ABOUT this webinar
Topic: Five Fee Management Tips for Business Growth and Risk Mitigation

Description: Do you feel burnt out with your marketing? So many firm owners get marred down in the writing and creation of content to support their marketing strategy. In this webinar, Zoë Meggert, founder of Perfectly Planned Content, is going over how to create a scalable content strategy using “pillar content.”

A recent poll showed 60% of clients ranked “clear and understandable fees” among their most important needs as a client.* Fees are the number one most examined topic for the regulators and the SEC reports most are failing.** Revenue is the #1 necessity of a business. However, most RIAs are ill-prepared to discuss their fees with clients or regulators and see “running billing” as simply a necessary evil. Join Redtail and Lacey Shrum, CEO and Founder of Smart Kx, for an interactive webinar discussing five simple adjustments advisors can make to take control of their firm’s revenue, be prepared to ace a regulator exam, and confidently discuss their fees and value with clients.

Register now for this webinar on May 9 at 10 am Pacific.

1268-OAT-5/5/2023

Editor’s note: this guest post is from Ben Cruikshank, President of Flourish, who will be joining us for a webinar, “Why Advisors Need to Have a Solution for Held-Away Cash“, on May 16. You can register for that webinar, or access a recording post-event, here.

The benefits of bringing cash into your orbit

Recent turmoil in the banking industry has suddenly put cash — and FDIC coverage — in the spotlight. Historically, while independent RIAs pride themselves on helping clients with all aspects of their financial lives, many of them have not been taking cash, the simplest of asset classes, into consideration

It turns out that many advisors simply do not know how much cash their clients have in the bank.

In the past, many advisors have disregarded held-away cash because they didn’t think it comprised a major part of the client’s overall net worth. When we’ve asked advisors how much cash they think clients hold — cash that is kept outside the portfolio — they typically answer “1-2%.” However, research has shown that cash reserves tend to be significant, much to the surprise of advisors. The 2022 Capgemini World Wealth report shows that investors with at least $1 million in investable assets actually keep 20% or more of their wealth in cash.

Just take a look at data from Flourish Cash^[1] customers: Across 500+ RIAs that represent $1.5T in total end-client AUM, clients with a self-reported net worth of $1-2MM hold an average of $183,672 in Flourish Cash accounts, while clients with a self-reported net worth of $5-10MM hold an average of $363,831 in cash. Clearly, the cash is there.

“We believe fiduciary advisors will increasingly need to expand beyond investment management and provide both advice and solutions across all aspects of their clients financial lives,” said Flourish CEO Max Lane.

Held-away cash is a critical part of clients’ financial lives, serving as everything from an emergency fund to a resource for short-term liabilities such as a tax bill or a down payment for a house. And, as we discussed in a recent article, cash just makes people feel happier. Researchers at the National Science Foundation found that individuals who have more cash on hand feel more confident about their finances and ultimately more satisfied with their lives.

With this knowledge, we recognize that giving advisors visibility of cash reserves can help strengthen the client relationship in several ways: it enables them to provide more holistic financial planning, builds trust, and offers clients an improved service that gives them a higher yield and more FDIC coverage than the average savings account.^[2]

As advisors integrate cash into their firm, they have the opportunity to increase their level of service. Advisors can help their clients earn more with a competitive yield account, while bringing assets into their orbit, allowing advisors to incorporate cash in the overall financial plan and even convert some of those dollars into fee-only assets.

Learning based on feedback from advisors

Flourish Cash is available only to the clients of partner RIAs who extend invitations to their clients directly. Since advisors do not directly manage Flourish Cash accounts, we originally assumed that most advisors would simply want to send an invite and move on with their lives. But immediately after we launched, we received feedback from advisors that they wanted to do even more for their clients.

Based on feedback from advisors, we launched the ability for advisors to prefill client applications in early 2021, allowing advisors to make it even easier for clients to open accounts.As interest rates began to increase last year, usage of that feature increased. When looking at the data from 2022, we saw that advisors had pre-filled applications for over 20% of client accounts — and as advisors have sent thousands of invitations to Flourish in recent months, we realized we could do even more to help advisors by more deeply integrating Flourish Cash with the systems that advisors use every day, continuing to help connect the dots between the tools and tech advisors use everyday.

