Why Financial Advice Should Be Like Dentistry – Episode #347

For decades financial advisors were defined by a business model that focused on selling products. Today many advisors, like dentists, are diagnosing a client’s financial health before offering a full treatment plan.

On this Dentist Money™ Show, Ryan, Matt, and Taylor Sutterfield, CFP®, discuss why more advisors are now building client relationships based on trust.

 

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Podcast Transcript

Ryan Isaac:
Hello, everybody. Welcome back to another episode of The Dentist Money Show brought to you by dentist advisors, a fee only comprehensive fiduciary financial advisor just for dentist all over the country. Check us out at dentistadvisors.com. Today on the show, Matt and I welcome financial advisor from dentist advisors, Taylor, to talk to us about how to make financial planning and the process and the experience more of a part of your life so you can make smarter financial decisions. We’re grateful to Taylor for outlining and writing some articles on this and some of the content for today’s show. We’re glad he was a part of this and excited for him to share his ideas with you today. So thanks to Taylor for being with us and thanks to many of you for joining us week after week. We really love it and appreciate it. And we’d love to answer your questions and point you in the right direction. If you would like to chat with us, go to dentistadvisors.com. Click the book free consultation link. Let’s have a chat. Thanks for being here everybody. Enjoy the show.

Announcer:
Consultant advisor. Conduct your own due diligence when making financial decisions. General principles discussed during this program do not constitute personal advice. This program is furnished by dentist advisors or registered investment advisor. This is Dentist Money. Now here’s your host, Ryan Isaac.

Ryan Isaac:
Welcome to The Dentist Money Show where we help dentists make smart financial decisions. I am your host slash moderator. My name is Ryan and I’m here with the guy I’m always with, which is the Hollywood mountain, Matt Mulcock. What’s happening, Mattie?

Matt Mulcock:
First of all, it’s Sir Ryan.

Ryan Isaac:
It’s Sir Ryan.

Matt Mulcock:
And second of all, you’re not always with me. There’s interviews you do. There’s other things.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah, I mean, when we’re together, we’re together.

Matt Mulcock:
Like surfing. Yeah.

Ryan Isaac:
And when we’re not together, you’re still with me. We’re panel style today that’s why I’m moderating. Although I’m not a very like moderate person. I don’t have moderation in like much of anything in my whole life.

Matt Mulcock:
You’re kind of intense.

Ryan Isaac:
I kind of overdo everything.

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah.

Ryan Isaac:
And then it fades away. But we’re here with Taylor. Taylor, advisor with Dentist Advisors. What’s up, Taylor?

Taylor Sutterfield:
Not much. I’ll say, it is weird being on this side of things after listening to hundreds of Dentist Money Show episodes. It’s weird to be on this side.

Matt Mulcock:
The belly of the beast. He’s in it.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah, it was funny, you say “this side of things”, we keep mentioning this but the middle seat, we’ve got three of us sitting, you guys can’t see this, but we’ve got three of us sitting on chairs. Me and Matt are on the outside, tilted inwards, staring awkwardly.

Matt Mulcock:
Staring. Each side of his face.

Ryan Isaac:
So, technically, Taylor’s not on any side. He’s in the middle.

Matt Mulcock:
He’s in the middle of the sandwich.

Taylor Sutterfield:
And I have to talk into the mic so I just kinda like side-eye.

Ryan Isaac:
Side-eye and talk straight. There you go. That’s how it’s going today, buddy.

Matt Mulcock:
What’s Taylor’s nickname? I think it might something like…

Taylor Sutterfield:
I’m really worried for this.

Matt Mulcock:
The accountant. Possibly.

Ryan Isaac:
You go for it. It’ll roll off if I’m feeling it. I don’t feel anything yet but if you feel it, let it happen.

Taylor Sutterfield:
Matt complains about the mountain and it’s like, how many people are gonna complain about being compared to a mountain.

Ryan Isaac:
A Hollywood mountain.

Taylor Sutterfield:
You know, mount… He’s gotta really like it.

Ryan Isaac:
[chuckle] That’s so true.

Matt Mulcock:
I really don’t.

Ryan Isaac:
He loves it. Okay, we’re gonna talk about something that’s kind of fun today. And I wanna actually, you didn’t know we were gonna do this, Taylor. Taylor prepared a lot of the things we’re gonna talk about today. So we’re kind of…

Matt Mulcock:
Taylor. He’ll do this by the way. He’ll do this.

Ryan Isaac:
Basically, we’re just gonna give Taylor the mic here in a second. I Googled something that I Googled a long time that I thought was hilarious, which actually describes a lot of things that I Google. But it’s…

Matt Mulcock:
What would one see if they saw your Google history?

Ryan Isaac:
I clear it all the time. Let me back up. Last weekend, we were giving a presentation to a really cool group of women dentists called Guiding Leaders. And it was super cool. But we got on this random topic. I think I opened the can of worms though so maybe not so random. We got on this topic how they’re in an industry where daily, and they said, sometimes hourly, their patients come in and let them know before they start working together, how bad they don’t wanna be there, how much they hate them.

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah. Yeah, yeah.

Ryan Isaac:
Like what were some of the comments? Do you remember?

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah, it was that. It was like I hate you, I have to be here, that type of stuff.

Taylor Sutterfield:
You charge me so much money.

Matt Mulcock:
You charge me too much.

Ryan Isaac:
You cost so much money. I hate this. You hurt me. But I need a problem, you gotta fix it right now.

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah.

Ryan Isaac:
And I got thinking that I don’t think… People think that about our industry and I think it’s totally deserved, but they don’t voice it that often.

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah.

Ryan Isaac:
Like, I don’t… Maybe with you. I don’t know. Do they get on the phone?

Matt Mulcock:
Why did you look at me like that? Oh my god. People probably say they hate you, not me.

