Ep 113: Scaling An Advisory Firm To Serve A Greater Mission Beyond Yourself with Stacy Francis

Financial Advisor Success

Michael Kitces

News, Business, Entrepreneurship, Business News

4.8 • 696 Ratings

🗓️ 26 February 2019

⏱️ 112 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

My guest today has made it her mission to empower women to take control of their finances. Stacy Francis is the president and CEO of Francis Financial, an independent RIA with a unique niche focus on recent widows and women going through the divorce process. She is also the founder of Savvy Ladies, a nonprofit focused on improving the financial wellbeing of all women.

In this episode, Stacy opens up about the challenging family situation that led her to enter the financial services industry to help women in particular, as well as why she says today’s market is the worst one for divorcees that we’ve seen in nearly a decade. Listen in to learn how she built her business up to managing nearly $280 million in assets, why she hired business coaches for both herself and her team, and how making the decision to go all-in on a niche has helped Francis Financial grow as much in the past three years as it did in the 15 years leading up to the change.

For show notes and more visit: https://www.kitces.com/113

Transcript

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0:00.0	Welcome to the Financial Advisor Success Podcast, where you go behind the scenes with
0:07.1	financial planner, speaker, and consultant Michael Kitsis to hear stories of how leading
0:12.4	financial advisors navigated the inevitable challenges that arise on the path to success
0:17.4	and get insight from leading industry consultants about how to break through to the next
0:22.2	level in your advisory business. And now here's your host, Michael Kitsis. Welcome, everyone. Welcome to
0:28.8	the 113th episode of the Financial Advisor Success podcast. My guest on today's podcast is Stacey Francis.
0:36.3	Stacey is the president and CEO of Francis Financial, an independent RIA based in New York
0:40.8	City that manages nearly 280 million in assets for 140 affluent clients.
0:46.5	What's unique about Stacey, though, is her deep dive niche into working with and financially
0:51.4	empowering women, from her RIA's focus on hourly consulting with
0:55.8	women going through the divorce process before working with them as ongoing wealth management
0:59.6	clients, to her launch of savvy ladies, a nonprofit dedicated to providing financial empowerment
1:05.7	to women, and all stemming from Stacey's own challenging family situation of witnessing a beloved grandmother
1:12.8	who stayed in an abusive marriage until the end because she wasn't financially empowered enough to leave.
1:19.2	In this episode, we talk in depth about Stacey's unique niche focus in working with women who are
1:24.6	recently widowed her going through a divorce, the unique referral network that she's been able to develop by becoming known for a targeted specialization.
1:32.3	How she effectively gets paid to market her wealth management services by getting paid hourly to consult with women going through the divorce process,
1:39.9	and then finding that nearly 95% of them stay on board for an ongoing basis thereafter.
1:45.7	And why her biggest regret in the business is not making the decision to go all in to focus on her women in divorce niche sooner,
1:52.7	as her firm has grown as much in the past three years within her niche than in the prior 15 years leading up to it.
1:59.6	We also talk about the unique way that Stacey has structured her firm and developed her team
2:04.4	to deliver services to clients.
	...

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