Yesterday, I had an in depth session with a leading Boston area financial advisor. Their firm has doubled every five years and they have plans to double again in the next five years. In the past, their growth has been on the back of solid personal business development activities by the two partners along with timely, yet somewhat ad hoc referrals. To achieve the next level of growth (from $300M to $600M AUM) they understand that they need a more systematic marketing and selling engine. But what should they do differently?

The challenge is that, along with growth comes increased business and operational complexity which takes up more senior team time. The senior team is saddled with business responsibilities and are not able to fully engage the market as intensely as they did in the early growth years.  At the same time, it is the senior team that is most critical to selling success. So, what is the answer?

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Part of a good solution is to develop a ‘Model Week’ for each member of the business development team. The model week articulates the level of selling activity that is both critical and realistic in a given week – balancing much needed personal time with the needs of the business and the sales engagement process. The elements that should go into a model week can be derived by building a revenue model. Here are some considerations:

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