Five Reasons Why Gradient Is the Swiss Army Knife for Life Insurance and More

By Brian Lucius, Chief Distribution Officer Sponsored By Gradient Financial Group

Today, financial professionals offer more to their clients than ever before. The business is less about products and more about relationships and referrals. That’s why having a brand is a must.

Consumers want substance — you have to prove you are well-versed in your discipline through TV, radio, podcasts and more. They want to know your strategy for the business if one day you can’t show up to manage their retirement plan.

After nearly 20 years in the industry, Gradient has seen the challenges advisors face in accomplishing their goals and found ways to help advisors overcome those challenges. Here are five ways Gradient uniquely serves advisors, and why it might be the Swiss Army knife you need for your financial and life insurance practice:

1. Life Insurance through Enhanced Planning

You may have heard enhanced planning referred to as estate planning, tax planning or advanced planning, but those terms are often associated with high-net-worth individuals. Gradient believes “enhanced planning” better describes what many financial professionals and their clients are facing — their legacy.

Life insurance is a major component of enhanced planning and meets a variety of needs. Because many people don’t believe they need life insurance, it’s best to start a conversation about life insurance by discussing the problems you (and your clients) want to solve and what you (and your clients) want to leave as a legacy.

“Buying life insurance is an emotional purchase. It’s the conversations around what would happen to your kids if you didn’t wake up tomorrow,” says Brian Lucius, Gradient’s Chief Distribution Officer. “What would happen to your family and where would your assets go? Most people don’t have a plan in place to address this.”

Gradient recently launched a comprehensive training program to educate advisors on the importance of bringing enhanced planning into the holistic financial planning process. The enhanced planning program works in tandem with Gradient’s Succession Planning University, a two-and-a-half-day live training event in Minnesota, which focuses exclusively on the advisor’s business.

2. Implementation

Gradient has a track record of implementing systems to connect financial professionals and their clients to a confident financial future, including assets under management; creating a recurring revenue stream for financial professionals; and technology infused with industry knowledge, strategy and processes.

“There’s a big difference between making something available for advisors and actually being able to help them implement it in their practice,” says Lucius.

While some IMOs offer multiple tools and approaches, they leave the burden of understanding how to use them successfully in a financial practice to the financial professional.

That’s why Gradient has developed systems to streamline your practice, allowing you to easily achieve repeatable success and scale your business.

3. Technology

Technology is another key component of Gradient’s platform, because it helps build an efficient, easy and successful process.

Lucius says, “Technology makes you more efficient and it helps ensure advisors don’t miss critical steps in the process.”

Using Gradient’s online information gathering tool eliminates duplicative work and ensures you don’t miss important questions in client conversations. Gradient’s proprietary Virtual Advisor® technology and the Generational Vault® for storing critical documents are tools designed to meet the needs of today’s sophisticated advisor practice.

“Our world today is about convenience. You must have a practice that is easy to access, easy to use, and facilitates increased communication with your clients,” explains Lucius.

4. Marketing and Branding

Today, you must differentiate your brand, which means having your marketing dialed in.

Advisors who understand this are seeing their practices grow as their brands become more recognizable in their communities.

Gradient has an innovative in-house creative design firm that focuses on results. “Our team equips financial professionals of all shapes, sizes and stages to ensure you stand out in a crowded financial landscape,” says Lucius. “Whether you want to use our proven marketing material or develop your own, we have the time, talent and resources to make sure your brand is taking advantage of every opportunity.”

5. Focus on Creating Happy Clients

“As producers know, the long-term success of their business is really a happy client,” says Lucius. “Happy clients bring more assets and referrals. Happy clients stay with you. So, if you have the tools necessary to make their retirement what they want it to be, you end up with a more solid practice.”