Ryan Isaac:
People are generally pretty nice, they don’t get on the phone and be like, “Matt, I really hate being here right now ’cause I don’t like you and this really hurts and you’re really expensive.” They don’t say that to us. They say that to dentists a lot. And that would be really tough. But I Googled something a while ago, and it’s brought this up, and it was like so on topic, if you go punch into Google, why are financial advisors…

Matt Mulcock:
Oh, I love this so much. And.

Ryan Isaac:
And then you just let the auto search auto-complete.

Matt Mulcock:
Can I just guess about that?

Ryan Isaac:
Yes. Guess!

Matt Mulcock:
One of them’s gonna be like “the worst”.

Ryan Isaac:
Okay. Alright. Taylor?

Taylor Sutterfield:
Scary.

Ryan Isaac:
Scary, okay. Keep going. And then the other… There’s another one that’s really similar. Financial advisors are…

Matt Mulcock:
The worst.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah, okay, so I’m gonna read these. It’s insane. Why are financial advisors so expensive, bad, so annoying, so rich, and then the other one’s not rich. Why are they so rich? And why are they not rich? Financial advisors are a rip-off, a joke, not worth it, a joke Reddit, are crooks, are scams, are a waste. So, punch that into Google and I think we have a similar vibe going on in the industry.

Matt Mulcock:
I feel personally victimized right now.

Ryan Isaac:
Do you feel attacked?

Matt Mulcock:
I do.

Ryan Isaac:
I don’t feel attacked at all. I feel like it’s totally warranted.

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah. [chuckle] No, I mean, it’s totally warranted.

Ryan Isaac:
Our industry is gross, folks. It’s kind of a… It can be a gross industry. Mostly, I think, by the way it was started and it’s… Unfortunately, it’s not just and only the people that are in it that kind of cause this problem, it’s the systems and it’s the business models that have created behavior in the people in the industry. There’s a lot of really smart, well-intentioned advisors or even like reps out there in the industry. But they’re in a system, in a business that incentivizes them in the worst possible ways to do things not in the best interest of anyone except for themselves. And so, it gets just slimy, and I mean, I don’t know if you guys feel this way, whenever I start a presentation, especially if it’s a group I don’t know well, do you feel that tension?

Matt Mulcock:
All the time?

Ryan Isaac:
Like in the front of the room, especially… I would like to say I do this on purpose, but it’s mostly because I’m really casual and, kind of lazy in the way I dress. I always wear t-shirts. I wear the Dentist my show t-shirt every time I speak somewhere. I don’t dress up, but I feel I used to and I would feel even worse if I was dressed. Nice.

Matt Mulcock:
Yep.

Taylor Sutterfield:
Yeah.

Ryan Isaac:
So there’s that kind of tension. We got into that when we were presenting last weekend and it was a fun discussion to hear them kind of echo back. Yeah. Like people feel that way about our industry.

Matt Mulcock:
When’s the last time you wore a suit for real.

Ryan Isaac:
Oh, for real suit.

Matt Mulcock:
For real. Like good suit.

Ryan Isaac:
I couldn’t even tell you the year. I don’t know. I don’t. And I’m just now I’m scanning my head. Like when’s the last like wedding or funeral I went to and I didn’t suit for that.

Matt Mulcock:
But for work.

Ryan Isaac:
Oh, for work.

Matt Mulcock:
Never?

Ryan Isaac:
This would have to be…

Matt Mulcock:
10 years. 15 years ago.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah. Easily, 10 years ago.

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah.

Ryan Isaac:
So anyway, that the premise [chuckle] the premise that I’m beginning with is there is kind of an unspoken, vibe from the industry it’s well deserved. I think that the negative connotation is for a reason, people have reservations and can be skeptical about our industry and working and getting advice from someone. And I think it’s totally warranted. And we’re going to talk a little bit about… And one of the reasons for that is because our industry was built on products.

Ryan Isaac:
That’s how our industry began. It didn’t… It wasn’t built on advice giving, it wasn’t built on like, “Hey, you spent an hour with me, advisor, I’ll pay you a fee for that.” Or I’ll pay you a retainer to be with me this year or whatever it is. And then we’ll talk and have… It’s like, I’m gonna sell you something that you don’t even want or know about. I’m gonna make sure you want it and I’m gonna sell it. And I’m not only gonna sell you the thing that pays me the highest amount of commission or gets me a trip, you know?

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah. I want a trip.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah. And that’s how the industry was born. Right. And so let’s get into, I’ll let Taylor kind of introduce, some of his thoughts around this, but the last thing I wanna say about that is there’s nothing wrong with financial products, right? I mean, it’s… We have to have insurances, we have to have loans. We have to have investment accounts. We have to have mutual funds. There’s nothing wrong with them. It’s just, how are they implemented? And why is the big question? And that’s what determines the whole relationship. So Taylor kind of, give us some thoughts on introduce what you were thinking about when you were kind of outlining this discussion about our industry, starting from a product standpoint, that’s where kind of begins and why did all these products and so many bad ones exist in our industry.

Taylor Sutterfield:
Yeah. And I… To kind of echo what you were saying, Ryan, we are the first ones to say that there is definitely some shady financial advisors, but I would say as a whole if you surveyed most financial advisors and asked them, do you feel like you do what’s in the best interest of your clients? The vast majority of advisors would wholeheartedly.

Ryan Isaac:
Say yes. Yeah.

Taylor Sutterfield:
Say yes. And, and they would believe it. Right. They would believe that they are trying to do what’s best for their client. And I think that at its foundation, a lot of this… We blame financial advisors for a lot of things. But I think a lot of the reasons why a lot of these products exist in the first place is just consumer demand. Right.

Ryan Isaac:
Interesting.

Taylor Sutterfield:
And this is not just unique to financial advising industry. I think it’s many things as Americans or as human beings, we want a product, we want something, we can purchase.

