Why Great Financial Advisors Get Overlooked

SPEAKER_01 0:00

And this is where most advisors make a huge mistake. They believe that the words in their mind to describe what they do is what people want to hear and will cause them to work with you. And it's not true. When advisors can say something that instantly connects with their ideal client, the person leans in and says, finally, somebody gets me. And it's enough of a they get me to build curiosity that then gives you permission to tell more about what you do. But if you lead with your job title, it's going to be a slam door. Like nobody ever said to me, Derek, oh my gosh, you have a CFP. But they do say, Derek, you get me. One of those is a lot more profitable. All these advisors get all these designations and they study and they get all this education. And you would think what would come with that would be a special phone on your desk for all these inbound leads that would come in. You would think, right? But nobody ever delivered that phone to me. And it was frustrating. And once I learned to accept that, it's up to me to go out to people and connect with their pain points.

Meet Derrick Kinney and His Journey as an Advisor

SPEAKER_00 1:07

Welcome back to the top 50 most innovative voices in advisor growth. I'm your host, Paul G. McManus. In this episode, I'm joined by Derek Kinney, America's financial educator and founder of Success for Advisors. Derek built a successful advisory firm before selling the business and beginning a new chapter focused on helping other financial advisors grow. Today, he teaches advisors how to communicate their value more clearly, attract better clients, and turn what they already know into a stronger business. In our conversation, we explore why great advisors still get overlooked, not because they lack expertise, but because they struggle to clearly explain their value. Derek shares why advisors need to understand their ideal client, own a specific problem, and, as he puts it, connect with pain. We also discuss why specialization builds trust, why repeating your greatest hits can be more profitable than constantly changing your message, and how books, podcasts, television, and media can build credibility before you ever walk into the room. And finally, we look at AI and why Derek believes technology should create more space for financial advisors to do what matters most. Connect with people and be more human. Before we jump in, be sure to subscribe to our YouTube channel or wherever you're listening so you don't miss a new episode of the top 50 most innovative voices in advisor growth. And now, here's my conversation with Derek Kinney.

SPEAKER_01 2:42

Derek Kinney, how are you doing? Paul, it's great to be with you. Thanks for the uh invitation to do this.

SPEAKER_00 2:46

Yeah, it's my pleasure. I've been looking forward to this. And as we talked about, we have several people that we know in common. And both of them, as a matter of fact, have been past guests on this series. So there's John Cutten, and then there's now Dr. John Randall. So That's right. Two people I hold in very, very high regard. Sharp guys. Yeah, definitely. So what I'd like to start with is that I find your personal journey fascinating. You know, you built up a very successful practice, you ended up selling it. You've now went into, which we'll get into, of course, coaching, consulting business. But along the way, what I find the most fascinating is just how you used thought leadership and the media in in all of your businesses to get to the top of the field. I'm looking forward to this conversation. But let's go back, right? So, you know, take us back to whatever point in time you want. But before you do what you do today, give us your story.

SPEAKER_01 3:39

Well, so I I graduated from college here locally in Arlington, Texas, squeezed uh four years into six, was working my way through. And when I graduated, I went to work for a small software company. I I had only taken one finance class in college, and that was just kind of personal finance, but I reached this dead end moment. I I had a boss that he bounced our paycheck not once, but twice, very frustrating. And I realized when I got passed over for a big bonus, I had a decision to make. I could either stay stuck in that job and let him decide my economic value, which was typically going to be about a 2% raise a year if he was generous, or it's so depressing. Oh, it was so depressing. Or I could put the chips on the table on Derek, give the wheel a spin, and go. And a gentleman actually came to our church and did a financial planning seminar. And I thought to myself as I watched him, I like to speak in public. I like money. It'd be fun to work with people, helping them solve their problems. I want to be like him. And so working full-time, I began to get licensed in the evenings and then eventually quit that job, thankfully, and then was questioned, doubted. People wondered what the heck I was doing, going off on my own. But that's when I launched my financial planning business.

SPEAKER_00 5:00

Now, I'm sure a lot of people, myself included, can relate to the comment, I like money, right? You know, who doesn't? But public speaking, you know, that that's special. You know, there's the old Seinfeld quip that, you know, if you were at a funeral, would you rather be in the coffin or giving the eulogy? And most people would be like, put me in the casket. That is great. So, in in terms of public speaking, just share a little

Connect With Pain: How to Communicate Your Value

SPEAKER_00 5:22

bit more about that.

SPEAKER_01 5:22

Yeah, in high school, I was a member of what was called FBLA, which was future business leaders of America. And we would practice speaking. And I just had something where I was in front of people. It made me feel like I was gonna throw up and sick to my stomach. But the moment I started speaking, it all went away. And I really enjoyed it. I was asked to speak at a group called the Million Dollar Round Table many years ago, big insurance organization. And uh, in that audience, I think there were probably about 2,000 people there. And when I stepped on the stage, at first it felt like this big eyeball just staring me down. It was me versus the big eyeball. Then I had this thought wait a minute, there's 2,000 people here, but if you think about how they're sitting, like if I was in the audience, all I see is the person on stage or the person in front of me. I don't see the people behind me or the people beside me. I don't even see the face of the person in front of me, just the speaker. So then I realized, wait a minute, I'm simply speaking to 2,000 individual sets of eyeballs with different goals and concerns and worries and fears. Just talk to each person as though they're the one person in the room. And that a-haw poll literally changed how I began to really evolve as a public speaker. So now the bigger the room, people would tell me, Derek, it felt like you were talking exactly to me. And they probably been in a room of 5,000 people, but the messaging connected with them. So I learned if you want to make it rain, connect with pain.

