349: 12 Marketing Strategies to 5X Your Advisory Business (Without Social Media Ads)

Today, I am talking with an advisor who has five Xed his business in the last five years. And he's on pace to do even more this year. But here's what I love the most about Matt's story is it's not about complicated marketing funnels, trendy hacks or trying to quote unquote beat the algorithm. His strategy for growing his business is really around clarity around his ideal client avatar, deep community involvement and building just real human to human trust. Today we are breaking down the 12 strategies that he uses every single year from niche specific seminars and appreciation events to write along to recognition programs and just overall creative referral experiences. So today you're going to walk away with tangible affordable ideas that you can put down on your calendar for Q2, Q3 and beyond and just a fresh perspective on what's working right now in our industry without always having to just do quote unquote social media. So if you've been wondering how to grow without burning out this one, it's for you. Look I know you're here because you know it's possible to have energy left over for your family and still have your dream business. You know the business that you are running instead of it running you. If you're new to the official advisor, welcome. I'm so so glad you're here. I'm Libby Graywee and I started from scratch built and sold by age 37 a 100% referral only planning practice that I grew to seven figures as a solo advisor all while working just three days a week and taking off 14 weeks a year so that I could lean into being a mom, a wife, a friend, a sister, a daughter, a community member and frankly a travel obsessed human who just loved taking vacations. I'm here to walk alongside you and to show you how to do the exact same and to help you take a media action on the most important strategies for scaling, organizing and creating less stress and overwhelm in your business. We are about to transform your practice together. So move over exhaustion and get out of the way advisor ADD. It is time to take that one right next step to build a business and a life that you love. And before we dive into this conversation with Matt, I just wanted to say a huge thank you. I know I've mentioned it maybe once before, but this podcast was just named to Kitzes's list of best podcasts for financial advisor. So thank you guys for showing up every Tuesday and every Friday for me and listening to this podcast. I appreciate my listeners so much. Thank you for sending me episode ideas on linked in sharing with me what's going on in your world and how I can be of service. So just from the bottom of my heart, I just wanted to say thanks. All right, let's dive into this conversation with my friend and local Cincinnati boy, Matt McManus. Matt is here. I'm I'm always excited for guests, but I am really, really, really always so touched when not only do we have a good coaching alumni on the show, but when we have an advisor who just emails me willingly and says, Hey, I'm doing these really cool things and I want to share about it. So thank you, Matt, for being here and just being so generous with all of the knowledge that you have acquired to five X your business in the last five years and just your generosity and willing to share that with our listeners. Yeah, it's my pleasure. Thanks for having me and listen. I was given so much early in my career, so many great advisors helped me along the way. I figure it's my time now to start giving back as well. So happy. Yeah, these are my kind of people. I love it. Okay, so tell the listeners a little bit about who you are, where you're from, what you do and who you serve. Yeah, so Matt McManus, I run a kind of a hybrid practice here in Cincinnati, Ohio and my primary target market and you're going to love this Libby, my ICA is first responders here in Ohio. And so for the last, let's say five now six years, I've really been keying in on that particular segment. Now I didn't do this for my entire practice. It took me a while to really get these things figured out. But for the last, like I said, six years, it's first responders, people age 48 to 60 who are at or in retirement is kind of my sweet spot. Okay, I love that. And so how long have you been an advisor just crossed this my 14th year? 14th year. And you've been focusing on first responders for six years because I hear all the time from people that are brand new and there's this big push from, I don't know, from from the community to have niches or niches. However, you want to say ICA is like right away and it takes a while to really figure out what is the type of work. And so I'll be honest, I remember having a firefighter come through my office with his package and I was like, oh, this is not my sweet spot. And thank God there are people like you that focus on this because those plans are crazy. They are. Well, awesome. So I know, I know people listening are like, okay, Libby, you said 5X in five years. So tell us a little bit about what you've been doing to see that type of growth. And I'm assuming it's not just 5Xing the revenue of the business, but also because we've worked together. I know you've been systematizing your processes and building out the infrastructure to support that level of growth. It's been getting really clear on who it is that you're serving and how you're serving them. But you've been doing lots of things. So I've said it a million times before that, you know, we were a referral and we business. I started in 2004 before LinkedIn