Latest / Financial Planner Life Podcast / Building An International Financial Advice Powerhouse - Titan Wealth International | Tyla Phillips & William Burrows

Transcript

Building An International Financial Advice Powerhouse - Titan Wealth International | Tyla Phillips & William Burrows · Financial Planner Life Podcast

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_00: How do you build an advisor proposition that makes financial planners stay in the international space?
• 0:07
  SPEAKER_00: Spoiler alert, it includes amazing lead generation and marketing.
• 0:17
  SPEAKER_00: Today I'm joined by Tyler Phillips and William Burroughs.
• 0:21
  SPEAKER_00: They're not just senior leaders at Titan Wealth International, they're founders of AHR, a business they built through the ground up, which was later acquired by Titan Wealth.
• 0:31
  SPEAKER_00: They've lived every version of this career.
• 0:34
  SPEAKER_00: Top performing advisors, business builders, founders, and now leaders in a much bigger international group.
• 0:41
  SPEAKER_00: This is a conversation about what it takes to go from being brilliant at the job to become player managers to building high-performing teams around them.
• 0:49
  SPEAKER_00: We also go deep into the Titan deal and crucially why it had to work for their advisors first.
• 0:55
  SPEAKER_00: They're very clear in this conversation that if the deal wasn't right for their people, it wasn't right for them.
• 1:01
  SPEAKER_00: And so we talk about how that decision making has helped shape a true one Titan culture and what it's like now being part of a bigger, ambitious, and more professional international planning platform.
• 1:15
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, guys, thank you so much for joining me today on the Financial Planner Live podcast.
• 1:18
  SPEAKER_00: I'm back in Dubai, absolutely loving it to be fair.
• 1:21
  SPEAKER_00: What a time of the year to come.
• 1:22
  SPEAKER_00: January is absolutely beautiful, a little bit chilly for me.
• 1:26
  SPEAKER_00: Sat out on the marina yesterday dinner, but you know what?
• 1:28
  SPEAKER_00: It's really, really good to be back.
• 1:30
  SPEAKER_00: It's good to be back in another business, another international business that's doing amazing things.
• 1:35
  SPEAKER_00: Now, Tyler, it's not your first rodeo when it comes to the Financial Panel Life podcast.
• 1:39
  SPEAKER_00: Four years ago.
• 1:40
  SPEAKER_00: Four years, yeah.
• 1:40
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, you were on the podcast.
• 1:41
  SPEAKER_00: So we're gonna get into a little bit about that, see what's changed.
• 1:44
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and for those that don't know, 11 years ago, my recruitment business placed you into the international market.
• 1:50
  SPEAKER_00: And what an insane journey that you've been on.
• 1:53
  SPEAKER_00: So I'm really, really pleased you're back, full circle moment, and we're gonna hear about all the success you've had.
• 1:57
  SPEAKER_00: Will, thank you for joining me.
• 1:59
  SPEAKER_00: And you yourself, again, have been on an incredible journey.
• 2:02
  SPEAKER_00: In fact, you knew Tyler very early on.
• 2:05
  SPEAKER_02: Very early on in the journey, yeah.
• 2:07
  SPEAKER_00: Very early on the journey.
• 2:08
  SPEAKER_00: So we're gonna hear a lot about you and what your journey's been like together as well, and where you are at the moment, the most exciting period, really.
• 2:16
  SPEAKER_00: Titan Wealth, Titan Wealth International, and what's that all about, and how has that impacted both of you and your business?
• 2:22
  SPEAKER_00: But first of all, if you can just give us an introduction, let us know who you are and what you do.
• 2:27
  SPEAKER_00: So, Will, starting with you first.
• 2:28
  SPEAKER_02: Uh so I'm uh operate as the uh joint international manager director at Titan Wealth International.
• 2:34
  SPEAKER_02: Uh, moved overseas 13 years ago, uh, originally as a business development manager, kind of worked my way through uh to become a full advisor, uh, following which co-founded Harrison Rowe with Tyler and a couple of others in 2018.
