Brad Johnson: If you had asked me 10 years ago what success looked like as a financial advisor, I would’ve rattled off numbers, AUM, revenue, production, all of the math. But now I know better because I’ve met advisors making millions who are secretly miserable, and I’ve met others making less who are winning in every category that actually matters. After two decades in this business and countless conversations with top-performing advisors, I boiled it down to the five lessons that changed everything for me and the advisors Triad has coached over the years. And if you get these, you’re going to grow faster, you’re going to lead better, and you’re going to actually enjoy both the business and the life that you’re building. So, let’s get into it.
Number one, relationships beat revenue every time. Early in my career, like I said, it was about numbers, numbers, numbers, and in fact, when you are in a business that is nothing but money and finance, sometimes money can consume you. And the advisors that have built the most sustainable, joyful businesses don’t just chase the clients for the revenue. They build real relationships, the kind that extend way past the portfolio, and they get into the family, the values, the legacy that’s important to their clients. And when you focus on genuinely helping people, number one, it feels better, and number two, the business just takes care of itself.
It’s the old Zig Ziglar quote, “If I help enough other people get what they want, I will get what I want.” And I found that to be very true over the years. A prime example, in fact, Episode 4 with SHP Financial and Episode 36 with Michelle Short, who happens to be their COO, that firm last year in 2024 gathered north of 300 million of assets organically and two-thirds of it came from existing clients and referrals. Why is that? Because they have gone so deep into the plans they build executing on it, not just talking about it, not just talking about the CFP standard plan that involves income, investments, taxes, healthcare, legacy estate. They’re actually doing it.
It’s not just a diagram on a website that they copied off of another advisor’s website for marketing purposes. They’re actually executing on it, and because of it, their clients are talking about it to other people. They’re talking to their friends, their family, “Oh, this was so helpful,” and that has actually brought more and more business in the door over the years.
Number two, simplicity sells, complexity repels. Shout out to Simon Bowen. He actually was an early episode as well, one of the top-viewed shows on the YouTube channel, and as he says, “When you draw, you draw people in.” So, that’s a master lesson on how he takes complex ideas, concepts, and simplifies them when it comes to drawing. But I’ve seen some of the best advisors in the country what they do is they do the same thing with everything in finance, including their appointment process. We call it the one decision at a time rule. And whether it’s a seminar, radio show, TV show, when it comes to your marketing funnel, here is the next step that may make sense if you have this issue. You might want to come in and talk with us.
Now, they come into the first visit. At the end of that, “Hey, good news. We can do this. The bad news is we can only move forward for the people that are serious because this is deep planning. We’re boutique. We’re high-end. We’re a wealth management firm. That means we can’t work with everyone. We can’t put the hours into this planning unless you are open to if we figure out a way where we can solve these problems we discussed today, you’re open to us being the ones that fix that for you. Once again, one decision at a time. That’s a little bit of an upfront close.
And then the second visit. One more decision, “Hey, are you open to us building that plan?” Oftentimes where I’ve seen appointment processes and just business practices in general get derailed is you are bringing in spreadsheets with 15 different decision points that are super complex. Maybe it’s surrender charges or different product details that are advanced details. Maybe it’s wealth management and different portfolios, ETFs, managed models with different fee structures. And now they’re like, “Wait, what about that, or that, or that?” and they’re just literally overwhelmed and then they don’t come back. That’s where you get the dreaded, “I want to think about it.” One decision at a time. Simplify the complex. Lesson number two.
Onto number three. Growth without alignment equals burnout or quitting. And I’ve seen this the hard way. In fact, many advisors over the years have successfully been incredibly successful, walking across the stage, top five in my organization, getting the awards, getting the trophies, but secretly dying inside. In fact, if you listen to an early episode with Anthony Pellegrino, there’s actually two of them out on the YouTube channel. I’m sure we’ll link to them in the show notes. He was a guy that actually was always one of the top people at every organization he’s been in. He tells a story where he walked across the stage after being recognized, photos taken, and went right into the bathroom, splashed the water on his face, looked at himself in the mirror, and said, “I will never do that to myself again. That was not worth it. No amount of money was worth going through that again.” We call that red line behavior when you focus on just marketing, sales, marketing, sales. And I’ve seen that disease happen over and over in finance.
Another thing, we call it DBDL. If you’re on here, that’s going to not be an unfamiliar term. But one of the things talking about building a business that you actually want to build and be a part of, the family dinner rule. If you wouldn’t have dinner with a client, why would you bring them on and do business for the rest of your life? If you don’t enjoy the relationship, and I see this happen over and over where people bring on clients just for the revenue, and what ends up happening is they’re miserable every time they call. And that’s why one of the things we do at Triad, that is one of the pillars of getting into the community. Do we want to both do business and do life with you? Because that’s a lot more fun on both sides, I can promise you that.
