{"id":78291,"date":"2025-08-03T13:01:36","date_gmt":"2025-08-03T03:01:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/riskinfo.com.au\/news\/?p=78291"},"modified":"2025-08-11T12:26:40","modified_gmt":"2025-08-11T02:26:40","slug":"two-critical-areas-for-advisers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/riskinfo.com.au\/news\/2025\/08\/03\/two-critical-areas-for-advisers\/","title":{"rendered":"Two Critical Areas for Advisers"},"content":{"rendered":"

Advisers attending June\u2019s 2025 MDRT Annual Meeting in Miami were urged to focus on two critical areas \u2013 build trust with clients and avoiding negative surprises.<\/p>\n

In his one-hour presentation, Tim Clairmont<\/strong> \u2013 founder of US-based Clear Financial Partners<\/a> \u2013 outlined what it takes to retain and attract clients.<\/p>\n

The central thrust of his presentation was on what he called the trust bank, providing clients with reliable and consistent service “…doing what you said you will do, when you said it would do it”.<\/p>\n

He said building trust with new clients starts with his existing ones.<\/p>\n

\"Tim
Tim Clairmont<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\u201cI hate having to build trust with a new client,\u201d he said. \u201cIt feels like a waste of time.”<\/p>\n

Rather than slowly building credibility from scratch every time a new client surfaces, Clairmont encourages advisers to proactively build trust with their current clients so referrals come pre-loaded with confidence.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen a new client walks in and says, \u2018you take care of John and Susie \u2013 I already know I\u2019m going to work with you,\u2019 that\u2019s the best client you can get,\u201d he said<\/p>\n

However, he says his \u2018rapid trust\u2019 concept is only possible through consistent service, exceeding client expectations, and regularly making deposits in clients\u2019 emotional trust banks.<\/p>\n

The only time you ever lose a client is due to a negative surprise…<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

\u201cIn doing so, advisers create advocates who naturally pave the way for smooth onboarding of referrals,\u201d he said. “The only time you ever lose a client is due to a negative surprise.\u201d<\/p>\n

He said these surprises often arise due to a disconnect between a client\u2019s expectations and the adviser\u2019s actions, \u201cespecially when those expectations were never explicitly stated\u201d.<\/p>\n

Clairmont broke down client expectations into two types:<\/p>\n

    \n
  • Explicit: what the adviser says and what the client hears<\/li>\n
  • Implicit: what the client assumes but was never directly said by the adviser<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n

    His advice is to bing assumptions to the surface, and “make the invisible visible in every client interaction,” to help avoid any mis-communication or assumed expectations.<\/p>\n

    Team development<\/strong><\/p>\n

    Elsewhere is his presentation, Clairmont shifted focus to personal and team development, particularly with goal setting.<\/p>\n

    Drawing on his 2014 book Passionate Ambivalence<\/em>, he outlined a structured exercise used at his firm whereby each new member of staff is asked to list 100 of their accomplishments.\"Tim<\/p>\n

    \u201cIt\u2019s easy to write 20 or 30,\u201d he said. \u201cThen it gets harder. By 50 or 60, you\u2019ll want to quit. But the breakthrough comes after that.\u201d<\/p>\n

    This process, he said, reveals patterns of value and passion, helping both advisers and their teams better understand their North Star \u2013 where their passions lie.<\/p>\n

    Clairmont said that for advisers dealing with increasing client expectations and regulatory scrutiny, it\u2019s best not to assume. But to communicate clearly, set aligned goals, and keep making deposits in the trust bank.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    Advisers attending June\u2019s 2025 MDRT Annual Meeting in Miami were urged to focus on two critical areas \u2013 build trust with clients and avoiding negative surprises. In his one-hour presentation, Tim Clairmont \u2013 founder of US-based Clear Financial Partners \u2013 outlined what it takes to retain and attract clients. The central thrust of his presentation […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":23,"featured_media":78293,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[282,241,4495,6831,6837,248],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-78291","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-associations","category-conferences-and-events","category-mdrt","category-practice-marketing","category-soft-skills","category-training"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/riskinfo.com.au\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/78291","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/riskinfo.com.au\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/riskinfo.com.au\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/riskinfo.com.au\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/23"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/riskinfo.com.au\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=78291"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/riskinfo.com.au\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/78291\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/riskinfo.com.au\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/78293"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/riskinfo.com.au\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=78291"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/riskinfo.com.au\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=78291"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/riskinfo.com.au\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=78291"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}