“Financial Planning Articles” is a collection of articles and research that I’ve been reading regarding financial planning, industry trends, career development, and more.
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This installment of Financial Planning Articles actually begins with two insightful podcasts (with transcripts) from Michael Kitces. The first interviews Kenneth Robinson of Practical Financial Planning and covers a range of valuable topics including credibility benefits from targeting a niche from your previous profession, using a Founders Club to refine your process at launch (and to potentially gain your first clients), and the value of working with a coach.
The second podcast was actually just released today and highlights how Peter Lazaroff has been able to develop and leverage his personal brand throughout his career. Kitces and Lazaroff dive into numerous helpful topics including how to begin building your brand, how to ensure your brand complements versus competes with your firm’s brand, and the importance of being on the same page with your compliance officer.
The first “true” article comes to us from Jacqueline Sergeant with FA-mag.com. Sergeant highlights a report from Spectrum Group on high-income millennials’ preferences regarding what services they prioritize in an advisor, how they define the American dream, and the financial concerns that keep them up at night.
Hopefully, only New Year’s celebrations will be keeping you up tonight and Caleb Brown of New Financial Planner Recruiting provides some good advice to take into the new year in our next article. Brown put together a list of tips and principles for new and early-career advisors to help ensure success.
Speaking of the new year, the final article this week comes from outside the industry and covers goal-setting (not resolutions). Noah Kagan, founder of popular Sumo.com and AppSumo.com, covers his process of reviewing and planning for the new year (for both personal and business goals). Kagan explains his “WWPP” process along with how to come up with a “word-of-the-year.”
I hope you enjoy.
What I’m Reading:
Career-Changing Into Financial Planning By Creating A Niche Serving Your Former Profession, with Kenneth Robinson (Michael Kitces, Kitces.com)
“And there’s another really crucial part of this, Michael, which a lot of people don’t think about. I was thinking about it at the time in terms of marketing. Who can I market to where, are they going to laugh me out of the room because, you know, here I’ve just switched careers from public service, I have zero clients, and then my first clients are people who I was friends with already? But what I hadn’t thought about very consciously at the time and on reflection that was really important is, who do I believe I can be credible with? You know, when I imagine myself saying, “Hi, I’m ready to be your financial planner,” I’ve got to believe that.”
Building Your Own Personal Brand To Complement And Not Compete With Your Advisory Firm, with Peter Lazaroff (Michael Kitces, Kitces.com)
“…everybody I spoke to I said, “A deal breaker is a personal blog. I’m not going somewhere where I can’t have a personal blog. It’s really important to me. I know I can build my audience, I know I can get more media mentions. I know I can get more visitors. I think it’s going to be a key part of my business development strategy.”
Millennials Searching For Guidance In Meeting Financial Goals (Jacqueline Sergeant, FA-mag.com)
“The report noted that high-income millennials are using advisors (49%) and 64% of that number seeks help from one advisor, while 25% utilizes two advisors.”
Developing The Right Mindset (Caleb Brown, New Planner Recruiting)
“I will be aware that I am unproved and that the person who hires and/or mentors me is taking a risk, and that I am far from knowing all I need to know to be a successful financial planner even though I have a degree in financial planning.”
Goals (Noah Kagan, OkDork.com)
“I’ve learned these strategies from years of trial-and-error — and lots of conversations with 8-figure entrepreneurs. This strategy has helped me grow Sumo and AppSumo into 8-figure businesses, create a podcast, do crazy experiments like Ayahuasca, and more. … What sticks out to you about your story? Find your theme, turn it into a single word, and use that as your Word of the Year. Your Word of the Year is your mantra. A simple and repeatable word.”
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