Articles Written by Jon Henschen

Outsourcing – Ways to Cut Overhead Expenses

00:00 01 June in Articles Written by Jon Henschen by rafferty

by Jonathan Henschen, CFS and featured in Producers Web June, 2006: It’s not uncommon for me to run into advisors who are paying up to five salaried assistants, and whose production is down around $500,000 in Gross Dealer Concession--their total net revenues from commission product sales and fee-based income. That’s a lot of overhead eroding what these advisors are actually netting at the end of the year! Even though our industry thinks almost exclusively in terms of “GDC,” an advisor’s “net revenues” are the true benchmarks of success. That means, the lower the cost of doing business, the more profitable the advisor! To prove my point, I recently began making highly profitable use of the outsourcing resources described here. As a result, my modest little experiment has reduced my business overhead. Big Time! See...

The Top 5 Reasons Advisors Change Broker-Dealers

00:00 01 April in Articles Written by Jon Henschen by rafferty

by Jonathan Henschen, CFS and featured in Producers Web April, 2006: Changing broker/dealers is a choice of last resort. Just the thought of it can cause an advisor’s guts to churn. For an advisor even to consider changing broker/dealers means that the pain threshold has reached disturbingly high levels. The causes of this pain are many, but here in descending order are what I’ve found to be the top five reasons advisors find it necessary to make that decision. 1. Unhappy in their current relationship Frequently, relationship issues are caused by consolidation of insurance companies and banks, where significant management changes have altered advisors’ home office contacts. For example, when an insurance company buys your broker/dealer, you’ll experience a six-month to one-year honeymoon period where things are left alone while the new owners decide...

Seven Recruiting Sins

00:00 01 March in Articles Written by Jon Henschen by rafferty

by Jonathan Henschen, CFS and featured in Broker Dealer Journal March, 2006: My first year recruiting was baptism by fire. No formalized training or guidance, just get out there and figure it out. As with any learning curve, however, I quickly learned what works and what results only in futility. The purpose of the “Seven Recruiting Sins” is to share principles, practices and behaviors that broker/dealers can use to avoid mistakes and dramatically improve their recruiting results. 1) Ignoring Advisor Prospects There was a time when I’d go along and MC home office visits by prospective advisors with an insurance-based broker/dealer. My first couple of prospects spent about 20 minutes with the B/D’s president. By the fourth visit, the president decided he was too busy to spend time with mere prospects. The trouble was,...