• 2:47
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, and then merged that business with Arlo Wealth in 2020, uh, and then obviously we were more recently acquired by Titan Wealth uh towards the end of last year.
• 2:57
  SPEAKER_02: Um yeah, hopefully that's.
• 2:59
  SPEAKER_00: What about the day-to-day duties at the moment, then at Titan Wealth?
• 3:02
  SPEAKER_00: If you would just kind of give us an insight into what you do day to day, what's your responsibilities?
• 3:07
  SPEAKER_02: Uh good question, uh, difficult answer, I think.
• 3:09
  SPEAKER_02: Um I think each day it changes.
• 3:12
  SPEAKER_02: I think in the roles we're in now, where we still look after a handful of clients to stay in touch with what's going on on the advice side of the business.
• 3:19
  SPEAKER_02: Um, our responsibilities daily are focused more around supporting everybody else across the business to be able to do what they are here to do ultimately.
• 3:30
  SPEAKER_02: So, you know, some days it might be coming in and helping the business development management team, might be coming in and helping the advice team, it might be helping the marketing team, could be helping the IT team or the compliance team.
• 3:41
  SPEAKER_02: Ultimately, our our role daily is to make sure that everybody is able to do what they're here to do and to do it effectively and efficiently.
• 3:50
  SPEAKER_02: And if we we do our role properly, which is supporting everyone else, then everyone else can do their role that they're here to do, and ultimately the business moves and trends in the right direction, which is which is key.
• 4:00
  SPEAKER_00: Love it.
• 4:01
  SPEAKER_00: Lived experience as well, and we're gonna get into that in a minute.
• 4:04
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but you, I know you, Will, now I've gotten to know you.
• 4:07
  SPEAKER_00: Massive problems.
• 4:08
  SPEAKER_00: Problem solver, Tyler, would you say?
• 4:10
  SPEAKER_00: Loves getting stuck into some problems, loves solving problems, coming up with some really unique solutions.
• 4:14
  SPEAKER_00: And I think some of the solutions you've come up with for advisors, really, really unique in this space.
• 4:20
  SPEAKER_00: So we're gonna touch on that later.
• 4:21
  SPEAKER_00: So any financial advisors hearing about it, because some of the biggest struggles, and we're gonna get into that as well because you've gone through the journey, is how you get clients.
• 4:28
  SPEAKER_00: You know, it's really, really difficult.
• 4:29
  SPEAKER_00: Marketing, branding, being taken seriously sometimes in the international space has been a struggle.
• 4:34
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, so we're gonna get into that in a bit.
• 4:35
  SPEAKER_00: So anybody listening, hold out for that.
• 4:37
  SPEAKER_00: Tyler, introduce yourself.
• 4:38
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, so um, I'm one of the uh the joint uh managing director here at Titan Wolf International.
• 4:44
  SPEAKER_01: Um, previously kind of started my career as an advisor, and after moving here, kind of built a client book from scratch.
• 4:52
  SPEAKER_01: Um, since then, we've moved into kind of, as Will said, leading and building the business, and that could be from developing people, building the right environment, and just giving everyone kind of the tools to be able to do the job and give as the best outcome possible for clients, really.
• 5:06
  SPEAKER_00: Love it.
• 5:07
  SPEAKER_00: Titan Wealth, very, very fast growing business, four years, I think it's over 35 billion plus under management within that time.
• 5:14
  SPEAKER_00: The international space has been acquired by them, right?
• 5:16
  SPEAKER_00: The international business, AHR, and we're gonna go into that journey.
• 5:20
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but let's just talk about and give the listeners some context as well.
• 5:23
  SPEAKER_00: How how how many people are out here with you in Dubai?
• 5:26
  SPEAKER_00: How many jurisdictions are you uh delivering advice to, for instance?
• 5:30
  SPEAKER_02: Uh it's a good question, I think.
• 5:31
  SPEAKER_02: If you know uh it changes uh month by month that the rate of growth that Titan are on.
• 5:36
  SPEAKER_02: Um I think we've got 150 in the office here, yeah.
