Seminar Marketing

Reposted from The Trust Advisor | By Barbara Kotlyar

This post has been brought to you by The Ultimate Estate Planner, Inc., providing practical, tested and proven technical and marketing products to help estate planning professionals throughout the country build their practices.  Check out some of our Continuing Education Seminars, used by professionals to develop referral relationships with other local advisors. We have plenty more coming down the pipeline, so stay tuned!

Source & Photo Credit: thetrustadvisor.com

By President, Philip J. Kavesh, J.D., LL.M. (Tax), CFP®, ChFC, California State Bar Certified Specialist in Estate Planning, Trust & Probate Law

You may already know that one of my favorite things in life is presenting educational seminars on estate planning, whether it be seminars to market my law practice to the consumer public or presentations before my fellow estate planning colleagues.  What you may not know - - and I’ve been asked to share with you here - - are some of the unusual occurrences I’ve experienced in doing over 2,000 seminars for my law practice over the past 25 plus years.  I’ve had so many funny, odd and not-so-funny events happen on the way to, during and after seminars that I really have to probe my memory to pick out the most unusual ones.

Of course, I’ve encountered all the “usual” goofs that any seminar speaker has experienced over time.  I’ve traveled to the wrong hotel, or gotten there on the wrong day and time.  Or, I’ve arrived to the right venue and found the seminar room locked and no one could find the key, or found the room open but all the chairs locked up in the storage closet with no one having the key.  I’ve forgotten the slides or handouts or brought the wrong ones.  I’ve suffered equipment failures, power outages and even overhead sprinklers going off!  However, I’ll bypass all these mundane misfortunes and go right to the weirdest, most memorable occurrences.

Let me start with some of the “lighter” ones.

The Jokester & His “Match”

I recall that once, during a seminar, I was talking about how all your assets comprise your estate, even your antiques and junk - - and quipped “you know there’s a fine line between the antiques and junk!” Immediately, a gentleman turned to his wife and blurted out, “Yeah, I know - - she’s the antique and she says I’m the junk!” (to which his wife instantly reacted by hitting him in the face with her handbag!)

“Please Hold Your Questions Until the End…”
Another time, during a seminar, a lady began raising her hand above her head.  I stopped and reminded her - - per the rules I set out when I began - - to please hold her question until the end and I would be happy to answer it then.  But that didn’t stop her.  Moments later, she raised her hand again.  I again had to nicely remind her to wait! Then, after 20 minutes, just when things appeared to be okay, she once again raised her hand, began waiving it wildly back and forth and practically jumped out of her seat to get my attention.  I finally caved in and said, “All right, I’ll answer your question now” to which she shrieked out, “Can I go to the bathroom?” and then proceeded to run out of the room! (Wow, I guess as a youngster she must have attended a really strict school!)

The Sleepy Attendee
I can recall receiving many strange questions during the question and answer session at the end of my seminar presentations.  One of my favorites came from an elderly man, seated in the front row, who had seemed to doze off at times during my two hour, detailed discussion of Living Trusts.  When this discussion was over, he raised his hand and I politely asked him for his question.  He stopped, seemingly locked in deep thought and then slowly asked, “What’s this here Living Trust thing you’ve been talkin’ about?” 

Please Have Some Seconds
Another time, at a dinner seminar, I got to the questions part, but no one raised their hand so I stood there and waited for a moment.  Finally, I saw a hand go up and I said, out of relief, “Good, a question!” to which the person responded, “Can I get another dinner and dessert to take home?”

That reminds me of a near riot I once caused at the end of a seminar...

“The Riot”
I was expecting a large audience and we had put out a big spread of gourmet cheeses, fruit, rolls, desserts and candies.  When I finished the seminar, I noticed the great amount of food left so I said, “Help yourselves to any of the food.” You should have seen the people bolt out of their seats and stampede to the back of the room - - then fight over the spoils, with ladies elbowing each other out of the way and shoving food in their handbags!

I’ve also had some “heavier”, more serious events occur. 