Ryan Isaac:
A solution.

Taylor Sutterfield:
We want instant gratification. Right. If I do this, what do I get today? Right. Whereas with financial advising, a lot of financial advising, especially what we do, it’s not about buying a product. It’s about advice. It’s about building habits. It’s about solid financial principles, but that’s hard to sell.

Ryan Isaac:
Well, that’s not the problem.

Matt Mulcock:
We’ve talk about this. Right. We’ve talked about this selling, what we do is really hard. I think this is why we… To your point, we’ve taken the approach. We’ve always said this, like at our… In our business, we sell with education. It’s a slow burn. Right. But to your point, it’s a lot easier to sell a product, because that’s really like what our mind is… Like our human brain is accustomed to or wanting. It is like you said, their instant gratification or this like binary. I have a problem. This one product’s gonna fix my problem. This is supplements in the funny era in the nutrition industry. Like it’s a lot easier to sell this magic pill. That’s gonna fix your problems rather than selling a six month training program that I’m gonna help you get through with discipline and patience. And like that thing is not something that a human is…

Ryan Isaac:
I can’t sell you a habit.

Matt Mulcock:
I’m not gonna sell you a habit.

Ryan Isaac:
I can’t sell you a good habit, Taylor. I like this take because I think it adds context to the probably flippant, joking I was doing about our industry [chuckle] and where.

Matt Mulcock:
We don’t do that.

Ryan Isaac:
It’s not me. But I think that’s really good context. And, and Matt, that the perspective or the comparison to like the, health and diet industry is probably spot on. A lot of these products weren’t probably necessarily created in order to prey on somebody, but more people…

Matt Mulcock:
There was a demand there.

Taylor Sutterfield:
People demand it.

Ryan Isaac:
People demand like our industry fulfilled the demand that people wanted. Which is kind of an interesting way to think about it. You think back to like the heyday of stock market, day trading of, brokers, calling people and letting them know, “Hey, there’s this hot new company.” There’s a predatory element in that, for sure. But there’s also this element of people want to know the next big thing, right? They want the inside track. They want the, the tip or the trick to get them ahead faster with less effort, less money, less time.

Matt Mulcock:
Now, to be fair to this though, like if you look at the history of our industry, the predatory aspect of this is…

Ryan Isaac:
Oh God wild though.

Matt Mulcock:
Well it’s yeah. Right. So if you look at like the eighties, right. Where advisors truly were like the guardians of information.

Ryan Isaac:
Yes.

Matt Mulcock:
Like they used a gap of information between advisor and consumer.

Ryan Isaac:
That’s powered, dynamic.

Matt Mulcock:
As a weapon. Right. That is becoming less. Yeah. You can’t do that really as much. There’s so much information. But that’s where I’m with you totally. This perspective of they’re just given the people what they want. I totally agree. But there also is a predatory aspect. Like they’re also not telling the whole truth.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah. We took and ran. I mean, you can take… I’m sure we’ll get here. We can take life insurance for example, the only kind of life insurance that even existed was the first kind that was invented, which was permanent life insurance. That’s all… There wasn’t cheap term.

Matt Mulcock:
Yep.

Ryan Isaac:
And it wasn’t started as a way to earn a lot of… I mean, it’s just what it was. I mean, it was one of the first kind of investments too, in a way, I remember one of my favorite Christmas movies, what’s his only asset when he’s in front of…

Matt Mulcock:
He’s life insurances, a wonderful life. He’s that? Yeah.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah. He’s there… He’s sitting there and he’s like, oh, humble the death. That’s all he got to his name, the life insurance.

Matt Mulcock:
That’s a solid movie.

Taylor Sutterfield:
Yeah. And just definitionally life insurance, you will never see that money. Right. Because if someone ever gets paid on that policy, you are dead [laughter] unless you faked it. Yeah. And they funneled it to you.

Matt Mulcock:
Now we’re talking.

Taylor Sutterfield:
And so…

Matt Mulcock:
That’s for another episode.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah.

Taylor Sutterfield:
Life insurance was set up to be hated and to consumers are never gonna enjoy… You can definitely sell protection for your family and making sure your loved ones are taken care of but, I just feel like human beings are inherently selfish, and the idea of like, “I’m paying for this thing and I will never ever see the benefit.” And so, okay well, there’s this demand that I wanna pay for something and see a benefit well… Let’s add an investment piece to it.

Ryan Isaac:
Exactly.

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah, Yeah.

Taylor Sutterfield:
Let’s add an investment piece, let’s add some security, let’s add somethings so that you can actually see a value that you could use in your life and still pay to [0:13:52.8] ____.

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah, you’re saying you have to pay for this regardless, you’re gonna have insurance, let’s just add some cash value to it. That’s not a far leap for people. I get that for sure.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah, that’s a really interesting position. Let’s talk about, when we you say financial products, ’cause that’s an important definition to make, because a lot of times we’re explaining to people, we don’t get paid to sell financial products, people like us, a fiduciary or a fee only or a no commission fiduciary. We’re not paid to sell products so let’s list some… What are financial products? What does that even mean?

Taylor Sutterfield:
Well, and we listed permanent insurance. There’s annuities, right? We could bring up examples today that are hot button topics, NFTs.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah, lets go through them. So, insurance products which include annuities…

Matt Mulcock:
Insurance products, that’s pretty big, annuities…

Ryan Isaac:
You mentioned NFTs, which I’ll give my offensive definition of NFTs, why don’t you define it really though.

Taylor Sutterfield:
I think I would have a similar… To me…

Matt Mulcock:
Beanie baby?

Ryan Isaac:
Beanie baby for tech guys.

Taylor Sutterfield:
100%. There’s no intrinsic value behind an NFT. But, coming back to what we’re talking about, the product. This is a product that you can see.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah.

