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Welcome back to the 309th episode of the Financial Advisor Success Podcast!
My guest on today's podcast is Anh Tran. Anh is the Founder and Managing Partner for SageMint Wealth, a corporate LPL-affiliated RIA based in Orange, California, that oversees nearly $325 million for 195 client households.
What's unique about Anh, though, is how, as a solo advisor, she differentiates her firm by leveraging the combination of a high-touch concierge approach to client service with a unique investment management approach through the use of very carefully chosen structured notes to differentiate her portfolio design from other advisors.
In this episode, we talk in-depth about how, even though it is admittedly more time consuming for her firm, Anh conducts extensive due diligence and analysis to integrate structured notes into her client portfolios and ladders them on a rolling quarterly basis so that clients can continuously reinvest at then-current rates and features, why Anh decided to hire not a second advisor to scale her firm but, instead, hired a full-time Director of Advanced Strategies to serve as an internal consultant to identify and outline ways to increase client service efficiencies as well as implement the technology to improve those strategies over time, and how Anh doesn’t implement a service model based on a client’s assets but rather segments clients based on how complex their needs are (which will determine the number of touch points they will receive, and in turn, the amount of fees they pay).
We also talk about how Anh began her career as an attorney, but decided to move away from the more transactional short-term relationship of litigation, and then, it was while she was working for Goldman Sach’s Ayco, that she realized that she could have a greater impact on her clients’ lives through financial planning and ultimately decided to become a CFP, the confidence struggles that Anh faced when she was assigned senior executives at Fortune 500 firms as a 20-something advisor and had to learn to get comfortable in demonstrating her expertise without feeling intimidated, and why Anh decided to remain a licensed attorney so that she could utilize her legal knowledge to guide clients through their estate planning needs (though she owns and operates her estate-planning firm with her husband as a separate entity).
And be certain to listen to the end, where Anh shares how she struggled early in her career to find a mentor that looked like her (especially as an Asian female advisor who is not from a wealthy background), but by leveraging study groups provided through LPL and other channels, she now has a steady foundation where she can gain insight with advisors who are similar to her (while helping to uplift other minorities in the financial services industry), why, after years of evolving her own confidence, Anh feels it’s important for younger, newer advisors to present their authentic selves to clients from the beginning of their careers so that they can not only connect with clients better but truly develop deeper and longer-lasting client relationships, and why Anh defines success simply by the term "freedom", where she can pick and choose the types of clients she works with, serves them the way she sees fit, has the ability to provide opportunities for her staff to thrive and grow, and has the flexibility to be present for her husband and her children.
So, whether you’re interested in learning about why Anh differentiates her portfolio management with structured notes, how hiring a Director of Advanced Strategies helped Anh transform her business, or how Anh helps uplift other minorities in the financial services industry, then we hope you enjoy this episode of the Financial Advisor Success podcast, with Anh Tran.