John O’Brien • Brookfield, CT
Advanced Financial Advisors • Lincoln Financial Advisors
We essentially do that in two ways.
The first is a series of client appreciation events. We frequently host luncheon events where we often bring in outside expert speakers—or we handle the presentation ourselves. We invite our clients to attend and encourage them to bring a family member, friend, or colleague if they would like to. It is really a blend of an informational event, some networking for everyone, and just a pleasant social gathering. This has proven to be a low-key but effective way to meet new prospects. But even without that function, it is a great way to informally stay in touch with clients and deliver information with some value.
The second piece is a more proactive program of marketing events that runs several times throughout the year. My first mentors in the business were excellent at marketing through seminar programs, and I have seen the power of that over the years. The key is to deliver informational content that has value and relevance to the target market, which in this case is retirees and pre-retirees.
We believe our process for retirement planning is different within the industry in terms of its sophistication and approach. It is both an elegant solution and relatively simple in concept. One of the leaders of our affiliated company, Integrated Financial Partners (IFP), is a frequent speaker at our events on retirement planning. We will also bring in an estate-planning attorney to present. We often hold these events in concert with an organization that is concerned with retirement issues, so we know the audience is deeply interested in this area.
Our model for retirement-income planning is called the Lifetime Income Model. The shorthand description is that it is a bucket approach. It is oriented around time frames in retirement, different levels of risk associated with those time frames, and different investment approaches, if required, for each bucket. It is about finding solutions to help clients meet their personal retirement-income and legacy objectives.
I like to talk about the theme of financial planning for life’s great goals—but a goal without a plan is simply a wish. Our holistic approach is designed to provide a road map to help clients identify opportunities, manage risk, protect and grow wealth, and efficiently transfer a meaningful legacy to those people or organizations most important to an individual or family. This is a message that I think resonates with our target audience.
Disclosure: John O’Brien is a registered representative of Lincoln Financial Advisors Corp. Securities and investment advisory services offered through Lincoln Financial Advisors Corp., a broker-dealer (member SIPC) and registered investment advisor. Insurance offered through Lincoln affiliates and other fine companies. Neither Integrated Financial Partners Inc. nor Advanced Financial Advisors is an affiliate of Lincoln Financial Advisors Corp. CRN-1522874-061016
Photography by Chris Beauchamp