was even a thing and the world has changed so much. So my area of expertise is not marketing and prospecting in 2026. So tell us how you're finding so many new clients. Well, I think at the end of the day, we're in a relationship business. We're not in a money business. And that's what I tell all the young people who are getting started at our firm. It's about the people. It's about the trust that we sell. And if you can understand that that's what folks are coming to you for and not necessarily the investing piece because I feel like especially now with AI and some of these advisory platforms we can use, all that stuff can be outsourced. That's easy to just say, hey, somebody else do it. But not everybody can manage those relationships. And so I was always tired and I'm going to sound like a very old insurance agent here. It's either people, right? And I know some people are going to roll their eyes at that one, but you got to see the people. And so I make a very conscious effort to get out into the community that I serve and be there for them in a capacity where it's just I'm not selling anything. I'm just there to learn more about who they are, what their struggles are, and how it can be of resource to them. And that has really driven the relationships that I formed. And then in turn, it's driven my business. And so just to give people context, 2020 almost killed me about how to close the doors. Then, but I was about 110 GDC and for the first 110,000 GDC. And for the first, let's say eight years of my practice, I was somewhere between 50 to 150,000 GDC. And once I made the switch doing the things that we're going to talk about, I went from 110,000 to just this past year, 520,000 GDC in that five year span. And this year, we're already projecting the hit at least 640. Amazing. Okay, okay. So let's dive into it. You have 12 things that you do every year for clients and prospects. So and what I love about this list is they're affordable, right? Like not everything is this big budget over the top. And certainly there are things that cost money, but there's something on this list that's applicable for literally anybody listening. So okay, so what do you do for your clients and prospects? So it's a little bit of everything. So I like to think of it as grill and marketing, just being out there. So we host seminars and debt are geared towards our target market. So we will go around the region, speaking directly to first responders about retirement readiness. So we will do that probably 16 to 20 times a year. We've created a recognition program because if anybody has watched the news lately, first responders, especially police aren't always painted in the best light. So we decided to flip that on its head. So we created a recognition program to start highlighting the good acts that were happening in the community, putting that out on social media. So we have our first responder of the month. And if we recognize somebody, then we'll bring out coffee and fruit to their station, make some photos. Typically, we like to get their chiefs or administration involved. And we just put good PR out for them. So people absolutely love that. We have appreciation weeks. So every virtually every profession has some sort of appreciation day or appreciation week. So we will take advantage of police or fire appreciation. So we do coffee with a cop during police appreciation week. I also am involved in their charities. So the Hamilton County Police Association, I sit on their charitable board and I help fund raise money and I serve as their treasurer. So I use my skill set and that capacity to give back to the community. And one note I want to make about that too, because I know a lot of people like me, being involved, pick a charity that's important to your target market, not necessarily important to you, right? Because what's important to them should be important to you. So, serve with kind of that mentality, mentality in mind. There's regular monthly dinners that my target market host. And so I will show up to those frequently. I may not make all 12 in the calendar span, but if I can get to 7 or 8 of them and maybe do sponsor one to where I'm buying the food, that's a huge win. Get involved in their fundraisers, go to their golf outings. Even if you don't play golf, they're always looking for help behind the scenes. So, people will love it if you volunteer your time to help them along. Okay, I love it. So, that's six of them to the bar because I want to ask a couple of questions. And then, but we'll get into the last. So hosting seminars geared towards your target market. Are you doing this all over Cincinnati? Are you doing it at the same place and it's pretty consistent? How are you? Is it geared towards different types of first responders? So is there a variety or is it literally a wash rinse repeat, same workshop over and over and over again? Tell me a little bit more about the seminars and workshops that you're hosting. So it's a rinse repeat. It's a one hour retirement readiness program. And we tie it to the wellness message that the first responders are here and quite a bit about. And we're going to talk a little more about this later. But we don't make it just about the money. Yes, we will talk about pinching considerations and deferred comps and IRAs and different things like that. But we also tie it to, hey, be sure your mental health is in order. Be sure your physical health is in order. Be sure your relationships are moving in the right direction because it's not just all about the money. So we do that. I like to think of