Getting a client is just the beginning. To successfully retain a client for life, business owners should seek to exceed the client’s expectations — turning them into advocates. In this episode of The Agent of Wealth Podcast, host Marc Bautis is joined by Richard Weylman, a business expert, serial entrepreneur, author, philanthropist, and keynote speaker. Tune in to discover how you can build rock-solid relationships that turn clients into delighted advocates for your business.
In this episode, you will learn:
- What the Great Re-evaluation® is, and what it means for businesses and professionals.
- What sets a business apart from the competition.
- How any professional can make sure they are meeting the expectations of prospects and clients.
- The everyday phrase that can make or break your customer relationship (without you realizing it).
- And more!
Resources:
www.richardweylman.com | 100 Proven Ways to Acquire and Keep Clients for Life | The Power of Why: Breaking Out in a Competitive Marketplace | Bautis Financial: 8 Hillside Ave, Suite LL1 Montclair, New Jersey 07042 (862) 205-5000 | Schedule an Introductory Call
Disclosure: The transcript below has been edited for clarity and content. It is not a direct transcription of the full episode, which can be listened to above.
Welcome back to The Agent of Wealth Podcast, this is your host Marc Bautis. Today, I’m joined by a special guest, Richard Weylman, a business expert, serial entrepreneur, author, philanthropist, and keynote speaker.
Orphaned at age 6, Richard lived in nineteen foster homes and attended eleven different schools. Rather than becoming victim of those circumstances, he overcame them and has had remarkable business success. He was an award-winning general sales manager of Rolls Royce, and he headed sales and marketing for the Robb Report – A Magazine for the Luxury Lifestyle, from its inception until its record liquidity event.
He is the author of two international bestsellers, the latest of which is The Power of Why: Breaking Out in a Competitive Marketplace. His next book, 100 Proven Ways to Acquire and Keep Clients for Life, will be released on March 12th and is available for preorder on Amazon now.
Richard has also been inducted into the Customer Experience Hall Of Fame for his legendary work helping brands engage with their customers and retain them.
Welcome to the show, Richard.
Well, thank you, Marc. It’s a joy to be with you today.
I’m excited to speak with you today, primarily about your newest book. In 100 Proven Ways to Acquire and Keep Clients for Life, you reference that people are going through a Great Re-evaluation®. What does that mean for businesses and professionals?
It’s a great question, and we all just stop for a moment and think about how we make choices. All of us have providers of all kinds of things, doctors, dentists, dry cleaners, financial banks. There’s everything we do today for the most part, that industry or that provider is part of a commoditized world. So there’s not just one air conditioning company or one heating company or one doctor or one dentist, one financial advisor, and what people have come to the realization is they don’t want to be taken for granted anymore and what they’re doing, they’ve stepped back and they’re going through a great reevaluation. Are we going to the right doctor or do I have the right dentist? I spoke to a young lady the other day and she said, I’m looking for a new doctor. I’m looking for a new dentist, and I’m looking for a new dry cleaner.
And I said, why? She said, because they really don’t care about me, and that’s what’s going on. I think what the pandemic did for everybody is made people realize their money is spent everywhere and what they want to have is a great experience. As a result of that. We call it the great reevaluation. Am I with the right advisor? Am I with the right bank? We’ve done this. Marc, if you think about it, if you and I go out to lunch, we have a great lunch, but it’s so noisy, we’re yelling across the table at each other. The next time we say, Hey, Marc, let’s go have lunch. You’re going to be good. And I say, let’s go back to that. You’re like, it’s so noisy. We could barely hear ourselves. We got two other people. We end up going somewhere else. All of us have experienced that and that particular facility, that restaurant we evaluated, we don’t want to be there anymore, so we’re going to go somewhere else. That’s what’s going on in our country right now. People are reevaluating where they’re doing business
As a consumer. I think that’s a great concept. A lot of times you don’t even think about it. You have either a mediocre experience, even a bad experience, and you either brush it aside and say, all right, maybe it’ll be better next time or not that bad, but it really makes sense for us as consumers. We’re spending money to go and reevaluate, look and say, is this the right place for my dentist, for my doctor, for my dry cleaner? So I kind of like that concept. Now on the business side of it, well, how do they go about creating experience so that they don’t wind up getting replaced and that they still become the provider of choice for whatever service they provide?
