Advisor for Life
Practical Advice for Succeeding in the
Wealth Management Arena
by Stephen D. Gresham
The
culmination of a two year research-based
“random walk” around the financial advice
industry, Advisor for Life seeks to provide
financial advisors, investment product
managers and industry executives with
insight into the relationship between top
advisors and millionaire households.
Interviews and firsthand observations
comprise the bulk of the research, which is
supplemented by additional marketplace data
from several sources. The project’s goal was
to first identify those products and
services most valued by high-net-worth
households and then seek different
strategies for addressing those
requirements. This client-based approach to
advisory best practices provides a more
complete view of the potential for success
among a wide variety of advisors. No matter
your approach to the market, there is
something in here for you.
Consistency is the book’s major theme since,
in the process of researching and writing
Advisor for Life, it became clear that the
very best advisors:
•
Know what their clients
will pay for (Chapter One – The Value of
Advice)
•
Have developed a
compelling Investment Philosophy (Chapter
Two)
•
Utilize a defined and
effective Investment Process (Chapter Three)
•
Help clients set
realistic goals (Chapter Four)
•
Define and minimize
“risk” in both financial market and
real-life terms
(Chapter Five)
•
Understand the
importance of diversification and how to
educate clients
as well (Chapter Six)
•
Employ
alternative investments to ordinary stocks
and bonds
(Chapter Seven)
•
Know how to help their
clients manage their dreams and fears
(Chapter Eight)
•
Facilitate the
growth of a client’s household over time
(Chapter Nine)
•
Understand the
family dynamic and all of its challenges
(Chapter Ten)
•
Appreciate the changing
role of wealth throughout a lifetime
(Chapter Eleven)
•
Know how to articulate
their Unique Value (Chapter Twelve)
•
Can quantify their
Unique Value to clients and prospective
clients
(Chapter Thirteen)
•
Have built a meaningful
and consistent Client Experience
(Chapter Fourteen)
•
Drive referrals with
service and attention to several points of
contact
(Chapter Fifteen)
•
Sell themselves
effectively vs. their competitors (Chapter
Sixteen)
•
Manage their practices
to maximize both current income and
long-term
value (Chapter Seventeen)
•
Maintain a
reasonable balance between education, work,
leisure and
family time (Chapter Eighteen – Taking Care of Number One)
Tools and Tactics
Sprinkled throughout Advisor for Life are
anecdotes from top advisors and tools for
improving the client experience. Many top
advisors gave generously of their time and I
am indebted to them for their insights and
their candor. The tools include
market-tested diagrams and questionnaires to
help millionaire clients better understand
the wealth management arena and help
advisors become more consistent in the
delivery of their best ideas.
If you have a moment, please consider also
the Introduction, in which I challenge us
all to consider the forces at work within
and around the advice industry and to take
on those challenges in order to provide
better, more consistent client solutions.
Our future – and that of the clients –
depends on our success.
Published
by John Wiley & Sons, Inc.
"Advisor for Life"
The New Managed
Account Solutions Handbook
by Stephen D. Gresham
Includes the following
chapters:
Foreword by
Christopher Davis, President of the Money
Management Institute
Chapter One: The Evolution of
Managed Accounts
The managed account industry
began amidst pension reform and has grown in
response to investors’ demands for a
consistent process to manage their
investments.
Chapter Two: The Revolution
of Unified Managed Accounts
Unified managed accounts, or
UMAs, evolved as investors sought greater
diversity among their investments and
demanded a platform that could incorporate
fixed-income components, exchange-traded
funds and other instruments.
Chapter Three: The Wrap
Account Option
Mutual fund wrap accounts
enable the financial advisor to leverage the
potential of multiple mutual funds in a
single client account. Here’s how to tell
which clients are best served by managed
accounts and which are best served by wrap
accounts.
Chapter Four: Alternative
Investments
The incorporation of
alternative investments will offer clients
greater diversification with assets whose
performance is not often directly correlated
to movement of capital markets. What exactly
are they and how can you use them
effectively?
Chapter Five: The Key
Benefits of Managed Accounts and Recurring
Revenues
Managed account solutions
allow for a more efficient use of the
advisor’s time, access to a more affluent
clientele, a consistent revenue stream
leveraged by the market’s growth and a more
valuable business entity—plus clients prefer
fees over commissions.
Chapter Six: How to Tell if
Managed Account Solutions Are Right for Your
Practice
Are managed account solutions
right for your practice? Here are ways to
evaluate your potential for success.
Chapter Seven: Transforming
Your Practice into a Wealth Management
Business
Wealth managers who’ve made
the transition from erratic,
commission-driven income to consistent
fee-driven revenues explain how they handled
the transition and what other advisors can
learn from their experiences.
Chapter Eight: Developing
Your Managed Account Solutions Business
Referrals from current
clients and fellow professionals can bring
prospects to your door but you must know how
to ask for referrals, have materials on hand
to promote your practice and know how to
determine which prospects are best avoided.
