In a follow up to our first stop on FPPad Tech Tour, we reconnected with LPL CIO Victor Fetter to tour the finished Carolinas campus complex in Fort Mill, SC.
Fetter gives us an overview of the spaces created to encourage collaboration and innovation, all in support of the tens of thousands of financial advisors who work with LPL Financial.
On today’s broadcast, get an update on LPL Financial’s technology roadmap, FutureAdvisor signs up the fifth largest bank in the US, Betterment forms a partnership with Uber, and more.
So get ready, FPPad Bits and Bytes begins now!
(Watch FPPad Bits and Bytes on YouTube)
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Here are the links to this week’s top stories:
LPL placing heavy focus on technology improvements from InvestmentNews, and
U.S. Bank Wealth Management Announces Partnership with FutureAdvisor to Offer Automated Investing Capabilities to Clients from BusinessWire
[Now on to this week’s top story that comes from LPL Financial, as this week the nation’s largest broker-dealer held its annual LPL Focus conference in San Diego.
I wasn’t able to attend the conference, but LPL CIO Victor Fetter kindly connected with me by phone to cover several of the key technology announcements made at the event.
First, ClientWorks, the replacement for the existing BranchNet platform, is now available to roughly 11,000 advisors, up significantly from the 500 beta testers this time last year. Next, an updated account opening solution is anticipated soon which will streamline the creation of LPL account forms, pre-populate forms for clients with existing LPL accounts, and automatically fire off an electronic signature workflow.
Fetter also highlighted a new Adoption Index score that advisors can use to gauge their own adoption of particular technologies and then identify areas where efficiency can be improved.
And finally, lots of attention was given to Guided Wealth Portfolios, LPL’s automated investment solution powered by BlackRock’s FutureAdvisor platform expected to be available in early 2017. Fetter told me that advisors can choose to add their brand to Guided Wealth Portfolios as an extension of their existing business, or they can create a new brand as a separate, but complementary, platform for certain clients.
Guided Wealth Portfolios will consist of ETF allocations managed by LPL Research and they will be visible in the ClientWorks dashboard. Clients can view their information using a mobile responsive website, but Fetter said a native app for iPhone or Android is not anticipated at this time. Oh, and I think fees for the service are still up in the air, so we’ll have to check back as the service gets closer to its official rollout.
And speaking of FutureAdvisor, this week, US Bank, the fifth largest commercial bank in the United States, announced that it, too, will be using FutureAdvisor to power an automated solution for its clients with portfolios designed by, you guessed it, US Bancorp Investments. Like LPL’s Guided Wealth Portfolios, US Bank said the service is expected to be available in 2017, and fees for the service were not yet disclosed.] To stay up to date with technological innovations, the independent broker-dealer LPL Financial is developing more tools for its new adviser dashboard and implementing smarter automation.
Uber Lets Drivers Hail an IRA with Betterment from the Wall Street Journal
[Next up is news on Betterment, as this week the company announced a partnership with Uber, the multi-billion dollar global ride-sharing network, which allows drivers to open and fund a Betterment IRA account directly within the Uber app. Drivers get special fees, too, with their first year of Betterment completely free, and after that it’s 25 basis points per year on accounts below $100,000.
So guess what? The stakes for client acquisition just went up, in fact, way up. Millions of people recognize Uber, and when they see a partnership like this, they have to be thinking, “Hey, if Betterment’s good enough for a huge company like Uber, it’s gotta be good enough for me.”
And for Uber, they could have chosen anybody for this partnership. They could have teamed up with Vanguard, Schwab Intelligent Portfolios, or even *cough* FutureAdvisor, but no, they chose Betterment.
So the way I see it, this is about distribution and decreasing client acquisition costs. Look, for years, industry commentators, myself included, have beat the drum about the high acquisition costs of automated investment services and how tough it is for robo advisors to actually make a profit.
Well, if an automated service can immediately get exposure to hundreds of thousands of potential customers by getting embedded in another app, what’s to stop Betterment from getting embedded in the eBay app to invest your extra cash, or even into SnapChat right along side the SnapCash feature? That’s a pretty inexpensive, yet clever way, to acquire new customers.
So welcome to the new front line in the battle for asset management, I hope your marketing team is up for the challenge.] Uber Technologies Inc. is partnering with robo advice provider Betterment Inc. to offer thousands of its drivers access to retirement accounts.
Here are links to stories that didn’t make this week’s broadcast:
In a world of software overabundance, Siftery offers clarity from Medium
Siftery helps you discover the right software product for your business. Great software is a force multiplier for your job. And picking the right solution for your company will make you look like a rockstar.
Guide Financial set to close operations on October 11 from FPPad
Guide Financial, the financial planning startup acquired by John Hancock in June 2015, told its users via email this week that the company plans to discontinue operations on October 11.
Integration Update: RiXtrema + Black Diamond Now Available from Advent
SS&C Advent’s Black Diamond wealth platform is now integrated with Portfolio Crash Testing by RiXtrema, one of the advisory industry’s leading Portfolio Analytics/Risk Management solutions.
Watch FPPad Bits and Bytes for August 26, 2016
This is the season premiere of FPPad Tech Tour!
Note: Treat this video as you would treat a TV show. FPPad Tech Tour is committed to telling the stories of people who are working hard to support financial advisors. These stories can’t be told in a two-minute video. So fire up your Apple TV, Chromecast, or your smart TV, kick off your shoes, and enjoy this up-close-and-personal video series.
Our first stop on FPPad Tech Tour is in Charlotte, North Carolina, where we met up with Victor Fetter, CIO of LPL Financial to learn about what attracted him to manage LPL’s technology solutions for the nation’s largest independent broker dealer.
