79. ZOOM FATIGUE !!! (from a financial advisor's perspective)

picture credit to the owner

Oh no!!! Not another zoom meeting!!!

Agency managers have never had it so good, when I was on the other side of the fence (distribution development on the corporate side), agency meetings are always preceded by:

• the conceptualization of the theme - it can be a market update, product launches, announcement of sales campaigns or to share insights that we hope will help our advisors provide more value to their clients
• this is then followed by budget requests to cover the costs of the venue, some light snacks and maybe some giveaways
• and if the budget permits, we would be inviting a guest speaker to increase attendance especially if we can afford a "credible" and "known" resource person

Nowadays, its mostly just coming up with a theme for the meeting, maybe invite a speaker, announcing the meeting and setting it up over zoom

I am all for efficiency and reach of online meetings, but after attending so many since the lockdown two years ago, I literally have to be more discerning as the time I would spend listening to the drawl of a typical zoom meeting is competing with the time I could have spent watching YouTube Videos of MDRT sharing (https://www.youtube.com/c/MillionDollarRoundTable) or watch Boss Rex reinforce old learnings and learn new ones (https://www.youtube.com/c/RampverFinancials)

CREDIBILITY - I think this is the key, as there are already costs savings from not holding these on a physical venue (at least most of it), maybe the organizers that use this savings in getting more credible speakers as they can be more expensive compared to run of the mill speakers they normally feature

I find it a waste of time (pardon my directness) to listen to speakers who have not sold a thing in their life trying to teach me about selling, a non-MDRT speaker telling me how to qualify or someone without any meaningful field experience coaching me on how to be a better financial advisor, its much like a blind person leading the blind

as they say - "pay peanuts, you get monkeys" ha ha ha