Taylor Sutterfield:
That you can buy it and there is an image or there is a token, there’s something visible and tangible about buying an NFT that for whatever reason, consumers really…

Matt Mulcock:
I want that dang picture of that monkey.

Ryan Isaac:
That money looks really stressed out. I need stress monkey. This is reminding me the conversation of demand and ingenuity from an industry to create a product that… I don’t know, it might be demand for, it was like mid-2000s all the mortgage derivatives. All the derivative securities. I don’t know who was really asking for that, other than bankers who wanted to make a lot of money.

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah, institutional. On the institutional side.

Ryan Isaac:
Which I don’t know, is that demand? Is that consumer demand, if the inside of the industry and bankers are demanding a product to move cash and churn things to make… Is that considered demand for a product?

Matt Mulcock:
I think there’s such a thing as creating demand out of thin air by some… That’s a good example of that it’s like, they didn’t even know the demand was there until it was…

Ryan Isaac:
Apple did that to us.

Matt Mulcock:
Exactly.

Ryan Isaac:
Right.

Matt Mulcock:
Companies can… That’s what innovation is about.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah, true.

Matt Mulcock:
Apple’s a great example.

Ryan Isaac:
Tesla has done that recently.

Matt Mulcock:
Tesla, any of these companies that create… That are innovating, they’re creating the demand with the products.

Ryan Isaac:
We didn’t even know. Yeah.

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah. So…

Ryan Isaac:
I feel like Disneyland does that to me when I’m there.

Matt Mulcock:
Oh yeah. Let’s not go there.

Ryan Isaac:
You all agree.

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah, no. It’s still raw, it’s still raw.

Ryan Isaac:
It just gets me to buy things I didn’t even know I wanted.

Taylor Sutterfield:
Matt’s a little outnumbered on this part.

Matt Mulcock:
I am. I feel… Again I’m getting bullied.

Ryan Isaac:
Okay so, I mean our day and age right now we’ve got… Crypto is a gigantic new… It’s not new but, it’s a whole…

Taylor Sutterfield:
I don’t wanna single out crypto and NFTs but this is where we’ve seen this gold, right? People for years have wanted to buy gold because you can touch it, you can bury it in the backyard, it is something that you can hold. Right, it’s a product.

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah and then you get on the investment side, technically you got, mutual funds are a product, right?

Ryan Isaac:
Totally. Well, why were ETFs invented? What was the demand?

Matt Mulcock:
Exactly, it was…

Ryan Isaac:
I want a mutual fund that I can day trade.

Matt Mulcock:
Exactly. It was in competition to a mutual fund again, same thing. Until someone created it, I don’t think there was a consumer out there thinking, man, I really wish I could day trade my mutual funds. It was created because, it was another way to package investing in stocks or in the markets and they created that product. So, we use products, we’re using ETFs, we’re using mutual funds.

Ryan Isaac:
Well, yeah, yeah. I always think about our industry compared to maybe the dental industry. They use products to implement their plan of health, their oral health plan all the time. I won’t be able to give a comprehensive list here, but you know.

Matt Mulcock:
Let’s go ahead and start from the top.

Ryan Isaac:
Give the scientific names.

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah. [chuckle]

Ryan Isaac:
Any time you get a filling or a crown or a bridge or an implant or braces, those are products… What’s interesting about the financial industry though is the products become the plans in our industry.

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah, they become the solution.

Ryan Isaac:
That’s what… Yeah, the solution, that’s what we lead with those. Not we lead but, our industry leads with those things like, you need this insurance policy, you need this account or this investment. It becomes the solution without even knowing anything. That would be ludicrous in the dental industry. For you to just go in to your dentist, and they’re like, well, we’re just gonna give you new braces prices today or… Because the implant rep came that day and was like, if you sell 10 implants today I’m gonna send you and your family on a vacation. You’ll be like, oh, I’m selling 10 implants today. Whether or not… So, that would be insane.

Matt Mulcock:
If you put it in that context, how wild is that? That’s happening today.

Ryan Isaac:
That’s how our industry still functions probably more than half of it. It’s still like, I have no idea what this person needs but I’ve got to sell 10 implants today.

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah. By the way, when is your trip to Hawaii, Ryan?

[laughter]

Matt Mulcock:
When are you going?

Taylor Sutterfield:
He’s just gonna go?

Ryan Isaac:
Not paid by the company.

Matt Mulcock:
Oh yeah, that’s the catch.

Ryan Isaac:
So, I always like to think about that in the dental industry. Their approach, which is totally rational, is sit down, poke and prod, let’s look in there, let’s take some pictures, let’s have a conversation, let’s look at history. Let’s look at old pictures, old x-rays, let’s come up with a plan, a diagnosis and we’ll pull these products for pieces of implementation, but these products are not the plan and we don’t start there. So, going full circle back to the beginning, that’s why people have. Some skepticism ’cause our industry will lead with those products as the plan before anything else is even known about somebody.

Taylor Sutterfield:
Well, and just the… What we’ve chosen to name ourselves, Financial Planners, Financial Advice, and the vast majority of us, we don’t give advice, we don’t create a plan, we sell products, right.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah.

Taylor Sutterfield:
And that’s kind of the… That’s the biggest problem is, we should have treatment plans in… As financial advisor…

Ryan Isaac:
There should be treatment planning.

Taylor Sutterfield:
We should have… Yeah, a $1000 of savings every month. That’s not a product, so it’s hard to sell, but that should be part of the plan.

Matt Mulcock:
And that’s such a good point, right there. It’s like, I think that’s actually the foundational issue here with our industry, is that right there, which is, if you… Same thing, come back to a dentist. If you go to a dentist, yes of course, there’s some variety of like what they do. Some can specialize in endo, even if they’re not an endo, some can specialize in some treatments, some can do ortho, whatever. So, there’s different things that they can do, but you go… You’re going to a dentist, you know what you’re getting for the most part, right?

