David Zavarelli, a certified financial planner at LPL Financial in Danbury, Conn., with $50 million in AUM, uses Redtail, a CRM system designed specifically for financial professionals. “Proper use of a CRM like Redtail allows me to deliver quality, timely client service, and helps to keep me compliant by documenting all client contacts,” Zavarelli says. “It’s also helpful to keep track of opportunities and prospective client contacts so they don’t fall off the radar. They also have an Apple mobile app that I can dictate notes into and turns them [into] text. This eliminates the need for me to use a dictation service, which typically costs another $70 per month.”
LPL offers him a discounted monthly cost of $50 for Redtail.
Like any system, Redtail is “only as good as the time you invest entering information and programing workflows,” Zavarelli says. “You need to get everyone to use it regularly to get the benefits. But once you get used to using it on a regular basis, it is very effective. It has allowed me to have a paperless office. I can essentially work from anywhere, and I have all necessary information in the CRM. Having one place to look at all communications with clients and be able to easily pull up detailed notes is invaluable.”