Double Duty: Make Your Documents Work Twice as Hard

Commentary April 24, 2012 at 01:07 PM
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Of course you read, "Bullet Proofing Your Practice Against Bad Clients."

You didn't?  Gasp! You need to read it to learn the process and discipline of contact management.  

The article that follows supplements the "good documentation policy" (named after me), I outlined in "Bullet Proofing." 

I'll trade you. I'm trying to get to 2,000 LinkedIn connections.

As I'm writing this, I'm at 1,768.  Send me an invitation to connect, and I'll send my article.

In the invite, please mention "Bullet Proofing." With my contact management process in place, naturally you follow the Law—every contact with a client or prospect produces an updated Note in the computer.

Preparing this note can take five or 10 minutes, depending on how extensive your conversation was.

In this short piece, I want to show you how to make your required documentation work overtime. 

If you subscribe to Copytalk (highly recommended), at the end of a meeting, with the client sitting right there, you dictate a message.

I must tell you, people find it very impressive. You will find it impressive because when the meeting is over, the documentation is over.

But if this is not your style, just as soon as possible after the meeting, you write a letter or email. You then copy the text of the message into your CRM.

Voila! You sent the client a message, and did your required documentation.

Here's a sample letter:

Throckmorton Jones, MD

Roberta Plack, MD

Rhinoplasty Associates

405 Main Street

Draper, Utah 84020

***

Dear Mortie and Bobbie:

It was a pleasure to see you again. I am delighted to hear the good news that you will be grandparents again, again, again.

To summarize our meeting today:

We reviewed your bond portfolio and your money managers. We agreed to remove Uzurp as they have consistently underperformed. We are replacing them with Snodgrass Associates.

You agreed:

1) To send me copies of all your statements and life insurance policies. 2) To send me the names, addresses and social security numbers of all your grandkids so we can set up educational accounts for them.

On my end, I will:

1) Review your all your statements to determine whether you are in fact as diversified as you believe. (I have reservations.) 2) Review your life insurance policies to make sure both of you have adequate coverage if something happens to either of you.

As we agreed, we will meet back in my office next Tuesday at 4 p.m.

If anything should come up that would make this inconvenient, please call Jewell at 555-243-9727.

Thanks,

Jim Sellers

Sr. Vice President

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