What can a 60-year-old advertising idea teach us about attracting affluent clients today? Quite a lot.

0:00Hello, this is Mark Satterfield and welcome to the Velvet Rope Playbook. Tonight's Chapter, Old School Marketing Advice That Still Works Great in the Affluent Market. I'd like for you to enter the Wayback Machine with me and return to visit an advertising man from the 1950s and 60s named Rosser Reeves. He came up with an idea that I think is just as relevant today as it was then, particularly if you're trying to attract affluent clients. Reeves popularize what's known as the Unique Selling Proposition, or USP, around a remarkably simple idea. Your advertising needs to give people a compelling reason to choose you.

0:44Now, that sounds obvious, but look at most professional marketing today and you'll see how rarely it actually happens. We're experienced. We're trusted. We're committed to excellence and provide exceptional service. Well, all these are perfectly good qualities, but virtually every one of your competitors can say exactly the same thing. Reeves would probably look at all of that and ask, why should I choose you? One of the most famous examples associated with Reeves was M &Ms. Melts in your mouth, not in your hand. Now, I know you probably offer services rather than a product, but what makes that interesting isn't the candy, it's the discipline behind the message.

1:28They could have given you five reasons to buy M &Ms. Instead, they gave you one specific idea that was easy to understand and almost impossible to forget. I think that's an important lesson for anyone trying to attract affluent clients, because affluent prospects usually don't have a shortage of choices a wealthy family can find plenty of highly qualified financial advisors someone building a five million dollar home can find several excellent architects and builders the same is true for attorneys physicians consultants and almost every other professional serving an affluent market so the question generally isn't are you qualified the question is, why are you particularly right for me?

2:13Now, that's where Reeves' idea gets interesting, because I'm not suggesting you need some clever advertising slogan. In affluent marketing, your USP can simply be one valuable idea you want people to associate with you. So let's say you're a wealth advisor. You could say we provide comprehensive wealth management tailored to the unique needs of our clients, and there's nothing wrong with that, but thousands of other advisors could make precisely the same claim. Perhaps after working with successful families for 25 years, you've noticed that once people accumulate enough wealth, one of their biggest financial problems isn't necessarily making more money, it's complexity.

2:54They've accumulated investments, businesses, properties, trust, insurance, estate plans, tax strategies, and frequently involving several different professional advisors. So your central idea becomes we simplify the increasingly complicated financial lives of successful families. Now, I understand the problem you solve, and if I'm thinking that's exactly what my financial life has become, you've given me reason to pay attention. There's another part of Reeves' philosophy that I think is particularly relevant today, and that's his belief in repetition. Today, there's enormous pressure to constantly produce something new.

3:35A new reel, a new email, a new hook, a new headline, a new idea. The result is that we are continually changing the message and then wonder why nobody knows what we're known for. You may think, I've already talked about this. And of course you have because you've heard yourself say it dozens of times. Your prospect hasn't. They may have seen one of your videos three months ago and barely remember it. or they may be encountering you today for the very first time. So don't continually change the central idea. Change the way you communicate it. Tell a story about it. Give an example. Share a case study.

4:12Perhaps make a video about a problem your clients encounter. Different content can reinforce the same central idea and that's how you begin to become associated with something. So here's something interesting to give a try to. Finish this sentence. Affluent clients should choose me because I'm the person who. Now, but don't allow yourself to use words like experienced, personalized, comprehensive, exceptional, trusted, or dedicated. Make yourself come up with something a prospective client would actually care about. Then try to get it down to one idea that a client could repeat to someone else because that's an excellent test of positioning.

4:58You should call Susan. She's really good. Well, that's certainly a compliment, but compare that with you should talk to Susan. She specialized in helping successful families simplify all the financial complexity that starts accumulating once they've created significant wealth. Now Susan owns an idea And that's the part of Rosser-Reeves thinking that I believe still matters enormously today. The advertising has changed, the media has changed, and the way affluent clients research and choose professionals has certainly changed. But one fundamental principle hasn't changed. People still need a compelling reason to choose you, particularly when they have plenty of alternatives.

5:42So rather than continually asking, what else should I be saying in my marketing? Ask a different question. What's the one valuable idea I want to become known for? And once you figure that out, you can communicate that through dozens of stories, examples, different pieces of content without changing the message that's underneath it. Now, of course, this all sounds well and good and makes sense conceptually, but the question then becomes what exactly should that idea be? And if you're not sure what that one idea should be, then that's something perhaps we should be working on together. And if that's something that sounds of interest, go ahead and either comment coach, visit the link in the bio, or visit getwealthyclients.com, and I'll send you information about working with me personally.

6:34And if we decide to do so, we'll identify the compelling reason affluent prospects should choose you and then develop the message that helps you become known for it. This is Mark Satterfield. Thanks for listening to this chapter of the Velvet Rope Playbook. I'll be back at you soon with something new, but until then, bye for now.