it as my road show. So we do that all over the Cincinnati region. So if I call up a local government, let's say, you know, the city of Mason, which is a suburb of Cincinnati, if I call them up and say, hey, guys, I want to come out and talk to your employees for one hour about this stuff, all I need is a space and a projector. Typically we get very positive response from these local governments and bringing us in because we're offering a valuable service to their employees. And so, you know, our typical audience is going to be anywhere from, you know, six to 15 people. And so we also use that as a way to capture leads and get them into our email marketing. But that has been a great valuable tool that we use and word to have spread across the region that we're the go to people for this. Okay, I love that. And so how many of those do you do in a year? About 16 to 20. 16 to 20. Okay, awesome. Okay. So the first responder of the month are those clients or viewers or not necessarily clients of yours. Okay. If I capture, if I see a good story, maybe on Facebook or maybe on the local news, I will grab that and run with it or I have enough contacts now throughout the city from some of the higher up leadership, maybe occasionally we'll send out an email and say, hey, tell us something good that's happening in your department. That's somebody that you want to recognize and Libby. I mean, we've recognized people for stuff you would never hear about. Last year we had two people that saved lives of folks that were getting ready to jump off of a structure. And you would never know it. And so these police and they have body cam footage that they send us like, hey, we want to recognize these people, which is so awesome. But the news doesn't pick up stories like that, but we will. And so we will turn around and blast that on social media. So people are always eager to share with us those stories, whether they're clients or not, it doesn't matter to us. Let's just put some positivity in this world. Yes. I love that. Okay. Appreciation week. So you take you to coffee with a cop during police appreciation week in May. How do you identify, is it just one cop? Like what does that look like? No. So we go by department. So we will approach certain police departments. And just say, hey, guys, we're doing this appreciation event. Is there a local coffee shop that you guys frequent? And then we'll typically block off a two hour time period from like 9 to 11. And we'll put it out on social media and they'll send it out to their PR folks. And anybody, civilian cop, whoever shows up in that time period, I'm buying them a cup of coffee. And we're just trying to create positive interactions in the community between my target market. And the communities that they serve. Okay. I love that. So then you talk about getting involved in charities that are important to their market. So identifying. And so what I'm hearing so far, and I want to double click on for people listening, whether it's first responders or whatever your identifying avatar is, you're getting the market involved. So it's not just you. You're actually like reaching the communities that they're part of. Like I love this idea of something. You like, okay, if you serve teachers, you could connect with different superintendents or principals to find these teachers to get into their network to get involved. Tell me a little bit more about the weekly or monthly dinners. So here in Hamilton County, where I live, there is the Hamilton County Police Association. And it's focused around all the law enforcement in the county. There's like 2,000 people. Let's call it a state, federal, county, local agencies. And they have a dinner. So anybody can show up. You don't have to be a cop to get involved in these dinners. So you show up, you pay your 10 bucks at the door to have dinner. And now you're in, you're in for lack of a better term target rich environment for who I'm looking for. And I'm just out there building connections. And they have these dinners once a month. And I guarantee you, if you go for any profession that you serve, there is some sort of association likely tied to that profession. And that association is likely meeting weekly, biweekly, monthly, quarterly, at least at some point throughout the year to where you can go and get involved. You just have to dig for this stuff. Yes. Okay. And then you talked about the fundraiser isn't getting involved. And they're always looking for, we're never overflowing volunteers. And what I love about that particular strategy is the other volunteers that are first responders are the people who are deep in that community. They want to serve that probably aligns with your own values. And even at the end of the day, if you don't get any quote unquote business out of the deal, you still got that warm fuzzy volunteering, which is good for your soul and heart. Anyways, okay. So I just wanted to kind of get a little bit deeper on those first six. So let's keep going with seven through twelve. Before we move on, one thing I want to reiterate about the volunteering side of things, they will start seeing you in a different capacity, right? Instead of you being the finance guy who's trying to get our finance gal, who's trying to get their money, once you start volunteering and you're not there to quote unquote make sales and they see you differently. All of a sudden your seat goes to their side of the table and now you become one of them. And the more they view you in that light, the easier it is to get business down the road. It's kind of that more shoulder