Launching the Redtail integration

According to a recent study, 85.7% of advisors use CRM integrations, which house critical client demographic data. Redtail tops the list, used by almost 33% of advisors in the independent RIA space.

We’re excited for the launch of an integration between Flourish and Redtail, which will make it easier than ever for advisors to support their clients by pre-filling applications using the data that advisors already have in CRM with just a few clients. The integration simplifies the process of opening a Flourish Cash account, helping to close the gap between advisors and held-away cash. Justin Burrow, Chief Operating Officer & Partner at Ryan Wealth Management commented on the integration: “We’re very pleased with how Redtail data is used within Flourish. The integration is extremely easy to use, and having our data easily accessible whenever necessary is ideal for our firm. It’s great to see Flourish continuing to innovate by prioritizing integrations with the systems we use every day.”^[3] Learn more about how to implement the integration.

 

^[1] A Flourish Cash account is a brokerage account offered by Flourish Financial LLC. Flourish Financial LLC is not a bank. The cash balance in a Flourish Cash account will be swept from the brokerage account to deposit account(s) at one or more third-party banks that have agreed to accept deposits from customers of Flourish Financial LLC (Program Banks). The accounts at Program Banks will pay a variable rate of interest.

^[2] The cash balance in a Flourish Cash account that is swept to one or more Program Banks is eligible for FDIC insurance, subject to FDIC rules, including FDIC aggregate insurance coverage limits. FDIC insurance will not be provided until the funds arrive at the Program Bank. Our current Program Banks can be found here. For additional information regarding FDIC coverage, visit https://fdic.gov/ and https://www.flourish.com/advisors.

^[3] This feedback may not be representative of the experience of other customers, and is not a guarantee of future performance or success.

Join Redtail and Ben Cruikshank, President of Flourish, for a webinar, “Why Advisors Need to Have a Solution for Held-Away Cash“, on May 16. You can register for that webinar, or access a recording post-event, here.

1143-OAT-4/24/2023

ABOUT this webinar
Topic: Pillar Content: How To Create a Content Strategy That Scales

Description: Do you feel burnt out with your marketing? So many firm owners get marred down in the writing and creation of content to support their marketing strategy. In this webinar, Zoë Meggert, founder of Perfectly Planned Content, is going over how to create a scalable content strategy using “pillar content.”

You’ll learn:

• How to spend only 10-20% of your total marketing time creating content.
• How to determine what your content “pillars” need to be.
• How to repurpose and recycle pillar content to scale and reach more people!

Register now for this webinar on April 11 at 10 am Pacific.

1000-OAT-4/10/2023

Editor’s note: this guest post is from Vito Grammatico, founder and CEO of TimeLyft. He demonstrated TimeLyft’s integration with Redtail CRM in a recent webinar, a replay of which can be viewed here.

Five Ways that Time Management Software Increases Advisor Revenue

Time management is one of the most important factors for success as a financial advisor. There is only so much time that can be allocated to each business activity and client, so how you plan your day is crucial to ongoing profitability. With this in mind, the use of time management software can help advisors understand and improve time usage, leading to a more successful business. It can be a game changer for financial advisors, as it allows an in-depth analysis of business activity and client profitability. Here are five ways that time management software increases advisor revenue:

1. Service Model Optimization
   It is crucial to have an established service model for client contact and tasks. Your current service model may seem fine, but not until you see the impact on hourly profitability can you optimize it to increase revenue. Time management software will show the time spent on each client monthly, as well as hourly profitability for each client.
2. Capacity Analysis
   Time management software helps advisors plan their growth strategy. They can analyze how much capacity they have for growth based on current time utilization and use this to find efficiencies. Comparing your time usage to your monthly availability will highlight if you have capacity for further growth.
3. Client Analysis
   Some clients may take more of your time than others, and this can take time away from other clients and business development. You can use time management software to track time spent with each client and compare this to your overall business activity.
4. Business Development
   How effective is your business development? Advisors can compare the time they spend on prospecting to the number of clients they acquire monthly.
5. Advisor Feedback
   If you own a financial advisory firm or manage advisors, it is important to understand your advisors’ time usage and performance. You can use time management software to compare advisors’ time usage on your team. You can instantly determine areas where advisors are struggling and give them guidance to improve. If you are an advisor looking for feedback on your own performance, then time management software also offers a great way to analyze your performance and improve each month.

