The Secret to Building Trust With Clients

Trust is a critical component of any relationship, and this is especially true in the financial advisory arena. 

Clients rely on their advisors to guide them through complex financial decisions, and they need to trust that their adviser understands them and has their best interests in mind. However, building that trust can be challenging, particularly in the face of potentially conflicting motivations. Thankfully, behavioral science technology puts the key in your hand.

Bringing the Right Person to the Table
Often, the most critical decision you make is choosing the right advisor for the client—someone they naturally feel in sync with. Trust will always come easier when two people are similar in the way they think and make decisions. So, how can you know which advisor to match with a new client when they first walk through the door? It’s done by using the comparison tool built into the DNA Behavior web app.

Style Matching
Top wealth management firms utilize DNA Behavior’s “Style Matching” insight to match clients with advisors. Knowing who will connect best with a client gives you quite an advantage right out of the gate!

Behavioral science studies show that advisors can have 40% more efficient meetings by working with clients with whom they are behaviorally similar.

How Does It Work?
Our behavioral finance technology can be incorporated into any practice. It helps advisors understand clients, leading to better conversations that produce better results.

The Process:

• All advisors in your practice complete a DNA Behavior discovery.
• The client is invited to the DNA Behavior client portal to complete their own behavioral discovery.
• Based on the unique insights generated, the client is matched with an advisor.
• The selected advisor then meets with the client. They start off on solid ground because of their similar behavior styles, then the advisor can build on that foundation by understanding the nuances of the individual’s unique style.

Knowing Your Client
It’s safe to say that trust is the bedrock of any good relationship. Having the ability to tailor your interactions based on what you know about the client can help them be more comfortable and make more informed decisions. Inevitably, that knowledge leads to trust.

What DNA Behavior Can Reveal About Your Client:

• Communication Style - hands-on versus hands-off, preferred meeting place and frequency, formal or informal…
• Cognitive Biases – the tendency to avoid losses, follow the herd…
• Decision-making Process – impatient, well-considered, emotionally-driven, prone to analysis paralysis…
• Needs and Goals – stability, building wealth for retirement, saving for a large purchase, smart investing for short or long-term returns…
• Tolerance for Risk – up for the big gamble, preference to play it safe…

The Benefit of an Unbiased Approach
Talking about money can be uncomfortable, especially when discussing potential risks and uncertainties. Frankly, it’s personal. Gathering detailed information about a client can take time and requires consistent active listening, transparency, and honesty. While that will always be true, you can get a jump on things by putting behavioral finance to work for you.

The DNA Behavior web app makes it easy to gain these types of insights, and it can do it in a way that is comfortable to share with clients. The unbiased and impartial insights provide a common language to address differences while breeding trust.

Prioritizing Trust
The bottom line is, clients who trust their financial advisors are more likely to follow their advice and make better financial decisions. Plus, advisors are more likely to retain those clients over the long term. Prioritize trust by getting to know your clients and you'll see positive outcomes for the whole practice.