Chapter Nine: Positioning
Yourself as a Solutions Provider
By cultivating mutually
beneficial relationships with service
providers, allied professionals and the
media, you can develop a steady stream of
referrals to help grow your business.
Chapter Ten: Attracting and
Retaining Clients
Five strategies for capturing
additional assets from your managed account
clients.
Chapter Eleven: Building on
Your Success
Techniques for establishing
yourself as an expert source in managed
account solutions and cultivating mutually
beneficial relationships with investment
companies and other financial services
professionals.
Chapter Twelve: The Future of
Managed Accounts
Industry leaders present
their vision of what the future holds for
the managed account solutions industry.
Resource Guide
Sample
business plans, investment policy
statements, manager evaluation formulas, and
sample seminar invitations.
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The Managed Account
Handbook
How to Build
Your Financial Advisory Practice Using
Separately Managed Accounts
by Stephen D. Gresham
Steve Gresham
has gathered leading advisors' best
practices for success in managed accounts -
from product basics to practice management
specifics. The Managed Account Handbook can
help you transition to a fee-based practice,
develop specialized skills and grow a
thriving managed accounts business.
"The Managed Account Handbook" |
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Attract and Retain the
Affluent Investor
Winning Tactics for Today's Financial
Advisor
by Stephen D. Gresham & Evan
Cooper
Are you
prospering from those millionaires next
door? Despite the growth of online
investing, most affluent investors manage
their financial assets with the help of an
advisor - be it a stock broker, financial
planner, accountant, or attorney. And while
many advisors target this burgeoning
affluent market, most harbor concerns about
their ability to compete in the future.
In Attract and Retain the Affluent Investor,
Steve Gresham, an expert in marketing
financial services to the affluent, and Evan
Cooper, a respected financial journalist,
show you how to increase your revenue and
earnings by building an affluent client
base. Along the way, they address your most
pressing questions.
"Attract and Retain the Affluent
Investor" |
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Magazine
Articles
Sticker Shock
Registered Rep Magazine -
March 2007
by Stephen
D. Gresham and Glen E. Gresham,
M.D
My father and I had the same reaction
when we looked at our copies of The
New York Times on a Saturday morning
at the end of January. On the front
page, just above the fold, was an
article entitled, “A Contrarian View:
Save Less and Still Retire with Enough.”
Had we read that headline correctly?
After decades of helping retirees cope
with financial and medical issues, our
shock and dismay were the same as if a
parenting magazine had declared “Let
Kids Play in Traffic — It's Fun.”
...
More>>
Grandma's Got A New Boyfriend
Registered Rep Magazine -
February 2007
by Stephen
D. Gresham and Glen E. Gresham,
M.D.
“Mother, you must be out of your
mind!” Ellen Fulton's eyes
blazed with indignation as she
put down her coffee cup with a
shaking hand. “He's the same age
as your children, for goodness'
sake! Have your little fling, if
you must, but stop talking
nonsense. Marriage, indeed! You
can't be serious!”
...
More>>
The Price Isn't Right
Registered Rep Magazine -
January 2007
by Stephen
D. Gresham and Glen E. Gresham,
M.D.
If you stop to think about it,
there are a number of surprising
parallels between the medical
and financial-advisory
professions. Both remedy issues
vital to long-term happiness:
health and wealth. Both require
highly technical knowledge,
coupled with personal and
intimate service. Both require
an initial assessment and
diagnosis a look at past and
family records, a talk about
current conditions ...
More>>
Diagnosing Your
Prospects' Pressure Points
Millionaire Hot Buttons
Registered Rep Magazine -
December 2006
by Stephen
D. Gresham and Glen E. Gresham,
M.D.
The end of each calendar year
provides a natural setting for
serious prospecting. Full-year
performance and other results
are easy to present to potential
clients and their accountants,
who can quickly make comparisons
among competing advisors,
retirement plans, mutual funds
and managed accounts. So how can
you use this moment to capture
additional assets and referrals
...
More>>
Partners In Care
Registered Rep Magazine -
November 2006
by Stephen
D. Gresham and Glen E. Gresham,
M.D.
It had been a festive family
reunion. Len and Gloria Benton
reclined on the veranda of their
upscale retirement community
condominium and happily rehashed
every detail. “We're so lucky,”
sighed Gloria. “Thanks to your
good planning, we've been able
to retire early, buy this great
place and really enjoy getting
the whole family together — our
kids, grandchildren and our
parents!” ...
More>>
Caregiver for Life
Registered Rep Magazine -
October 2006
by Stephen
D. Gresham and Glen E. Gresham,
M.D.
After her
traumatically brain-injured
(TBI) son, Jim, had finally
settled down and gone to sleep,
Adelaide Newton sat alone in her
living room to ponder her
current situation. While
her two older children were
married, had children and were
living independent lives of
their own, Adelaide, a widow in
her early 60s, had to decide how
to deal with Jim, 19, once a
very promising college student.