SPEAKER_00 6:57

I was I was concerned that the story was gonna go a different direction. You're like, if there's one big eyeball that's causing concern, imagine when there's like 2,000 eyeballs staring at you. I mean, I would have been like, okay, you know what, guys, I'm sorry, but I'm out of here. I'm out of here. That's right. That's funny. We never saw Derek again. Yeah. Right, no, exactly. I think that's probably most people's experience, right? It's like, ah, I'm gonna do something else. I'm gonna go get that 2% raise a year. That sounds pretty good at this point. That's right. It sounds very attractive. Yeah. And so shift gears a little bit, if you would, and tell us about your Americas days. Um, when did you start and ultimately what led to your accent?

SPEAKER_01 7:30

Yeah, so I I actually interviewed with several different firms. And uh what I liked about at the time, it was IDS financial services. But what I liked was this concept of holistic financial planning. It wasn't just only insurance or just investments, it was the whole package. I really liked that. And I didn't know it, but you know, years later, they would allow advisors to have equity. And suddenly now we became a true full-fledged business owner. So I loved it. You know, I loved really the pressure, as crazy as it sounds. I liked the pressure of having to make payroll and having to make sure my team was well taken care of and providing the best service to our clients and even competitive situations, making sure that our game was always better than other advisors that's coming to our clients to try to steal them away. Our game had to be on point to be able to do that. And so that that's what I loved about it. And and even, you know, when you when you talk to people, one thing that was interesting, I I had a woman, I was in the office on a Saturday morning and I saw my voicemail like blinking. And I knew I needed to press that and listen to it, but I but it could probably get me off track. So I pressed it and I heard this frantic woman's voice that I recognized. And she said, Derek, Derek, you've got to call me back. Uh, they're about to send me to jail and I don't know what to do. Now, Paul, have you ever had a call like that where somebody says they're about to send me to jail? I don't know what to do. I never had.

SPEAKER_00 8:56

Continue. I you got my attention.

SPEAKER_01 8:58

Okay, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. I I, you know, I never had that before. So I knew when when I heard that, I needed to call her back right away. So I called her back and I said, first of all, tell me what happened. She said, Well, I got this letter in the mail and basically says that uh there's not enough money in my account. They're gonna send me to jail. And I said, Okay, read the letter. Basically, it was a non-sufficient funds letter. She had written a check and she had moved money from her savings to checking, and the check bounced. And I said, Why do you think they're going to send you to jail? So she then tells me a story. She says, Derek, when I was seven years old, I overheard a conversation that my dad was having with the store owner. Her dad had just gone to the store to buy school supplies for she and her sister, and he had accidentally bounced a check. And the person said to her dad, as she could hear over the phone, I know you bounced this check on purpose. I'm going to send the cops to your house and send you to jail. So in that moment, here, this was a 55-year-old woman going back to what she remembered as a seven-year-old thinking, my dad bounced a check. He was threatened with jail. I bounce a check. They're going to haul me to jail. I told her, good news, you will not be fitted for an orange jumpsuit this weekend. You're safe. But let's help you on Monday. We'll move the money for you from checking to savings, help you with that. Let's come in the office next week. I think we need to unpack some things. She rolls in the office on Wednesday. And for a long time, on the outside, she was the picture of success, looked the part, but she was always complaining about Derek, why aren't I getting paid what I deserve? Why aren't I getting the promotion? And most importantly, she never took my financial advice, which would have made her quite a bit of money. And it all made sense. She was risk averse because she believed if you make a financial mistake, you go to jail. It verifies you're not good with money. And when she began to realize this, it was like this woman who on the outside looked successful, but on the inside, she was this wilting flower. And when she realized, wait a minute, what was in my past has passed. It doesn't dictate my future. Suddenly her entire vibe changed. And surprisingly, within three months, she got a $25,000 a year raise and got promoted to vice president. But most importantly, she began to take my advice and she began to make some serious money. But what it taught me was so many clients look the part on the outside. They look like they're very successful. But on the inside, men and women, they're like a wilting flower being held back by bad money beliefs. If they don't change them and address them, it's going to hold them back from achieving their true potential.

SPEAKER_00 11:46

Yeah. Tell us a little bit more about just the practice that you had built and then also eventually what made you decide to sell.

How Media and Better Messaging Build Credibility

SPEAKER_01 11:53

Yeah. So our primary focus as a practice was people about five to 10 years from retirement or just recently retired. I began 26 years old. I looked like I was 13. And so I had to get kind of creative in terms of how we built our business. People don't want advice from a 13-year-old, especially with a mustache that the two parts don't connect in the middle. And oh yeah, it's crazy. Very, very young. My parents weren't driving me to work for goodness sakes, but I mean it is what it is. But but I had this idea, Paul, and that was, you know what? If I could get on TV, if I could get on TV, that could build credibility and that could probably help grow my business. So what I would do is I would get to the office early, probably 6:30, 7 in the morning. And then once a week, back in the day, we had these things called fax machines. I would then send a fence.

SPEAKER_00 12:39

Can you spell, can you spell that for me, please? I'm worried I might misspell it, for goodness sakes. Sorry, I keep making jokes as you're telling your story. Please continue. No, no, no, it's great, it's great.