• 5:39
  SPEAKER_02: 200 over 200 for the international side, jurisdictions uh from uh North America, uh Europe, Africa, Middle East, Asia, Australia, um and the UK.
• 5:55
  SPEAKER_02: I think all but a couple of locations I think we operate in.
• 5:58
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, fantastic.
• 5:59
  SPEAKER_00: But your journey started in Dubai for both of you, right?
• 6:02
  SPEAKER_00: Yes.
• 6:02
  SPEAKER_00: And you didn't come over here and start a business from scratch.
• 6:05
  SPEAKER_00: So let's just give some context because I think it's really important that people understand that the international space has changed, right?
• 6:13
  SPEAKER_02: Massively.
• 6:14
  SPEAKER_00: And it's tough.
• 6:15
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 6:15
  SPEAKER_00: You know, it's different.
• 6:16
  SPEAKER_00: It's definitely different from the UK, right?
• 6:18
  SPEAKER_00: So your journey together, okay.
• 6:22
  SPEAKER_00: Will how did you meet Tyler?
• 6:25
  SPEAKER_00: How did you guys get in contact with each other?
• 6:27
  SPEAKER_00: And what was it like in those early years?
• 6:29
  SPEAKER_02: So I I I had arrived, I think, May 2013, uh, initially actually as an advisor, and then chose to become a business development manager when I realized quite quickly that it was a very different environment out here than it was back in the UK.
• 6:41
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and a friend of mine who happened to work with Tyler at Lloyd's, yeah, Jason, um, on Tyler's second day out here, uh invited me, said one of his friends from the UK was over, got to take him out for a drink, showing him Dubai.
• 6:56
  SPEAKER_02: Am I around?
• 6:57
  SPEAKER_02: So I popped down and I literally met Tyler on his second day.
• 7:00
  SPEAKER_02: Um you never look back.
• 7:03
  SPEAKER_02: Never look back, yeah, exactly.
• 7:04
  SPEAKER_02: Um and then it wasn't it was six months after, I think.
• 7:08
  SPEAKER_02: Six months after that, I was a little bit uh I think discontented is the right word in the firm that I was in.
• 7:15
  SPEAKER_02: And Tyler seemed to be doing very well at the sixth month, six month point.
• 7:20
  SPEAKER_02: I think it took a little while to get there.
• 7:22
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, by myself.
• 7:24
  SPEAKER_02: And uh and suggested coming over and having a conversation.
• 7:27
  SPEAKER_02: And I think the decision was quite quick.
• 7:29
  SPEAKER_02: Um, even just being able to work alongside Tyler at the other at firm number two, we shall call them, um, made a lot of sense, and I jumped ship six months after.
• 7:38
  SPEAKER_02: So we started working together very quickly, yeah, having met in 2015.
• 7:42
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, that's really good though, isn't it?
• 7:44
  SPEAKER_00: Like being connected with somebody from those early days where you didn't quite know what you were doing, you were in a brand new environment.
• 7:52
  SPEAKER_00: Tony, I'm gonna ask you, working for Lloyds back in the UK, you were the youngest charters, one of the youngest chartered planners in the UK at the time, weren't you?
• 8:00
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah.
• 8:01
  SPEAKER_00: So you had a good career, you had a good business that you were part of.
• 8:04
  SPEAKER_00: And I remember when I reached out, well, you tell us the story.
• 8:07
  SPEAKER_00: How did you end up actually coming over?
• 8:08
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, well, it was when you look back, it's mad how things can can happen, right?
• 8:13
  SPEAKER_01: I was sitting at my office, uh at my desk, sorry, in um Mayfair, and an advert popped up about Dubai.
• 8:18
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know if I'd ever been to Dubai, never considered Dubai, and I just thought I'd look just because I was intrigued more than anything.
• 8:23
  SPEAKER_01: And then next thing you know, I'm I'm on the plane over here, right?
• 8:26
  SPEAKER_01: And it's it when you look back and you think how one small decision can make such a material impact to your future, not just career, but kind of life, I guess.
