Abstract
When it comes to financial services a couple of rules emerge that are worth keeping in mind. 1. Customers aren’t interested in what the company really has to offer. Most people don’t feel a need to buy. You must convince them with the correct messaging. 2. For one of the few times we see differences by education, perhaps because those with high school education or less feel uncomfortable with heavy-duty business terms. Especially when talking about a topic that is so emotionally laden as is retirement. Retirement brings feelings of death. The planner has to be sensitive. 3. It is possible to predict membership in the risk averse vs. balanced groups by knowing certain types of external information about a person. 4. A better approach to understanding the customer comes from mind-set segmentation. We see three quite different groups emerging; the planner, the truster and the student.