NEW YORK - On a Friday morning, Chris Rosoff was ready to roll.
His hair was carefully combed, and he looked sharp in his tailored blue pinstriped suit, crisp white shirt, bright red tie and designer suspenders. He had his Big Gulp coffee, his radar detector and BlackBerry/phone were turned on, and the Global Satellite Positioning map in his sleek new Atari gave him directions to his first call of the day, a financial adviser in Toms River, N.J.
Mr. Rosoff's official title is regional vice president for Denver-based Jackson National Life Distributors Inc., a division of Jackson National Life Insurance Co. of Lansing, Mich., which in turn is an indirect subsidiary of London-based Prudential PLC.
He is more commonly referred to as a wholesaler, a salesman who peddles Jackson's life insurance products to financial planners and advisers around New Jersey.
But Mr. Rosoff said he is really a white-collar truck driver, delivering not just products to the planners but advice and information.
Probing for needs
"I need to find out what's going on in their practice, what makes them tick and what's changed in their life," he said. "And what needs I can solve."
"The single most common question I get asked is, how did the biggest fish in the pond become successful?" Mr. Rosoff recounted. "What they should be asking is, what is the guy on top doing to be successful going forward?"
Those planners, according to him, are employing increasingly sophisticated marketing methods, staying in constant touch with their clients, using people like him for market intelligence and keeping up with the array of new products hitting the market.
Mr. Rosoff's job Friday was to talk up the newest living-benefit features of Jackson's popular Perspective II variable annuity.
One guarantees the principal of a client's investment, regardless of market performance, while the other, available for clients ages 60 to 80, allows annual withdrawals of up to 5% for life, without annuitization. Fees for the former start at 0.90 percentage points, and at 0.65 percentage points for the latter.
"As people are living longer, they need income longer than they thought they'd need it, Mr. Rosoff said.
"But emotionally, it's difficult for them to address the risk-reward equation in their portfolio," he said. "They need to be eating broccoli, and we put a little cheese sauce on the plate so it goes down better."
Mr. Rosoff's first stop was Tom Connors' office in a bland suburban New Jersey office park between the Garden State Parkway and the Atlantic Ocean. Mr. Connors, a regional manager for Poughkeepsie, N.Y.-based Gilman & Ciocia, a tax and financial planning firm, was casually dressed, friendly and enthusiastic.
"How you doing, man?" he greeted Mr. Rosoff. "How you been?"
The planner and wholesaler talked about the stock market, investors' using the uncertainty of the upcoming election to put off their financial decisions, and about the best way to advertise.
"It doesn't matter so much how you do it, as long as you did do it often," Mr. Connors said.
He told Mr. Rosoff that he was about to embark on a marketing campaign using the Bill Goode system, which automatically contacts each of his clients every 90 days.
Mr. Connors mentioned that he was thinking of doing a client appreciation dinner, and Mr. Rosoff offered to lead a wine tasting. The price of admission will be bringing someone else along.
Mr. Rosoff gave his Perspectives II pitch using anecdotes, numbers, a Monte Carlo simulation chart that tracks age and payouts, and a newly minted sales kit. Mr. Connors was attentive, asking questions and jotting down numbers on a piece of paper.
He loves the "5% forever" feature. "That's huge," Mr. Connors exclaimed.
He thinks the variable annuity is a good fit for his clients who, he said, are typically in their late 60s and early 70s, with a pension, money in the bank and three to four grown children. They are risk averse but want steady income.
Mr. Connors expects complaints about the product's relatively high fees, but he has a comeback ready: "No one ever went broke paying fees to guarantee their money."
He is convinced that variable annuities are the product of the future.
"This is great news," Mr. Connors told Mr. Rosoff. "Seriously."
At lunchtime, Mr. Rosoff headed north to Red Bank, a gentrified Jersey Shore town that has become decidedly upscale and boasts Bruce Springsteen as a neighbor. Mr. Rosoff stopped at a refurbished Victorian house that is now the office of Neil Piper, an investment adviser representative of Tampa, Fla.-based Invest Financial Corp.
Mr. Piper and his brother Craig, a financial planner for Nationwide Planning Associates of Montvale, N.J., joined Mr. Rosoff for lunch at the chic Red Bank Bistro in the heart of town.
The Pipers are co-hosts of a Saturday afternoon radio show, "You and Your Money" on WCTC Central Jersey 1450 AM. The listeners, the brothers said, are mostly older.
"Seniors are concerned with three things," Neil Piper said. "Safety, safety, safety."
The brothers also like variable annuities but don't like hearing constant criticism about the fees. They want financial services companies to rebut the negative press about variable annuities more aggressively.
Neil Piper said he spends "every waking moment growing the practice in the right way." That means, he said, looking for "the right type of clients," identifying their needs, and understanding "where they are emotionally and mentally."
Alliances are critical, according to Mr. Piper, who said he has been working with local banks, insurance companies and accounting firms. "We refer business to each other," he said.
Craig Piper said he makes house calls to build his business. He is looking for "well-tailored" clients, preferably with at least $500,000 in investible assets.
"That's the sweet spot," he said. "Otherwise, I'm just another squirrel trying to get a nut."
After lunch, Mr. Rosoff dropped the brothers off and headed over to a non-descript cluster of one-story office buildings in nearby Tinton Falls. David Collins and Brendan Rochford each head their own planning firms but share office space along with a lawyer.
Mr. Collins and Mr. Rochford are the most seasoned financial advisers on the day's itinerary. They no longer make cold calls, do seminars or send out mailings, Mr. Rochford explained.
"We work off our existing base," he said. "Those clients are trying to protect what they already have; that's why variable annuities appeal to us - the client can have his cake and eat it, too."
Nonetheless, they sit mostly stone faced during Mr. Rosoff's presentation, occasionally asking him questions about commissions, annuitization, fees and the competition.
The payoff
As Mr. Rosoff winded down, the silence was deafening.
"So where do we stand on the business front, gentlemen?" he is forced to ask. "Do we have a place to move forward?"
The two advisers said yes, but they wanted to compare the Jackson variable annuity to similar products. "There's so many options out there," the white-haired Mr. Collins said in a thick Scottish brogue.
He and Mr. Rochford are more receptive to Mr. Rosoff's suggestion that he help them set up a "beneficiary's dinner," where existing clients invite their beneficiaries to a dinner to meet the advisers. ("It's more difficult to say no to someone in person," Mr. Rosoff explained later.)
Back in his car, Mr. Rosoff plugged his headset into his BlackBerry hand-held device and called the home office as he drove, explaining which adviser needs what type of follow-up.
Over the weekend, he hoped to get in some trout fishing.
But he knew that on Monday, he would be back on the road.