SPEAKER_01 12:48

So so I looked up the news, the morning news producer, because I knew that those people kind of set the tone for the rest of the day. And I would send faxes to all the local Dallas Ford Worth news producers. And the fax sounded something like this: Hey, dear uh so-and-so, when you need someone to talk about financial topics in an easy to understand way, call me. For example, you know, three steps to save on credit card rates or four ways to catch up on retirement savings. And I always learned the numbers were important because it was catchier for the title. So I did this for about six months. And one day I got a phone call from CBS 11, the local station in Dallas Fort Worth. Hey, Derek, uh, we know you like to be on TV. And would you come a week from now and talk about this topic? Of course I said, love to, love to do it, having never ever been on TV before. But one of the things I've learned is it's better to create the opportunity than be fully prepared and not have an opportunity. So I knew by pushing myself to now get it, it forced me to practice. So I then had my wife ask me practice interview questions. I looked in the mirror, I practiced my tonality, my voice, and I just visualized one thing as plain as day. The moment that interview is done, they're going to walk up to me and say, Derek, you are made for TV. Would you come on on a regular basis? Now, fast forward to that day, I walk in the studio, meet everybody, and we do the interview, and it went great. And afterwards, the producer said something like, Derek, you're really great on TV. Would you mind being a regular with us? And I simply said, yes. And that was the moment. Now, what happened was the anchors in TV are a lot like card lots. They people tend to move around a lot. And so one of the female anchors went over to the NBC affiliate, and one day her producer said, Hey, do you have anybody that can talk about money? And she remembered me. You ought to call Derek. Well, that led me being on five times a week. I was able to engineer a 5:30 a.m. slot, a 10 30 a.m. slot, and then same thing on Thursday two times. Then I said, you know what, I've got this idea. A lot of people listen to financial radio, or they're sort of in more of a contemplative mindset on Saturday mornings. How about you have me on to answer viewer questions on Saturday morning? So that parlayed into five days a week. And what happened was that began to grow our business. And what happened, people sort of build a relationship with their TV anchors. Now, so it's more think about influencers, your TikTok, your Instagram, your social media. There's people that you follow that you dislike their content and you hope inside, are they as cool in person as they are online? And luckily, I was close to being as nice as I was in person as on the news. And so it attracted clients. So that that taught me again, if you want to do something bold, put yourself out there first, get the opportunity, and then figure out how to do it once you got the opportunity.

SPEAKER_00 15:52

Yeah. No, I I love it.

SPEAKER_01 15:53

What year was it when you first got on TV? So I became an advisor. This would have been 95. And then about three years after that is when I kind of got my legs under me. I I always was an aggressive marketer. And one of the things I realized was somebody taught me early on make the phone your friend. Learn to love rejection. And I learned always be marketing. You know, you think about all these advisors get all these designations and they study and they get all this education. And you would think what would come with that would be a special phone on your desk for all these inbound leads that would come in. You would think, right? But nobody ever delivered that phone to me. And it was frustrating. And once I learned to accept that, that it's up to me to go out to people and connect with their pain points. Yeah. Like nobody ever said to me, Derek, oh my gosh, you have a CFP. But they do say, Derek, you get me. One of those is a lot more profitable.

SPEAKER_00 16:51

I 100% agree with everything you're saying. And I'm just really super interested and curious just to see it through your lens and your personal experience. I mean, I don't want to say it's not valuable, but the alphabet soup after your name is, I think, overvalued from the person get, you know, investing the time, and it's undervalued by the person who you're actually looking to attract, right? Whereas media, you know, influence, celebrity, you know, authority, pick your word is ultimately so much more powerful. And just for context, you know, it's not necessarily, you know, the person on TV, the influencer, they're not necessarily the best advisor. You know, the person with all the credentials after the name may have a lot better information, maybe a better advisor. But when it comes to the marketplace choosing who to work with, why is it so natural for the person to choose the person that they're familiar with, you know, that they've seen on TV or the radio or YouTube or, you know, you name it. If you could just unpack that phenomenon a little bit more.

SPEAKER_01 17:52

Well, let me give you an example. One of my favorite movies is called Bohemian Rhapsody. And it's about Queen. And it talks about how Queen went from just this bottom basement band to a worldwide phenomenon. And there's a scene in the movie where they're about to record some music and the producer doesn't agree with the music they're selecting. They've got this big bold vision. And the random other producer in the room says this phrase fortune favors the bold. Fortune favors the bold. And so what I what I've learned is when I'm on a stage and I'm about to be on a stage in a couple days again, and I'll ask the audience, how many of you have ever felt overlooked by the ideal prospect you know you should be working with? And predictably all these hands are gonna go up in the air. Okay. And I'll also ask, how many of you have seen someone work with another advisor and you know they were less than you? They should have worked with you. All the hands are gonna go up. That's what I've learned is in the absence of you connecting with an instantly relatable pain point that a prospect quickly understands, you will be overlooked. And the reason why is, and the example I would give you, when I would be in social settings, one of the biggest cringe moments for me was when somebody asked, So, Derek, what do you do? I just knew, oh, it was terrible, Paul. I knew the moment the words financial advisor came out of my mouth, it was like time slowed down. People would yawn, their eyes would roll back in the back of their heads, they they gradually walk backwards.

SPEAKER_00 19:28

Which makes it kind of hard to market yourself, right? It's like if the thing that you do is the thing that you don't want to say, it's like that that presents a challenge.