Well, again, if we think about the great reevaluation and they’re reevaluating whether they’re with you, what do business owners, what do professionals, what do anybody in business, I don’t care if you’re a salesperson, a receptionist, a marketer, the CEO, you’re running a small business and I don’t care what kind of business it is. Now what we need to do is really take a different approach and have a great re-engagement. We’ve got to engage with people at a different level. It cannot just be a transaction. The truth of the matter is most companies, most professionals, even CEOs, they’re in love with their product, their process, their principles, their pricing, and they love to talk about their piece. But what the consumer is really in love with is the experience and the outcome today. They want someone to personalize and humanize the relationship. They want to feel like they’re important to you.
So personalizing and humanizing means they want to experience things with you. That demonstrates four things. I want to do business or go somewhere for lunch or have a doctor, have a dentist, have a financial advisor that’s kind, that’s caring and cares enough to really find out what’s going on in my life. I want a waitress who walks up to me and cares enough to make sure that I’m comfortable throughout the entire meal or the waiter. I want someone that’s thoughtful, that takes the extra step and someone that’s empathetic to me and my situation. So how do we move forward? We’ve got to realize we need to personalize and humanize every interaction, every touch point, so that people feel appreciated. They feel like somebody cares enough about them, that somebody sees their situation and that they see you as thoughtful and kind. I’ll give you an illustration.
If you and I had a favorite place to go for lunch or a place we’ve been once or twice, and we go in and say, oh, marc, they say, nice to see you again. We got the table over there in the corner reserved for you again so you can talk, but you’re going to keep going back there because they personalize and humanize the experience at the same time. Think about the mail you get says, dear client or dear customer, you don’t really feel a sense of connection there. So what’s the path forward? We have to personalize and humanize, not because I said so, it’s because we interviewed hundreds and hundreds of people. It said, we’re sick and tired of being an account. We’re sick and tired of being addressed as to your customer. We’re sick and tired that nobody personalized and humanizes any part of our relationship. They just see us as a sale
Sale. So I think those four things make sense and they probably cut across every type of business or service that’s out there, but they’re probably, I would imagine, how you actually execute. The four things are probably different. Let’s say I’m a restaurant or I’m a financial advisor, or I’m a doctor within their specific business. How do they go about doing that?
Again, another great question, Chick-fil-A, let’s just take a step back and think about Chick-fil-A. The Founder was a good friend of mine, and we had lots of conversations about work. Keep in mind Chick-fil-A is only open 10 and a half months a year, because they’re closed every Sunday. That’s 52 days. So for all intents and purposes, they closed November 15th and reopened January 1st. Yet they have the highest gross of any other fast food restaurant chain in the world per location. So McDonald’s is open 365 in many cases, 24, and you’ve got another store called Chick-fil-A that’s opened 10 and a half months, and they’re beating ’em on revenue. There’s a message there, I think. Now what’s the message? Well, we talk to people, and you know what? Even the people sitting in the lines there with the two or three lines that get in their cars, it’s not about the chicken sandwich.
It’s exactly what he had told me years ago. He said, Richard, we are not in the chicken business. We are in the people business. Help me elevate that experience and where we are as a society. Please, thank you for my pleasure, which are the watch words at Chick-fil-A. You asked about restaurants, please, thank you in my pleasure. People go back. Why? Because the people there they perceive are kind, thoughtful, caring, and empathetic because we say, please thank you and my pleasure. That’s how far we’ve slid as a society in terms of graciousness. So here’s three things that were done that elevated them to the greatest revenue of any store in a fast food chain. So that’s an example. Another one, Freddie Steak Burger in custard out in Kansas. Great. They read my current book, the Power of Why the COO called me. We had a long conversation.
I went out and met with ’em, wonderful steak, burgers, et cetera. He’s like, how can we elevate? So more people come here. So what do we do? We crafted with them a thing called the Freddy’s Way of doing business. This is the way they’re being treated in the stores. We’re not going to have every booth nailed down. We’re going to take part of the booths out. We’re going to put tables and chairs. So when the little league comes in on Tuesday night after the game or Saturday, they can slide their chairs over to the corner. Church groups can slide over to this corner, et cetera, and build a sense of community there. They just won the national fast casual Restaurant award for the best casual repeat business in the industry. They beat everybody, Culver Smashburger. Now, why? It’s not about us. It’s about the experience.