Ryan Isaac:
Well, yeah.

Matt Mulcock:
You go to 10 financial planners, a 100 financial planners that call themselves financial advisors. The sad part of our industry. This is just the sad truth. Like you don’t know what you’re getting.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah that’s true.

Taylor Sutterfield:
Depending on where you go.

Matt Mulcock:
And that foundationally is the problem.

Jess Reynolds:
Hey everyone, this is Jess Reynolds with Dentist advisors. As you know, we are passionate about giving dentists, the education and resources they need to make smart financial decisions. We’ve brought you the Dentist Money Show podcast, which has been downloaded over a million times. And we’ve been providing dentists with a premier private wealth management experience for 15 years. Honestly, it’s been great. And now we’re adding to our lineup to help even more dentists get the financial guidance they need. Now, not every dentist is looking for the Cadillac experience that comes with our private wealth management service. So, we have introduced a self-paced subscription based planning service called the dentist money membership. For a monthly fee dentist money members get access to a suite of planning tools, including the innovative elements app and investing portal, CE approved content and a lot of other cool members only benefits. Plus, as a dentist money member, you can pay for one-on-one coaching sessions with a CFP advisor on an as needed basis. To learn more about these features, visit dentistadvisors.com. You can get started right from the website or book a 15 minute demo just to see how it all works. That’s dentistadvisors.com.

Ryan Isaac:
I mean, I’d be interested to know Taylor, how you feel coming into the industry and the company from another part of the industry too, where you’ve seen a lot of the product side, how do you as an advisor switch that mindset, but we know… Sorry it’s kind of a side note, but our elements platform that we’ve built, we’ve built it into a tool that other advisors have been able to use. And what we know about that, that’s been kind of difficult for people to adopt is, it’s a tool that facilitates advice giving. It facilitates conversations, it facilitates the planning and the establishment and the accountability of habits and values. It’s not products.

Taylor Sutterfield:
It’s not products.

Ryan Isaac:
It’s not a product, and for some people it’s been like a godsend, but for other advisors and firms, it’s been a weird concept.

Taylor Sutterfield:
Yeah.

Ryan Isaac:
For them to adopt and be like, “Well, what am I, what am I selling though?”

Matt Mulcock:
How does this help me sell…

Ryan Isaac:
The whole life.

Matt Mulcock:
My whole life [laughter]

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah. So Taylor, from your perspective, I’m curious, do you have any thoughts on how, from our side of the table, an advisor gets to that mindset or like what that even means to kind of adopt that versus the industry standard of products or plans?

Taylor Sutterfield:
Yeah, and that was a very long question, Ryan.

[laughter]

Ryan Isaac:
I don’t have any other kind dude.

[laughter]

Matt Mulcock:
There is no variety.

Ryan Isaac:
I don’t even ask questions, I just tell stories with an inflection at the end, and I’m like, go.

Taylor Sutterfield:
So I will throw my best to answer, but I kind of wanna answer with my own story, you know?

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah, yeah.

Taylor Sutterfield:
This… I come, as you mentioned, Ryan, I come from a background, working at a financial company that was centered around products. And literally if I sold a certain amount of products in my first six months, I got a $500 pen, which…

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah, okay.

Matt Mulcock:
Heck yes, with their number on it.

Taylor Sutterfield:
It did have a number, it was the number that you clear. Once you cleared the benchmark to get the pen, it wasn’t… That wasn’t enough, if you cleared it and some they would include your number that you cleared…

Matt Mulcock:
So, you could have your new client sign deals with this pen.

Taylor Sutterfield:
I have this pen…

Ryan Isaac:
Hold on, I have a question. Did some people have pens with no numbers and then some had pens with numbers and then you knew…

Taylor Sutterfield:
You didn’t get the pen at all…

[overlapping conversation]

Matt Mulcock:
Until you had to earn the pen…

Taylor Sutterfield:
A platform, but it…

Matt Mulcock:
You could Just buy that pen.

Taylor Sutterfield:
Then they inscribed your number. So it wasn’t good enough to just get a pen…

Ryan Isaac:
If you got a pen, you got a number on it.

Taylor Sutterfield:
It was, how big was your number on the pen?

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah.

Ryan Isaac:
Okay.

Matt Mulcock:
Let me see your pen, bro.

Ryan Isaac:
Okay.

Taylor Sutterfield:
But anyways, we sold, there was… Shouldn’t say we, ’cause I just could not bring myself to.

Matt Mulcock:
You were very good at it.

Taylor Sutterfield:
That was the… One of the reasons why I.

Matt Mulcock:
Taylor, didn’t get a pen.

Taylor Sutterfield:
Ultimately here… I did get a pen.

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah, he got a pen.

Taylor Sutterfield:
Not selling this, but once a month we would get together as the whole state, The whole state would get together in a room.

Ryan Isaac:
Okay.

Taylor Sutterfield:
And they would have these presentations that continuing education in a way, right. And someone came from the national office and they had a presentation about permanent insurance versus a 401K.

Ryan Isaac:
Oh, I wanted to ask about the pitting of products against each other like that.

Taylor Sutterfield:
Yeah.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah, okay.

Taylor Sutterfield:
So they would talk about… And they could do this because in their… In this company, they have the numbers to tell what would happen with someone that was paying a $1000 a month into a permanent policy versus a $1000 into a 401K.

Ryan Isaac:
Wait, can we guess before… What we think? What… So, they were, let make sure, I understand this, they were asking or they were presenting the case that maybe…

Taylor Sutterfield:
Basically what would…

Ryan Isaac:
Who’s more likely to keep doing it?

Taylor Sutterfield:
Who would do better, right, and who would end up with more money in their account…

Ryan Isaac:
Okay, yeah.

Taylor Sutterfield:
If they did a $1000 into a permanent insurance policy or a 41000 into a 401K?

