Wayne Cotton, CLU
CEO of Cotton Systems
Advocis Member since 1968
Was a financial advisor for 28 years
Member - Million Dollar Round Table 30+ years
Qualifying member of MDRT, COT or TOT for 21 years
Has given over 1,000 industry keynote speeches or workshops
Addressed many management conventions (LAMP, GAMA, LIMAC, GA, etc)
Contributor of Precision Marketing in the Advocis Best Practices Manual
Author of:
The Precision Marketing Approach™ for strategic marketing
Precision Management Workshop for management teams
The Agency Development Program for candidate referrals
The Cotton Agency Productivity System for agency building
BaseFlow and CareerView selection program for candidates
Fast-Track Selection program to get new advisors rolling fast
Registered Advisor Management (New Advisor Growth) Program
The Business Development Program™ referral presentation
The Cotton Client Acquisition System™ for new client building
The Principles of Growth™ for coaching financial advisor growth
The Registered Advisor Management Program™ for training advisors
The Precision Growth™ newsletter to help grow established advisors
The Precision Leader™ newsletter for those that develop new advisors
Wayne started as a life insurance agent in 1968. He was with a major life insurance company, but their dysfunctional “success formula” caused him to mentally quit many times in his early years. It was Wayne’s incessant search for better ways of doing business that caused him to begin developing the Cotton System in 1972.
Soon Wayne was qualifying for the Million Dollar Round Table. At the request of other advisors, he started publishing his concepts and tools in the early 80’s. Soon it became the first “Cotton System” that included specific training to help others benefit from Wayne’s consumer-driven style of conducting business.
Thirty-five years after he stared developing the tools in his system, Wayne continues to develop, expand and perfect the Cotton System. When someone mentions the Cotton System to Wayne today, you will often hear him say, “Which one?” Several versions have been developed over the years...with each one better than the last. Many advisors, both newer and established credit Cotton systems for their survival and success.
The latest “Cotton System” is called the Cotton Client Acquisition System and is focused on positioning producers in front of the right consumers for their (advisor’s) current level of competence and confidence. This of course, leads to consistency in results and fewer unhealthy dependencies on management or mentor time to prop up new advisors that can’t get rolling.
More than 30 companies in Canada, USA and Australia have adopted the Cotton System as their program to develop new or young advisors into successful producers. Wayne has also created several tools and training programs to help field leaders recruit and select the right new candidates. His fast-track program helps managers guide new recruits to 30 clients in 90 days and 100 clients in year one...with little or no joint field work. The result is quite extraordinary.
Wayne’s new program to convert young advisors to MDRT members by Year Two is an extension of the Cotton fast-track program. It has led to the project of developing the Model Agency, using Cotton Principles of Growth™ and Wayne’s processes for professional client acquisition. The first beta-test firm that implemented Wayne’s model agency process resulted in a scratch organization developing fifteen new producers and six MDRT qualifiers in their first two years. Their retention at the two year mark was still at 100%.
New advisors need total clarity and proven process to succeed. Wayne believes it is high time we blew up the sacred cows attached to the outdated advisor training formula that really never worked in the first place. They include such things as Project 100, confusion training, joint field work, mentoring to advanced markets, extensive and intensive product training, multiple methods of marketing, and many other diffusion generators that prevent young advisors from achieving success. You’ll learn more about the issues and solutions in the Precision Leader newsletter.