM B / 30 People 30 people who recognize and understand how to capitalize on clues and triggers 0 people unaware of how they can help Which firm Drives more Cross-Selling Growth?

  46. Recognizing Clues/Triggers • Four Steps: • KNOW OUR SERVICES • Be Actively Engaged in the Relationship. Have your Antenna Up! • Engage • ACT

  47. Common Clues You May Hear • Clues… • I wish… • I’m having trouble with… • I can’t seem to… • Our competition is… • I’m concerned about… • This trend is scaring me…

  48. Triggers You May Encounter • Triggers • Recent sale, merger, or divestiture • New facility, building, land, physical expansion, etc. • New division, product or service line, niche, focus • Owner retiring, succession to another generation, ESOP • Physical expansion into new markets • Rapid growth in number of employees • Significant changes in cash flow, payables, receivables, financing, profitability • Addition or subtraction of a key competitor

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