“It’s time to revise Failure Is Not an Option: Creating Certainty In the Uncertainty of Retirement,” my friend and client, David Rosell, announced. The book, which the financial planner wrote in 2013, hadn’t been updated in five years, and the country’s financial realities had changed.
When we compared schedules, however, we either had to meet right away or wait for a month. So, we jumped.
“My head’s not really in this,” admitted David shortly after he had arrived and settled in.
We’ll see about that, I thought. Challenge accepted. Failure is not an option in my world either.
We started talking about the small updates required. Charts would need to be updated. A section about investing when interest rates are high would have to be added. And a new chapter would have to be written based on the work the firm is now doing to make sure that business owners create an exit plan well in advance of selling their business.
“We’re going to need a David story,” I said. “Every other chapter has one.”
“That’s what makes your book so special and so successful,” I added before he could say a word. “We have to stick with this winning formula.”
The idea for what turned out to be a surprising and surprisingly successful approach had arisen more than ten years prior, shortly after we had discussed the book he was thinking of writing.
Although we remember the event differently, I’m pretty sure my version is correct. David had wanted to create a marketing piece he could send to his clients. He envisioned a short book that would provide financial basics retirees and those about to join their ranks needed to know.
I understood why this could be a solid marketing tool and was ready to help. But I can’t say I was all that enthused.
Our second meeting took place at his office, which was decorated with artifacts from around the world. When I asked about the art, stories about David’s travels tumbled out. During his late teens and through his twenties, he had run a seal-coating business, which had grown into quite an enterprise after starting it as a youngster. However, in upstate New York, where he lived, that kind of seasonal business can only operate in the warm weather months. He spent the other six months of the year traveling to—and living in—one country a month. Over the course of ten and a half years, he had spent a month in sixty-five different countries and had plenty of stories to tell.
We realized that coupling those adventures with financial lessons would make for a far more entertaining read than the financial information alone. Only later, after the book was published, would we discover the profound effect the book would have on his business.
While the book had originally been intended for clients, plenty of others read it as well. The stories give them a candid look at who David is and what drives him. The financial information provides them with his investing philosophy. By the time they actually meet him in person, they’re ready to sign on as clients before there’s even been an initial conversation.
The book has proved to be such a valuable marketing asset that David no longer promotes the business. He just promotes Failure Is Not an Option. So, spending the time and money to update his book made enormous sense, even if he wasn’t in the mood to focus on it right then and there.
We discussed a couple of options for the story that would anchor the new chapter geared to business owners. That’s when David realized that since his book opens with the seal coating business he started as a kid, it could close with the sale of that business more than ten years later.
We then figured out one more addition to the book that he was even more pleased about.
“Now I’m excited,” he exclaimed.
That’s the whole point.
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