By Steven J. Oshins, Esq., AEP (Distinguished)
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Marketing Yourself: Being Famous
You have to market yourself. This article is about the importance in doing so and how to do so.
Don’t be shy. Don’t be passive. The more you market yourself, the more famous you become. This concept applies not only to estate planners, but also in every profession.
You might be the most technically skilled estate planner with an extraordinary understanding of the tax code and the various estate planning techniques, but if you don’t market yourself, you’re simply never going to substantially grow your business. In other words, if a tree falls in the middle of the woods and nobody is around to hear it, does it make a sound???
Website, Email Address and Other Contact Information
You must make a point of including all of your contact information on every marketing piece. This includes published articles, blog posts, seminar and webinar announcements, emails, social media posts and the like.
The internet provides a virtually unlimited marketing space to draw people into your website, to read about you and to keep you in mind if they ever need someone with your skillset.
Other People’s Email Lists
Your email list and audience reach have a finite audience. Many estate planners fail to take advantage of opportunities to get their name and abilities in front of new audiences. This is easily done by writing articles or blog posts for others who have a wide reach. It’s also done by writing articles for newspapers, magazines and other print options.
Every time you write an article for a different audience, you expand your marketing reach exponentially. Keep this in mind if your business is slow and you’re looking for more growth.
Choose the Right Topic for your Articles, Seminars and Webinars
Which topic is more likely to put your name in the mind of the audience members? (a) Dynasty Trusts, or (b) Powers of Attorney? Obviously, Dynasty Trusts because you may receive a future Dynasty Trust referral as a result of the presentation, whereas none of us should want a referral simply to draft a Power of Attorney.
Before you write an article or pick a seminar or webinar topic, think about the marketing effect. How do you want to be remembered? Do you want to be remembered?
Repetition
Marketing requires repetition. Seeing your name once on an article or a seminar or webinar announcement generally won’t cause your name to stick in the recipient’s mind. But if the recipient sees your name five or ten times over and over and over and over and over and over again, your name will often be remembered.
Therefore, don’t just try this once and then give up. It takes years to get to the point where everyone knows your name in a certain field. Once you get to this point, you have truly become a famous estate planner and more referrals will come your way because you will be the first name that comes to mind when others have a client who needs what you have mastered.
And remember that the number of eyeballs that see your name on the marketing piece is just as important as the number of seminar or webinar attendees.
Recycle your Article
Post your article on LinkedIn. That gives you yet another audience. Then let some time pass. Repost your article on LinkedIn. Then let some time pass. Rinse, repeat.
Technical Skills
I will admit here that you can be famous without having technical skills. I see some estate planners getting tons of “likes” on LinkedIn when posting non-technical comments, articles and/or videos that show off no technical skillset whatsoever. I personally still have no idea why or how this is the case, but clearly they’re doing something right!
Outside of these occasional social media “sensations”, it is absolutely imperative that you master the tax code and the estate planning techniques that will bring you clients with larger net worths.
Fame can get you in the door. But you still have to know what you’re doing once the door has been opened.
Therefore, spend hundreds of hours mastering the estate and gift tax rules, the grantor trust rules, the asset protection concepts, state income taxation of non-grantor trusts and other skillsets that are useful for larger net worth clients.
This is the best marketing of all — being able to show other advisors that you’re the person they need when they have a client who needs assistance in this area.
Summary: Fame and Technical Skills
In summary, marketing yourself by including your website address, email address and other contact information on your articles, seminars and webinars helps make you famous by getting the word out. Use other people’s email lists.
Fame in estate planning gets you in the door, but you still need the technical skillset in order to do the work. Spend the hundreds of hours necessary mastering the tax code and the sophisticated estate planning techniques. Fame plus technical skills equals success.
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RELATED EDUCATION
If you found this article interesting, you might also be interested in these other educational programs and products by Steve Oshins:
- The Spousal Lifetime Access Trust: A Gifting and Creditor Protection Technique
- Estate Planning Techniques in a Time of Low Interest Rates
- The Installment Sale to an Intentionally Defective Grantor Trust
- The Grantor Retained Annuity Trust: Significant Estate Tax Savings with Nearly Zero Gift Tax Risk
- Steve’s FREE State Rankings Charts
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Steven J. Oshins, Esq., AEP (Distinguished) is a member of the Law Offices of Oshins & Associates, LLC in Las Vegas, Nevada. He was inducted into the NAEPC Estate Planning Hall of Fame® in 2011. He has been named one of the 24 “Elite Estate Planning Attorneys” and the “Top Estate Planning Attorney of 2018” by The Wealth Advisor and one of the Top 100 Attorneys in Worth. He is listed in The Best Lawyers in America® which also named him Las Vegas Trusts and Estates/Tax Law Lawyer of the Year in 2012, 2015, 2016, 2018, 2020 and 2022. He can be reached at 702-341-6000, ext. 2, at soshins@oshins.com or at his firm’s website, www.oshins.com.