SPEAKER_01 19:36

It's so hard when people are walking backwards when you're trying to approach them. So, as I mentioned earlier, most of our clients were about five to 10 years from retirement, but their main pain point was they did not want to run out of money. That was their number one pain point. So one day I decided to experiment. And when a woman asked at Rotary, hey, so Derek, what do you do? I paused for a second and I said, You know how so many people they worry about running out of money in retirement? We help them fix that. She paused. She said, So are you like a financial advisor? And I said, Well, so we have a five-step process where we custom tailor a game plan so people don't run out of money and they feel confident. We specialize in retirement income planning. And then I told a quick story about a client recently that we met with because of our process, they could retire earlier. And she was like, that's exactly my concern. And so what it taught me was by saying financial advisor, typically you get a closed door. But when you lead with that, you know how framework that I've developed, people tend to lean in and say, hey, tell me more. And so once I began to practice that and realizing I wasn't perfect at it, typically when you're in social settings, the default is whatever you've said many years for that amount of time. So I had a game I played with myself, and that was I really like to eat, Paul. I like to eat. And so what I told myself was if I answer that question with financial advisor, I have to skip my next meal. Ooh, ooh. I call this raising the stakes. Raising the stakes. Well, in my case, it was missing out on the stakes, but well, there you go. But raising them. And what it taught me was I had to regroove my brain to take the time to answer it in a way that I knew would at least possibly open a conversation. And that was the pivotal moment for me. I like

Own a Problem and Attract the Right Clients

SPEAKER_01 21:31

to say now, you know, when you own a problem, you own your success. And so what I would tell people listening and watching right now is once you identify who your ideal client is, picture them sitting on their back porch on a Friday night. They've got their favorite beverage in their hand. What exact words are they saying? Something like, Honey, we make good money, but why does it feel like we're falling further behind? Oh, I think.

SPEAKER_00 22:00

You're gonna say that that they're thinking it's like, you know what we really need is a CFP.

unknown 22:04

That's right.

SPEAKER_00 22:06

And if they're a fiduciary and they have a couple other things after the name, I think that would actually help me solve my problems. That's right. That's that that's not the conversation is what you're saying.

SPEAKER_01 22:15

You you make the point very, very well right there. But the point is, and this is where most advisors make a huge mistake, is they believe that the words in their mind to describe what they do is what people want to hear and will cause them to work with you. And it's not true. All people know is all advisors must be the same. They do the exact same thing, provide the exact same advice, I'll work with the cheapest one. But when you can articulate the pain point early on, for example, Paul, I'm gonna say a phrase and I want to see how you respond to it. And our audience can do the same thing. So, Paul, you know how it feels like when you take your car to the mechanic? You feel like you're either getting taken advantage of or overcharged? Or if I'm talking, if there's two moms of teenage daughters and one mom is talking to the other mom, and one mom says, You know how it feels like when you talk to your daughter, what do you say goes in one ear and right out the other? The other mom's gonna say, Yeah. Was there any brain cells required to be burned to understand that comment? No, no, it's instant. And so when advisors can say something that instantly connects with their ideal client, the person leans in and says, Finally, somebody gets me. And it's enough of a they get me to build curiosity that then gives you permission to tell more about what you do. But if you lead with your job title, it's gonna be a slam door.

SPEAKER_00 23:42

Yeah, 100% agree. As a marketer, this is the core lens that I look at all of my communication, whether it's in books, whether it's in videos, whether it's in anything that I do, it's always you want to enter the conversation already happening in their head. Yes, right. And when you do that, it's magic. And I think it's human nature. I think it's intrinsically we think, okay, what do I do? What am I trying to accomplish? And you know, it's very me focused. I want to sell, I want to get a new client, I want, you know, more AUM, I want to sell this, therefore I'm gonna talk about the product, right? Thinking that that's gonna somehow interest people that have not shown yet interest in that. And so what you're saying is 100% spot on, but it's challenging, right? So, I mean, because I think that's the norm. And so you actually one, you have to understand what you're saying, and then two, you have to actively apply it. I want to back up from that though a second. And so you said something else, which is your ideal client. And I think one of the challenges that people face when it comes to being able to do that effectively is that they first need to start by knowing who the ideal client is, right? Because just take an example that you shared, you know, very simple example. But if you said the the mom thing to someone who doesn't have children, it's like, well, you know, I don't understand that. So you need to know who your ideal client is. And that's something that I find so many advisors struggle with. Can you expand maybe just a little bit on the importance of that clarity in terms of who you work with so that you can effectively connect with their pain, so that you can effectively get inside their head and be able to communicate effectively.