What’s great? NFL Vikings built a new stadium. We had the privilege of auditing. First thing is to put another 2000 TVs in. 2000 TVs is the news. But in 2000 TVs, there’s too many places where they couldn’t see the game. A closeup perspective, let’s put an app in so they can order food from their seats. Let’s change security so the kids aren’t all in line screaming, mommy, mommy, why do we have to go here and change the branding on it and say, you must pass through here to be a certified fan. When they come through, the kids get a sticker. Well, if the second game, I get a call from this, he said, Richard, what are we going to do? The kids want to go through twice. They want two stickers. I’m like, just give ’em an extra sticker. So all these are little things we can do.
It’s never the big thing. So if I’m a financial advisor, I don’t know my first name. In other words, my first initial is C. I get a lot of emails, marc, dear C, I don’t read ’em. Okay. I have a friend of mine in Atlanta. She’s very wealthy. She was in her eighties. Her nickname is Lolly because when she was a baby or little girl, her grandfather called her Lollipop and they called her lolly because she loved lollipops. Well, if you call her Elizabeth, you’re going to lose her business forever. She’s not even going to talk to you. She’s not Beth. She’s not Elizabeth. Her name is Lolly. She sends out invitations. Please come to my party. Sign, lolly. So my point is personalized and humanized. It’s how you engage with people. It’s like salespeople. They’ll send out, I’m just, they’re calling you. Hey, Marc, I’m just following up. I got nothing more to offer. I’m really hoping maybe you’re going to make a decision. I’m pretty desperate over here. I’m just really like, man, got my fingers crossed. Wow. Well, who does that? If you’d have made a decision, Marc, you’d already called me.
Yeah, no, that’s great. Sticking with those four, four things that businesses can do, one of them is being empathetic. What are some of the ways that business or someone can show a client that they’re empathetic?
It’s an interesting fact today that people are not really confident in somebody sitting on their side of the table. And I struggled with this for a long time and how I could come up with a way that anybody could be empathetic in any situation. I mean, there’s one thing to say, Marc, I’m very empathetic, but it’s another thing to demonstrate. I sold cookware door to door. I never sold any on the box. I had to get in the house and cook a meal. So there’s demonstrating and talk orchestrating, but it hit me that the easiest way to do it is the way we speak to people. Example, I might say, if you don’t mind me asking, march, hope as soon as you hear, if you don’t mind me asking, up comes the defensive walls. It’s like, whoa, what’s he going to ask me? Now, we always used to predicate on the front, there’s proper English.
What dawned on me in the middle of the night literally, is to put the predicate on the back. So Marc, how old are you, if you don’t mind me asking? So then I did focus groups and I would say, if you don’t mind me asking, boom, rude, boom, they pushed the button, rude, boom, aggressive, boom, alpha. I mean, people were trying to crush the buttons in the focus groups. I asked the exact same question. How much money do you want to invest with us? If you don’t mind me asking. Very empathetic, 83%. Empathetic, empathetic, empathetic. It’s the same question reverse to predicate. I mean, that’s a simple example, but it’s one that goes to the point where our words matter and it engages with people. Another thing you could do, let’s say somebody doesn’t buy from you. What do you do? Most people say, well, I didn’t buy you and the price wasn’t right.
Why don’t you send ’em a thank you note? That’s what I do. Somebody calls me and wants me to speak at a conference. I send ’em a thank you note. Whatever the reason that they decided to do something else, I always send ’em a thank you note. I don’t say I’m sorry. I say I’m disappointed. Disappointed. We’re unable to do business. Now, I won’t say forever. It might be disappointing timing. We’re unable to do business now. I look forward to working with you in the future. Always feel welcome. Don’t say feel free. Feel welcome. That’s empathetic and gracious. Feel welcome to call. I just spoke at a conference in Chicago. The CEO gets up to introduce me. He said, four years ago, I tried to get Richard to come in and we couldn’t get it done schedule wise, and then with all the other things that weren’t working out, and he said, I felt really bad.
We just couldn’t make it happen. And he said, the reason he’s here today though is I want to read you something. And he picked it out of his pocket and he said, this is a note Richard sent me four years ago, disappointed. We’re unable to do business now. Marc, I look forward to working with you in the future. Always feel welcome to call. Warm regards, Richard. He read that to the audience. He said, this is where we’re going to take our business. You know what it does? It does two things. One, it shows empathy, but the second thing it does, it allows the, let’s call it the buyer or the prospect who said no to save base. I’m shocked how many times I’ve sent that out and somebody will call. We made a different decision on consulting and we realized we’ve made a mistake. I think we could kind of reengage here, Richard. It allows people to keep the path open to continue the relationships and relationships drive revenue. Relationships drive everything.
