Making Financial Planning Less Scary For New Clients By Focusing First On What Brings Them Joy: #FASuccess Ep 457 With Larry Sprung

Welcome everyone! Welcome to the 457th episode of the Financial Advisor Success Podcast!

My guest on today’s podcast is Larry Sprung. Larry is the founder of Mitlin Financial, an advisory firm affiliated with Carson Group and based in Hauppauge, New York, that oversees approximately $200 million in assets under management for 200 client households.

What’s unique about Larry, though, is how he has grown his business in part by helping prospective clients focus on what brings them joy rather than on financial details that they might be more nervous to discuss.

In this episode, we talk in-depth about how Larry starts his prospect “fit” meetings with open-ended questions (including asking prospects what their ideal life filled with joy would look like) to find out what’s really important to them, how Larry has found that this approach can take the edge off when many clients come into the process worried about whether they’ll be judged for their previous financial decisions, and how Larry’s focus on leading with “joy” questions shows prospects that his firm cares about their overall wellbeing (and not just the dollars and cents of their financial life), increasing trust and the likelihood that they will choose to become a client.

We also talk about how sharing more business-related and personal content on social media helped Larry drive greater engagement with prospects and clients (convincing many they’d want to become clients even before meeting with him personally), how Larry’s openness about his values (including prioritizing his family by purposefully keeping his practice small for many years) helped him gain and retain clients who share those values, and how Larry decided to transition from a lifestyle practice to a business enterprise after his youngest child left home (giving him the time needed to focus on growing his firm).

And be certain to listen to the end, where Larry shares why he decided to affiliate with Carson Group rather than try to scale the business on his own or to sell to a larger buyer, how Larry smoothed the transition for his clients by being transparent about how their fees would change and the enhanced services he’d be able to offer under Carson Group, and how Larry ultimately views professional success as his ability to help as many generations of client families as possible while also helping his staff reach their personal success (which ultimately leads to better service for his clients as well).

So, whether you’re interested in learning about how to bring joy to the financial planning process, how leading with joy can speed the prospect-to-client timeline, or how an active social media presence can boost prospect and client engagement, then we hope you enjoy this episode of the Financial Advisor Success podcast, with Larry Sprung.