We Will Never Forget
One emblazoned in my mind happened just as I was about to leave my home to go to a seminar.  I had spent a great deal of time and energy preparing for this particular seminar and I was very pumped up to give it - - my first ever on the new invention I had just created, the “IRA Inheritance Trust®”.  As I was halfway out the door, my wife screamed, “Your Mom is on the phone and she sounds like she’s having a heart attack!”.  I ran to the phone and my Mom was shouting almost incoherently, “Turn on your TV - - right now!”.  I did and just as the picture came on I saw an airplane fly into the side of a skyscraper building.  The day was September 11th, 2001 and after I calmed down my Mom (who lived close to New York and was afraid for her life!) I called my office to cancel the seminar, a small misfortune compared to the horrible suffering of others on that day.

Another False Alarm?
I’ve also had to call off seminars midway through them due to other unexpected, near catastrophic events.  Once I was speaking at a hotel where an irritating, loud fire signal repeatedly went off, followed by an announcement over the loudspeaker, “Sorry for the false alarm!”  So when it happened for about the fifth time, I just calmly said to the audience, “Don’t worry.  Stay seated.  It’s probably just another one of their false alarms.”  Everything did seem fine, until a few minutes later a man in the audience jumped out of his seat and motioned to the window where we could all see smoke and then flames lapping up the side of the building!  Fortunately, we all got to safety.  But you can imagine all the chaos as fire engines were pulling into the parking lot, attendees were scurrying in all directions and I was frantically chasing them to grab their response forms before they got into their cars!  (I quickly learned the value of having an assistant accompany me at my seminars!)

Thanks to the Men in Blue
Another mid-seminar disaster was far more strange.  As I was speaking, I faced the back of the room where the entry and exit doors were located across from each other.  All of a sudden, one door swung wide open and a man with a hoodie pulled over much of his face ran across the back, heading for the other door - - followed by a policeman with his gun drawn!  They continued their chase out of the exit door, and shortly thereafter police backup cleared the audience and me from the room.  As we were standing in the parking lot watching the police place a tape barrier around the building, I realized, to my dismay, that all my seminar equipment, handouts and keys to my car were still in the room - - and I had to travel to another location in about 45 minutes to give another seminar!  This time not only didn’t I get the attendees’ response forms, I had to call off the other seminar too because I wound up spending hours swapping jokes with the policemen in the parking lot before they finally let me back in the room.  (You know, I never did find out whether the hooded man was apprehended!)

An Important Lesson Learned by Everybody That Day
But the one mid-seminar disaster I most often recall was scarier than either a roaring fire or armed police chase.  While I was speaking, I noticed that a man in the audience suddenly slumped over and looked like he was about to fall out of his chair.  The person seated next him shouted out, “Dial 911!”  My assistant did so immediately and laid the apparently unconscious man flat on the floor.  Seemingly within a minute, paramedics rushed in, placed him on a gurney and wheeled him out. No one knew if he was dead or not, or whether he could be revived.  After all this disruption, I tried my best to return to my seminar presentation and seemed to have recaptured the audience’s attention, when all of a sudden the paramedics wheeled the man, now in a conscious and seated position, back into the room!  As the rest of us looked at him in shock, he explained, “I’m okay.  Just had a minor heart attack because I forgot my medicine - - but I wasn’t going to let them take me to the hospital because I really need to listen to what you have to say!”  His entrance seemed right on cue because I was just about to flip to the slide where I explain that the reason people don’t have any estate plan, or one that has become old and out-of-date, is procrastination - - and that no one has a guarantee they’ll have a chance to take care of it tomorrow!  Needless to say, everyone at that seminar wound up making a consultation appointment!  (And, by the way, there may be a lesson in this story for you, too!)

Despite all the wild, crazy, funny (and at times not-so-funny) things that have happened on the way to and during my seminars, there does occur a wonderful event after almost every seminar nowadays that keeps me plugging along after all these years.  Invariably, someone - - either a client of our firm, or a trustee who has served on behalf of an incapacitated or deceased client, or a client’s beneficiary - - walks up, extends his or her hand, and personally thanks me for how we have helped.  That alone makes all the seminar “madness” I’ve endured worthwhile.  It serves as a reminder why I got into this area of law and have devoted to it over half my lifetime.