These are just a few of the many benefits for advisors to integrate time management software into their business planning and daily activity. Time management is the key to avoiding burnout and providing the best service to clients. Often it is not until we visualize the ongoing usage of our time that we can truly make impactful changes and understand the service requirements for each client.  Time management software is a great way to accomplish this.  New users can sign up for a one-month free trial of TimeLyft’s time management software. Please visit www.timelyft.com.

0949-OAT-4/4/2023

ABOUT this webinar
Topic: Effective delegation: How to leverage your team’s strengths and improve efficiency

Description: Delegation is a vital management skill. But for some, it’s the hardest to put into practice. Join Redtail and Kate Guillen, founder of Simplicity Ops, as they share 3 strategies to improve efficiency in your firm through effective task delegation.

This webinar will focus on providing you with tools for utilizing Redtail to:

• Manage firm tasks.
• Communicate with your team using activities.
• Run reports to measure productivity and your team’s bandwidth.

Register now for this webinar on March 14 at 10 am Pacific.

0708-OAT-3/9/2023

ABOUT this webinar
Topic: Accelerate Growth and Scalability using Collaboration Tools

Description: Join Jen Goldman, CFP® and Business Transformer, to see the latest collaboration tools that increase productivity, improve communication and adoption of change.

Key Points: Learn how collaboration increases culture, learning curve, progress, adoption, and produces clarity on each person’s value to the team and business.

Key Tech Ecosystem elements discussed: Business Intelligence, Visualization, Project Management, Core, and CRM

Register now for this webinar on February 14 at 10 am Pacific.

0385-OAT-2/9/2023

Editor’s note: this guest post is from Stephanie Dannebaum, ChFC®, MBA/MPP, Founder and Principal CRM Consultant at Stephanie Dannebaum Consulting. She led the Practice Management Takeover webinar we hosted on Tuesday, January 10th, 2022, a replay of which can be viewed here.

Taking Your Technology from Major Barrier to Exponential Growth

Financial Advisor technology is your competitive advantage.

I experienced technology as a barrier for myself when I was working at one of the largest independent Registered Investment Advisory firms in the country. I served as the resident technology expert at my firm and I created Stephanie Dannebaum Consulting to help other Registered Independent Advisory firms successfully implement their customized client service processes with the robust features of Redtail CRM.

This blog post can be your sherpa as you navigate through the hills and valleys that is Financial Advisor technology.

What Part Does Each Person Need to Play? 

Advisors should be using technology the least.

The idea is to optimize your tech stack and empower your staff so you, as the Financial Advisor, can free up your plate to generate business.

Staff members should be the ones to log in to your technology systems every day to track notes and complete to-do items.

A condensed version of most software through a mobile app is enough for an advisor, where a staff member is going to want a full web version to be successful.

Set rules, expectations, and boundaries for your technology, don’t just set it and forget it. 

The Top 3 Rules to Engage your Staff in Technology

Rule #1: Play in the Technology Sandbox

Typically most software systems will offer a free trial. Free trials are the perfect opportunity to click every button you see. The software will not break from clicking buttons. If there is sample data within–that is even better! Use it as a safe sandbox to go in and play without any thoughts or repercussions. It’s a no judgment zone and you’re guaranteed to discover something new that will add value to your office. This is not the time to sit on the fence and say, “I’m not tech savvy,” this is the time to dig around and get under the hood!

Remember: The best case study to use is yourself. Put in your contact information, your details, your favorite restaurant, and see how you like to see and find information. 

Rule #2: Acknowledge the Curse of Knowledge

When you know something, you forget what it was like not knowing. For technology you might have scheduled a demo, you might have sat in on a training–but your team didn’t. Once it’s time to introduce a new software, assume there is zero experience with the product. From that expectation you can schedule hands-on education. You need an expert to visually demonstrate your expectations. From logging in to tracking RMDs. Your team is in a position where they don’t know what they don’t know and knowing there is a learning curve is better than ignoring it. Give people a chance to demo–to see it, feel it, read about it, and practice what you’re expecting, and adaptability will be more than 90 percent.

