Why Successful Professionals Get Intimidated by Wealthy Clients

0:01Hello, this is Mark Satterfield and welcome to the Velvet Rope Playbook. Tonight's chapter, Imposter Syndrome May Be Costing You Wealthy Clients. There's a peculiar thing that happens when someone decides they want to move up market and start attracting wealthier clients. Now, they may have 15 or 20 years of experience. They may be exceptionally good at what they do. Their existing clients may love them. They may have every credential they need to serve someone with considerably more money than the clients that they're currently serving. and yet put them across the table from someone worth 20 million, 50 million, or 100 million, and suddenly something changes.

0:43They start questioning themselves. Am I really at this person's level? Why would someone this successful listen to me? What if they ask me something I can't answer? What if they realize I don't normally work with people like them? That's imposter syndrome. And if you want more wealthy clients, it can feel extraordinarily expensive because the problem isn't simply that you feel less confident. The problem is that you start behaving differently and wealthy prospects can feel the difference. Now, here's what I find interesting about imposter syndrome. Most people imagine it looks like somebody sitting nervously in a meeting, stammering and sweating.

1:25Usually, it's much more subtle than that. You over-explain because you feel you need to prove how much you know. You talk too much about your credentials because you're trying to establish that you belong in the room. You agree too quickly because you don't want to challenge an important prospect. You become reluctant to ask personal or probing questions because you're afraid of overstepping. You may even lower your fee, add unnecessary extras or become overly accommodating because somewhere in the back of your mind, you're thinking, I really want this person as a client. Ironically, all those things can make you less attractive to a wealthy prospect.

2:05The insecurity you're trying desperately to conceal begins influencing your behavior. Now, here's one of the more useful things to remember. When you meet someone considerably wealthier than you, you may be thinking about the difference in your financial situations. They probably aren't. You might be thinking this person has a$15 million house. They're thinking, can this person solve my problem? You might be thinking this guy sold his company for$80 million. He's thinking, does this person understand what I need? You might be thinking she could hire anybody in the country. She's thinking, do I trust this person?

2:45Those are completely different conversations. And once you understand that, you can stop auditioning for wealthy people and start advising them. And that's an enormously important distinction. One of the worst things imposter syndrome does is convince you that you need to be impressive. You really don't. In fact, trying to impress highly successful people frequently has the opposite effect. They've met plenty of people who wanted to impress them. What they encounter far less frequently is someone who is comfortable enough to be curious, listen carefully, ask intelligent questions, and occasionally say, I don't think that's the best way to approach this.

3:26That last one is particularly important. Suppose a prospect tells you what they think you need. Someone suffering from imposter syndrome may immediately say, absolutely, we can do that. A confident expert might say, we could, but before we do, let me ask you something, because I'm not convinced that solves the real problem. Which person sounds more valuable? The second person isn't being arrogant, they're behaving like an advisor. And affluent clients tend to value people who bring judgment to the relationship rather than simply agreeing with them. Here's a very simple exercise. Before your next conversation with an affluent prospect, take out a piece of paper and write down three things.

4:12First, what do I know that could genuinely help this person? Second, what questions do I need to ask to understand their situation? Third, what am I willing to tell them that they may not necessarily want to hear? Notice what isn't on that list. How to impress them. That's not your job. Your job is to understand, diagnose, and advise. And the moment you move your attention away from yourself and onto the problem that you're there to solve, a lot of the anxiety begins to disappear. Because imposter syndrome feeds on self-consciousness. What do they think of me? How do I sound? Do I belong here?

4:54Confidence grows when you replace those questions with much more useful ones. How can I help this person make a better decision? There's another exercise I recommend, particularly if you're moving into the affluent market for the first time. Create what I call an evidence file. Write down 10 situations in which you created a meaningful result for a client. They don't have to have been wealthy clients. Maybe you prevented someone from making an expensive mistake. Maybe you saw something other people overlooked. Maybe you solved an unusually complicated problem. Maybe a client trusted your recommendation and later told you it was one of the best decisions they made.

5:35Write those stories down. Because when imposter syndrome says, who are you to advise someone like this, you need evidence that says, here's what I know how to do. Your expertise doesn't suddenly become less valuable because the person across from you has more money. Competence doesn't mean pretending you're wealthier, more successful, or more connected than you really are. So please don't do that. You don't need the same house. You don't need the same watch. You don't need to vacation in the same places. You don't need to match their status. You need to be comfortable with their status. And that's completely different.

6:13You should be able to sit across from somebody enormously successful and think, you've accomplished some remarkable things. And in this particular area, I may know something that can help you. That's a healthy relationship between two adults. They don't need another admirer. They need somebody who is good at something they need. And this problem doesn't only show up when you're sitting across the table from a wealthy prospect. It can infect your marketing long before the meeting ever occurs. Imposter syndrome makes you soften your opinions. Instead of saying, here's what I recommend, you say, here are a few things you might want to consider.

6:50Instead of developing a clear point of view, you hide behind generic information. Instead of charging what your expertise is worth, you look at your price and wonder whether someone wealthy will think you're worth it. Instead of reaching out to someone you would like to work with, you wait for them to discover you. So you can have the right website, the right funnel, the right content, and the right offer and still sabotage the entire thing because somewhere underneath it, all you haven't become comfortable with is seeing yourself who belongs in the affluent market. That's why confidence isn't some fluffy personal development issue.

7:27It's a marketing issue. It's a sales issue. And ultimately, it's a revenue issue. So the goal is not to eliminate every nervous thought you've ever had. I've been doing this for decades and are still situations where I walk into a room and don't know exactly what to expect. Confidence isn't walking into every situation thinking I'm the most impressive person here. Real confidence is walking into the room without needing to be. You can be interested instead of impressive. You can ask instead of perform. You can listen instead of prove. And you can trust that if you know how to help someone, you have every right to be in that conversation.

8:08That ship can completely change the way wealthy prospects respond to you. And if you know this is an issue for you, I actually created an entire program specifically to help you master this inner game. It's called unshakable inner self-confidence. It isn't simply a collection of motivational speeches telling you to believe in yourself. I show you very specific techniques for confidently engaging wealthy people, starting conversations when you don't know anyone in the room, asking better questions, being taken seriously by highly successful prospects and turning an initial conversation into a meaningful business relationship.

8:46You also learn how to appear confident even when you don't necessarily feel confident yet, how to reduce the anxiety that can come with affluent social situations, and how to become much more comfortable interacting with people who may be considerably wealthier or more successful than you are. Because you may already have the expertise to serve wealthy clients, the missing piece may simply be becoming as confident in that expertise as you should be. You can get unshakable inner confidence by commenting confidence or visiting getwealthyclients.com. Stop wondering whether you belong in the room.

9:26Learn how to walk into it knowing exactly what you bring to the table. This is Mark Satterfield. Thanks for listening to this chapter of the Velvet Rope Playbook. I'll be back with you soon with something new, but until then, bye for now.