SPEAKER_01 25:15

Yeah. Yeah. One of the biggest mistakes that advisors make is they think they know who their ideal client is. Well, this is who I tend to work with. But when you look at the data, it doesn't always support that. So let me give you the simple five and five exercise, Paul. So what I tell advisors when I coach them is I want you to look and write down the names of your five most recent clients. So write down their names, and then you begin to look and say, what problem did they come to you to help them solve? Now you begin to weave a thread and you begin to see a pattern of, okay, this is a common problem. But here's one thing, surprisingly, that most advisors discover. When they look at their five clients, I ask, are those your ideal clients? Probably 90% of the time they say no. Probably less than half of those are the actual ideal people I want to work with. Well, what happens is they're pressured to bring in clients. They're so busy, they're juggling lots of plates and spinning them. So when you pull back and think like the CEO, you realize, oh, we're not even bringing in the people that we most want. So that's your most recent five. I call that your focus group. The second five are your five favorite clients. These are the ones when you see their name, you smile. They love you, they take your advice, they pay you what you're worth. You might even socialize with them outside the office. They are your ideal people. Okay. So you want to do the same exercise with them. Write their names down, determine what was the problem of why did they come in to see me in the first place. Well, now what you've got is you've got 10 people names kind of staring back, almost like that big giant eyeball, but individually. And they're telling you, here's who you currently work with. So you have a choice to make. So when I was a kid, we had these books called Choose Your Own Adventure. Okay. And I love these books because at the end of each chapter, you got to pick what chapter you went to next. Most books, it was just the next chapter, kind of boring. But if you want to see this, go to chapter three. You want to see this, go to chapter seven. So this is where advisors get to have their own adventure and choose it. One is you could say, I like the people I'm currently working with. Let's get clear on their pain points and focus more on them. Or you might say, I don't really want to work with those types of clients anymore. I want to work with this group. I want to work with highly compensated tech professionals, or I want to work with blue-collar business owners who run successful businesses, whatever that may be. Well, then all you got to do is pivot to that. So you don't need any more specialized training, no more advanced degrees, no more designations. All you need is this one simple thing: a greater understanding of the painful problems they worry about. And if you can articulate those painful problems that that new ideal client has, they will then say about you, finally, somebody gets me. See, what holds advisors back, I like to say that action leads to satisfaction. But most people think I've got to get it perfect. I've got to be ready. I talked to an advisor recently. So painful. But he was so hardworking. But he said, Derek, I'm waiting until I get all of my education, all of my systems ready, then I will go get clients. And I said, I know this is gonna sound crazy, but go get the client and then figure the rest out. One is a much better way to grow the business.

SPEAKER_00 28:42

100% agree. And one of the things I really appreciate today with tools like AI is that if you know that as a goal or objective, it's becomes easier to do that. Everything that you need, the the raw ingredients to be able to do this so effectively compared to, you know, I don't know, 10 years ago when maybe you could do it, but it would take more time and effort to do it. Now it's like it's so obvious to me, but I would imagine it's not obvious to everyone. So I guess the question is that when you share this, do people relate to it? Do you get pushback? And maybe what are some of the challenges that people have to actually turn that from a good idea into reality? Because, you know, I would imagine that someone hears that and be like, of course I want to work with clients that I enjoy that, you know, are profitable and all these different things. But the facts on the ground for most people, I don't think support that.

SPEAKER_01 29:36

Well, they don't. And it's interesting because even the highest level of producers that my team and I coach, oftentimes they realize inside, on the outside we look very successful, but on the inside, we know we're not even reaching close to what our potential is. So so many advisors simply believe that clients just come to them. And whoever comes to them is who they choose to work with. They often think they have very little agency or control in specifically attracting exactly who they

Why Specialists Win and Great Messages Get Repeated

SPEAKER_01 30:10

want. Now, you think about this. Let's say that you needed to have a delicate medical procedure done on your heart. Would your first thought be, I'm gonna go to my general practitioner to do the surgery because they know a little bit about a lot? Or would you say, I'm going to the specialist? I want to work with a person who works on hearts only 24-7. You go to the specialist, right? I mean, that's just what we would do. And so there's three things we know about working with a specialist. One is the moment that you listen to this podcast and this show, if you were to call a specialist, would you expect to get in 15 minutes later? Yes or no? Probably not. There's demand. There's demand, right? And then second of all, insurance can vary on this, but would you expect to pay more or less when you saw a specialist?

SPEAKER_00 30:56

You're less price sensitive.

SPEAKER_01 30:57

Less price sensitive. And then third, would your mentality be, I'm gonna do the surgery myself. I'm gonna watch YouTube, I'll figure this out. I'm not gonna listen to her.

SPEAKER_00 31:07

I'm gonna DIY this.

SPEAKER_01 31:08

I'm gonna DIY this. Or would you take a friend, a family member, you'd have a note taker, you'd be taking notes, you'd be hinging on every word she said because you know she's gonna do your surgery, right? So when people begin to realize, oh, I can leave the world of being a general practitioner. And the moment I step into being a specialist, it all changes. Then I can specify who I want to work with. I mean, imagine the shoulder specialist who people who needed their knees worked on kept showing up at their office. Eventually their staff would say, Hey, you got to change your marketing doc. We're attracting exactly the wrong people. So when you choose to specialize, and by the specialty, it's not a niche, it's owning a problem. When you can specifically articulate that problem with the least amount of words that even a third grader could understand it, and people begin to think, hey, when you've got like Paul in your case, when you've got a book in your head, but you have no idea how to write it, you call Paul. It's simple. You see, you own the problem of you've got a book, need somebody to help you with it, call Paul. When somebody says, when you need retirement help, you call Susan. When you've got all these complicated stock options, you call Ted. You see, the key is when you own a problem and you're known for that, that's the key. I'll give you an example. Let's say that your favorite band was coming to your town for a concert. You know, what Paul, out of curiosity, what would your favorite, what would a band be that you would say, man, I'm going to that concert?

SPEAKER_00 32:40

I always struggle with the favorite because then immediately I'm like thinking, okay, what is truly the favorite? But I'll go with one of the bands. I guess the last concert I've been to was Toby Keith. I know he's since passed, but you know, imagine he hasn't. Toby Keith's coming to town. Okay, let's go do that.