• 8:36
  SPEAKER_01: Um moved here January 2015, didn't really know anyone uh other than a couple of friends, got in, started to do the RAW, and and it was a lot more difficult than I than I expected it to be.
• 8:50
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and the reason I say that is when you're at like a bank, right?
• 8:53
  SPEAKER_01: Everything is structured.
• 8:54
  SPEAKER_01: You get training, you follow process, you get given clients.
• 8:58
  SPEAKER_01: The clients are normally fairly warm and want advice.
• 9:01
  SPEAKER_01: Whereas when we got here, they done the two-day training and then gave me a business card and said you're going out there.
• 9:08
  SPEAKER_01: I didn't even know where I was going, let alone where I was finding people.
• 9:11
  SPEAKER_01: So it was a very different, very different environment whatsoever.
• 9:14
  SPEAKER_01: And and to get to get used to that is difficult.
• 9:17
  SPEAKER_01: Um and to and to kind of get going, really, is is is always a challenge for most people when they first get here.
• 9:22
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, it's a steep learning curve, isn't it?
• 9:24
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, it's a very steep learning curve, and an unexpected one that I think people don't anticipate when they move over.
• 9:29
  SPEAKER_02: Kind of even if people come from experience, they feel like they've got certain parts of it figured out, but it was very, very different, especially in the early days when there was that lack of support.
• 9:37
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, and I think look, it was a good company, I enjoyed my time there, so I wouldn't want to say anything otherwise, but I think you learn from making mistakes, and also what I found difficult was when I see clients at the beginning, they were like they were questioning me a lot more.
• 9:52
  SPEAKER_01: Are you like one of them?
• 9:54
  SPEAKER_01: Are you really helping me?
• 9:55
  SPEAKER_01: Whereas in England, you sit with someone, you gave them advice, they take that advice.
• 9:59
  SPEAKER_01: They either proceed or they don't, but they respect the advice a bit like an accountant or a lawyer.
• 10:03
  SPEAKER_01: Whereas out here, the reputation was not what I expected or was um was prepared for, really, and that kind of took me back.
• 10:12
  SPEAKER_01: And I think what what was then key was kind of looking around and speaking to a lot of people, doing the job well, and just trying to share some best practice, understand what's worked well for them, understand what we can do to actually start to make that work.
• 10:25
  SPEAKER_01: And that was probably the biggest learning curve in the first kind of four or five months, but that was definitely one of the biggest headwinds, wasn't it?
• 10:30
  SPEAKER_02: Is the reputational risk.
• 10:32
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, the industry sector view was in tatters from not any one particular company, I don't think, but from a variety of businesses that had gone about delivering advice in the wrong way from hiring non-qualified individuals through to advising on products that wouldn't be acceptable in most highly regulated jurisdictions.
• 10:51
  SPEAKER_02: And you had a really the the industry was tainted, yeah, most definitely, and yeah, and I think the biggest challenge people get is running out of money, right?
• 11:00
  SPEAKER_01: You come out here, you're used to being on a salary, a lot of things are given to you.
• 11:03
  SPEAKER_01: When you come out here, and if you are on a share of revenue, you kind of got to get going quite quick.
• 11:09
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and I remember I was kind of four months in, I hadn't onboarded a client.
• 11:13
  SPEAKER_01: I had lots of opportunities that I thought were going to go ahead and didn't really hit me hard.
• 11:17
  SPEAKER_01: And I remember getting down to my last couple of hundred pounds the night to ring my mum and say, look, I think I'm gonna have to come home.
• 11:23
  SPEAKER_01: And it was really embarrassing, and I felt kind of yeah, it didn't feel great at all.
• 11:27
  SPEAKER_01: And and I don't know if someone was looking over me back then, but my mum, who's who's not a particularly wealthy person, um, had saved an endowment policy and she said, Son, this matures this month, or last month it might have been.
• 11:39
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and she was always planning to kind of split it with me, my sister, and her.
• 11:42
  SPEAKER_01: And that£5,000 got me through the next two months that done my first piece of business that then obviously got me going.