(Watch FPPad Tech Tour Season 1 Episode 1 with Victor Fetter on YouTube)
FPPad Tech Tour is brought to you by the following Back Stage Sponsors:
Envestnet|Tamarac: http://www.tamaracinc.com
Orion Advisor Services: http://www.orionadvisor.com
Redtail Technology: http://corporate.redtailtechnology.com
CHAPTER MARKERS:
0:16 FPPad Tech Tour Intro
1:10 How did your career bring you to LPL Financial LLC?
2:55 How do you accommodate and respond to the needs of a diverse group of financial advisors?
4:55 Victor speaks about candid conversations with financial advisors
6:29 What’s your typical day like? How much do you interact with financial advisors?
7:53 Victor talks about connections with LPL Financial advisors beyond the business setting
8:43 One secret not many people know about you
11:14 How do you feel about automated investment services, aka robo advisors?
12:38 What are you telling advisors to do about automated investment services?
13:09 Where do you get your best information on where the industry is headed?
14:40 We take a drive to Fort Mill, South Carolina to view the construction site of the new LPL Financial facility
15:45 What investments are you and LPL Financial making for the future of financial advisors?
On today’s broadcast, LPL Financial unveils new back-office technology for its representatives. Will the tools set a new bar for advisor productivity? Laser App continues to expand its library of fillable forms. Can you guess how many paper forms have avoided the shredder? And, did you know you can now build a “robo shield” for your business? Find out what steps you should be taking right now to differentiate yourself from the online advisor competition.
So get ready, FPPad Bits and Bytes begins now!
(Watch FPPad Bits and Bytes on YouTube)
This week’s episode of Bits and Bytes is brought to you by Total Rebalance Expert, the industry’s largest, privately owned portfolio rebalancing software provider.
Now available as a part of the Orion Advisor Services platform, TRX features tax-efficient rebalancing, an easy to use interface, and more, all at an affordable price. Learn how you can gain a half a million dollar return on your technology investment by downloading their latest white paper at fppad.com/trx
Here are the links to this week’s top stories:
LPL Financial Unveils Next Generation ClientWorks Platform for Advisors at focus14 Annual Conference from Marketwatch, and
LPL Financial Announces Expansion of CRM Offering for Advisors at focus14 Annual Conference Through New Relationship With Redtail Technology from PRNewswire
[This week’s top story comes from LPL Financial, the nation’s largest broker-dealer with over 13,000 representatives, who held it’s annual Focus conference in San Diego last week. On the technology front, LPL unveiled ClientWorks(SM), a completely new technology solution that should offer expanded functionality and more seamless integrations.
Victor Fetter, chief information officer at LPL Financial, told attendees that ClientWorks is designed to work on any device, including phones and tablets, will feature streamlined workflows for account opening and trading, and will offer business analytics to increase advisor productivity. The first phase of ClientWorks, including a Resource Center library, will release later this fall, with the full ClientWorks suite anticipated sometime in the Spring of 2015.
Also making news at the Focus event was the announcement of new relationship between LPL Financial and Redtail, the leading web-based CRM for financial advisors. Beginning in October, LPL representatives will be able to subscribe to Redtail for $50 per month for each 15-user database, and the CRM will likely feature a tighter integration with LPL data once ClientWorks rolls out next year.] LPL Financial LLC, the nation’s largest independent broker-dealer*, an RIA custodian, and a wholly owned subsidiary of LPL Financial Holdings Inc. LPLA, +0.80% today unveiled ClientWorksSM, a next-generation technology solution for advisors and institutions that will seamlessly integrate and expand its offerings.
Laser App Software Sees Continued Growth With New Custodian and Broker-Dealer Clients from Marketwired
[Another event held in San Diego last week was the Laser App 2014 Conference. If you haven’t seen them already, I filmed five videos on site providing highlights of the educational sessions as well as the networking events, which included some pretty epic surfing attempts by attendees, including yours truly.
While the company did not make any specific new product announcements, Laser App did provide an update on how widely the solution is being used across the financial services industry. There are now over 32,000 forms in the Laser App library accessed by over 115,000 users, and the company estimates that documents in its library have been processed in some way, shape or form over 45 million times. Clearly a lot of business is being streamlined with the Laser App solution.] From its 2014 Financial Services Conference, Laser App Software is pleased to announce it has added 40 new customers so far in 2014. The forms-filling and automation management software provider sites the growing need for advisor efficiency as a key driver of broker-dealer and advisor adoption of its solutions.
Use this link to download the white paper.
[And finally, while at the Laser App conference last week, Deborah Fox of the Fox Financial Planning Network took the opportunity to introduce a new white paper to financial advisors. Titled “How to build a robo-shield™ for your financial advisory firm,” the nearly 40-page white paper offers 20 tactics you can implement right now to differentiate your business from the online software-based investment services.
Fox recommends strategies like focusing on a specific client niche or specialty, building service teams of two advisors and one admin, defining and then automating workflows in your business, and much more.] Fox Financial Planning Network (FFPN) announced today the availability of a new industry white paper that identifies ways advisors and institutions will need to enhance their business model and service offering to counteract the threat from online investment advice platforms known as ‘Robo-Advisers.’
Here are stories that didn’t make this week’s broadcast:
The Power of Marketing Videos for Financial Advisors from GuideVine
With high consumer demand, it’s clear that creating personable, tailored marketing videos can offer an efficient and powerful way to attract new clients.
External IT puts Junxure on its virtual desktops from InvestmentNews
External IT has added the office-management software offered by Junxure to the applications it can include within the cloud-based virtual desktops it creates for advisers.
Watch FPPad Bits and Bytes for August 22, 2014