Rule #3: Develop an Internal Expert

The great thing about financial advisor technology is that it’s not like Apple where you have to wait for the next update for new things to be released. Instead, new things are added to software regularly! That can include bug fixes or brand-new features. A resident expert can keep up with any changes to continuously improve your office.

Get this person signed up for the software’s newsletter and reserve a few minutes at each team meeting to let them explain any new updates. It’ll empower your employee by giving them ownership and they can be the go-to person for questions.

Here are some other ideas to get the adoption ball rolling:

• Offer incentives like a gift card
• Include staff wins in team meetings
• Offer specific recognition during staff reviews
• Gamify adoption and announce leaders in a certain category
• Question staff to discover pain points and give them the power to fix it

For more on templates and client phases, watch my Takeover Tuesday webinar replay I did for Redtail Technology on how to get your database in good working order. I also have a downloadable PDF you can access on my blog.

Still Lacking Technology Adoption? 

Sometimes in working with offices I find that someone on the team can say things until they are blue in the face and no one listens. Then someone like me can say something one time and suddenly. . . it’s adoption time!

My thought is that these tips will help you and you’ll find a few strategies and tactics that will work.

Remember technology adoption is the single biggest way to give your firm a competitive advantage–you’ve got this! 

Warm Regards,

Stephanie Dannebaum

0071-OAT-1/11/2023

ABOUT this webinar
Topic: New Year, New Workflow: Templates and Clean Up for a Seamless Client Experience

Description: Let’s build a Workflow together and get your database in good working order for the new year! We’ll clean up, set up, and teach you about the different templates available for your client phases in Redtail CRM. Sign up for a take-home template! Presented by Stephanie Dannebaum of Stephanie Dannebaum Consulting.

Register now for this webinar on January 10 at 10 am Pacific.

0033-OAT-1/6/2023

ABOUT this webinar
Topic: Virtually unite using workflows for a cohesive client experience

Description: The post-COVID work environment has shifted the workplace dynamic for all professions, including financial advice and how advisors deliver that advice to their clients. As firms grow and scale and therefore divide the client service responsibilities, it’s important that “the left hand knows what the right hand is doing.” We’ll demonstrate how to use a variety of client service workflows to give everyone on the team transparency of “who’s doing what, when, and for which client” which eliminates the dreaded intraoffice “reply-all” email or instant messaging system that’s been used in the absence of any proven system.

Register now for this webinar on November 1 at 10 am Pacific.

2045-OAT-10/28/2022

Editor’s note: this guest post is from Derek N.H. Notman, CFP®, Founder and CEO at Intrepid Wealth Partners. He led the Practice Management Takeover webinar we hosted on Tuesday, January 11th, 2022, a replay of which can be viewed here.

Tips for financial advisors to set up an RIA

Redtail serves a lot of financial advisors, some independent, some affiliated with wire houses, BDs, etc.  

For advisors looking to break away and start their own registered investment advisor, here’s a list of tips & considerations you should think about on your journey to independence.

I took this journey myself, making the transition in December of 2021, to form my own RIA (Intrepid Wealth Partners) where I use the Redtail CRM, and learned a ton along the way.  Please use this blog post as a way to learn from my journey.

What is a Registered Investment Advisor?

A Registered Investment Advisor is a firm with at least one Investment Advisor Representative that advises clients on investments and manages their financial portfolios, and is registered with the SEC (US Securities and Exchange Commission) or a State securities authority.

To become an RIA, you must meet certain legal and professional qualifications, such as passing the Series 65 exam or maintaining your CFP® designation, completing Form ADV parts 1, 2, and 3, and registering with the SEC, and updating your U4 when making the transition.

Although these things are necessary to get up and running there are other items that are equally important and will need your attention.

Tip One:  Define Your Why 

Without knowing your Why, the rest will be more challenging.  Ask yourself the following:

• Why do you want to become an independent Financial Advisor?
• What does running your own firm mean to you?
• How would your life change if you started a registered investment advisor practice?
• Why is now the time to start?
• Will the grass be greener?

