Kerri Sullivan-Kreiss, CFP®, AIF®, based her unbiased advisory agency, SullivanKreiss Monetary, in 2004. Having spent the earlier 13 years as an advisor on employees with a publicly traded firm, she needed to depart massive company agendas and proprietary funding merchandise behind. As president of her personal enterprise, Sullivan-Kreiss was desperate to develop a concierge service mannequin constructed round a powerful tradition of fiduciary duty to purchasers.
As Sullivan-Kreiss says, “I’ve all the time based mostly my enterprise on the elemental principal of treating others as I wish to be handled. My goal is de facto quite simple: to place our purchasers’ pursuits first, act with integrity, and embrace the individuality that every shopper brings to our follow.”
Throughout our conversations, the pressure of Sullivan-Kreiss’s dedication to this imaginative and prescient all the time shined via. The profitable progress of her agency might be seen as emblematic of the depth with which Sullivan-Kreiss engages with purchasers. It additionally highlights her extremely environment friendly use of time. To offer the personalised concierge service that Sullivan-Kreiss believes makes her agency particular, she has turn out to be a grasp of time administration. She has discovered find out how to function effectively and collect the mandatory assets to maintain progress and construct economies of scale.
In the event you’re trying to go unbiased or develop a longtime advisory enterprise, understanding the facility of Sullivan-Kreiss’s enterprise selections may aid you chart the way in which towards optimizing your time and setting your agency up for long-term progress.
Constructing One thing Particular
For Sullivan-Kreiss, constructing shopper relationships is all about specializing in the journey with every individual you serve. With a purpose to develop a high quality follow, it’s important to make every shopper really feel particular. That will sound elementary, however it’s essential to maintain prime of thoughts. As she says, “It’s being there for purchasers via on a regular basis moments, celebrating life’s main milestones, and serving to to offer help, encouragement, and, hopefully, consolation throughout tough instances.”
A proactive service mannequin. Ideally, SullivanKreiss Monetary purchasers shouldn’t get voicemail once they name, and follow-up to requests and issues have to be speedy and correct. However concierge service is greater than that: it’s being proactive versus responsive, going above and past what’s anticipated. Sullivan-Kreiss focuses on long-term, complete monetary planning; she isn’t serious about “merely being a cash supervisor.” This implies setting common critiques to maintain abreast of adjustments in purchasers’ lives and assembly each two weeks when creating a plan for a brand new shopper.
The consequence? Sullivan-Kreiss has constructed one thing particular: a extremely engaged group of long-term purchasers. For her, that’s what makes the advisory enterprise rewarding and enjoyable. And there’s icing on the cake: in line with Sullivan-Kreiss, “Nearly all of my agency’s new purchasers come from referrals from current purchasers.”
Spending Extra Time with Purchasers
As you may see, Sullivan-Kreiss’s enterprise mannequin is immediately tied to her spending as a lot time as attainable with purchasers. Notably, like a lot of her Commonwealth friends, Sullivan-Kreiss spends considerably extra time in shopper conferences than different trade advisors. That’s in line with a 2020–2021 research performed by Commonwealth in partnership with Cerulli Associates, which discovered that, on common, Commonwealth advisors spend 33 % extra time in shopper conferences than different advisors from each wirehouse and unbiased companies.
Actually, based mostly on additional evaluation of the information, Commonwealth’s Observe Administration crew decided that Sullivan-Kreiss ranked within the prime decile of productiveness amongst Commonwealth advisors, based mostly on gross income, progress fee, and period of time spent with purchasers. This statistic speaks to the essential work Sullivan-Kreiss undertakes day in and time out with the people she serves.
Reaching Scale and Effectivity
So, how is Sullivan-Kreiss capable of spend a lot time with purchasers? There are inherent difficulties in scaling a concierge mannequin. Nonetheless, as she labored via fixing them, Sullivan-Kreiss discovered that having the appropriate employees and agency associate will help facilitate enterprise scale and effectivity.
The ability of your individuals. Sullivan-Kreiss delegates administrative, operational, and sure planning duties so she will be able to concentrate on client-facing work. With three full-time employees members (a director of shopper relations, a monetary analyst, and an operations supervisor), she is evident on their significance to her enterprise mannequin: “My crew is phenomenal. What they do behind the scenes permits me to be good at my job and spend as a lot time as I can with my purchasers. Their strengths permit the agency to ship top-tier concierge-level help—the personal touch we commit to each shopper.”
In keeping with Sullivan-Kreiss, her regular progress has been pushed by her crew’s steadiness of competencies. And that progress has introduced the agency to an inflection level, the place further employees is important. To deal with the amount of labor and hold her productiveness excessive, Sullivan-Kreiss plans so as to add an funding supervisor and an extra advisor to the crew.
When requested about recommendation for advisors trying to develop, she states, “One of the vital productive issues you are able to do is empower your individuals and provides them room to develop. It’s completely key to have the appropriate individuals on employees, significantly those that have complementary expertise units to yours.”
The influence of your agency associate. Sullivan-Kreiss remembers her agency’s early years flying by in a blur, however she has all the time acknowledged the significance of a supportive agency associate. She explains, “Along with actually busting your derriere . . . it’s important to domesticate the appropriate relationships with the appropriate individuals. You must have a associate behind you that’s proactive and responsive.”
Like different unbiased advisors, Sullivan-Kreiss seems to be to her agency associate for a big selection of back-office assets and help. As a result of her work is grounded in monetary planning, she appreciates having specialists, reminiscent of Commonwealth’s Superior Planning crew, available to speak via a posh planning or retirement drawback.
As for funding administration, Sullivan-Kreiss acknowledges that this position is an ongoing problem for any unbiased agency. She prefers customized portfolio administration and, with the help of her monetary analyst, does a substantial amount of her personal funding analysis. Nonetheless, if a shopper is searching for a particular funding technique, she desires to have the ability to depend on her agency associate for specialised information. She receives that help from Commonwealth’s Funding Administration and Analysis crew.
Finally, Sullivan-Kreiss says that your agency associate should be capable to present a “phenomenal degree of help” that’s tailor-made to your wants.
Cementing the Cornerstones of Success
Being an unbiased advisor has allowed Sullivan-Kreiss to utterly align her agency together with her values and purchasers’ finest pursuits. She’s been capable of construct the agency she’s all the time dreamed
of, one based mostly on placing her purchasers’ wants first and powered by environment friendly time administration. Proper now, she’s targeted on the fun of the current and accelerating much more progress sooner or later. Something is feasible together with her imaginative and prescient, a powerful crew, and Commonwealth’s partnership at her again.
In the event you’re an advisor desirous to go unbiased, Sullivan-Kreiss’s recommendation is to do it as quickly as you may. As for contemplating a agency associate, be thorough about due diligence and align with a agency whose values mirror yours. Final, however definitely not least, all the time needless to say you need to go the place you may develop, even when it’s one step at a time.
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