Yeah, yeah. We’re talking about this engagement and experience. At what point does the client actually become an advocate for you? Is it after one great experience? Does it take multiple? What can someone do to kind of nurture that client becoming an advocate over time?
It’s an interesting question, and I’ve studied this intently. There doesn’t seem to be, how shall we say, a formula or a timeline that one can say in this industry it’s going to take X. What it really does is the more you personalize and humanize every touch point, what we’re seeing is after, and again, I hesitate to put a time on it, but it seems to be after people have had eight, 10 personalized humanized experiences with you, that they then feel like they’re in the right place and everybody’s different. Every buyer’s different, every prospect. We get that. But if your focus as a CEO, as a business owner, as a salesperson, whatever, is to realize that the more you can elevate the touch points and you personalize and humanize what happens to people then they become delighted advocates for you because you reassure them. Reassure them they’re in the right place.
And I’ll tell you where the gap is, and I write about this in 100 proven ways to acquire and keep clients for life. What people look for is emotional security. So the more you can touch on the emotional points of a sale or of a relationship example, instead of saying, well, marc, how are you doing? You and I both know the answer’s going to be fine, but on the other hand, if I say, well, Marc, what are you and your family most excited about this summer? I’m going to get a completely different answer. And the advantage is, you’re going to tell me more of your story, and the more I know your story, the more sensitive I can become to your story, and more importantly, you’ll share things with me that you wouldn’t share with anybody else. And that helps build an emotional connection, and that connection leads to delighted advocacy.
Now, obviously you have to be competent in what you do and you have to perform. We get all that. But at the baseline, what’s the difference between a satisfied client and a delighted advocate? It’s the emotional relational connection they feel with you. So if you do six or eight touchpoints and you’re really focused on them and not on yourself, you win because they see these individual’s. For me, it’s like you go to a doctor one time, you’re kind of nervous. Second time you go back, you have the same bedside manner. How are you doing? What’s going on? What are you and your family focused on? Great. How have you been feeling? How can I help you? Anything else that I can help you with today? That doctor, by the time you’ve gone twice, you’re like, this doctor is the real deal. Why? Because they are personalized and humanized versus the guy, how can I help you? What can I do for you today? Snap out of it. What do you mean? What can you do for me today? I don’t even know what my problem is. I’m just here looking for some help to figure out what the solution is. So get people to tell their story. That’s critical to help them feel as though they’re in the right place. The truth of the matter is the average American thinks the people they buy from could care less.
As a professional, how can I be sure that I’m either meeting or even better exceeding the expectations of my clients? We all go to the doctor and get a text right after it. Here’s a survey, or we’ll get an email saying, please write a Google review. Are those effective ways?
Both things you mentioned are very common. We get customer satisfaction surveys all the time. I ran it from her the other day. We’d like to know how satisfied you’re, but what people need to realize is all of those commentaries and all of those scoring dissatisfaction, those are all a look back. We’re talking about what happened when I did something with that company. We need as salespeople, professionals, business owners, we need to be looking forward. And how do you do that? Well, I’ll give you two ways. One, I had a call with a CEO today. Last thing I said to him is, what else can I do for you today? And went in a completely different direction of our conversation. I mean, it was like we were talking about a, and he went over to D. I mean, it was like, as soon as possible, what else can I do for you?
He is like, oh, there is one more thing. So what I’ve learned is a way to really make that connection and to get great reviews and create delighted advocates is always available. What else can I do for you today? Even if it’s a five minute conversation. Marc, thanks so much for calling. What else can I do for you? No, I’m all set. But people remember that. That’s one. Two, when you sign your email, stop signing. Feel free. Always sign and feel welcome to call. Feel welcome to reach out. It’s more gracious. It’s more kind, and it builds advocacy. I have people tell me, my advisor is always there for me. He always says, always feels welcome. Well, that’s a blessing that people feel like you’re there for them, even if you’re not there for them. And then the other thing is every year instead of asking, how did we do, which is a look back, the satisfaction scores, why don’t we ask a different question?
