I remember the first time we deployed laptops to our salesforce (yes, it’s a while ago) and began the training process. It quickly became evident that the team was divided into 3 camps.
Wholesalers who embraced what was then the new technology and were eager to learn.
Wholesalers that had a more difficult time with the learning process but were extending a solid effort.
Wholesalers who used the new laptop as a door stop!
While the technology tools are different (read: worlds apart and amazingly better), today the universe of wholesaler technological proficiency is the same.
Yet even the geekiest among us are hesitant to enter into the discussion with our advisors because in the back of our head we have compliance screaming YOU CAN’T DO THAT!
So the wholesaler begins to believe that because they are prohibited from certain aspects of technology by their firm (social media) that they need not know the technologies or how they might benefit their advisors.
Big mistake.
You can add tremendous value to your advisor’s practice – and too many wholesalers are ignoring a HUGE opportunity to simply teach.
Think about playing the role of technology educator to your advisors.
You don’t need to have a blog like Wholesaler Masterminds – but you can know that there are blogging platforms that make the process easy for advisors to get their brand and message out to their target prospects. WordPress.com (hosted), WordPress.org (self-hosted), Blogger, Tumblr, Posterous, and Typepad will all do the trick with varying levels of simplicity. As an added benefit some of these platforms double as social media outlets.
You don’t need to write and publish articles – but you can tell advisors about sites that publish their articles for free and therefore get them search engine exposure. In addition, their article may be picked up by another site that needs content, thereby extending the PR and Google goodness. EzineArticles, Go Articles, Suite101, Articlesbase all allow for free article submissions.
You might have a marketing department to reach your clients en masse; many advisors are left to their own devices. At shorespeak and Wholesaler Masterminds we’ve successfully used both Constant Contact, and Aweber for email marketing and newsletter creation/distribution. Tell your advisors about these services.
Know about productivity tools that will make help advisors lives easier.
Make sure you are the one that tells them about:
Dropbox -to store and share files and folders
Evernote – to remember things big and small from your life using your computer, phone, and the web
Diigo – a browser add-on for bookmarking and to research productivity
WiseStamp – enable users to transform their emails into a powerful self expression and promotional tools
PC Tools -powerful utility and security software
These tools just scratch the surface – and no, you don’t need to be a technology expert to get tremendous relationship value from your advisors – simply be the person who knows just enough to help them solve a problem.
The easiest solution?
Send them this post.