"Most consumers only really care about mortgages at very specific moments in their lives, namely when they want to buy a property, move house, renovate or remortgage. This means that the opportunities to engage with clients are somewhat limited. Or are they?
"Rule number one is to understand your customer. Do you see them regularly? Do you schedule times to talk to them? If you know where they are at throughout their financial lives then you have a greater opportunity to be able to advise on their finances. All the more reason to be able to advise on protection and other insurance-related products.
"If your approach is to advise on and sell a mortgage that is fully protected, then you are in a far better position for the future: firstly, because you know that you have done a complete job; secondly, because you will have more touch points with your client, thereby fostering a closer relationship; and thirdly your revenue is much healthier.
"Clearly, you should be on top of when people are due to come to the end of their mortgage deal, so that you are contacting them beforehand to offer advice on next steps. However, it’s crucial to fill in those gaps in between, and this is where protection can be a door opener.
"Younger people don’t tend to want to think about protecting their mortgages but as they grow older and progress through life stages, protecting their family from financial hardship starts to take on greater importance. Generally speaking, people’s attitude to risk changes as they get older.
"The key to knowing your customers is data. You need to be adept at capturing the right type of data at point of sale to enable you to profile them for relationship management data purposes. Obviously ‘know your customer’ is a regulatory requirement but an adviser skilled at relationship management will have a system to filter that data, track it over time and use it to add value to the business.
"For example, do you have a system that can easily help you identify clients by mortgage value or family size? Does your system make tracking clients over time easy? Does it allow different members of your team to record notes as to when they have spoken to a client and what the nature of that conversation was?
"Keeping in touch is an art and it requires you to be professional, slick and on the ball. It’s about remaining relevant even if the last thing you did for that client was to arrange a mortgage three years ago.
"Clearly you have to strike the right balance between being helpful and becoming a pest but you should aim to be in touch with all clients once a quarter. The opportunities to speak directly to your client base are greater than ever before as technology changes the way we all communicate and consume information.
"This could be an email newsletter, a quick personalised email even, something in the post or even a phone call. Good advisers even contact a client on their birthday. If you’re really feeling brave then social media is a cost-effective and time-efficient way of reaching people that is unobtrusive and shows your human side. After all, people do business with real people.
"Whichever way works for you, find good reason to keep in touch. If you lose that contact then the chances are you will not be the first person your client thinks of when he or she wants to do business - that business will just walk out the door."