Hopefully, if you’re an estate planning professional, I haven't completely scared you away from doing seminars with all of my stories.  If anything, I hope you take away that despite the crazy events in life that are out of your control, you can still find a great deal of success in marketing your practice and your services via seminar marketing.  For those that took the time to read through this blog entry, I personally extend to you a very special 50% discount on any one of our seminar marketing packages (for this month only).  Simply enter in the coupon code "SEMINARBLOG" when checking out to apply your 50% discount.  If that doesn't make doing seminars a little easier, I don't know what will!  Click here to view our Seminar Marketing Packages.

This post has been brought to you by The Ultimate Estate Planner, Inc., providing practical, tested and proven technical and marketing products to help estate planning professionals throughout the country build their practices.  Connect with us on Facebook, Twitter or LinkedIn.

Source: kaveshlaw.com

By Philip J. Kavesh, J.D., LL.M. (Tax), CFP^®, ChFC, California State Bar Certified Specialist in Estate Planning, Tax and Probate Law

I and many practitioners have over the years built successful practices on what I call the “middle market”, that is, estates valued anywhere from $500,000 to $5 million.

This level of estate planning practice faces a number of challenges today unlike any we have had in the past.  Our services have become commoditized into mass produced documents, with increasing low-priced competition from the internet, do-it-yourself packages, non-attorney paralegals and bargain-priced attorneys.  Plus, with the new $5.12 million Federal Estate Tax exemption amount for 2012, there is now reduced need for advanced--level estate tax planning and post-death administration. 

Should You Even Stay in the Under $5 Million Market?

Given all these challenges, I have heard many practitioners say that it is time to quit the under $5 million market.  I couldn’t disagree more. 

First, the greatest potential market share is comprised of less than $5 million estates.  I have read various statistics which estimate that estates over $5 million represent less than 2% of the overall estate planning market.

Second, the middle market consists mainly of those described as the “Millionaire Next Door” (profiled in the famous New York Times’ bestseller of the same name by Thomas J. Stanley).  These are the “Moms and Pops of America”, the great unserviced, silent majority, who don’t typically have a long-term, fixed attorney relationship.  Maybe they have worked with an attorney here or there for a specific matter or maybe for a “one-shot” estate plan, but they have basically been “orphaned” by the legal profession.  These are the easiest people to reach, close and get to refer their other friends to you.

Third, if you have a high net worth practice, by also offering planning to the middle market you can generate the cash flow you need to live on while you are “hunting white elephants”.

Fourth, you can develop a volume practice in this middle market that will allow you to retire someday!  If you have only a few, high net worth, “high touch” clients that require you to always be meeting with them, it will be much harder to transition them and it will be a far greater risk if you try; if you lose a few large clients, that’s a big hit on your total revenue.  If you have more of a volume practice, you can gradually turn over your clients to your junior associates and phase down (that’s what I’ve done).

Assuming that I have now convinced you to stay in this middle market, how do you overcome each of the challenges that I’ve pointed out and not only survive, but thrive?

Fight Back Against Commoditization and Low-Priced Competition

Some practitioners have just ignored these issues and have decided to do something completely different (or the opposite), focusing only on the “high touch” approach, over-servicing a few clients at higher fees.  The problem is, in this middle market, will there be enough of these types of clients willing to continue to pay significantly higher fees?  Will you be able to generate enough consistent cash flow?  And, if so, how much constant work will you have to put in for each client, that will effectively reduce your net profit? 

Consider the possibility of having two practice models side-by-side, like low and high end models in a Mercedes Benz showroom.  Maybe you can retain your high touch model for larger estates and a different model for estates under $5 million.

My approach to the under $5 million market is different than the high touch model.  I accept that we have become a “commodity” and show prospective clients why mine is better.  Where in any industry there is a Coca-Cola, there’s always room for a Pepsi.  You can actually leverage off the marketing done by the other competitors in your market.  Check out what they offer versus what you offer and show people how to comparison shop as part of your “consumer education” marketing approach.

For example, you can emphasize the importance of counseling as a part of what they get when they work with you, an estate planning attorney.  Emphasize that attorneys have, in the past, been called “counselors at law” and how important it is to see a skilled professional to assist with important choices, such as the following. Who should be the Trustee? Should there be Co-Trustees?  Independent Trustees? Distribution Trustees?  Who should be guardians?  Who should be the health decision makers?  How and when should each beneficiary receive his or her inheritance in the best manner?  And, of course, there is the counseling necessary to resolve special issues with blended families (children of prior marriages), LBGT couples, business succession planning, specific bequests and equalization formulas.  Emphasize how there are many decisions to be made, even before “filling in the form” or preparing their document - - and that “one-size-fits-all” planning may be the worst thing that people may do!

