In early August, I got a call from an investor in Toronto in response to my regular column in the Globe and Mail, asking if I could recommend an advisor.

In talking about her situation, this woman explained that she and her husband were both in their mid thirties with one child, owned a house in mid town Toronto on which they were aggressively paying down the mortgage, both had good jobs and had saved about $500,000 - so not huge clients but ones that would be a fit for many advisors.

After spending a bit of time trying to understand exactly what she was looking for, I suggested that I identify three advisors that might be a fit for her needs, that she could talk to and then make a decision on whether one of those three was a fit for her.

Three advisors who took a pass

I emailed six advisors in Toronto who I thought might be a fit. At some point, all had approached me about the possibility of getting introductions to new clients.

In each case, I provided some background on this client and asked if they'd like to have their names put forward - understanding that they would be one of three advisors who I'd be recommending.

In one case, I got an out of office email response that this advisor was away until September 7 and that on urgent matters I should contact his assistant. (Remember this was early August.)

In a second case, the advisor got back the same day, thanking me but saying that her minimum asset level for new clients  is $1 million - but that she'd be happy to be considered in the future for prospective clients who had at least $1 million.

A couple of days later I got an email back from a third advisor saying that if I wanted to put his name forward and recommend him, that he'd be happy to talk to this client but that he had no interest in being one of three advisors and having to participate in a "beauty contest", as he put it.

Putting your best foot forward

I asked each of the three remaining advisors for a one page overview with some basic background, summarizing their approach and the benefits to clients of working with them, with the view to forwarding this to the prospective client so that she and her husband could have some background on the advisors before contacting them.

I got virtually the identical response from all three advisors.

In every case, the answer was that they didn't have a one page summary that could be forwarded to a potential client - instead they sent me links to various documents.

One advisor included an article she'd written, another included an article that had been written on him. A couple included links to client testimonials and an overview of their team. Two sent links to a summary of their process. And one included an overview of what clients could expect.

I sent each email to the prospective client exactly as it was sent to me - I simply forwarded on the information that I was provided with.

Communicating your case to prospects

I have four takeaways from this experience.

First, none of the three advisors seemed to have an information package that could be readily emailed to prospective clients. So my first conclusion is that if acquiring new clients is one of your business objectives, you need to have an effective information package assembled and close at hand.

Second, as part of that package, advisors need to have a one page cover sheet that summarizes                          background on them and their firm and that also provides a summary of the other documents that are included in the package.

Third, advisors need to ensure that their information package looks professional.

That obviously means no typos, but beyond that all of the elements of the package should have a consistent graphic identity. When I looked at the background information that these advisors sent me, in two out of three cases there was huge divergence in the look of the different  elements that they had forwarded - different  type styles, sizes and colours.

Finally and most important, advisors need to make the contents of this information package as concrete, specific and differentiating as possible.

When thinking about the reason to work with you, prospective clients won't be impressed by generalities - rather you need to provide a tangible, fact based rationale for why someone should give you their business