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah, okay. I mean, what would you guess Matt?

Matt Mulcock:
C neither do crypto. I have a list of coins, call me.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah.

Matt Mulcock:
I mean what I’m I gonna guess their answer was, for sure, the permanent policy that was their end result.

Taylor Sutterfield:
I mean I think you can see this coming, but the thing that was most interesting to me, like I wasn’t surprised when they said permanent insurance, the reason behind it is what I was surprised at, and they didn’t claim by no means did they claim that their…

Matt Mulcock:
I know where you’re going.

Taylor Sutterfield:
Their investments… That they returned better…

Ryan Isaac:
That their return was better, wasn’t a superior return.

Taylor Sutterfield:
No, the top two reasons, number one is that people will cancel their 401K, their drafts.

Ryan Isaac:
They stopped doing that.

Taylor Sutterfield:
And it was some astounding number, it was like four, five times more likely to cancel your 401K draft.

Ryan Isaac:
Than your insurance.

Taylor Sutterfield:
Than cancelling [0:26:29.7] ____.

Matt Mulcock:
They’re playing the behavioral side of this.

Ryan Isaac:
Well, which makes sense because, it’s a little they know what they’re doing. You don’t stop saving into your insurance policy if it’s also your insurance policy.

Taylor Sutterfield:
Well and not just that most and I’ll say to their credit, they would, they did a good job of pairing term insurance with the permanent policy, they kinda view the permanent policy as an investment, not necessarily…

Ryan Isaac:
As an insurance coverage.

Taylor Sutterfield:
So it wasn’t they were losing insurance coverage, but I think going back to the foundation of why we’re even having this conversation is, the whole life is a product, if you stop that payment, you visibly see a death benefit disappear.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah, you don’t get your, yeah it’s like a straight across exchange, I pay money, I get this thing, and if I don’t pay money, the thing goes away.

Taylor Sutterfield:
And just by nature, it’s anchoring bias, by nature, having a number attached to that policy even though it’s a death benefit they in their minds…

Ryan Isaac:
It has nothing to do with your retirement.

Taylor Sutterfield:
In their head, that’s what I’m gonna have eventually.

Ryan Isaac:
It’s a fascinating behavior, because when you’re saying that question, I’m like, Well, mathematically, the options of investing instead of a 401K in a broad market versus the options that are typically available, especially a whole life policy, which is not a market, based investment, it’s not even.

Taylor Sutterfield:
Yeah and this goes back… The second reason why the 401K didn’t do as bad was not because you couldn’t do better investment return-wise, it was just that a lot of 401K plans are poorly managed and people never really look at them because it’s not a quote on quote product. So there’s no someone checking up on it and making sure that you have re-balanced to the proper asset allocation that you’re invested in. Why is that?

Ryan Isaac:
That you are maintaining diversification and the right allocation.

Matt Mulcock:
That was gonna be my truly, my first thought when you were setting this up was that’s a hard comparison to make because to say 401K is like well what does that mean? I mean, there is a 401K but.

Ryan Isaac:
It feels so intangible.

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah, your third party administrator could be different with different fees, your investment options in that 401K vary widely, depending on where you are, so that makes sense that the second option, or the second reason for that is what you just said, which is like, you never know what you’re gonna get with the 401K.

Ryan Isaac:
Yes, and.

Matt Mulcock:
Yes, and.

Ryan Isaac:
Yes and also, we’ve been talking about this a lot, most people don’t equate investing in the stock market with the purchasing of physical assets.

Matt Mulcock:
Yep.

Ryan Isaac:
It’s usually equated with just some magical casino in the sky that might or might not pay them later, but probably won’t.

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah, Yep.

Ryan Isaac:
They don’t equate… It’s the same level, like you pay money, you get insurance, you put money into 401K you have physical assets that are actually like last month you had 10000 shares of the thing in this month, you have 12000 shares, people don’t equate that, that they’re accumulating physical things it’s just not, they’re not connected and so.

Taylor Sutterfield:
And they almost think that their product is the 401K. We come across this all the time. The misunderstanding of…

Ryan Isaac:
401K gets bad returns.

Taylor Sutterfield:
What a 401K is.

Ryan Isaac: What an ironic thing to say that the reason why 401K aren’t better is because they’re mismanaging… People aren’t paying attention to them, so pay attention to them and [0:29:37.0] ____.

Matt Mulcock:
 Maybe help them with that.

Ryan Isaac:
Make sure they’re, what a funny, okay so that’s your background that’s a really fascinating story, what’s, I mean it’s probably natural for you and other people to kinda ’cause you sat there and heard that wrong, you’re like, this doesn’t make sense to me so for you to make that switch between, I need to go away from the product stuff and I need to find a way to like… You wrote this in you’re like productized is that a word?

Matt Mulcock:
Wait, wait, say the word what was it product?

Taylor Sutterfield:
Product utilization of the American retirement, I think was like.

Matt Mulcock:
Oh my God.

Ryan Isaac:
A I said productize.

Matt Mulcock:
That sounds like a freaking book.

Ryan Isaac:
Mine’s like prantacizing, so it’s not a thing, product utilization of something or other something.

Matt Mulcock:
The American retirement system.

Taylor Sutterfield:
I made the word up, I made the word up.

Ryan Isaac:
Oh you did, okay fine.

Taylor Sutterfield:
It is definitely not a word.

Ryan Isaac:
But you’re on to this, you are on to this thing Reese has talked about this in the past a lot too, which was kind of I mean It’s funny, it’s kind of some of the impetus behind what really pushed us to build the elements planning system was we kinda, I mean we knew this about behavior in people in the industry is people will gravitate and hold on and stick with something when it feels like a physical product. You can widgitize, it’s also not a word.

Matt Mulcock:
But it is now.

