SGH Wealth Management grew its assets by 24% last year as the Michigan-based RIA has capitalized on an organic growth strategy driven by the social media presence of its founder.
Sam Huszczo, winner of InvestmentNews' 2025 Advisor of the Year for the Midwest region, has over 35,000 followers on Instagram and 19,000 followers on Linkedin. SGH Wealth Management has grown to 15 employees managing roughly $570 million across 430 clients since Husczco started his business in 2005 at 25 years old based in a suburb of Detroit.
“Last year we got 57% of our new business from social media and SEO sources, and the average firm gets like 10% in those numbers. So that's been our superpower—we are interesting to people online,” said Huszczo. “The social media stuff, it's not like you do three posts and then you get results next week. It's taken me six years to get to a point where it's an actual legitimate lead-gen.”
READ MORE: Head to our dedicated awards site for more details on the event, categories and nomination forms.
Huszczo won the CFA Institute Volunteer of the Year award in 2017, which caught the attention of CNBC Squawk Box. He’s appeared on national TV programs several times since, helping boost his public profile alongside posting consistent and authentic social media content on investing and wealth management topics.
“I was one of the early people on LinkedIn locally, and that was a huge client source for a while. Nowadays, there's so many copycats that it's not producing the same results that it used to produce, but that means you have to innovate and keep trying new stuff,” Huszczo said.
The independent contractor model has long been the dominant workforce structure for the advisor industry, but Huszczo is proud to have set up his firm entirely as W-2 employees who are able to participate in revenue sharing. The average age of his employees is 27, with Huszczo having success in visiting campuses at the University of Michigan and Michigan State to get in front of students interested in careers in wealth management.
“That independent contractor route is saying, hey, these are my relationships. Don't talk to my clients, stay away from my book, even though they're all sharing a roof,” said Huszczo. “It's not a team approach at all. They're almost like competitors with each other, being paranoid that somebody might take their business.”
Schwab says that the RIA industry will need to add over 70,000 new staff over the next five years based on current growth rates, while the broader financial advisor industry is projected to face a shortage of around 100,000 advisors by 2034, according to McKinsey research.
SGH Wealth Management has been growing steadily with its college campus recruiting focus that Huszczo has committed to for the past six years. Part of his hiring process for prospective employees includes testing them on their knowledge of “Finding your Path,” a book written by Caleb Brown that’s intended for college students seeking careers in financial planning.
“We've just totally reworked our recruiting efforts to go for straight out of college. So having a three year internship runway, having a very set career path where people can get integrated before being client facing,” he said. “I'm not in the rat race of the war on talent. The war on talent is everybody going after this one person because they want their book of business.”
Huszczo aims for his RIA to reach $1 billion in assets. Along the way, he’ll have some guidance from Ric Edelman, the famed financial advisor whom Huszczo met backstage at last year’s InvestmentNews Awards in New York City. The two struck up a conversation after Edelman accepted his Lifetime Achievement Award, bonding over their shared interest in prioritizing organic growth.
“He's been actually kind enough to mentor me and talk me through some things,” Huszczo said of Ric Edelman. “I would have had no chance to meet this person if it weren't for the green room at the InvestmentNews Awards ceremony. So that's been really special for me.”
READ MORE: Head to our dedicated awards site for more details on the event, categories and nomination forms.
The latest father-son additions at Merill include a tandem originally with Wells Fargo and an Iowa-based trio that crossed over from Baird.
Investors say the advisor graded its own assets - then cashed in
Oregon investors allege Norada sold high-yield notes through a Ponzi scheme
Schwab founder Charles Schwab invested in Kalshi in 2021. Now the brokerage is launching binary options on predicting the S&P 500 through Cboe.
With more HNW clients coming to meetings armed with AI research, BNY Wealth report finds advisor expertise is more critical than ever as the final human check.
Dan Biagini of American Equity says the steady decline of pensions, longer lifespans and a reset in interest rates are rewriting how advisors build retirement income
Direct indexing is on pace to outgrow ETFs and mutual funds. Northern Trust's Ken Lassner explains why the advisors who get it wish they had started sooner.