SPEAKER_01 32:56

Yeah, okay. So, so imagine back when Toby Keith was alive and had such a great following and audience. When he and his band members would come into town, do you think a couple hours before the show that night, they gather at a coffee shop and they say, Well, you know, in Dallas last night we sang all these songs. This audience doesn't want to hear those songs again. Let's rewrite all new music for tonight's concert.

SPEAKER_00 33:20

100% absolutely not. They want to hear the greatest hits.

SPEAKER_01 33:24

That's right. And so what we find is what these artists do and they can teach us something, they keep singing the hits consistently, like it's the first time they've ever sung that song. But so many advisors, we want to change things, even things that are working so, so fast. So once you can identify, here's the ideal client, here's the problem that you've tested, when you say the word, you see the reaction on people's faces. Yes, that's my worry. You simply do this. Repeat, repeat, repeat. Keep singing your greatest hits in front of every single prospect. It'll feel boring. You're gonna wonder, I should probably change this. But when you see your production numbers and you see all the AUM flowing in and all the new clients, trust the process and say, you know what? Boring can be very profitable because I'm helping a whole lot of people.

SPEAKER_00 34:18

Yeah. Yeah. On the individual level, to me, that makes perfect sense. Now, what about if you run a larger enterprise? Is there a point where you can't be specialized? So let's take Cutton, for example. He runs a massive enterprise. He employs 100 or so or more advisors across many, many different markets. For someone that runs a larger enterprise, you know, whatever the size, how would you approach that same question? If it's not, if it's not a self-employed specialist, but it's someone that runs other people, what would be the play there?

SPEAKER_01 34:52

Well, ultimately, people are attracted to specialists. You know, the the reality is when we know psychologically that there's this dynamic of if I say to someone, you know, we specialize in this, but they don't have that exact need for the specialty, it still attracts them psychologically to that person because, hey, here's somebody with a special set of skills, as our friend Liam Neeson uh once said, that could help them achieve their goals. And so people are attracted to that. So for example, because I sold my business to John Cutton. And as I famously told John, John, I'm not handing people off, I'm handing them up. That's why I chose you and your team. And most of my team that I had in place is still there and helping the firm grow. That's part of my legacy because ultimately when I sold my business, I wanted my clients to say, Derek, you were really good, but John and his team, really, really good. And my team, hey, Derek, you were a good boss, but John and his team, they're they're really a good boss. See, that's part of it. Part of selling a business is accepting you will eat humble pie. See, I built a business thinking Derek is the bomb. There's nobody better in Dallas and Fort Worth, Texas, than to work with Derek and his team. But to legitimately sell my business and look myself in the mirror, cash that check, and feel like I helped my clients, I needed to find an advisor that I thought was better than me. And I had to live with that. And that was the win. And so my clients, even years later, say, Derek, we really love working with you, but we like so-and-so. See, that's the magic. That's the win. So that's why when I go and do something new now and I coach advisors and speak and consult and get hired by firms to train all their advisors, I can look in my review and say, I did it well. Yes, I was paid well, but also I set up the clients well for their next level of success. And so I'm admiring John and you and all the people attached to that firm from a distance because of what they're doing. But what I would say is you want to make sure that the pain points you're describing are exactly what those people are feeling. And one of the things I've learned recently, I had this idea to launch a business. I called up a respected friend and I said, uh, hey, let me run this idea by you. And I told him what I was thinking. And what he said back to me was said completely differently. He said, Oh yeah, Derek, you're like the communication guy. You should be like at every financial advisor event because you teach people how to talk to people so they pick up clients. Well, that wasn't how I describe my business to him, but I learned a valuable lesson, Paul. And that is, I used to think if it's in Derek's brain, that's the best way. That's the only way, but I was wrong. You see, now when I say an idea, how somebody says it back to me is the better way because that's what a buyer would say. That's what somebody who could hire me would say. And then if two or three people say the exact same thing, just go with it. Don't overthink it. That's your focus group. Just take action and go.

From Financial Advisor to Author and Advisor Educator

SPEAKER_00 38:00

Yeah, no, I love it. I want to transition or I want to switch gears into what led you to decide to sell your practice and then go into what you do today. And what is it that you do today?

