If you’re wondering whether taking custody of client accounts and a virtual assistant is right for your independent advisory firm, this episode’s for you!

Taking custody can be a scary decision, but sometimes it's the right one. Just ask XYPN member Kate Yearwood Young, CFA, CFP®, founder of Yearwood Young Advisors.  From engineering to Wall Street to founding a successful business, she acquired the skills and services to meet her client’s needs where they are.  And their needs dictated that she take custody.

Born into the advisor role despite her family’s best efforts—her father, aunt, and cousin are in the industry—Kate was encouraged to explore other avenues of interest, but sometimes it’s in your blood! After getting a degree in engineering, Kate pivoted back to finance and soon found herself on the Wall Street Trading Floor.

She developed her knowledge and expertise in evaluating hedge fund managers for large pension funds and ultra-high-net-worth clients. In 2019, she made the decision to leave her last firm and start her own business. She launched in May 2020 with a six-month-old baby but found a way to persevere and began to grow her firm.

Kate has a really unique service offering.  In addition to comprehensive financial planning and investment management, she also has a family office service. She needed to take custody of client accounts because she has bill pay authority for her office service.

A deeper dive into the topic reveals her experience with the audit process and the documentation required when you have full control of a client's bank account.

We also dive into what she's building and how she plans to get more control of her calendar, the number of hours she works, and how she's leveraging a virtual assistant and soon-to-be outsourced paraplanner.

From being in touch with her clients’ needs to growing her business in the most sane and productive ways, Kate’s story is one that we need to hear.

You can find show notes and more information by clicking here: https://www.xyplanningnetwork.com/366 

If you are interested in learning highly effective, yet simple ways to use data-driven market research to find and maximize your niche, this episode is for you! 

In this candid and informative conversation with XYPN member Marlon Wesh, MBA, founder of Wesh Financial, we learn how Marlon’s early experience in HR for the Marine Corps helped formulate his firm’s operational systems. We also hear how earning his undergraduate degree and MBA in business administration was tremendously helpful in structuring the business side of his firm—especially his marketing classes which informed his approach to finding his niche. 

While completing his MBA, he did an internship with Merrill Lynch and decided that his path would be better served as an entrepreneur where he owned 100% of his business and where someone else wasn’t testing out their inclusivity on him.

He launched his firm in late 2019 with minimal planning experience, but a whole lot of grit and self-confidence. He tried a few niches and quickly established that just because there’s a gap in the market, it doesn’t mean there’s a market in the gap. So, he turned to methods informed by both his marketing classes and what came most naturally to him: data-driven market research. 

His strategic approach proved to be both satisfying and profitable.  A Google search that started with “What are professions that have complicated taxes?” ultimately led him to his niche: traveling nurses. He didn’t stop there though, he studied multiple online forums where traveling nurses shared what he determined were pain points.  He then turned those pain points into his selling points—which directly fueled his success.

Marlon was super open about the challenges of starting a firm, especially with young kids, and how he and his wife ultimately navigated it. He also shared that the next phase of his business will focus on helping advisors with their marketing. I hope you enjoy this conversation as much as I did.

You can find show notes and more information by clicking here: https://www.xyplanningnetwork.com/365