Knowing what you want and, more importantly, why you want it assists in keeping you motivated and focused when the going gets tough.

Tip Two:  Existing Contracts and Risk 

Most of us as advisors have signed some form of contract with our present/existing firm. It’s important to know what they say and what liability you may be exposed to when starting your own firm.

Non-Compete & Non-Solicit Contracts 

Do you have a Non-Compete or Non-Solicit contract? What are the terms of these contracts? Have they been enforced by your firm in the past?

These contracts differ from one company to the next and even from one state to the next. There are many gray areas here, so if you aren’t especially sure about the contracts you’re bound to, consider speaking to an attorney who’s familiar with these types of contracts.

What does your spouse have to say? 

Make sure you have a transparent and to the point conversation about leaving your present employer, what it means, and the risks that are involved.

Your spouse will be one of your biggest supporters and deserves to know everything about the transition you’re considering.  Without their support it will be a lot harder to make the move.

Calculate your risks

Leaving your existing firm could be a significant risk on your part so you really should be intentional on any and all risks you subject yourself to.

Assess the pros and cons before executing your move. If you are careful enough in your planning and execution, you will make your move to independence as smooth as possible. Make sure you spend time identifying the risk and evaluating if it’s worth the reward.

This isn’t a spur of the moment idea, it’s something that needs to be carefully thought out and planned.  I thought about my own transition for almost a year and then spent another 4 months getting everything in order to make it happen.

Tip Three:  What client data are you bringing to your new registered investment advisor? 

As part of examining your existing contract you will learn what client data you can and cannot bring with you.  This will vary depending on a variety of factors but make sure you find out early on in your transition process as you will want to communicate, as allowed to, with your existing clients so they will know what’s coming and why.

Speaking to your clients will realistically take months so don’t plan on a blast email on a Friday and think everything will be ready to go on Monday.

Tip Four:  Your Brand & Niche 

You will need to determine the name of your firm. This will drive everything from your website URL to your marketing initiatives and logo design and a color scheme. 

If you’re like me you may already be operating under a brand or DBA so bringing that name brand with you will be much easier than having to start from scratch.  If you’re operating under your own proper name now then you will want to give yourself time to figure out a brand, name, logo, etc. that will resonate with you and your niche clients.

Your branding is your definition of your ideal client. In a perfect world, what does your ideal client look like? Who do you want to cater to? What is unique about their demographics?

By defining your ideal client, you’re finding your niche. And this is imperative when it comes to your branding as you’ll want to gear everything towards them.

All of this can seem overwhelming which is why I created my Conneqtor financial advisor training & course to show advisors exactly how to do all of it.

Tip 5:  Some RIA housekeeping Items

Although not as fun as figuring out your brand, etc., you will still need to tackle the following tasks and then some:

• Filing your RIA entity paperwork (LLC, S-Corp, etc.)
• Know the rules and regulations of the state you are filing in
• Tax ID for your entity
• Will your RIA be State or SEC-registered?
• Notice file in each state you are registered in
• Update your U4, the timing of this is delicate
• Business bank account and credit card
• Set up payroll service
• Establish a retirement plan and Health and E&O Insurance

This is not by any means an exhaustive list but what I’m sure you can see here is that there are a lot of moving parts in play.  Some of these things you can do on your own.  Some you can ask your CPA and/or attorney to help with, and some can even be done by firms like FIN Compliance (I use them).

Something also to keep in mind is what will you do for things like leadgen, digital marketing, and your tech stack to serve your clients?

For more on all of this and then some make sure to watch my Going Indy webinar replay I did for Redtail and part two of my guide for going independent on my Conneqtor blog.

Overwhelmed 

If you’re feeling overwhelmed right now then you are not alone.  Making a move to independence is a big deal and should not be considered lightly.  You may be feeling like you need to make the move right now but most likely you actually have some time to be thoughtful and make the move a good one for you and your clients.

I hope these tips and resources have given you some direction in starting your own registered investment advisor.  

Sending positive vibes your way!

Best Regards,

Derek Notman

 

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