SPEAKER_01 38:12

Yeah. What is it that I do today? I'm asking myself that a lot. What am I doing? What's going on here? Yeah, so funny story. So I realized about 15 years ago, I had a problem. And the problem was I on the outside had the successful look, very driven guy, like to set a lot of goals, but I realized that without clarity and reviewing my goals on a regular basis, I can run really fast and look up, and I have run fast in a circle, and I've accomplished nothing. And it's majorly frustrating. So I began to go on what I call a yearly sabbatical. I take about five days completely by myself to think and pray and journal. And I ask three questions of myself. Number one, how do I be a better husband? Number two, how do I be a better father? And number three, how do I be a better business owner? Those three questions guide my time. I typically go by the water. It's kind of relaxing for me. So in July of 2019, I was at the W Hotel in Boston, overlooking kind of the wharf there. And I began to write out what I put at the top of the piece of paper, Derek 2.0. And I began to write out all the things I would like to do. I wrote crazy things like write a book, launch a podcast, coach, speak, consult. Could I build a new business and basically replicate the recurring revenue that I was selling in this business I'm about to get rid of, if you will. And all of those things on there were things I wanted to do because I realized I had taken my practice as far as I wanted to go. I was very proud of it. It was a top 1% firm within the Americas system. For a long time, I was the top fee-based advisor in terms of fees of all the 10,000 advisors at the company. I believed in the mantra, no fee, no me. I'm a big believer in fee-based planning. And when people put their name to you, they've got buy-in. You know, when they're paying you a fee, they're like putting their fee down saying, I'm going to work as hard as you want me to to help achieve these goals, you know, which was really good. So I then decided to go ahead and sell the business. I did not candidly, this might step on some toes and be a hot take. I didn't want to be a lifestyle advisor. I didn't want to mail it in for a couple days a week and know that I could be doing better. I'm either all in or I'm all out. And so what I did, this is gonna sound crazy, but I decided to sell and I had no future game plan. All I knew was I was gonna do marketing and I was gonna build something, but I wasn't sure what it was. I wasn't retiring, I was rewiring. And so that was my goal. So when I sold it, I backed myself in the corner and just had to build something and work my way out of that. And so I was questioned, I was doubted. People wonder, what are you doing? Why would you, why would you do that? And I said, Well, I knew it's sort of like when you watch your favorite athlete and you think to yourself, you know what? He should have retired two years ago when he was really, really good. And now he's kind of on the tail end of the career. I didn't want that said about me. Okay. So that's when I decided to sell it. That was January of 2020, right before COVID. And I interviewed a lot of different advisors. And John Cutton, all the people I talked to and interviewed, I liked the culture. And specifically, what I liked was the culture of development of his team. John just has a unique gift and he works at it. I don't think he was just born with this gift. He works at it diligently to become a real connector and leader of people. That was important to me for my team to leave them in a better spot. Um, so after that, uh took a few months off, began to write the book, A Good Money Revolution, which has become a bestseller. That's been really fun, launched a podcast and have done a couple other things. But then I began to get asked by other advisors and even firms, hey Derek, it seems like you were able to attract high net worth clients easier than most other advisors. Can you come teach us how to do that? And Paul, it was sort of like the grandmother on Thanksgiving that makes that special dessert. And the recipe is only in her head and nobody else knows what's on the note card except her. I began to write on my little recipe note card. Here is the formula, here are the five steps that can lead to more high net worth clients. And as I began to teach it, firms began to say, hey, this is so practical. Like, like what you're teaching, the words you're saying, how you're speaking, these actually are helping our advisors connect. Like I was at an event earlier this year, and the CEO called me 24 hours later and said, Hey, Derek, after you spoke, 24 hours later, one of our top advisors used what you said and got a long simmering prospect to do business with him, several million dollar account. And I was like, great. So it's all about giving people the confidence, whether they're introverted or extroverted, when you know what to say and do, then your ideal clients can choose you.

SPEAKER_00 43:09

Yeah. As you know, my my company, Influential Advisor Media, we we help advisors write books, we help them do podcasts, get on media, all those different things. So I'd love to know from at this point in your journey, starting over, writing the book, starting your own podcast, and then building from there, what is the value in your own journey and then potentially for people in general based on your experience in capturing your thinking in form such as a book or a podcast?

How Books, Podcasts and Media Build Authority

SPEAKER_01 43:39

Well, this is interesting because when I wrote the book, I just wanted to encapsulate my ideas. I wasn't thinking about, hey, I could use this to get on stages or I could do this or that. But what I found is when people are hiring me now, they've begun saying, Hey, Derek, can we buy some of your books and do a book signing? And what happens is the moment I step off the stage, Stage, people already have practical action tools they can use in their very next conversation to pick up a client. But when they get to meet you and you get to sign a book personally to them, it just gives you this intensely high level of credibility, which is really, really cool. So as an author and a speaker, to get to be close to the people in my audience and have them tell me, I really, Derek, when you said this, it was so meaningful. Or when they DM me, hey, I tried this and it worked. Thank you for that. It's really, really powerful. So what I find is now I'm a big believer, Paul. This is why you and I are probably, you know, brothers from another mother, in the sense that books and podcasts and TV and the media, I always believe that people should know who you are before you enter the room. Your reputation could go, should go in probably a hundred yards before you and prepare the way. So when you walk in, but what I've learned is, and I learned this the hard way, you can't act like you're the celebrity. Come, come approach me. I'm unapproachable. You, if you're gonna go this path, have the book, have the podcast, be the brand, be the image, you wanna be the most friendly person in the room. That's how you significantly amplify your reputation. There people say he is he or she, they're even nicer in person than they were on social media or in the book. They're they were so nice. So then they become verbal ambassadors for your brand that can spread your reputation far more than you ever could.

SPEAKER_00 45:31

Yeah. What has been for a podcast? So you have your own podcast. How have you used that to build your own brand and to also build your current business?

