MarketCounsel Summit Caps Conference Season
Known as the capstone to the conference season, the MarketCounsel Summit held forth for the 15th time in Las Vegas in early December.
Brian Hamburger, the advisory attorney and CEO of MarketCounsel, opened the conference with some pointed observations and questions for the audience, setting the stage for the next 2 1/2 days of content and networking.
“Operational complexity is the No. 1 reason that advisors are selling today,” he said. “What was once a collegial environment in the industry is no longer, as firms are fighting for a limited talent pool.”
Hamburger added: “More and more folks are joining the party, such as PE investors, which is creating a natural tension between business priorities and advisors’ role as fiduciaries — and as a result, are clients losing their seat at the table?”
These themes and issues populated the agenda, with the perennial focus on organic growth topping the list. As recent industry studies show that independent advisors’ growth has been slowing once market gains are netted out, everyone seems to be doubling down on ways to regain marketing muscles.
The opening panel discussion, “Tactics of High Growth Firms,” featured a diverse set of advisory firms. Triad Wealth Advisors, which recently launched an RIA, was represented by Sara Baker, chief planning and legal officer. Also on the panel were Jonathan Blumenthal, CEO of Quotient Wealth Partners, a newly formed RIA on the Dynasty platform that left Goldman Sachs Personal Financial Management after the sale to Creative Planning; and David Wood, chief visionary officer of Gateway Financial Partners.
Blumenthal’s growth strategy was to identify local corporations with aging workforces and become experts in all aspects of retirement planning for those firms. Baker noted that in-person seminars were working as a tried-but-true way to convert new business, and Wood highlighted a personalized gift catalog, made available to his advisors, that helped to drive increased referrals. Everyone agreed that while there are many approaches, advisory firms need to be committed to investing in the process to drive scalable results.
Next on the agenda was the return of Mark Hurley, the original RIA industry prognosticator, who gained notice from a 1999 white paper that predicted the consolidation of the industry into just 40 firms. While his predictions didn’t happen as quickly as he had thought, some did come to fruition with today’s crop of mega-RIA firms.