You also want to emphasize why your “hard package” (yes, your commodity!) is better and more complete.  This is also, of course, how you will justify the value of your higher fees.  This is not a technical article, but there are many unique features to your Basic Living Trust plan that probably do set you apart from plans of your competitors - - everything from “flexible” A-B trust provisions, HIPAA and Medicaid features, and custom-fit beneficiary trusts (lifetime, spendthrift, special needs and beneficiary defective asset protection trusts - - with special flexibility features like powers of appointment and trust protector powers). You can also emphasize the additional features of your overall trust plan, what I call the “support mechanisms” that make sure that the plan will actually work properly when the time comes - - things like title transfers, or adjunct materials like an Owner’s Manual and Health Document Emergency Card (such as Docubank).  You can also add on, for people with larger IRAs, a Stand-Alone IRA Inheritance Trust.  Finish by simply posing the question, “Do those other low-priced plans do all this?”

You also can emphasize service after the sale, which they don’t get from the low-priced competition.  Some practitioners utilize a maintenance program at an additional fee, but I favor a free service package approach with the under $5 million market.  I’m not going to get into here the reasons why.  In either case, you can provide such things as periodic updates or seminars as laws and planning techniques change, a newsletter, periodic review meetings and a free Trustee meeting when the time comes that the Trustor is disabled or passes.  Be sure to “show and tell” prospective clients all the things that set you apart.

Combating the Reduced Need for Advanced Level Estate Tax Planning and Post-Death Administration

Even in the middle market, there are still a few simple, advanced level building blocks that can be placed onto the Living Trust foundation.  The key is to emphasize not so much the estate tax benefits of these planning devices, but more so their asset protection benefits, income tax benefits and succession management benefits (keeping assets in the family).  When describing these simple advanced techniques to middle market clients, just like with your basic product, you want to emphasize how your advanced product is also superior.  Examples of these products are: Dynastic Flexible Irrevocable Gifting Trusts (“dynastic” may mean even utilizing another state situs and by “flexible” I mean power of appointment and trust protector features that permit change of Trustee, beneficiaries and how and when they get their inheritance); LLCs and Self-Settled Trusts, particularly if clients own a business or rental real estate (again, possibly in another state utilizing better asset protection laws); Life Insurance / ILIT, emphasizing estate building and its use later as a “family bank” to acquire more property and wealth or, for use in equalization of bequests, and designing them too as “flexible”); CRTs for sales of appreciated assets without capital gains tax; and, QPRTs as a way to hedge peoples’ bets about estate tax in times of uncertainty, particularly in the middle market where they may not want to make substantial gifts of investment assets they may need later to live on.

Your post-death administration may go down for estate tax purposes, but if you have done better lifetime planning, which includes continuing trusts for beneficiaries (even if they are beneficiary-controlled trusts), you clearly have more opportunity for next-generation planning, such as when testamentary limited powers of appointment need to be exercised.  And, even if clients come in for administration meetings where there is little more to do than a distribution deed, there is always an opportunity to make referrals to other professionals (who hopefully will refer back to you), such as a CPA or financial advisor, or to work with the client’s existing advisors and establish new business relationships.

Obviously, I could go on further in much more detail; however, given the limited space of this article, I trust that this will give you a good starting approach to being successful in the middle market.  Perhaps, in a future article, we can address another issue or “challenge” so many practitioners in this market face - - how do you attract and bring in these clients?

This post has been brought to you by The Ultimate Estate Planner, Inc., providing practical, tested and proven technical and marketing products to help estate planning professionals throughout the country build their practices.  Connect with us on Facebook, Twitter or LinkedIn.

Photo Credit: westbound415.com

Phil Kavesh here to share with you a very special Valentine’s Day Gift that I am passing along from a dear friend of mine.