SPEAKER_01 45:42

Yeah, it's all about content. And one of the things I found, I didn't anticipate this, but you want to put yourself in certain rooms and with certain guests. So I'm going to tell you something. I don't share with many people, but when I first started the podcast, I've actually stopped the Good Money podcast. And now a couple other companies have, you know, kind of repurposed that content. We may launch another podcast. But we had guests on, such as Matthew McConaughey, Ed Marlett, Mel Robbins, people that I respected. So I just made a list of who would be somebody I'd like to have a conversation with. And one of the crazy things I did because people say, Derek, how did you get Matthew McConaughey on your podcast? I mean, you're you're little Derek Kenny, for goodness sakes, right? And so at the time he had a book out called Green Lights, and he needed to sell copies of that book. And so what I said is, you know, I want Matthew on the podcast. I'm gonna put my money where my mouth is. I'm gonna buy a couple hundred copies of his book as well and give them out to friends and family. Well, the moment they heard that, oh, well, you're willing to kind of help us achieve our goals. He wanted to hit that New York Times list. I'm happy to do it. He comes on the show for 45 minutes. And Paul, I got to tell you, my daughter was in the room kind of watching this whole thing. McConaughey probably did, I bet he did eight interviews that day. But in the 45 minutes he had with little Derek Kenny here, he made me feel like I was the one person in his universe. And that content, I still replay it. I post it on Instagram, it appears on LinkedIn. It's evergreen. It's evergreen goodness, as I call it. So it cost me a little bit of money to do that, but to have my association with Matthew McConaughey that I can parlay into other stuff, it has continued to pay big dividends.

SPEAKER_00 47:31

So, and I say this half jokingly, half serious. I think our listeners want to know when you were, you know, as a financial advisor in the financial advisory industry, when you were on the call with Matthew McConnelly, did you guys do this?

SPEAKER_01 47:46

At the end, I was asking, hey, just just say, all right, all right, all right. You know, that's tell us about Ed Milet. Well, so Ed Milette is a good example of this. So I had had him on the podcast about a year earlier and uh had had kind of begged and pleaded to get him on. Then he had a new book that came out, and he said, Hey, could could I come on your show? So suddenly now he's reaching out to me to be on my show. But what he did very creatively is he encouraged his friends that they bought a certain number of books, a couple hundred books to help him get on the New York Times list. He did a private event in California, and you could go to a reception at his house. Now, on his street, Kardashians, Sylvester Stallone, it's a good street, okay? But what I the reason I tell you this is sometimes you have to pay to play. Sometimes you want to be in the rooms with those people, and paying your way in is where the doors of relationships open up. You know, there was one really, really famous guy in the back of the room. I walked up and say, hi, you offered me a French fry because he was eating lunch. He wouldn't have offered me a French fry had I had done a Zoom with him and a cold email. Okay. I was in the room with him. So if you're thinking about, I want to be with this group of people, sometimes paying to get into that room to build those relationships. Because people, what I've learned is they want to work with people they know, like, and trust. But more importantly, people want to work with people who they think like them. Like Paul, if I think, I think Paul likes me as a person, I'm gonna be more apt to want to work with you and do things with you. But if I think I don't think Paul likes me, I'm probably not gonna want to work with you. So it's not that I don't know you, like you, trust you. I need to feel like you like me. And that's one thing I'm learning. It's uh, it's this new piece I'm testing and I'm finding it with my clients to be very, very true.

SPEAKER_00 49:42

Is there any, is there anything that I haven't asked you that you think would be useful for this conversation for our audience, or anything that is important to

Why AI Should Make Financial Advisors More Human

SPEAKER_00 49:50

you to share?

SPEAKER_01 49:50

Paul, I think you've asked great questions. And my hope is that wherever you're at right now, as you listen to this and you watch this, and if you're thinking to yourself, I know I'm better than what my current revenue numbers say, then you've got to do something different. You know, I I call myself an anti-regret specialist. You know, you watch these great movies, there's often the main character at the end that laments, if only I had done this or coulda, woulda, shoulda. And I just say regret is off limits. If you're gonna change it, you've got to do something different. If you want a business that's booming, focus on the human. And right now with AI, tech, all these things, ultimately, tech gives you space for more face-to-face. Be more human. You're gonna see your business be more what you want it to be.

SPEAKER_00 50:36

It's ironic that AI, I think, in many ways is freeing us up to be more human, right? As it takes care of some of the mundane things that maybe bogged us down in the past. Now we can be more human in terms of what we do. So I totally agree

Where to Find Derrick Kinney

SPEAKER_00 50:50

with that. For someone that's isn't already following you or wants to learn more, tell us where someone can find you and you know, what are the kinds of services or things that they should be aware of that you do?

SPEAKER_01 51:02

Yeah. Yeah. LinkedIn is our most popular social media. We post seven days a week, helping people grow their business, attract their next best client, and really how to think like a CEO. A lot of top advisors tell me the content. Uh, oftentimes they review it in their Monday morning meetings with their team, just practical ways to grow a business. And we provide coaching, individual advisors, coaching for teams, especially for next gen advisors, these high-growing RIAs and broker dealers that have younger advisors that have very little business development skills. They bring us in to help correct that and really help provide them a simple framework to grow. And then we do a lot of enterprise work. Firms bring us in to talk to all their advisors and do some skilled training there. But the first stop would be LinkedIn.

SPEAKER_00 51:49

LinkedIn. Perfect. And you said that your podcast that you've discontinued it now or you're no longer doing new episodes?

SPEAKER_01 51:54

We we actually, another magazine called Modern American Advisor just picked up our podcast. And so you can go to modernamericanadvisor.com and they're replaying a lot of our very best episodes. Matter of fact, I just had one with Will Ghidara, who wrote the book Unreasonable Hospitality, that I'd kind of forgotten about. I had done, and they just replayed that. And we did one with Jesse Cole, the Savannah Bananas. Really nice guy a couple years ago, a fast moving guy. So we're looking at some other media opportunities now, but also Instagram at Derek Kenny is where we get quite a few follows as well. Awesome. Derek, I've really enjoyed the conversation. Thank you, Paul. Thanks for having me. I really enjoyed this today.