to shoulder. It is. Yeah, I love that. I love that. Okay. So tell me a little bit about your drop off like your surprise. Yeah. So this, to them, it's a surprise to me. I know it's coming because you're the queen of organization, Libby. But every week, we all have slow weeks in our calendars. We all have slow months in our calendars. For me, in particular, it's right around July 4th. So during that time period, either a day before, day after July 4th, I will load up my Jeep out pack of full of water and gatorade and I will just drive around to different stations, police stations, fire stations in the region and just drop off waters and gatorades as a quote unquote surprise to the folks. And people absolutely love that because a lot of times it's super hot here in Cincinnati, hot and humid. They don't always think to throw extra drinks in their car. So if they can put an extra gatorade or water in their cruiser because of me, then hey, that's just what we're going to do. Okay. I love that. All right. So let's talk. You have a couple of light specifically like for existing clients. So you had listed taking out clients at doing some sporting events that just kind of let and loosen having fun. Yeah. Yeah. So tell me, I'll give us some examples. So I stumbled across this. This is years ago, my manager at the time, he had some nice tickets to the Cincinnati Reds Game, the professional baseball team here. And early in my career, somebody told me one of the biggest mistakes that advisors make is that they always play golf with the same people. They always go out to events with the same folks. And typically there are other people in the industry that we're very comfortable with. And he said, you know, you could really make it really make prospecting easier if you've decided to take other people with you. And that always stuck with me. So when I got these reds tickets, I thought, well, instead of inviting my buddies, let me try something a little bit different. And so we had just broken into a new local municipality. So I was really starting to get to know some folks there. And one of my very first clients, I called them up and I said, Hey, Bill, I said, I got these extra reds tickets. I don't, I can't really find anybody to bring. Would you mind grabbing a couple guys from the station and all four of us will just go down to the reds game and have some fun. And I did that about two weeks before the game and the night before I called them to confirm. And he goes done deal. And I'm like, what do you mean done deal? And he goes, Oh, I already talked to the guys. They're going to switch their money to you. And it was. And I'm like, well, that was not the expectation, but, but thank you. And it turned out to be one of the biggest clients I ever gotten was because of that. And all three of the people who went with me to the reds game that night are still clients of mine from, you know, six, seven years ago. And I, it really opened my eyes. And so I started doing this more and more where you get a nice ticket, you know, nice tickets to reds game. Don't use your, your kids straight A tickets where your second. Well, but by some decent tickets. And you can use this for even if you get like a fundraising table at an event, you could use this for golf outings, you could use this for bowling outings, like whatever it is, you want to do the, it all works the same. But invite a client and then ask them to invite a couple of friends. And then what I love about what you said. So we would like, we, you know, I mentioned at the top of this, right? Like we didn't do a lot of marketing or prospecting per se, but we did a lot of referral events. Like when we first kind of started making the switch to only working with ICAs and referral only. And sorry, I was just on the kids this marketing summit talking about these, but what I heard you say is something that we did that made all the difference in the world. You said, why don't you grab a few buddies from the station? And so you were very clear about who you wanted him to invite. Not in a way like it absolutely has to be some buddies from the station or they must be cops who are open to switching their financial advisor. With a minimum of 500,000. That's right. That's right. Like here are the parameters in which I would like for your friends to fall into. But you were very clear about like, Hey, I've got these tickets and invite some buddies from the station. And when you choose a client that loves you and just kind of gets how this business works, they tend to understand what it is that you're trying to do. And it's a very, in my opinion, it's a very easy way to meet people and at the end of the day, even if you don't get any business from it, it's fun. You get to hang out with a couple of guys, have a few beers at the reds game. And so many advisors are starting to become disenchanted with their business, right? Like it becomes monotonous. It's not quite so fun anymore. Like the exciting parts of getting up and running are sometimes they, I went through this about every five years in my own practice. Right. Start to get a little bored, a little disenchanted, kind of a little like, Oh, what do I need to do to mix this up? So I love this one as a way to kind of tie business and pleasure together. I think that's amazing. Okay. Sorry to interrupt, but I often get asked, Libby, if you were still running an advisory business today, what would some of the tools and things that you would be using if you were doing your business now? And if we're going to talk about efficiency, right, you wouldn't