Ryan Isaac:
You can widgitize financial planning, make people feel like they get a thing, they’re getting something.

Matt Mulcock:
Yep.

Ryan Isaac:
And so that’s probably the tie in here of like how do you take a habit like Matt said, we’re gonna get you to repeat a boring habit for the next 30 years, and that’s what’s gonna save you and not this product. So what’s the connection there? How do you think we help connect that to people?

Taylor Sutterfield:
That’s honestly why I fell in love with dentist advisors as a company and why I ultimately came here, was the…

Matt Mulcock:
This is the real reason Taylor is here go ahead Taylor.

Taylor Sutterfield:
Surprise, I didn’t really as a kid, grew up wanting to be a financial advisor for dentist.

Matt Mulcock:
What?

Ryan Isaac:
I wanted to be behind a microphone my whole life.

Matt Mulcock:
I wanted to be my own bank, I don’t know about you guys.

Taylor Sutterfield:
It might shock my clients to hear that, but I just fell in love with the way that dentist advisors approach financial planning and the way that I felt about it. And I love every time we sit down with a client and we’re showing them or we’re going through, Hey, this is how much you’re doing in monthly savings, this is what it looks like down the road, their whole total term element that we talk so much about, it almost puts, it almost makes retirement savings into a product, because it shows us, if you continue to do this amount of savings.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah, here’s your thing.

Taylor Sutterfield:
This is what it will look like down the road.

Ryan Isaac:
Exactly.

Taylor Sutterfield:
And when we turn off those savings and we do this all the time, you guys see this, people change their savings draft all the time. But when we do that and we sit down with a client again, we show them, Hey, you changed your savings draft, here’s now what it looks like now, so that they are aware ’cause I think a lot of times when we originally or initially meet with a client and we show them these plans and we show them, Hey, you’re gonna be great if you save X amount in their head… It kinda goes back to the reason why they buy products. They feel good and they’re like, “Okay, I’m good, I’m taken care of.”

Ryan Isaac:
Yes. It fulfills the need… It checks, it takes it off their list. It checks the box.

Taylor Sutterfield:
It checks the box and then they turn those savings drafts off a year or two down the road. And they forget that turning that savings draft off has affected that plan.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah.

Taylor Sutterfield:
And so we try and pull it back and show them again. “Well, you turned this off, now this is what that does. This is how it affects your future.”

Ryan Isaac:
I love that. And I think I would also love to throw in there. I would love if we could widgetize or product utilize… Sorry, I don’t even know what I’m talking about.

[laughter]

Ryan Isaac:
Make the relationship between a good advisor and a client, the widget itself.

Matt Mulcock:
Yep.

Ryan Isaac:
As the thing. Because even there’s cool dashboards and there’s great reports and there’s analytics and there’s data and there’s cool stuff to look at. But that relationship with a third party human who’s not selling you something and who’s not emotionally invested in your decision making. To me, that’s the product.

Taylor Sutterfield:
Yeah.

Ryan Isaac:
You could honestly strip a lot of stuff away that are… I mean they’re cool, some tools and stuff, but it’s really like that communication between two people who really understand each other and really have like mutual trust over a long period of time, that’s the widget to me.

Matt Mulcock:
Well, that’s a good point, Ryan. And I’d say we made a decision a long time ago. Well before I was here, I’d say you and Reese made this decision a long time ago.

Ryan Isaac:
So Reese made it and I went along with it?

Matt Mulcock:
Reese made it, you were there. No. But to that point…

Ryan Isaac:
Reese talked me into it?

Matt Mulcock:
You guys made the decision a long time ago to say, “Look, we’re willing to sacrifice growth of a company,” ’cause you are. We’re saying, “We are trying to sell a relationship. We’re selling education. We’re selling long term habits.” That is hard to scale. Like I…

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah. Not everyone bites off on that.

Matt Mulcock:
No.

Ryan Isaac:
And not right away either.

Matt Mulcock:
No. But the people that get it, get it. Right? Like the people that come to us, that hire us, they get it. And I’m not saying like, you either get it or you don’t, like you…

Ryan Isaac:
If you don’t hire us you don’t… Yeah.

Matt Mulcock:
But I’m just saying that they see the value there and it would be a lot easier. Like let’s just be real. It would be a lot easier to scale this business to sell… If we were selling products.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah, with a product as their solution.

Taylor Sutterfield:
A hundred percent.

Ryan Isaac:
‘Cause that’s what the industry has totally done. And to your point, even if that’s a foreign concept to people, it’s amazing. Our sale cycle is really long in our business because people, they’re not as familiar with that. And for some people it’s kind of natural for them.

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah.

Ryan Isaac:
That maybe that’s just their personality to like outsource and hire people. It’s not mine. I’ll be candid. Like I, I’m like, “I’ll keep everything on my plate and do all my own stuff until I just fail at it.” And then I’m like, “Yeah, I should probably hire the person who knows what’s going on.” But for those who… That’s not a natural tendency, our sale cycle is long because people just go, they’ll go tune into the show or watch videos or interact on webinars for like 12 plus months. People call us…

Matt Mulcock:
How many people… Three years?

Ryan Isaac:
For the first time, they’ll be like, “I’ve been listening for three years. And this is the first time I’m reaching out.”

Taylor Sutterfield:
It happened to me today.

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah.

Ryan Isaac:
Really? What was the…

Matt Mulcock:
Long time listener, first time caller.

Taylor Sutterfield:
They literally said, “I met Reese and Ryan at an event, a dental success network event, in 2018.”

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah. Four years ago.

Taylor Sutterfield:
“And I’ve been listening to the podcast ever since, but I haven’t been in a position to do anything. And I think now is the right time I wanted to talk to someone.”

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah. I love hearing that because I think that long, it’s a long game, but you cultivate the right expectations over time. Like hey, the widget is time. The widget is relationship. The widget is trust. There’s tons of products, and the products are always changing. Products of today will be different than of tomorrow.