What can my team and I do to elevate your experience further? I’ll give you a classic example. I’ve got a guy, and he’s not far from you actually in Wayne, Pennsylvania area in financial services, there’s several widows and executives as clients, and I encourage him to ask the question and the widow said, well, frankly, we don’t like driving out here when it’s so snowy, it just feels dangerous. I’d rather stay home and I don’t like Zoom. I don’t get to see your staff. He said, well, how about we provide a car service for you? Oh my God, that would be amazing. Well, guess what happened? Picked up 11 new clients because those widows told their widow friends, my advisor sent a car to pick me up. It’s not an Uber car. He’s got a company that’s a client that happens to run a limo service, so he gets them to go. Then he started doing it with executives. Now, what’s the point? Very minimal cost, but what a massive impact. He would’ve never known had he not asked the question.
You mentioned that a little bit earlier about yourself doing focus groups. Have you seen businesses do focus groups, or even in my industry, they call ’em client advisory boards where they’ll bring together some clients and they’ll go through, this is what we’re currently doing, and kind of test different things out. Like you said, looking forward to how we can make improvements or what kind of changes we can make? Do you see companies having success doing those?
Those that do it have significant success with it because they’re getting direct input from the consumer. The unfortunate thing is that one of these focus groups that some firms do, they tend to ask questions that get them the result they hope that we’re looking for doesn’t, I mean, it’s gratifying, but it’s not so good. Secondarily though, the organizations that have true focus groups or have a board and invite their customers onto the board, like an advisory board, I think you mentioned that is a good example. I have been in a board meeting for the last three days in Naples, Florida, and we have a couple of clients. It’s for this particular company that I consult with, and I’ve been on the board for several years there. But we have clients that are selected to also serve on the board. Why? Because we want to hear their voices.
We want to say, this is something we’re going to do organizationally, and how would that resonate with you, Tom or George, or whatever, and it’s remarkable. Sometimes you’ll say, well, that’s good, but you ought to look at it in a different way. And it’s always like, wow, I wouldn’t have thought of that. So unfortunately, not enough companies are having either client advisory boards or have, shall we say, customers or clients serve on their boards. One of the things we did at Freddie Berg and Custard, we started a fan club and we pulled them and asked them questions. It was unbelievable. I mean, unbelievable. Some of the tips and they cost nothing. If people love to share, if they feel like they’re part of something, people will support that, which it is. They feel like they’re building or supporting. It’s just remarkable. So you’re exactly right. Focus groups.
I mean, I do ’em because we do a lot of consulting and branding and client experience. I mean, I’ll get 15 of their clients in the room to say, what can we do to elevate the experience? And you get a torrent of ideas. People say, well, you know what they could do? They could pay. I had one, the other we did for a group the other day, I said, well, we hate to pack to get our validation of our parking, it takes like 15 minutes. Why can’t they do that when we come in the door, if I’m in a hurry, I come in, I’m going to have my meeting with Marc, I hand you the ticket, it gets validated While I’m having that meeting, I come out, here’s your ticket, saves me 15 minutes. I mean, it’s kind of like, what’s the question here? Okay, but these are the clients saying, another person said, the elevators are too slow to be able to go up and down. We don’t like that, and these two banks aren’t working. Another woman said, I don’t like the fact that when I go into a ladies’ room, they don’t have hand soap and hand towels. How hard is that to fix? You can say, well, we’re in a building. We don’t own the restroom. Fine. Why don’t you put ’em in there and courtesy of a, B, C physicians group? People go, wow, these people are great. All these little things you can do. They really cost nothing, but they make an enormous impact.
Like you said, it’s the little things that make a difference. Alright, that’s all of the questions I had for you today, Richard. Thank you for joining me for an episode of The Agent of Wealth. Before we go, can you share your website and any other relevant resources you may have for the listeners?
My website is richardweyman.com. There, I’ve got a whole host of videos in the “Resources” section, available for free. Your listeners are welcome to go enjoy those. We also have a coaching division – we offer consulting in a variety of different industries.
Also on my website, you can find information on my newest book, 100 Proven Ways to Acquire and Keep Clients for Life. You can purchase the book from Amazon, and other retailers as well. If you select “Learn More” on that page, you’ll find a link to the bookstores where it’s available. Yes, Amazon is easy, but I think we should support local bookstores as much as we can.
Great, we will link to those in the resources section of the show notes. Thanks again, Richard. And thank you to everyone who tuned into today’s episode. Don’t forget to follow The Agent of Wealth on the platform you listen from and leave us a review of the show. We are currently accepting new clients, if you’d like to schedule a 1-on-1 consultation with our advisors, please do so below.