build a financial plan without a very clear visual of your clients entire financial picture. Right. I personally would use asset map to keep myself super organized and to be able to see all of my clients complex data in one easy to understand interactive snapshot. It helps you engage clients drive better decisions, embouste efficiency in every meeting. If you want to streamline your practice and deliver more value in less time, make sure you check out asset map today at asset dash map dot com slash Libby asset map. Reimagining financial planning. Okay. So we've all been on an AI journey together. And I know I know all of this AI and integrating it into your practice can feel super overwhelming. And we all know how important it is, right? AI is transforming how financial advisors work. It's streamlining everything from client onboarding to communications to meetings to creating deliverables for you. I mean, gosh, you can even use it to write your investment policy statements and so much more at Bimo automation. They do it all for you. It's a done for you customized solution founded by a former advisor. So instead of an off the shelf, we're trying to connect things together, which all are totally cool and have their place. If you want something totally custom tailored to your unique needs, you need to check out Bimo automation. And as an efficient advisor listener, because you're awesome, you get to visit bmo automation dot com slash efficient advisor to get a free consultation and complimentary AI blueprint for your business. You will not regret sitting down and having someone map out all of the things that AI could be doing for you in your business. Okay. So tell us a little bit about your client appreciation events that you did. So I'm assuming that's similar, but on a grander scale. It is on a much grander scale. So we do kind of three main ones throughout the year. So we have a big one down at FC Cincinnati, where we'll get and that's a professional soccer team. So we'll run out an entire suite for 125 people. Now it's not just me. There's other advisors in a firm that will help out with this because trying to fill 125. It gets rather extensive. But but we will open this to our broader base of clients. So there's superintendents, there's local government folks, there's business owners. We got everybody. And it is a huge hit every single year. And it's just a way to say thank you. Right. We're not asking them anything. We're not doing presentations out in the parking garage beforehand. It just hey, let's get together. Let's enjoy each other's company. But inevitably what happens and we do this with first responders to on a smaller scales. We'll do one specifically for police and fire. And then we do a Santa event event in the Christmas time. But inevitably what happens is everybody knows everybody and especially in a in a town like Cincinnati, all of a sudden people walk into our event and they see somebody that they went to the police academy with 20 years ago. Oh, I love that. Yeah. And or they just saw somebody that maybe they worked a case with five years ago or hey, you know, you and I worked at this station. Way back in a day and it's all of a sudden we've we've created this massive social proof that you know, their friends, their family, their buddies, they're all using us. And it's such a wonderful environment. And again, it's it's nothing more than just for us to say thank you to our clients. And those three days are easily my favorite days of the year. Well, yeah. And so and are you telling clients are they able to bring guests to this event or is this closed and just for clients? It is closed just for clients. Okay. Okay. Now, now occasionally we will have like a strategic guest show up. Maybe you know, every once in a while, but by and large, it's all of our clients. Okay, awesome. Love that. And Cincinnati is it's the weirdest thing because it's a big city, but it is such a small town. And I didn't realize this until I moved here after college. Did you grow up here? Yes. Okay. So when I moved here and people would say, Oh, where did you go to school? This was the first place in the universe that I ever knew of that people were asking where you went to high school. Like I did not know that was a thing until I moved here. So I have to imagine all these first responders and like this like synergy and connection that happens. Interesting. So just for the record, if you're ever here and someone says, where did you go to school? They're not asking about college. They're asking about literally your high school. Okay. So taking people to sporting events, hosting client appreciation events and being in it sounds to me like you're being intentional with choosing things that are interests to your ideal client avatar. So it makes sense that first responders and sports go ahead and hand. Yes, I'm not going to do a, you know, cheese and wine event at the art gallery for my just not going to work. I love it. No, no, no, your people, no, your people. Okay. And so you also said you go to industry conferences. Tell us a little bit more about what that looks like. Yeah. So I will show up at their there, not mine, not our industry conferences, although that's still a good idea. But the Ohio Police Chiefs Association has a meeting every year in Columbus to where they get together and they invite vendors in. So we show up to stuff like that. Or they run wellness symposiums throughout the region. And so we will show up to those as a sponsor and you know, we're working on getting some speaking roles at those types of events. So again, we're trying to show that we're involved in every facet of their lives, not only personally, but professionally to get a deeper understanding. understanding of what it is exactly that they do. One of my favorite things I've done recently, and this is not on a list, I started doing ride-alongs in 2025 with my police officer clients. Stop it. That's so cool. Yes. So, and anybody can do this, right? So any civilian can go to their local, any police agency and just say, "Hey, I'd like to do a ride along at some point," and then they'll get you scheduled, and you can go out and do a Friday night shift. I've done a Monday morning shift. I did three of those last year and it was some of the most fun I've had and in quite a long time. Stop it. That is actually really cool. Yes. I didn't even know that was a thing. 