Matt Mulcock:
And again, we use products.

Ryan Isaac:
We have to.

Matt Mulcock:
Products are simply tools.

Ryan Isaac:
There are implants.

Taylor Sutterfield:
The treatment plan.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah. They’re our crowns and our bridges and our whatnots and our whose alls and our whats its.

Matt Mulcock:
And our doodads and our…

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah, doodads. But they’re not the plan. The widgets are different and it’s a really cool concept. And it’s foreign in the industry, but it’s growing a lot. Thank goodness. That’s today’s bumper sticker.

Matt Mulcock:
That’s the bumper sticker. Yep. We decided from now on we’re doing…

Ryan Isaac:
Bumper sticker.

Matt Mulcock:
Bumper sticker of the day.

Ryan Isaac:
It used to be T-shirts but we got bored.

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah, now it’s bumper… [chuckle]

Taylor Sutterfield:
Too many T-Shirts.

Ryan Isaac:
Let’s go. Final comments. We’ll go Matt and then Taylor.

Matt Mulcock:
Oh gosh.

Ryan Isaac:
I like doing that to people because then they’re like, they think I’m gonna say something and then I just throw the ball to you. You like what…

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah, just like, “Oh, final thoughts, Matt.”

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah. You can just tell me what you’re hungry for right now, if that’s your final thought. Like that’s fine too.

Matt Mulcock:
I mean I’m always hungry. You had a donut earlier. That’s on my mind right now.

Ryan Isaac:
If you’re ever in Utah, there is no donut in this entire nation, I’ll fight you about this, than a chocolate on chocolate Dunford donut, Dunford bakers. Nothing like it.

Matt Mulcock:
So my final thought would be very simple. It would be products… We’re not disparaging all products, certainly.

Ryan Isaac:
No, they’re necessary.

Matt Mulcock:
We’re saying they are necessary for success. I think everyone has use of products in this industry. I just think it’s… They’re not the solution. I think that’s the biggest difference here is products are rarely, if ever, the solution.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah. Good. Taylor.

Taylor Sutterfield:
Yeah. Final thought, I’m just glad that there are people in the industry fighting the battle. ‘Cause the thing that still gets me down a little bit is we had our best year last year. We brought in a hundred new clients to the firm, we’re 450 plus new clients.

Matt Mulcock:
Mild flex, just a mild flex.

[chuckle]

Taylor Sutterfield:
Mild, but it’s definitely mild when you compare it to where I was at my previous firm.

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah.

Taylor Sutterfield:
And there’s 60 plus individuals across the state that are selling products and bringing on new clients at 150 a person…

Ryan Isaac:
The imbalance is still…

Matt Mulcock:
It’s a beast. Yeah.

Taylor Sutterfield:
150 a person. And so there’s so… It’s such an uphill battle in the sense of…

Matt Mulcock:
It’s a really good point.

Taylor Sutterfield:
We’re doing this education based planning, which is so beneficial and so helpful for so many people. But there are sharks in the water and there are so many people out there. This podcast, Ryan calls it the sad-lebrity, right.

[laughter]

Taylor Sutterfield:
But we get several…

Ryan Isaac:
It’s when you’re kind of… A sad-lebrity is when you’re known for doing something that’s kinda lame.

[laughter]

Taylor Sutterfield:
There only several… There’s several thousand people that listen to this on a weekly basis. So, only a few thousand people are going to hear this.

Matt Mulcock:
Just short of Rogan, I think.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah. Just short…

Matt Mulcock:
Just like a few million.

Taylor Sutterfield:
But compared to the amount of people and the tens of thousands and hundreds of thousands of products that are being pushed, but it’s just a small drop in the bucket and that it needs to continue to happen.

Matt Mulcock:
It’s a really good point.

Ryan Isaac:
That’s a good… I like that the sharks…

Matt Mulcock:
His final thought was way better than my final thought.

Ryan Isaac:
Well, it was a little bit better.

Matt Mulcock:
But I’m not redoing mine. So, I’m just gonna take that L.

Ryan Isaac:
Taylor had me at sharks in the water, that hits close to home for me and I don’t…

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah, it does for you, literally.

Ryan Isaac:
I don’t like that.

Matt Mulcock:
This is why I will ever surf with you. I’m sorry. Can’t do it. Can’t make me.

Ryan Isaac:
Actually Taylor surfed last week and we have that video that might go on the DMM private Facebook.

Matt Mulcock:
It might have to, yeah.

Taylor Sutterfield:
Please, please no. You feel so cool when you do it for the first time, then you watch the video and you’re like…

Ryan Isaac:
Oh, never watch the video.

[laughter]

Taylor Sutterfield:
Please never send it.

Ryan Isaac:
Thanks everyone for being here. Good people plus good technology equals the ultimate widget.

Matt Mulcock:
I love that. Bumper sticker.

Ryan Isaac:
Thanks Taylor for bringing us this topic today. Super cool Matt. You’re always here, but nonetheless still appreciate you all the time. Appreciation doesn’t dip. It’s not diminishing returns on Matt’s presence.

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah. Yeah [laughter]

Ryan Isaac:
Always here still appreciative. Well, thanks for tuning in everybody. If you have any questions for us, you can even get on Taylor’s calendar and you go…

Matt Mulcock:
If you’re lucky.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah. You go to DentistAdvisors.com and click the “Book free consultation” link. And you might be on there. It’s like a one in five chance.

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah.

Ryan Isaac:
20% chance to be on Taylor’s calendar.

Matt Mulcock:
It’s like 20% chance, it works every time.

[laughter]

Ryan Isaac:
20% of the time it works a hundred percent of the time. Thanks for being here. We’ll catch you next time on another episode of The Dentist Money Show. Take care now. Buh bye.

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