• 11:49
  SPEAKER_01: So, would have I gone home otherwise?
• 11:50
  SPEAKER_01: Who knows?
• 11:52
  SPEAKER_00: There's challenges in those first years.
• 11:55
  SPEAKER_00: You obviously both worked in separate companies, you were helping each other, which is probably non-existent back then.
• 12:00
  SPEAKER_00: That's like almost like hyper competitive, people competitive in their own firms, let alone in other firms, right?
• 12:04
  SPEAKER_00: So you'd obviously built like a really great relationship and you shared common ground by the sounds of things, right?
• 12:09
  SPEAKER_00: Which is good.
• 12:10
  SPEAKER_00: I like that.
• 12:11
  SPEAKER_00: Collaboration, not competition.
• 12:13
  SPEAKER_00: How did that then, and those formative years, how did that shape what then became Harrison Roe?
• 12:21
  SPEAKER_02: I I think it's a good question.
• 12:26
  SPEAKER_02: I think there's there's three parts to the to our businesses aren't very difficult, right?
• 12:30
  SPEAKER_02: Advice businesses aren't particularly complex to a certain extent.
• 12:34
  SPEAKER_02: Um I think there are three main pieces to the puzzle that need to benefit.
• 12:38
  SPEAKER_02: The primary one being the clients, the second one being the employees of the business, and then latterly, if those two are taken care of, shareholders or stakeholders will be correctly looked after as well.
• 12:48
  SPEAKER_02: And I think in in 2016-17 we uh looked around at the businesses that were around the region at the time, we looked at the one we were working within, and I don't think we felt that there were any companies out there where they'd solved all three of those things, and it didn't ever seem to look like the one losing out was the shells.
• 13:09
  SPEAKER_02: Um so somebody else in that chain, you know, they were they were not benefiting properly or as they should have done.
• 13:15
  SPEAKER_02: So I think the initial objective with Harrison Roe was we just wanted to establish our own boutique advice business where we were in control of the employee structure and the client proposition with the thought that, or the hope and the belief, I suppose, at that point, that the other part would take care of itself because we owned it.
• 13:34
  SPEAKER_02: Um and that that took, I think we took 16 people with us, and that took maybe six months for us to realize that you know, in in an environment where everybody's doing the right thing, it's probably very difficult to build a really solid business.
• 13:49
  SPEAKER_02: You've got to have a USP which separates you from everybody else.
• 13:53
  SPEAKER_02: And I think if your USP is doing the right thing by the client and by the people that work in the business that deliver the advice to the client, if that's your USP, then it's very easy to build a big business.
• 14:05
  SPEAKER_02: I think it was about six months in where we kind of realized we were onto a very good thing, not because of anything clever or innovative, just by doing the right thing.
• 14:14
  SPEAKER_02: And over that two years as Harrison Rowe, we kind of grew very, very quickly.
• 14:17
  SPEAKER_02: We obtained another couple of regulated licenses, ventured into new territories.
• 14:22
  SPEAKER_02: Um all really, whilst not knowing particularly what we're doing, you know, we're we're starting off on a journey having been advisors and moving into leading advisors and building a business.
• 14:32
  SPEAKER_02: So you make mistakes, but I think that was that was definitely the the main item was the realization that just doing the right thing accelerates you past the majority of what sometimes we we sometimes refer to it as competition and not competition, but you understand what I'm saying.
• 14:47
  SPEAKER_00: No, I totally get it.
• 14:48
  SPEAKER_00: And and and Tyler, where were advisors do you think being left to work things out on their own back then?
• 14:53
  SPEAKER_00: And you know, what did you actually create that was, I suppose, not rocket science, yeah, but worked.
• 15:01
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, and I think look, obviously, when I that that learning curve at the beginning where I went round and tried to learn from everyone and kind of built my own kind of way in which to deliver the advice and the process, really.
• 15:11
  SPEAKER_01: I think we look, we we were very close, and the team we had there was actually very close at the end where we worked together, we shared best practice, and we worked as a team.