100%. And you can do this with, listen, you can do this with any profession, right? Because all these professions are trying to get new people in the door. So they have some sort of program, I'm sure of it, to where you can just go in and kind of learn about it. And so some of my colleagues here who work a lot with public school teachers, they will go in and teach a class for the public school teachers, right? Just to be able to walk a mile in their shoes and better understand about what it is that they do on a daily basis. I love that. I have a friend who is a surgeon and I would always tell her, "When is bring a friend to work day?" Because I absolutely love to experience what you do all day long. I just think it would be, she does a very specific type of surgery. I just think it would be absolutely fascinating. So, okay, I love that. So in service days, educational days at their employer was something else you listed. How did you get, so this is a may hear from advisors, right? We'll talk about, like, we'll show up at their employer. Like, so I worked with being in Cincinnati, a lot of Proctor Gamble employees, a lot of General Electric employees, a lot of CentOS, executives. And it was very hard to be able to get into that niche through the employer. So how have you successfully done that? We have successfully done it through their wellness coordinators. So I'm giving away all the secrets here. Okay. So if I were to go to, like, let's say, a mayor or a administrator, a lot of times they would shut the door on us. But we found out over time there's been such a lack of financial wellness, financial education in these types of employers programs. I was talking to a wellness coordinator one day and she said, "Yeah, we got this for the mental, this for social, and this for physical, and yoga instructor, this." And I said, "Well, what are you doing for financial?" And she said, "We don't have anybody yet." And I said, "Hello, I'm standing right in front of you. We will 100% come in and do these things for you." And she's like, "Really?" She said, "Yes, absolutely." And that's really what kicked off our deeper dive in kind of those seminars that we've been doing that I talked about earlier in the podcast. That's really what got our foot in the door. And because it's such a small tight-knit community, one wellness coordinator starts talking to another, and then another and another and another, and pretty soon reputation and word spreads. And it becomes a lot easier to get a yes than it was five years ago. Yes, I love that. And probably just that consistency of showing up in a way where you're not selling, where you are being authentic to what you said you were going to do, which is helping with financial wellness, as opposed to like, "We're here to sell your employees and we're experts at the blah, blah, blah, retirement plan." Okay, I love that. Okay, tell us about the last one. The social events, again, this is something I love doing, but if your client has a retirement party, do everything you can to show up to it. Because guess what? There's going to be other folks just like him or her who are probably at or near retirement. And if you show up to this stuff, it's a great place to meet people. It's a great place to just show your face again and show them that you are truly, again, on their side of the table, not just there to sell a product or a service or something like that. Anytime there's a social event, I try to make it if at all possible. Okay, so for someone listening and they're like, "Okay, I love you're doing all 12, really 13 because you give us a bonus in there." You're doing all 13 of these things. Yeah. But like how? Okay, so tell us a little bit about how you organize that on your calendar so that you're not all over the place all the time. You're not burning out. How do you still make time for the actual client work and the personal development and your own wellness? How does that all fit together on your service calendar? Yeah, so part of it is you have to be very intentional right, right, out of the gate and keep in mind, I didn't start out doing all 12 of these. Otherwise, I would have quit it a long time ago. But we just started adding and doing one, adding in another, so on and so forth. So at the beginning of the year, I know when police week is going to be so I was just go ahead and block that off. I know when these monthly socials are going to be. They're the second Thursday of every month. So I can block that off. Then for me, I run all my client meetings on Tuesday Wednesday Thursday. So that leaves me a Monday and Friday open to get this other stuff done. So if I can fit my seminars in on a Tuesday Wednesday Thursday, that's typically ideal. I build those out one quarter in