Stop relying on outdated tools: IncomeConductor on the need for targeted technology

Greg Greenberg  00:00:10

Welcome back to Investment News TV Today we're joined by Sheryl O'Connor, CEO and Co-founder of income conductor, a platform that's helping financial advisors rethink how they approach retirement planning. Here's the thing, when it comes to distributing clients retirement savings, many advisors are still relying on strategies from decades ago. Think about it. In almost every other industry, from technology to daily life, we've moved far beyond the tactics of the 1970s so why are we still doing the same in financial services. Sheryl spent over 25 years challenging that status quo, and today we'll dive into how her platform is giving advisors tools they need to meet the demands of today's rapidly changing retirement market. Welcome, Sheryl.
 

Sheryl O'Connor  00:00:54

It's a pleasure to be here, Greg. Thank you.

Greg Greenberg  00:00:57

Sheryl, You have an incredible background in both financial services and technology innovation. What inspired you to Co-found IncomeConductor?

Sheryl O'Connor  00:01:07

Well, it all started with the 2008 market crash. I was a principal of an asset management firm at the time, managing our tamp when I noticed that there were significant amount of our retired or nearly retired clients and their advisors who were not contacting us or touching their portfolios. So it really piqued my curiosity as to why these people were remaining so calm. So after some investigation, I found that they were all using a distribution strategy called time segmentation, and that Phil Labinski, one of the financial planners using our tampin portfolio management services, had developed this strategy back in the 1980s so I reached out to Phil to learn more about his strategy and why it helped people remain so calm through such a devastating market downturn. And we eventually decided to team up to develop a technology that would help other advisors create and manage plans using Phil's strategy.

Greg Greenberg  00:02:19

Well, IncomeConductor offers a complete program to financial advisors. Can you tell us more about how it helps advisors capture opportunities in the distribution marketplace?

Sheryl O'Connor  00:02:30

Retirement income planning represents a huge market opportunity, and today's clients are looking for specialists who can help them through their last phase of life. So we help firms turn their advisors into retirement income specialists who can differentiate themselves from their peers and attract clients at a time when they are typically at their peak asset level. We give advisors training on all aspects of retirement, proven sales and marketing tools and a powerful technology and strategy that clients really love. So the results for the advisor are a high ROI per household, sticky business as clients tend to consolidate all of their assets to a single retirement income plan manager and wealth transfer opportunities by demonstrating sophistication and aptitude to The next generation in the investor's family. So our technology is really it's more of a program. It also helps advisors maximize efficiencies so they can handle hundreds of new clients without adding to staff. And we've seen advisors more than double their assets under management and commissions in just one year, using our technology. Also having a defined and repeatable process means that an advisor can sell their business to their transition partner or another firm at a very high multiple.

Greg Greenberg  00:04:20

And you built an impressive SEC registered RIA, growing it from nothing to over 900 million in assets under management. How did your experiences with that particular journey influenced the creation of IncomeConductor?

Sheryl O'Connor  00:04:35

As principal and founder of the asset management firm, I work directly with firm executives, plan sponsors, product providers, financial advisors as well as clients. So I learned to look at the business from each perspective and understand the goals of each entity, which can be different so building on my experience in the insurance space, I quickly learned about the investment world, both the wealth management and retirement plan sides of the business, and having that broad knowledge of the industry how they work or don't work together, I believe, has given me a perspective that many technology founders don't have. Understanding each of those entities goals has really shaped the technology, our guiding principles and how we deliver our solution to the market across these verticals. Ultimately, everyone wants to have a successful experience, and we think bringing the best of all of these worlds together as a unified offering to the consumer will make that happen.

Greg Greenberg  00:05:54

Technology plays a critical role in financial planning today. So what key trends are you seeing and these are technology by advisors. And how is income conductor helping them stay ahead of the game?

Sheryl O'Connor  00:06:07

Yeah, and I think you mentioned this before, Greg, but today's consumer is very different from the consumer a decade or two ago, our market is typically people who are 50 and over, these people want to be engaged in the process. They've been responsible for investing their savings in their retirement plans. They've learned to use smartphones and desktops to do banking and make purchases. They're prolific users of social media. Yet, many of the tools that advisors use simply have not adapted to these new consumers, needs and desires. They're still basically Back Office tools run by the advisor or their staff spitting out lengthy reports full of confusing financial jargon. So income conductor focuses on real time client engagement and allows the client to partner with their advisor in creating and managing their income plan. We make it easy for the consumer to understand all the complexities of retirement and how their decisions impact their plan and its success. So by being active, engaged, educated in the process, clients show a much greater adherence to their plan, which leads to better outcomes for both them and the advisor.

