David Burch, thirty year resident of Atlanta and top fifteen advisor for Peachtree Planning Corporation decided to permanently move to Sea Island, Georgia earlier this year. David viewed Sea Island, known as an exclusive wealthy enclave, as the ideal spot to grow a high-end financial and estate planning business. David knew the transition to a new location would be easier using a wealth management software system that supported his client base.

The Solution

David has approximately 30 clients now on the AdvisorPlatform. At Peachtree more than 35 advisors are using the system. These advisors garner fees ranging from a minimum of $1,500 to an average of $8,000 with several clients paying $15,000. David has had to add staff to handle his increasing number of clients and to administer the system. He now has a partner, two junior partners and three full time assistants. The assistants scan documents, assist clients in setting up aggregation and troubleshoot any technical issues clients have with the system.

The Benefits

David feels the AdvisorPlatform offers his clients real value. The client facing features of the system, such as aggregation, the Vault and the comprehensive overview of finances are very valuable to clients and offer tangible benefits. David says the financial planning fee he charges becomes incidental – and is reoccurring. Though David does reduce his fee after the first year, it increases as a client’s Assets Under Management grow, so David’s success as a financial planner is linked to the increasing fee.

Peachtree has a very systematic approach to fee-based financial planning. David enjoys the numerous benefits of the AdvisorPlatform using this approach. During Phase One of his client relationship – the Design Phase, David uses the AdvisorPlatform to help the client get organized and to demonstrate how their assets are interacting with one another. During Phase Two, the Implementation Phase David will retrieve valuable documents and ensure they are uploaded to the client’s Vault. Because he has access to a client’s important documents such as insurance, wills etc, it is possible to do side-by-side comparisons for clients and where desirable provide pitches for alternate coverage through one of David’s alliances. During Phase 3, The Scorekeeping Phase, David performs reviews of the client’s progress and includes the client’s personal website and aggregation. Here David will demonstrate how the AdvisorPlatform is helping the client grow their networth. The agency has been able to synchronize its systems to the beneficial features of the system.

The automated, collaborative nature of the system enables David to keep in touch with his clientbase – despite his relocation to Sea Island. This will enable him to build a new clientbase while retaining his long-time clients. It will also help him keep clients who decide to move away in today’s mobile economy.

David has a broad range of clients using the system though the sports industry and those in real estate figure highly. The increasing value of real estate in this sought after part of Georgia has meant that real estate agents have become a key part of David’s clientbase. For the many real estate agents using the system it can be particularly useful to load properties and closing statements into the system’s Vault. Other clients on the system include doctors, attorneys and entrepreneurs.

David says that the AdvisorPlatform has offered him numerous opportunities to add value for clients. In one example the system’s alerts notified him of a $500,000 drop in a client’s SEI Account. As it turned out SEI was simply doing a change in asset allocation and everything was fine. However, the client was extremely impressed with the speed with which David could address the problem – and put his mind to rest. This capability, David says, is not to be underestimated.