Ask an Advisor: What does your first meeting with your financial planner look like?
Transcript
Paul: 00:09
Hi. Welcome to Puckett & Sturgill Financial Group’s Ask An Advisor segment. I’m here today with Aaron Puckett, certified financial planner with Puckett & Sturgill. We’re here to talk today about when you come into the office and you’re going to have an initial meeting with a financial planner, what’s that look like, and what do we think? So we’re going to have a little discussion about that, and talk about what you should expect.
Paul: 00:31
I know one of the first things when someone walks into the office is, they’ll come in, they’ll maybe wait for a minute while we gather our things and one of our administrative staff lets us know they’re here, and we’ll sit down in the conference room. What’s the first thing that comes up?
Aaron: 00:47
Yeah, I think this is one of the questions that people get nervous. They’re coming in, they don’t know what to expect. Maybe they never met with us before, met with an advisor before.
Aaron: 00:57
So first thing we’re going to do is usually give them a little bit of a high level view of how our firm works, what it exactly is it that they should expect from an advisor. We usually explain how our compensation models work, so they know how they’re-
Aaron: 01:14
How we’re being paid, how it kind of works in our industry. And then it’s going to be a lot of time for us to just kind of connect with them. I consider that first meeting as a time for them to get to know us, us to get to know them, and for us to just see if there’s a connection. Most of the time we’re not really giving a lot of advice in that first meeting.
Paul: 01:36
Yeah. It’s essentially information gathering, get to know you type of situation, and sometimes there’s an organizational component to it because folks may or may not have all their ducks in a row, and that’s okay. They may not be organized. That’s what we’re here for.
Aaron: 01:50
Yes.
Paul: 01:50
To help create that relationship where we can help you organize and put everything into one place, and make it makes sense.
Aaron: 01:57
Yeah.
Paul: 01:57
And I think that’s one of the things we love to do in that first meeting.
Aaron: 01:59
I’ve heard you call it financial triage sometimes with people. You know, we’re trying to find out what are the most pressing issues? What are the things that we need to really try to address? I guess the one key component to every first meeting that happens is we schedule a second meeting.
Paul: 02:16
Yes, yeah, yeah.
Aaron: 02:16
Because you just don’t accomplish everything in one meeting.
Paul: 02:19
Yeah, and the truth is, and I think that folks should understand this as we get to know each other, it’s a relationship business, and we don’t expect to make decisions that first meeting. We expect those decisions to be made out into the future, and I think that’s what, I think if there’s anything that anyone would take away from this conversation is that this is not pressure, this is not some sort of sales, sales pitch. This is can we help you, can we get your situation figured out and let’s hopefully make, let’s not make decisions today. We’ll make-
Aaron: 02:46
That’s an important point. We don’t ever ask a client to make a decision while they’re sitting in the office.
Paul: 02:53
Right.
Aaron: 02:53
You know, we’re always sending them home and saying “Take your time. Think on this.”
Paul: 02:57
Yeah.
Aaron: 02:58
“Sleep on it.”
Paul: 02:59
Yeah.
Aaron: 02:59
“Talk to your spouse about it,” and then we get back together to implement things.
Paul: 03:03
I think that’s a great synopsis of a first meeting, Aaron.
Aaron: 03:06
Please don’t hesitate to ask your question. Ask through the website, email us, call us, we look forward to connecting with you and it’s our pleasure. So please, give us a call.
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