Welcome back to the 378th episode of the Financial Advisor Success Podcast!
My guest on today’s podcast is Michael Collins. Michael is the CEO & Founder of WinCap Financial, an RIA based in Boston, Massachusetts, that oversees $80M in assets under management for 70 client households.
What’s unique about Michael, though, is that since 2021 he has been able to grow WinCap Financial at a rate of more than $10M of AUM per year through consistently reaching out to leads purchased through SmartAsset, spending $5K/month that turns into $10K in recurring revenue in less than 100 days, an average of more than 4X the return on financial investment than if those clients had been obtained through an acquisition buying at a traditional 2X revenue multiple.
In this episode, we talk in-depth about how Michael maintains his ongoing $5K/month marketing spend with a process that has an ultimate failure rate of 95% because the financial ROI on the prospects that do close continues to make sense (and he is ultimately not afraid of sorting through the No’s to find the right Yes’s for WinCap), how Michael supports his SmartAsset conversion rate with a weekly blog that is written by taking the upcoming economic calendar, automating it into a narrative article in his writing style using ChatGPT, and then simply editing it to add his own commentary (which cuts the time it takes for him to write from 2 hours down to 30 minutes), and how Michael has systematized everything from his follow-up emails to text messages to his weekly blog and an ongoing tracking sheet to ensure no prospect slips through the cracks, which allows him to generate his results with a high volume of SmartAsset leads while only spending 8–10 hours/month on the entire process.
We also talk about Michael’s advisor journey that began with selling Gateway Computer “Cow Boxes” in college (and getting used to the No’s that came along with computer sales) and how Michael channeled that comfort-with-hearing-No into his career shift into wealth management with a process that has a “20 leads to 3 prospects to 1 new client” marketing formula, the reason Michael’s decided during the pandemic to take a chance on leaving his then-current advisory firm starting his own RIA (after realizing that he was already doing the important aspects of both client service and business development himself, which made it difficult to justify why his current firm was owed an 80% share of the revenue he was bringing in), and how, when the stress of launching his firm was at an all-time high and a concern for the sustainability of WinCap at the end of 2022 was a major challenge, Michael found that acts of service in education – by becoming a part-time adjunct professor teaching college students – became a key rewarding element of life that kept him going.
And be certain to listen to the end, where Michael shares how moving from a large, firm-supported environment to an independent practice wasn’t as hard as he expected because he could easily integrate tools and platforms he was already familiar with (and had the financial ability to get a $50K bank loan to buy a big chunk of SmartAsset leads, which further helped to jump-start his new practice), how surprised Michael was with the amount of support he did get when he launched WinCap, with more than 80% of his previous client base also following him into his new firm within a year, and how Michael had long struggled to take the leap because of the perceived safety and credibility in being part of a larger advisory firm but ultimately found that he could get similar credibility by affiliating his new firm with reputable RIA custodians… which helped Michael’s clients, and also Michael himself, find the necessary confidence to move forward.
So, whether you’re interested in learning about how to effectively use lead generation tools like SmartAsset to grow and connect with potential clients, how to justify a shift from a large company-supported firm to an independent solo practice or how to use ChatGPT to ‘Frankenstein’ blog posts that communicate complicated financial information in an easier-to-understand way for your audience, then we hope you enjoy this episode of the Financial Advisor Success podcast, with Michael Collins.
