Our monthly Top Advisor by Participant Outcomes (TAPO) honorees are a great source of best-practices information for 401(k) advisors. Here are a few quick tips from some members of the 2019 class.
And be sure to tune into next week’s 2020 TAPO celebration, with special guest Anthony Scaramucci on Friday, September 18, at 3:30 eastern.
Breaking News! 401(k) Specialist Top Advisor by Participant Outcomes 2020 Recipient (September 18, 2020, 3:30 pm ET)
This is it! The big announcement. Why were these 12 advisors chosen for the honor, and what are they doing right that got them noticed? We call them out individually and name the overall ‘Top Advisor by Participant Outcomes (TAPO)’ recipient for 2020. Join 401(k) Specialist and JP Morgan to find out who it is and why they won!
Your Value Proposition
“You need to show more value than just being a retirement consultant; that’s only one part of the benefit dollar they’re looking at. If you can show that by designing more targeted, successful benefit packages, you’re getting their population to retirement at an age of 67, and you’re reducing their future healthcare costs and future liabilities, you become a real partner to them.” — Jamie Greenleaf, lead advisor and principal of Red Bank, New Jersey-based Cafaro Greenleaf
“If we’re doing all these wonderful things on the plan side [auto-enrollment, re-enrollment, auto-escalation, etc.], we don’t necessarily need to talk 401(k) or why they should save more, since we’re utilizing auto features to help a lot of folks do that. We’re now spending time on helping them understand Social Security, and [in 2019] we rolled out an HSA as part of the platform for them. It’s now about bringing in all this other great stuff.” — Daniel J. Peluse, director of retirement plan services with Chicago-based Wintrust Wealth Management
Get Participants to the Full Match
“I look at raw data in a lot of very granular ways. You can sort through it pretty darn quickly to get what you’re looking for. Anybody who’s not contributing enough to get the full match, that’s the No. 1 data point. It’s unbelievable to me how reaching out to those folks and having a conversation—and it doesn’t take long—gets them to the full match.” — Marcy Supovitz, principal with Worcester, Massachusetts-based Boulay Donnelly & Supovitz Financial Services
Avoiding ‘Analysis Paralysis’
“When I’m looking at target-date funds, there are so many different things that are out there: peer rankings, expense ratios, performance, and glide path. Generally, these funds are in the 90th percentile in terms of performance. If we go out and add more, it’s going to make the employer’s decision impossible. If you get something that has the name recognition that the employees like and will use, I think you’ll get better participation than if you choose a fund that, in theory, is better but that they’ve never heard of.” — Jerry Lynch, president and founder of Boonton, New Jersey-based JFL Total Wealth Management
The Roth 401(k)
“If they’re aware of it, they often have a misconception around it. They think that they earn too much money to contribute to it, or they’re too focused on the fact that they’re in a higher tax rate today and a lower tax rate in retirement, so you have to constantly hammer home the tax-free growth portion of it. From the standpoint of participant outcomes, the adoption of the Roth is really important, but you have to educate to it.” — Jeanne Fisher, formerly of ARGI Investment Services in Bowling Green, Kentucky, and now managing director with Strategic Retirement Partners in Nashville
Granular Approach to Customization
“We ask about the debt load of the employee group, and if it’s a topic that’s raised in enrollment conversations. Clients often say, ‘Yes, 40% of my group is within five years from being out of a postgraduate degree, and they have a pretty heavy debt burden.’ If we not only get them to understand how to pay down debt, but how to address all the other financial decisions in their early lives, that’s going to make a very, very significant impact on retention of those employees—something the employer soon realizes.” — David Griffin, director of institutional retirement plans with Georgia-based Atlanta Retirement Partners | LPL Financial