• 15:19
  SPEAKER_01: The reason why I think Harris somebody was set up as well is we was we had a few successful years, and it was like, what's next?
• 15:26
  SPEAKER_01: Where can we grow into this business?
• 15:28
  SPEAKER_01: And unfortunately, they wasn't it wasn't an option, and I thought if that's not an option, it's kind of where are we gonna get that fulfillment going forward?
• 15:35
  SPEAKER_01: And that's when we said, look, let's set up our own, our own small business, see how we get on.
• 15:39
  SPEAKER_01: And as we told people, people kind of was attracted to that vision.
• 15:44
  SPEAKER_01: And then when you then brought them over, we probably felt that it's a duty that we've got to try and help support them as much as we possible, right?
• 15:51
  SPEAKER_01: Which is probably slightly different when you're working for the firm on your own.
• 15:54
  SPEAKER_01: So when they came over, we spent a lot of time training, sharing all the best practice, like Will's one of the best at what he does, right?
• 16:01
  SPEAKER_01: So he kind of recorded everything, he made all the documentation and really tried to develop these people to be the best representation of our business as possible.
• 16:11
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 16:11
  SPEAKER_01: And I don't think there was many firms probably giving that much love and attention to the people, and I think that really made a huge difference to the environment that we were trying to build.
• 16:19
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 16:19
  SPEAKER_00: And did you feel like the structure of teams was something relatively unique?
• 16:24
  SPEAKER_00: What did you build when you started structuring teams?
• 16:27
  SPEAKER_00: Did you build things around advisors to give them more support?
• 16:30
  SPEAKER_00: What what yeah?
• 16:31
  SPEAKER_02: I think it's back to what we said at the start is that if we can empower people to solely focus on the role they're supposed to be doing and not on all the peripheral things that come at them, they'll be able to achieve far more.
• 16:45
  SPEAKER_02: And with an advisor, you know, especially from me, looking at Tyler, who's, you know, exceptionally qualified, exceptionally knowledgeable, and then being able to, but Tyler's spending his time doing his administration at the old firm or trying to find the prospective clients to meet, which is hugely time consuming, or doing the power planning work, it it it again, you know, it does it's not rocket science, it's looking at the system going, Tyler should and I and and every other advisor should be spending their time in front of clients, either existing clients managing that relationship, or in front of the prospective clients.
• 17:20
  SPEAKER_02: But they shouldn't really be doing all the other items that go behind the scenes.
• 17:23
  SPEAKER_02: And so, whilst we did have an element of this at the firm before we left, it was really building out those functions that support the advisor so they can do the absolute best work they possibly can and not an encumbered both mentally and time from a time-constrained perspective on the job.
• 17:41
  SPEAKER_02: So, you know, allocating business development managers to the advisors, allocating paraplanners or associates to the advisors, um, PAs to the advisors, administrators to the advisors.
• 17:54
  SPEAKER_02: The idea and the concept was that an advisor should, like I said, just should just be in front of a client.
• 17:58
  SPEAKER_02: Everything else should be taken care of by a well-alled machine behind the scenes, so they can do the bit of the job that they've qualified and worked very hard to be able to do ultimately.
• 18:10
  SPEAKER_00: So you two are very high producers of business.
• 18:13
  SPEAKER_00: You were writing high levels of business, you were you were very successful, those formative years of smashing their telephones, probably, and you know, walking to every place, picking up business cards, the real hard slog of the early days of being an international financial planner have paid off.
• 18:26
  SPEAKER_00: And it's interesting, isn't it?
• 18:27
  SPEAKER_00: Because you look at the UK, lack of young people coming into the profession.
• 18:32
  SPEAKER_00: I think one of the biggest struggles for anybody that does come into the profession is actually winning business, generating new business, right?
• 18:38
  SPEAKER_00: And you guys did that.
• 18:39
  SPEAKER_00: And I think that's one of the things the international space does incredibly well, is trains people and develops people to see sales ability as not a dirty word.
• 18:51
  SPEAKER_00: You know, it's not a dirty word.
