Don Meredith, CRPC • Chesapeake, VA
Integrated Financial Partners Inc. • Lincoln Financial Advisors Corp.
We have two ways for developing new clients. Each might be called a structured referral process. The first involves thinking about the appropriate time to ask clients for referrals and how to best handle that for a specific client.
We constantly check with clients to make sure that we’re meeting their needs. Once we’ve gotten to the point where we have executed their financial plan—and they’ve affirmed to us that we have met their needs—then we begin to say, “When you come across people in your lives that have similar types of needs, we would welcome the chance to be a part of their lives, too.” That’s a common refrain that we use with the clients.
When a life event happens and we go through things like a family tree, we might also explore referrals to a sibling, or an aunt or an uncle, or when a son or daughter comes of age, especially in doing estate planning. Of course, we also have a fair amount of people simply informing us, “Hey, I told somebody to give you a call to get acquainted.”
The other way that we get referrals is in partnering with a limited number of high-quality CPA firms. We introduce financial planning and wealth management into a CPA firm for a couple of advantages for the CPAs themselves. One is to get a better handle on their clients and to understand how those dollars are being invested.
When you’re talking about high-net-worth people, especially in the taxation environment that we’re in right now, somebody who is not attuned to the effects of taxes on certain trading strategies can obliterate a return just because they create so much tax liability.
The CPAs like the fact that, when we work with their clients, one of the layers that we put into our portfolio construction is that tax sensitivity. The other thing that it does for the CPA is that, in partnering with them, we can then show them how we can increase their value to their clients.
We believe very much in going deep with a few particular firms and helping in all aspects of their clientele. It’s made a big difference. The firms that we work with are very appreciative of the level of engagement that we have with their clients and the level of engagement that we have with them. Referrals then can flow in both directions.
Disclosure: Don Meredith is a registered representative of Lincoln Financial Advisors Corp., a broker/dealer (member SIPC) and registered investment advisor. Integrated Financial Partners Inc. is not an affiliate of Lincoln Financial Advisors Corp. CRN-1175785-041615
Photography by Chris Winton-Stahle