A little over a year ago, I had the fortunate opportunity to pick up a copy of The eBoot Camp’s President, Corey Perlman’s, book entitled, The eBoot Camp: Proven Internet Marketing Techniques to Grow Your Business.  Some of my favorite marketing minds and authors had endorsed the book for small businesses and as a self-proclaimed internet dinosaur, it was not only an easy read, but I could tell that Corey knew what he was talking about.

Corey then informed me of a 2-day Seminar he was holding where he would spend time with me and other attendees on the concepts of internet and social media marketing for our businesses.  More so, he was going to give us hands-on, personal consultations about our website and our current internet marketing plans.  I was convinced that I needed to go, but the seminar was in Florida and my schedule wouldn’t allow it.  He then offered me the option for a personal consultation while he spent a week with several other businesses in Los Angeles - - an offer I couldn’t refuse.

It was time and money well spent and we have already incorporated a lot of Corey’s ideas into not only my law practice, but with The Ultimate Estate Planner, Inc. as well. 

Corey sent me an e-mail this morning with my Valentine’s Day gifts from him.  Good thing Kristina and Megan monitor my e-mail, because I might have deleted it (joking of course, Corey!).  It was filled with different offers that I asked Corey if we could pass along to all of you and he replied back with a resounding, “YES!”.  So, here you go.

The eBoot Camp’s Valentine’s Day Gifts to You
by Corey Perlman

Gift #1: A Tip

Engagement is an important piece of the social media puzzle and occasions like Valentine's Day are great for connecting with your prospects and customers. 

If you're going to send out a Valentine's Day email or post to your social media sites, here are a few tips:

• Give sincere appreciation. Valentine's Day is about telling people how you feel. Take the opportunity to tell your customers, contacts, fans, co-workers, etc. that you appreciate them and are thankful for their business. 
• Use video or pictures. Two years ago, I posted Happy Valentine’s Day on my Facebook business page and got very little in the form of engagement. Last year, I also included a cute video of a lion and his trainer reuniting after being separated for a year. It got a lot more responses and engagement from others. Videos and pictures are worth 1,000 words! 
• Ask them to engage! Ask for a funny Valentine’s Day date story or ask them to 'like' your post if you helped remind them to go get something special for their significant other. 

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Gift #2: A Video 

My friend Erik Qualman (Social Media Revolution) is at it again and shot a great social media video with a Valentine's Day theme. Enjoy and share it with your community as well: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6vY9Nd3Pft8

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Gift #3: A Free Webinar 

Time is limited, budgets are thin. But we all know social media is here to stay. I will share five tips YOU can implement right now to increase your reach and see a better return on your web marketing efforts. If you're in charge of your social media marketing, don't miss this session. 

It will be February 23rd from 12pm-1:15pm EST. 

Here's the link to register: 

Social Media Webinar: 5 Ways to Maximize Your Efforts

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Gift #4: A Deal

We're at about 50% capacity for our 2-day Workshop in Atlanta, so we're going to have a great group of entrepreneurs, business owners and marketers. 

At the 2-day on March 22nd and 23rd, you will:

• Receive recommendations to improve your Website.
• Make sure you rank well on Google.
• Start a Wordpress blog and learn how to update it. 
• Makeover your LinkedIn profile. 
• Learn to use Twitter efficiently and effectively - never miss a Tweet about you or your business.
• Start using Google+ and I'll share why it's going to rival Facebook and Twitter. 
• Work on strategies for better email marketing and video marketing.
• Leave feeling confident on exactly what you need to do on the web to be successful.

Deal #4 - You're getting $200 off the price. 

Deal #2 - You get to bring a colleague for free. 

Deal #3 - I'll give you a 1-year subscription to our Geek for 1-Hour a Week program. 

That's about $2,000 worth of a DEAL! 

Register between now and February 14th (pssst- that's Valentine's Day!) 

Here's the link: www.ebootcamp.com/seminars

Corey really helped my practice out and got the ball rolling for me to enter the 21^st Century in marketing.  If you aren’t ready to commit to his seminar, then at the very least, visit the eBootCamp’s website, sign up for his e-mails, read his Blog, and connect with him on Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn.

This post has been brought to you by The Ultimate Estate Planner, Inc., providing practical, tested and proven technical and marketing products to help estate planning professionals throughout the country build their practices.  Connect with us on Facebook, Twitter or LinkedIn.

Photo Credit: eBootCamp.com