• 18:53
  SPEAKER_00: You know how to sell yourself, how to go out there and win business.
• 18:57
  SPEAKER_00: Your lived experience of doing that and then bringing that into your business, that must have been a powerful thing to do.
• 19:04
  SPEAKER_00: I totally get the building the structure around people, freeing them up to do.
• 19:07
  SPEAKER_00: And again, if you're two big producers, that must have been a bit nerve-wracking, though, to kind of take your eye off the fact that, well, hang on, if I just carry on the pathway I am as a financial planner, I'm gonna be a multi, multi, multi-millionaire and I'll make all my money and then you know I don't care about anybody else.
• 19:20
  SPEAKER_00: Being a player manager, essentially, that must have really been a shift in your thinking, right?
• 19:27
  SPEAKER_01: Uh yeah, look, I think it it was just an evolution, right?
• 19:30
  SPEAKER_01: As we got people to come over and join us, it was something that we had to, we I felt that we were obliged and wanted to make sure we look after them.
• 19:39
  SPEAKER_01: And to be honest, as I started to spend time with people, trying to train them the best I can and watch them grow, it did give me much more fulfillment than I was getting.
• 19:48
  SPEAKER_01: And obviously, we used to wait to to produce business.
• 19:50
  SPEAKER_01: That's the only way we got paid for a long, long time, right?
• 19:53
  SPEAKER_01: And also by doing a great job meant that we can train better, it meant that we were well respected in what we do.
• 19:59
  SPEAKER_01: So it was all kind of working parallel.
• 20:01
  SPEAKER_01: But I think the more time we spent watching and developing people, the more enjoyment we got from that.
• 20:07
  SPEAKER_01: And then naturally, over time, you then start to give up a lot of the client work that you're doing and spend more and more time on the development of the people in the business.
• 20:15
  SPEAKER_00: Now, how were you doing that?
• 20:16
  SPEAKER_00: Was it like side by side or you know, classroom-based training?
• 20:19
  SPEAKER_00: What were you doing?
• 20:19
  SPEAKER_00: And what did you take into today's examples that are things that work really, really well when building really great financial planners?
• 20:26
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, so look, lots of trainings done in a in a boardroom, right?
• 20:29
  SPEAKER_01: With someone standing at the front presenting, and we still do a lot of that.
• 20:32
  SPEAKER_01: A lot of that will be technical training or or typically updates from budgets and other and other and other things.
• 20:37
  SPEAKER_01: But where realistically, how much information is taken in from everyone in the room from an actual group training session?
• 20:43
  SPEAKER_01: A few points at the most.
• 20:46
  SPEAKER_01: And to be honest, a lot of people then won't ask the difficult questions or the struggles they've got in a room in front of loads and loads of people.
• 20:51
  SPEAKER_01: So, what we've done, we spent a lot of time doing one-on-one training.
• 20:54
  SPEAKER_01: We got our guys to do recordings of their meetings, and like back then, I was flying around doing meetings and in the evenings listening to all their meetings, writing notes, going through it with them, and really analysing their performance so we can work out where they're really strong, where there's development areas, and then working out how we can kind of build that out together, which I think really went a long way with building the trust with the guys and also made sure they are really good.
• 21:18
  SPEAKER_01: And the other thing we've done a lot of was role play training.
• 21:20
  SPEAKER_01: A lot of people were shying, shy away from role play training because they're slightly nervous.
• 21:25
  SPEAKER_01: And I just said, look, if you can present in front of your colleagues at the optimum level, imagine how good you're going to come across with a client.
• 21:33
  SPEAKER_01: And at the beginning it was uncomfortable, and after a period of time it becomes natural, right?
• 21:37
  SPEAKER_01: So I think we spent a lot of time back then training and we made we we helped we helped build some amazing advisors in this in this in this business and other businesses now.
• 21:46
  SPEAKER_00: Love it.
• 21:47
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, I think if you've there's a number of items too, right?
• 21:49
  SPEAKER_02: If you've got someone like Tyler at the front writing the levels of business and winning the the kind of clients that he was bringing on board, as a leadership point, you've got people that can see what's possible.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_02: They can see what's available, right?