A skiing accident had left him
with permanent mental
limitations. She had barely
recovered from the loss of her
husband from a sudden heart
attack when the call had come
that Jim was being airlifted to
the regional trauma center
...
More>>
Scaling Old
Peaks
Registered Rep Magazine -
September 2006
by Stephen
D. Gresham and Glen E. Gresham,
M.D.
The longest block
of Kenilworth Road in our town
has so many physicians that it
has been jokingly referred to as
“Pill Hill.” It is a tree-lined
street in affluent suburbia
dotted with large stately houses
— most designed in the Tudor
style — that were built between
the two World Wars. They were
ideal homes for affluent
physicians and their broods in
the 1950s and 1960s. Those
doctors are now senior citizens.
the kids are long gone and the
houses are too large, too much
work to maintain and — for many
— too lonely. This brings a
previously unthinkable agenda:
selling the home and moving to a
smaller place
...
More>>
Retirement Roulette
Help clients prepare to win the
longevity sweepstakes
Registered Rep
Magazine -
July 2006
by Stephen
D. Gresham and Glen E. Gresham,
M.D.
The members of the
Cadeucis Colloquium, a
discussion group of retired and
semi-retired physicians, sat
together in Dr. Kaplan's living
room overlooking the lake one
recent afternoon. Dr. Kaplan
finished serving drinks and
asked: “Who goes first?”
“I noted in the New England
Journal of Medicine [April 20
issue] that overall life
expectancy at birth in the U.S.
has reached 77.2,” Dr. Whiteside
said. “We're catching up with
Canada, Britain and Japan — at
last. Of course, they've always
achieved their superior figures
with less than half of our
per-capita cost for health care.
But, let's take time off from
talking costs and just consider
the impact of this demographic
on our thoughts about aging.”
...
More>>
The Final Reward
Registered Rep Magazine -
May 2006
by Stephen Gresham and Glen E.
Gresham, M.D.
A patient fidgeted in his chair
in a doctor's waiting room.
Impatient as always, he was torn
between complaining about being
kept waiting and a creeping
anxiety about what the doctor
might tell him. Approaching 60,
he had always been healthy,
hard-charging and successful.
His marriage was still solid,
his kids were launched on
promising careers, he still
excelled at tennis and he had no
“financial worries.” There were,
however, clouds gathering on his
horizon. For several months, he
hadn't felt quite up to par. He
was frequently tired, sometimes
edgy and having “gut problems.”
His initial hope that this would
all just go away was fading and,
when his urine had turned dark,
he caved and called the
doctor ...
More>>
The Rewards of Risk
Review
Registered Rep Magazine -
April 2006
by Stephen D. Gresham and Glen
E. Gresham, M.D.
Life is full of risks, and the
financial advisor's job is
largely to minimize the
financial perils their clients
face. What the risks are, how
they will be reduced and what it
will cost to do so must all be
taken into account with the
knowledge that the task will
vary from one household to the
next. Nor are the concerns of
every generation the same.
Contrary to what you would
expect from conventional wisdom
and this space, the greatest
fear of baby boomers is not
death or a market collapse.
Instead, according to Age Wave
guru Ken Dychtwald, their chief
worry is the loss of
independence characterized by
contracting a major illness or
being confined to a nursing
home. A Dow debacle didn't even
make the list ...
More>>
Prime Time Risks
Registered Rep Magazine -
March 2006
by Stephen D. Gresham and Glen
E. Gresham, M.D.
Buttoning his
shirt at the end of the physical
exam, he was the very picture of
a clean bill of health: A
handsome, fit businessman, who,
at 47, was in the prime of his
life. Call him Matt Parsons.
That's not his real name, but
what happened next that day in
the doctor's office is based on
a true — and too common — story:
“Well, what do you think it is,
Doc?” a subdued Parsons said.
Parsons was having problems
walking and his doctor started
by explaining that it was due to
muscle spasm, which probably
meant that some changes were
taking place where his nerves
originate in the spinal cord.
Parsons also had episodes of
blurred vision and his doctor
discussed them with him, too.
They needed to be evaluated and
his doctor would schedule an
appointment with a specialist as
soon as possible ...
More>>
Reaching Boomers
Registered Rep Magazine -
February 2006
by Stephen
D. Gresham and Glen E. Gresham,
M.D.
The following
letter, based on a real life
situation with a friend and the
friend's financial advisor,
offers a peek at issues
concerning boomer clients (all
names are fictitious): Dear
Roger: Thank you for spending so
much time counseling our niece,
Amanda, about how her recent
inheritance should be invested.
I had told her to listen
carefully to your advice, as I
have been most favorably
impressed by your management of
my wife's portfolio (which, of
course, is similarly based on an
inheritance) ...
More>>
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