3 Tools Financial Advisors Didn’t Know They Had

Being a financial advisor comes with its own share of stress. For many companies and individuals, financial advisors are extremely important components to building the future they want for themselves. And though this is a heavy task, there are a lot of tools out there that many financial advisors don’t know they have on their side. Here’s a short list of three of the most powerful:

Google Authorship and Alerts

Google Authorship is becoming more and more real. Authorship is an online reputation manager that keeps track of everything published online by an individual, including original posts, website, comments and interactions, and more. When it comes to company personal business usage, Google Alerts is the ideal tool for knowing everything about who, what, and where about all online interactions and/or mentions of your business or brand. You can set up alerts for not only the company name, but also individual names and topics as well so you’ll know when there’s any buzz about you or your company online.

Lifestyle/Priorities Checklist

Here’s a simple reality: financial advice relies heavily on your clients’ personal lives. In some cases, trusted advisors are almost more like life counselors than just wealth managers. For this reason, it’s good practice to incorporate a quick survey for your clients to take before you meet in order to better understand where they are in their lives. It’s easy to forget that a client with a family and a home to his name will have different values and priorities than he did when he was a new, single graduate. Understanding how their priorities change and what’s happening in their lives—along with how their needs change for their future—will help you give better financial advice.

Life Settlements

Life settlements are often an overlooked option for retirees who no longer want or need their life insurance policies. Whether the policy is simply under performing, or the need for it has passed, a life settlement can provide liquidity for other investments that better fit the needs of their clients. In a life settlement, the insured sells their life insurance policy to a third party for a lump sum of cash. It’s a great alternative to either letting the policy lapse, or surrendering it for the (often minimal) cash value. If your client has a life insurance policy they no longer need, you can use our qualification calculator to see if it’s a good fit.