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| Onboarding Clients |
| Newport Capital Group in Red Bank, New Jersey, winner of the 2016 PLANSPONSOR Plan Adviser Large Team of the Year designation, has many strategies in place to onboard and get to know new plan sponsor clients. The advisory firm believes it is important to “thoroughly understand each plan sponsor’s goals for its company.” Immediately upon starting with a new client, the practice sits down with and asks its executives what issues are the most pressing—both for the company and for individual employees. As Newport Group puts it, having an “open dialogue during early onboarding sessions” is one of the keys to long-term retention. It may seem obvious, but even in the age of technology and plan automation, having as many of the initial conversations in person as possible is crucial to establishing rapport.
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| Pooling Investors’ Assets |
| Pooling investor assets results in a number of efficiencies including significant cost savings. That said, advisers should be aware of certain considerations that arise depending on the types of investors that participate in pooled investment funds. Specifically, certain requirements under the Employee Retirement Income Security Act and the Internal Revenue Code must be met when accepting benefit plan investors, such as ERISA-covered plans and individual retirement accounts.
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| When Advisers Tout Their Own Services |
| Under the fiduciary rule reforms, an adviser can still tout the value of their services and educate the prospective client without becoming a fiduciary adviser. However, when you recommend a specific investment, an investment strategy or a particular type of account that results in compensation to you or your firm, you will engage in a fiduciary act. And you may also be committing a prohibited transaction for which an exemption such as the best interest contract exemption is needed.
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| Keeping Them Happy |
| When plan advisers ask sponsor clients for their feedback, this can call forth compliments that validate an advisory firm’s service model and working style. But sometimes sponsors give negative feedback about an advisory firm’s services. Premier advisers learn to welcome not just sponsors’ compliments, but their occasional criticisms, too.
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| 2017 PLANADVISER Retirement Plan Adviser Survey |
| Advisers were asked to rank both their perception of listed recordkeepers and how often they have worked with those recordkeepers. The providers that received the largest percentage of “very favorable” ratings were: Empower Retirement, Fidelity Investments, T. Rowe Price, Vanguard and Principal Financial Group. Still, it is worth noting that only Empower received a very favorable rating from more than half of the advisers scoring them—53%. The rest of the group most frequently worked with were John Hancock Retirement Plan Services, ADP Retirement Services and American Funds Distributors.
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