Late next year, Rob Foregger plans to offer retail advisors technology to rival any online robo-advisor's platform.
Advisors who have avoided moving their businesses online, he says, will see in NextCapital's retail digital advisor platform a way to serve more clients, while still retaining the personal relationships their clients count on. The Chicago-based digital advisor and technology provider believes it can equip individual advisors with multiple asset class models, portfolio analysis tools and advice methodology for affordable rates, due to the benefits of scale NC realizes from its institutional 401(k) managed accounts and portfolio management services.
Together, NextCapital's co-founders, Foregger, John Patterson, Dirk Quayle and Jon Hagen, embody the technology that helped open the door to the digital advisor era. The team created the first 401(k) managed accounts platform, one of the first online banks (EverBank), and the first electronic financial advisor, Personal Capital. Now Foregger wants advisors to succeed despite robo competitors by adapting a hybrid of human interaction backed by digital support. Doing so, he says, will produce higher client volumes for less money. (This fall Transamerica Ventures Fund and Russell Investments led a $6 million investment in the NextCapital.)
In particular, advisors who have wanted to take on small, employer-based retirement plans, but have held back because of the volume-related time and labor costs required, may find they can through NC's platform with its automated registration and aggregation, which is available now at NextCapital.com.
A lot of time can be saved through digitizing with NC's aggregator. The online aggregator, which Foregger calls “Beyond the Shoebox,” digitizes client minutia: confirms, receipts, transcripts and financial statements, freeing the advisors for in-person counseling on budget preparation and retirement strategies. Since the aggregator is open to anyone, advisors can encourage prospects to enter their investment information for advisors to review and offer personalized advice as an example of their services.