Is Your Advisor Relations Program Leaving Value on the Table?
Getting invited to advised transactions is the focus of more than 90% of advisor relations professionals. In the ISG Advisor Relations Playbook, we highlight four key elements for improving your chance to be invited to the right deals:
- Data Sharing – sharing capabilities and market success to support long-listing.
- Messaging – develop messaging that is on-point, engaging, and memorable.
- Advisor Education – identify the right mix of advisors to educate.
- Relationship Building – work towards advocacy with all appropriate advisors.
I’ve been hearing recently that many advisor relations teams ‘just want to meet face-to-face with advisors.’ I understand this tendency. Ours is a relationship business, and face-to-face engagement is the best way to build trust and advocacy. I would challenge, however, that a program that doesn’t include all four of these key elements is incomplete and is leaving value on the table. Let me explain…
Getting invited to advised deals starts with being on a longlist.
I’ve written about the CPQ process before so I won’t go into all those details. Having a solid process for data sharing helps ensure ISG advisors have the most current information when working with clients on their longlist-to-shortlist discussions. I suggest a quarterly review to ensure ISG has the most current data to support our long-listing process. You should evaluate three elements of your data sharing:
- Advised transactions, especially ISG advised transactions, often have multiple towers in scope. Some service areas – like cloud, applications, and workplace services – are used quite often by the ISG CPQ team. Others that aren’t used as often can still be critical in determining long-list generation – service areas like Cybersecurity and Network. Plan your participation not only around the areas you feel you can get strong positioning, but include those areas that will support your ability to get on long-lists when multiple towers are in scope.
- The CPQ team uses the underlying data to support long-list generation to contextualize capability data for individual buying decisions. Make sure you’re providing data at a regional level to help with this contextualization – otherwise you could be getting left off appropriate long-lists.
- Where many firms have data gaps is with respect to sharing information about your wins in the market and making sure ISG has up-to-date case studies in each market segment you play in.
Messaging is a complex topic.
Preparation is critical when introducing your executives to an advisor. Not every executive understands the role advisors play and can, as a result, inadvertently be sending the wrong messages. There are a couple of main points to consider – how they represent your company and how they present your credentials and expertise.
For the former, it is a turnoff when an executive directly asks for invitations, even if it is stated as, “If you give us a chance we won’t let you down.” I understand the urge to ask, but asking directly for invitations can make advisors uncomfortable and less likely to want to engage with an executive again. This is the exact opposite of what you’re trying to achieve!
With respect to presenting your credentials, make sure everyone understands ISG’s role. Here is a quote from one advisor…
“I view myself as a conduit of information between the provider and our clients. For me to be an effective conduit, I need simple, short, crisp messaging and case studies. Less is definitely more.
Providers are engaging, enthusiastic and no doubt capable, but the messaging can be convoluted. In turn this makes it less memorable for me to quickly convey to a client.
The purpose behind messaging needs careful thought. Providers do not need to SELL to ISG. We are NOT BUYERS per say. We are influencers. We need enough information and the right information to wield our influence to best position the provider.
Recognizing the difference here should change the tone and the depth of the messaging. Yet this is not what I see.
I see providers eager to share every minute detail of a project, every hurdle, every change. We just do not need this detail - in fact, it lessens my ability to influence as it increases confusion and makes it less memorable.”
Prioritize your messaging around the things advisors are most likely to find memorable – your success with clients and what makes you different.
Understanding is the bridge to trust. Advisor education is critical.
My belief is that every provider should be working to build understanding levels in the community, but many skip this important step. I was talking with an advisor relations lead the other day. Our team had recommended an education program that targeted advisors who lacked an understanding of their capabilities. I was told, “I would have bet my next paycheck ISG couldn’t bring more than 10 people I didn’t know onto a briefing call. You had 13 people on the call I’ve never met. Taking this approach made me realize I had a blind spot I wasn’t aware of.”
I am of the mindset that it is very difficult for a provider to move from the longlist to a shortlist if the advisor doesn’t understand their capabilities. Therefore, building understanding levels is critically important. I suggest you work with your CSR on your advisor fit model to identify the advisors that work on the types of deals you have strong credentials for but don’t understand your capabilities.
I have heard the arguments about targeted messages and virtual briefings not yielding direct ROI. But I know this, advisor trust drives provider invitations and you can’t achieve trust without first achieving understanding.
Trusted relationships drive invitations.
Our data clearly shows the correlation between advisor trust levels and provider invitations. So, the question is, how do you increase trust levels?
- Build new trusted relationships – on our awareness framework understanding comes before trust. Implementing relationship-building campaigns with advisors who understand your capabilities but don’t yet feel comfortable recommending your company is a great place to start. I’m sure you’ve heard me say, “Trust is built on many small actions over time.” Take this heart and work proactively to nurture these relationships. You’ll know you’ve succeeded when an advisor calls you to ask for your insights on something they’re working on.
- Nurture existing trusted relationships – typically this is an area of strength for providers. Once a trusted, mutually beneficial relationship is formed they tend to last. This is the gateway for advisor advocacy!
Recommendation
A healthy advisor relations program works on each of the four key elements. Your program should be well rounded and have goals for each of these elements. My recommendation is to assess your program’s effectiveness in each of these areas – and be a tough grader – to be sure you’re getting all the value you can from your program.
As always, I’m interested in hearing your thoughts on these ideas. Feel free to drop me a note or give me a call to discuss!
