by Brandi Bottorf Tailor Made Sales Consultant
Times are changing, and so is our business. The huge wave of baby boomer retirees has captured our industry’s attention – and rightfully so. Yet, many insurance agents and financial advisors can’t quite seem to put their finger on how to target one particular group of this critical segment: women. According to TD Ameritrade Institutional, a division of TD Ameritrade Inc., women control $8 trillion in assets in the U.S. and are expected to control $22 trillion by 2020. These women want and need your services, possibly more than any other market, so what are you doing to meet their goals and let them grow your business?
We spoke with Mike Wilk, president and CEO of Five Rings Financial, an independent agency headquartered in Littleton, Colo., for an inside look at how to target, connect with and serve the female market more effectively. Mike founded Five Rings Financial in 2004 with more than 20 years of industry experience under his belt in an effort to positively change the lives of others, both those working within his agency and the clients they serve. Currently, Five Rings Financial employs more than 1,250 agents throughout the country and attributes a huge portion of their dramatic growth to their focus on marketing to women.
Q: What led you to realize that focusing on the female market was critical to growing your agency?
It all started about six or seven years ago when I attended a Marti Barletta seminar on marketing to women. She mentioned the importance of this segment specifically for those of us in the financial industry, and how women would be controlling a larger part of retirement planning decisions as time goes on. Women inherit nearly twice what men do, we’re currently experiencing the third generation of women working outside of the home, and with the divorce rate on the rise, more women are forced to make financial decisions on their own. Although many would prefer to work with female advisors, our industry doesn’t currently support that, so I knew I needed to change my business model accordingly.
Q: How did you determine that your Money 101 program would be a fit for the female market?
Today’s public education system doesn’t talk at all about handling and saving money. Children learn by watching their parents, but fewer women are given the opportunity to fully educate themselves about the real importance of these skills. The irony is that women are much more interested in finding out how money works and desperately want a better understanding of how it impacts their lives. So, we developed Money 101 to teach attendees about the basics of money, including how interest and tax deferral work, and how inflation and taxes impact money. The seminars are very disarming because we dig into the basics of personal finance and help attendees start to build a platform for saving over time.
Q: What kind of response have you received from these seminars?
The response has been phenomenal. We hear from many attendees, women in particular, that they’ve been to four or five financial seminars and this is the first one they’ve understood. We eliminate traditional industry lingo and any talk of product, and instead try to provide an educational, entertaining, non-threating environment that basically makes them feel like they’re at a “chick flick.” We tap into emotion by sharing stories, incorporating humor and providing relatable examples. Although I’ve been doing seminars for more than 30 years, I’ve had to completely reformulate my approach as I join my agents in these presentations.
Q: With attendees engaged, do the sales quickly follow?
One of the biggest things we’ve learned is that although we’re taught to sell on our first visit with clients and close on the second, female clients operate in a completely different way. Women want to research and ask more questions; they also require a much deeper level of trust to be established before buying. We’ll meet with women four or five times before selling anything, providing a comprehensive financial review with solutions for reducing costs of living, generating better returns and improving their retirement plans. Yet we recoup the cost of holding multiple meetings quickly, as women are far more willing to provide referrals once they’re satisfied with a purchase. In fact, 25-35% of our female seminar attendees bring other women to future seminars, and some come month after month with friends and family to listen all over again!
Q: How has this success in marketing to women changed the makeup of your agency?
To help build our platform and attract the female market, we’ve grown from 10% of our agents being female to 55%. Furthermore, women represent about 70% of our total agency sales. We don’t see the women’s market as a “niche” market – after all, there are more women in this world than men! Six of our top 10 producers last year were women, including the top two, and we’re expecting these numbers to continue rising. In order to grow this aspect of the agency, we’ve had to alter our training programs. You may be able to hire and train a man in 60-90 days, but it often takes six to nine months for women. However, it’s totally worth it, because when they’re convinced they are doing the right thing for clients 100% of the time, these women will become true crusaders.
Q: Now that you’ve generated so much success, what’s next?
To continue better serving female clients, we’ve created our Wine, Women & Wealth program. Although 75% of our seminar participants are women, we realized that many of them hesitate or even refuse to attend alone. This women’s-only networking group meets for 90-120 minutes to share ideas and challenges both financially related and more personal. With the camaraderie built, participants can then attend a seminar as a group, and enjoy the common interaction, education and care we put into the presentations. It’s also fun to watch a growing portion our female agents become more successful with these programs. Because of the flexibility and freedom associated with being an independent agent, our female professionals can be great moms and family women while enjoying huge success.
FOR AGENT USE ONLY. NOT FOR USE WITH THE GENERAL PUBLIC. 12393 – 2012/7/18