Greg Greenberg  00:07:46

Well, income conductor has won several awards. What do you think sets it apart from other solutions in the wealth management space?

Sheryl O'Connor  00:07:54

I think the founders deep experience in all aspects of retail, financial advice, services, technology innovation and investment management, combined with the time segmented income plan design methodology makes us unique among other solutions in the retirement Income space. Our commitment is to helping advisors not just grow their practice, but also expand their expertise and improve their level of service in retirement, specific skills that goes much farther than just delivering technology. We've been in their shoes as business owners, as advisors, as firm executives, as product providers. So I think the founders deep expertise and our willingness to share that knowledge has gained US industry recognition as thought leaders, but it also gives us an empathy for our customers that really sets us apart in the marketplace and informs the development of the technology and the surrounding program.

Greg Greenberg  00:09:15

And with so much focus on the retirement market, what advice would you give to advisors we're looking to grow their businesses in this area?

Sheryl O'Connor  00:09:26

Yeah, I would say three, three key points. If an advisor really wants to focus on this retirement income marketplace as a specialty, they should, number one, accept the fact that retirement income planning and management is completely different from accumulation planning and requires very different strategies and skills. So educating themselves about all the components of retirement is very important.The unique risks the components like Social Security, medical expenses, Irma, RMDs, Roth, conversions, taxes, longevity and more decisions that the client is going to make throughout retirement. All of these things are really important to becoming a specialist. Secondly, they should redefine their value proposition from an asset manager to a plan manager and life coach. The value they bring to retirees is not managing their assets or selling them products, it's managing the overall plan and ensuring that plan stays on course. And finally, they should also adopt a winning strategy and technology like income conductor that sets them apart from the majority of advisors and addresses the needs of today's consumers, that differentiating factor is the number one reason our advisors are growing their businesses so quickly and getting tons of referrals. In fact, yesterday, I received an email from one of our advisors saying he had just landed a multi million dollar case with income conductors stating that IncomeConductor sells itself.

Greg Greenberg  00:11:28

And finally, looking ahead, how do you see technology continuing to transform the financial advisory industry? And what's next for IncomeConductor?

Sheryl O'Connor  00:11:39

So technology is a tool, and it's there to support a firm's overall business strategy and align with specific market needs. Smart advisors and firms have a clear business strategy and plan. They understand their market and they choose their technology suite accordingly. I think that targeted approach is a key to success. Too many large companies now use a small suite of unspecialized tools that they believe address all needs and all business strategies. I think the model for the future is one of segmentation and specialization, and this can be of benefit to a one person advisory shop as well as support a larger firm where specialized teams support different segments of The market and use different technologies for those purposes. Secondly, you know, the utilization of data is also going to transform the industry, whether through integrations among technologies and with data providers, but also the use of AI and machine learning to produce insights on the firm's customers and products and more utilizing their internal data. So data is going to be in is right now, but it's going to continue to be very, very important in the future. As to what's next for IncomeConductor. We're currently developing sophisticated optimization algorithms to accelerate the speed of plan design, provide deeper customization for each unique client, household, and reduce the learning curve for new users. Advisors want to adopt technology very quickly, so it's important for us to understand it needs to be very simple for the advisor to use, and yet very powerful and sophisticated under that user interface. We also plan to integrate institutional long term care data into our planning editor, alongside our existing actuarial longevity projections and personalized healthcare expense projections, incorporating this data will result in much more personalized and accurate plans. And I think the the ultimate goal is to, of course, achieve better outcomes for both clients and their advisors.

Greg Greenberg  00:14:31

Well, thank you, Cheryl, for sharing your insights with us today. It's clear that IncomeConductor's helping advisors elevate the practices and meet the growing demands of the retirement marketplace. We look forward to seeing what's next for you and your team.

Sheryl O'Connor  00:14:44

Oh, thank you very much, Greg. It's been a pleasure.

Greg Greenberg  00:14:46

And thank you for watching Investment News TV. I'm Greg Greenberg.