How to attract clients with a female-friendly culture

At The Advisor Center, we help financial advisers dissect their businesses in an effort to help them find new affiliations, broker-dealers or RIAs. Going through this exercise, advisers often find they don’t actually need to move to improve.

Sometimes just identifying and addressing a gap or two in your business is all you need to jumpstart growth.

One common area of concern is attracting and retaining female clients. Some advisers are doing a great a job serving female clients, while many are struggling to connect.

It’s not rocket science. In fact, it’s not scientific at all. However, there are six universal truths we seem to hear over and over again.

1. Get the Big Picture: Listen
Women don’t necessarily want a female adviser. What women want is an adviser—male or female—who will take a holistic approach, get to know them on a personal level and clearly understand what they need their investments to do for them. In the end you will probably find that you’ve learned a lot about her whole family—spouse, children, parents, grandchildren—and how she wants her financial plan to include and address their needs.

To get to this deep level of understanding, you will have to do a lot of listening—especially at first. This is good because women also tell us they want to be heard. In turn these women will listen thoughtfully when you provide financial planning and investing advice.

2. One Size Does Not Fit All
Don’t lump women into one bucket. See her as an individual.

Take the time to learn about her unique needs, whether it’s providing a secure retirement, enabling a change of career, funding college tuitions, caring for elderly parents, leaving a legacy to future generations or donating to philanthropic endeavors. You may need to ask a lot of questions to help her crystalize her vision of financial security and wealth management.

3. Quit the Numbers Game
It’s not all about the numbers. Don’t talk to her about a hot investment or gaming the system. Bernie Maddoff stories and clips from “The Wolf of Wall Street” keep her up at night.

Most women want to make measured decisions without being rushed or pressured. This is where advisers who are focusing on financial planning are enjoying a lot of success.

4. Channel Goldilocks
Do not condescend. Ever.

Don’t get too far into the technical weeds and provide confusing details she may not have asked for in an effort to exhibit your expertise, either. Instead, channel your inner Goldilocks to strike the “just-right” note and meet her where she’s at. Again, if you’ve been doing a good job of listening, this shouldn’t be difficult.

Many of your female clients will have busy, complicated lives. They will want easy-to-understand advice provided efficiently and consistently. This is especially true for breadwinner women and those in the sandwich generation simultaneously caring for their parents and children. But again, in an effort to provide simplicity, be sure to avoid condescension at all costs.

5. Be Indispensible
Be the one area of her life she doesn’t have to manage. Make it easy to work with you.

Have an authentic relationship with her and become her go-to resource for related matters. Have a vetted and trusted referral list of estate attorneys, divorce lawyers, social workers specializing in elder care or special needs children, insurance experts, tax professionals, career coaches and even college counselors.

As the general of her financial campaign, help her find some allies.

6. Focus on the Couple
Many of your female clients will come to you as one half of a couple. This adds complexity to your relationship with your female client. In the unfortunate event that she is no longer part of the couple, your individual relationship with her is paramount to retaining her business. Consider the following:

70% of widows changed their adviser within a year of the death of their husbands. (Spectrem Research, 2011)
32% of advisers report losing female clients after divorce. (TIAA-CREF, 2015)
To avoid these pitfalls focus on her as an integral part of a couple. Ask both partners to update you on their individual goals to be sure their financial plan addresses both.

Strongly encourage both partners to attend meetings. If she prefers to be in the background, make a point of engaging her and asking her opinion. Even if she doesn’t choose to speak up, at least she will know you are interested in her thoughts.

Don’t forget the details. Are newsletters addressed to both parties or just the husband? Are all emails sent to both recipients?

Bottom line: As a financial adviser it’s not difficult or complicated to create a female-friendly culture. Be genuine. Understand the emotions she brings to her financial planning. Most importantly, listen up. I can’t stress that one enough!