advance. So we've already have Q1 scheduled out. Now we're scheduling for Q2 for this type of stuff. So once you kind of get into the rhythm, it's a lot easier just to put it on there ahead of time. And if you know ahead of time, you know, this Libby, it's so much easier to plan for things that are already there. Trying to squeeze one more thing onto an already packed calendar. Yeah. And things like the first responder of the month, are you still personally doing that or is somebody else on your team handling some of that for you now? I am still personally doing that. Now the idea is to pass that along eventually. But for now, it's me. But that's listen, that's an hour out of my month. Right. So yeah, so is there like a certain day like at the beginning of the month, is it like, okay, here are the things that we need to do for the next month or are we finding who we want to recognize for the next three months all at the same time? How do you get into that cadence where you don't drop the ball? The first, the first responder of the month is a little more ad hoc just because we don't always have that great story that we're looking for each and every month. So that's a little more kind of by the seat of our pants. But everything else is very, very structured in the practice. So if you look at my calendar, you would know that this stuff is already built out. And I always weigh it against my personal calendar too. So there's no overlap there. But by and large, I'd say 90% of it's already scheduled. Okay, I love that. And I love that you mentioned you didn't go full blast into doing all of these things at the same time. And knowing what I know about you, you know, you said we're going to start hosting these workshops. You built it, you systematized it, you made it wash, rinse, repeat, you made it easy to implement and then added something new. And I have to imagine even things like your first responder of the month program is a templated email that you're sending to ask for these stories. And you have some sort of templated structure for the posting and sharing of the stories. Is that a fair assessment? Yeah, I will have my assistants send those emails out now to our contacts to see if they have any good stories for us. Yeah, perfect. Well, very good. So you mentioned several times throughout the episode that what you do goes a little bit beyond just the number. I should say a little bit, a lot of it beyond, but just the numbers, you guys are obsessed with wellness as a whole. How has that that approach really contributed to this 5x growth over the last five years? Wellness in general has completely changed my life and my practice. So about five and a half years ago, I decided to go on my own wellness journey to where I got my mental health and order and then, you know, physical health and so on and so forth, relationships got better. And because that is such a strong message in the first responder community, we're able to, I'm able to talk about it at a very deep and personal level. And people have responded tremendously to that because I'm sharing my vulnerabilities. I'm opening up to them before they're opening up to me. And I had this huge epiphany the other day when I was talking to a prospect. And he and I have been friends for a very long time. And he goes, he goes, Matt, and he said, I don't really like financial advisors. They're all up in your business, so on and so forth. But he said, I really like you. And he said, I think it's because you talk about your sobriety so much. And that's when it hit me. And I said to him, you know, Bob or whatever his name was, I said, I think you like me because I was vulnerable first. And now you have permission to be vulnerable back to me to where normally when clients are coming to our office, right, we're just going to give them the Facebook, the Instagram highlight, Reels of how good we are. And this and that and the other to where since I have lived the journey and we talk about the journey. And I think it gives people. people permission to trust us more. And that has worked out really, really well. And one thing I always think about quite a bit is Steve Jobs, the old founder from Apple, who had, he amassed this huge fortune, right? And he died at such a young age, at 54. And so for us, and for me, we could help our clients get all the money in the world. He can get them the best rates of return and the best tax efficiency. But if they're not healthy enough to enjoy the money, did they really win? - Right, right. - And so we're not afraid to talk about, and we do this in our presentation. We have a quarter of our presentation is dedicated to the wellness side. Take care of your body, take care of your mental health. A lot of our clientele suffer from PTSD. There's alcohol issues, there's dependency issues, there's gambling issues. The social aspect of it, they go from this massive fraternal organization of police and fire to when they retire, all of a sudden they're by themselves and they lose that network. And that's a big deal for folks. And so because we're not shining away from these types of conversations and we're bringing it to the forefront, I think that's also attributed massively to our success. - Yeah, and it's interesting. So we have a new group of advisors who are just starting the group coaching program right now. And we'll be doing their Y stories as you know, kind of in short order. And it's one of those things that the ideal client avatar work, the Y story, like some of that stuff, the branding pillars, it feels so fluffy, right? It feels like fluffy work or