Winning your clients’ kids

Canada’s youngest millennials will celebrate their 30th birthday this year and next, while those at the other end of Gen Y are in their mid-40s. This influential cohort is having an outsized influence on the financial advice business, just as it has on other industries in recent years.

Speaking at Future Proof Citywide 2025 in Miami on Monday, Shruti Joshi, president and COO of Facet and Kathy Wunderli, head of private wealth at Wealth.com, shared their views on how best to win these clients and benefit from the wealth transfer already under way.

“You need to meet them where they’re at,” Wunderli said. “They are not engaging with content the same way that the boomer generation did. They’re using resources like social media. In fact, they get so much information from social media you probably have to re-educate them on some of the things that they’ve heard.”

Park bench ads and golf tournament sponsorships won’t cut it anymore — successful businesses reach millennials by offering helpful information rather than blasting out messages about how great they are.

It’s not just that these young adults grew up on social media, it’s that they gravitated to digital content providers who they could relate to and trust.

“Authenticity is a heavily overused word in the arena of marketing these days,” Joshi said, but that doesn’t make it any less important. “The younger generations really value it.”

Joshi recommended advisors build small communities with real-life needs and deliver high-quality content that meets those demands.

“It’s about edutainment,” she said, “nurturing them through, ‘why do I need financial planning to why should I actually get it now?’ That takes a little bit of time, energy and resourcing. … Be there as a trusted advisor through their educational journey, and then to actually get them to convert.”

For a lot of millennials, what they need most right now is estate planning. Young parents know it’s the right thing to do, but many assume the process is more difficult than it is. And, as Wunderli put it, their “hair is on fire and they have no time for anything else.” Offer helpful information on that, make it easy for them, and you’ve got a relationship you can build on.

“About 80% of our members had not worked with a financial planner before,” Joshi said. “The key is to demystify the service. … A lot of people don’t know what financial planning is. They think it’s the same as investing. And it’s really not, especially if you’re doing legitimate, holistic financial planning.”

Facet’s model provides financial planning for a fee. What it hasn’t done — although Joshi said she wouldn’t rule it out — is offer a free service as a loss leader. “What we’ve really spent our energy on is demystifying the service by way of educational content, helping people to understand what the experience is like.”

Wunderli is similarly apprehensive. “Free is always a good idea to at least consider,” she said. “But how does it really work? When you offer something at no charge, are you able to convert that?”

Next-generation clients

What makes navigating generation-to-generation wealth transfers difficult is that a lot of clients aren’t ready to talk about it.

“It takes convincing your clients to sit down with their adult children and actually have open and clear communication,” Wunderli said. Baby boomers are still living active lives, travelling, buying second homes and all the rest.

She sees an opportunity for advisors to deepen family relationships by helping to facilitate the conversation. Be proactive.

And don’t assume you’ve got an inside track on winning the business of those adult children. Sometimes, the advisor’s existing relationship with the parents can be a hindrance if the kids haven’t had any time with you.

“A lot of our members are saying, ‘I don’t want to go to my parents’ financial advisor,'” Joshi said. “‘I’m looking for a modern solution that helps me with my needs, which are unique. It’s a different world than it was 20, 30 years ago.'”

Future Proof Citywide 2025 runs until May 19. This year’s event has attracted more than 2,500 visitors from 13 countries.