And then the last one. I heard this advice early on in my podcasting and my YouTubing career, if you don’t enjoy the first episode, you’re sure never going to make it to the hundredth. And so, I have seen this happen over and over. I’ve advised probably dozens, if not hundreds of advisors at this point in my career where they want to start a podcast, they want to start a YouTube channel, they want to start a TV show, radio show, but it’s miserable. They actually don’t even enjoy the process. They’re reading a script, it doesn’t resonate. It feels like they’re faking it, and they get about three or four episodes and then it dies on the vine. And so, if you want to do something that’s actually going to matter, that’s going to add value, you have to make sure you’re going to actually enjoy it. So, make sure there’s alignment in what you’re doing in your business and how it aligns with you being excited in both business and life. So, that’s number three.
Number four, your network is your net worth. I owe much of my success to being in the right room with the right people. I’ve often mentioned the Jim Rohn quote, “You’re the average of the five people you surround yourself with,” and that’s in every aspect of life. That’s if you want to be a better husband, if you want to be a better father, if you want to be a better business owner, if you want to be in better shape, if you want to be a better version of yourself in just about anything, that is one of the best hacks you can do. And the beauty of today is a lot of those rooms you don’t always have to earn your way into. Sometimes you can buy your way into the room.
You’ve heard many times the story of my journey into mentoring and coaching with Michael Hyatt in the early days. Yes, it was a tough check to swallow at the time, but I was committed to investing in myself. I read a book, The Richest Man in Babylon, and it talked about you need to invest in yourself. That’s the best investment you can make. That took me into a room that actually led to this podcast that led to many of my favorite relationships today because of the fact that I got in the right room with the right people.
And the other thing I’ll say when your network is your net worth, rich does not mean money in life. That is not how I define it. I believe the compound interest of relationships is actually much more powerful, and that has served me much better in life as I’ve grown a business, as I’ve continued to try to level up on the personal side. And we say oftentimes at Triad, “Play long-term games with long-term people, and it’s a lot more fun when you do versus short-term transactional games. Nobody enjoys those.” So, that’s lesson number four.
Lesson number five, true advisors are leaders, not just spreadsheet jockeys or portfolio managers or financial planners. I was actually just looking. There are over 300,000, yeah, I believe 300,000 licensed Series 65 advisors, a 600 plus thousand licensed insurance agents. So, sorry, I don’t mean this to be a negative light, but the truth is that’s a commodity. There’s lots of financial advisors, lots of insurance agents out there. The ones that stand out are the ones that truly show up like leaders. They’re not just there to give the advice on the latest stock or the latest insurance product to the day, but to actually go deep. And think about all the tough times you face in this business.
You are meeting people in some of those toughest times where true empathy during the loss of a spouse, a divorce, the anxiety over market volatility. And oftentimes what I’ve found clients need during those seasons is a leader in their financial life, not financial advice. They need you to meet them where they are. There’s a great video, Brené Brown on Empathy. We’ll link to it in the show notes. And it talks about just sitting in that with them, and I found that to be very powerful. Some of the best advisors, the most successful advisors I know, they show up a lot more like a leader, sometimes more like a therapist in those moments than they do somebody reading returns off of a spreadsheet or getting into all of the dynamics of a portfolio.
And so, I think that’s really important. I oftentimes see the over-indexing in our space of kind of sounding like a spreadsheet, and I will tell you, that will not connect you with humans. Maybe some, maybe some of those engineers out there, but most are looking for a very different thing when it comes to walking into your office. They’re looking for the leader in their financial life that can get them from here, retirement, to whenever that last day is, and all of the bumps and turns along the way and be with them to guide them through grace and empathy and meeting them where they are. So, that’s five.
Quick recap. Relationships first and always, simplify the complex, align business with life, DBDL, get in the right rooms, and lead — don’t just advise. So, I want to flip it back to you. If you’re watching this out on YouTube, if you happen to be listening on audio, which one of these resonates most with you? Where are you at right now? Or maybe if you’re wrestling with one that’s not on the list, let’s go there. But I would love to encourage you, leave a comment below if you’re watching this out on YouTube and let me know which of those five, I wanted to hit them kind of brief here, give you an overview but if there’s one of those five that really resonates, just put the number down in the chat, put the soundbite down below that really resonated with you. And if there’s one of these you want me to expand on, let me know. A lot of these I could go a lot deeper on, share some stories, some real-life ones.
So, with that, I wanted to share that. That’s from almost two decades of being in finance. And love to hear your all’s thoughts and where you would like to go from here. Hope this served you. Be well!