like, oh, I really, like, especially coming into a program like this, like I wanna get down to the templates and the process and like, organizing my thoughts and like getting this down on paper and building an SOP. And I can't, you know, underscore enough how important it is to do this work. And I have read now, I mean, we've had hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of advisors go through the program. And there's probably five or six Y stories that I still remember that stick out very, very, very strongly in my brain. And yours is one of them because that vulnerability, that immediate sharing, it does, it just opens up the floodgates of what humans are looking for, which is this human-human connection. And not this, oh, you're this financial advisor who has it all together with your perfect house and your perfect car and your perfect bank account, that you're kind of untouchable and more like the guru that goes up the mountain top and gets all the paperwork and come back down and tells poor little me what to do. But more like you're an actual human with lots of different facets and lots of different life experiences that you bring to the table. And it makes you so likable and so relatable. And it builds trust with people so much faster. - It does. And that's why I open this podcast with this is a relationship business, not a money business. And at the end of the day, our clients don't care about our credentials, they don't care where we graduated from unless of course you're in Cincinnati. - But only high school. - Not only high school. They don't care about our systems or our processes. That's stuff for us. That's to make us advisors feel good on the back end. What the clients want is somebody who's competence, I feel like it's just table stakes. But they want somebody that they can relate to and talk to and have a relationship with. - Yeah, and feel seen and heard and known and have the ultimate human condition. So, well, thank you. I know there are advisors listening who are in that place where they're like, okay, it's 2026, what am I gonna do? How am I gonna get new clients this year? What's actually working for people? And as much as we love social media and the online space, there's different strokes for different folks and there's all kinds of things that are working for advisors all over the place. So thank you for bringing your 12 plus one, your bonus ideas, your 13 ideas to the table. And hopefully, somebody listening will be like, yep, this is the year that I'm gonna get. My poop in a group, I'm gonna get organized, put some of the stuff on the calendar for Q2, Q3 and experience that same 5X growth that you've had over the last five years. And it's been a pleasure to just be a tiny part of your journey and speak into what you're doing because what you're doing is very, very cool. - Thank you. And thanks for being a part of the journey. I mean, if anybody's on defense about your group coaching, please jump in there. The efficient advisor was awesome. I did the program last year as well, some of my colleagues and nothing but great feedback from that aspect. And yeah, get out there, get involved in watching the magic unfold. I think good things will happen if you get getting touched with your community. - Thank you so much for your time. And I will make sure people can follow you over on LinkedIn and see all of the cool things that you're up to. - Thanks, Libby. Appreciate it. - Equitable advisors LLC and as affiliates are not affiliated with the efficient advisor LLC. - Clinton Kersting and Matthew McMannis offer securities through equitable advisors LLC, member SIPC, equitable financial advisors in Michigan and Tennessee, and offer anew to ease an insurance through equitable network LLC. Equitable advisors and its affiliates do not provide tax or legal advice. Financial professionals may offer products and services and or respond to inquiries only in states in which they are properly registered and or licensed. This podcast does not constitute financial advice or an offer of any kind. Triple Crown Wealth Management LLC is not owned or operated by equitable advisors or equitable network. - Okay, I hope you loved that because I know I did it. It felt really refreshing for me to hear that growth doesn't always have to be louder and louder and more and more and more. It just has to be done at a deeper, kind of more meaningful level. You don't need to be everywhere. You just need to be intentional, clear on who you serve, consistent in how you show up, and willing to get shoulder to shoulder with the community that you want to build inside of. So just pick one idea from today's episode. Just one, get it on the calendar, systematize it, execute it well, and then layer in the next, right? That's how momentum compounds, Matt did not build it overnight. And if you're ready to build the systems and structure that support this kind of growth without working 80 hours a week, make sure you check out the Efficient Advisor Group Coaching Program and online course. We start in August, so it's never too soon to start thinking about your bandwidth and what's on the calendar and what you're gonna be focusing on. But this August for 10 months, so August 2026 through June of 2027, we build out the most important processes for your business so that you can scale and have fun. But until next time, thank you guys so much for tuning in, get out there, get involved, and go be the advisor that your community is already looking for. Thanks so much, and I hope you guys have an amazing rest of your week. (upbeat music)