• 22:01
  SPEAKER_02: And then Tyler's absolutely right, you know, the the the classroom-based education for academic development is key.
• 22:10
  SPEAKER_02: But what is often missed, I think, because it takes a huge amount of time commitment, is that detailed analysis of almost every interaction between an advisor and a prospective client or a BDM and a prospective client, and analysing that.
• 22:24
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, if you look at professional sports people, whether it's footballers after they've played a game or F1 drivers when they come back in from the track, they don't sit and watch a lecture, right?
• 22:34
  SPEAKER_02: They will sit and analyse every data point of the game, every data point of the break before the corner or the acceleration out.
• 22:41
  SPEAKER_02: And what most advisors don't do is they'll they won't, I mean, we record meetings for quality and training purposes, but also from a compliance point of view.
• 22:50
  SPEAKER_02: And one of the best things that allows you to do is then sit, as Tyler did for hours on end, go through those and analyze them, and then be able to give that feedback back to the advisor so they can develop it for the next meeting.
• 23:01
  SPEAKER_02: And it's not necessarily the information around the advice specifically, it's about how to communicate, yeah, how to build trust with a client.
• 23:09
  SPEAKER_02: That's the the most clients that we sit with will need advice because they've come to seek that help and the support and the advice.
• 23:15
  SPEAKER_02: The difference is that ultimately the bit they're trying to make, the bridge they're trying to build is that trust build bridge between them and us.
• 23:22
  SPEAKER_02: And that's done through communication.
• 23:24
  SPEAKER_02: And most people typically, even now, we'll, you know, we'll have one mouth, two ears, but we'll operate in reverse, right?
• 23:29
  SPEAKER_02: We're thinking about what we're going to say next, and that's what people do in meetings often.
• 23:32
  SPEAKER_02: So when you listen back and you slow it down, even without saying anything, an advisor will listen and go, that's not what they asked, or that's not what I should have said at that point.
• 23:42
  SPEAKER_02: And if you develop that over a period of time, people's ability to build rapport with prospects and build that level of trust extrapolates, and therefore their efficiency goes up.
• 23:53
  SPEAKER_02: So they don't need to sit, you know, meet twice as many new prospects to do the same amount of new clients or bringing new clients on.
• 23:59
  SPEAKER_02: They can sit the same amount, but just increase the number that actually become clients because they're listening, they're building that trust, etc.
• 24:05
  SPEAKER_02: And that's the difference I think that we've tried to implement, or Tyler tried to implement definitely, is bridge that gap and help the advisors better and go from Tyler helping to advisors doing it themselves.
• 24:18
  SPEAKER_02: Most people don't want to listen back to themselves on a meeting, but the value of doing that is enormous.
• 24:22
  SPEAKER_02: So I think that was a big part of the training that was implemented.
• 24:25
  SPEAKER_00: I absolutely agree on that.
• 24:26
  SPEAKER_00: You become sort of obsessed about the process, become obsessed about the process, hyper focus on the areas where you can make improvements and make sure there's that ongoing regular feedback.
• 24:36
  SPEAKER_00: And I think that can often be the challenge, isn't it?
• 24:38
  SPEAKER_00: When someone's doing quite well, when they're doing well, we'll leave them alone.
• 24:41
  SPEAKER_00: But it's about staying close to the person that's doing well.
• 24:44
  SPEAKER_00: How can I one learn from that person that's doing well to teach others, but also how can I improve that person's process?
• 24:50
  SPEAKER_00: Where can we make it even better for them?
• 24:52
  SPEAKER_00: Because they're only going to do really, really well and then become super duper overwhelmed.
• 24:55
  SPEAKER_00: So if you're kind of staying close to the situation, you're staying close to the process, you're only going to make those improvements.
• 25:02
  SPEAKER_00: And they can be small incremental improvements that over time are going to be so massive.
• 25:06
  SPEAKER_00: And if you are documenting them, which is the main thing, and then you're sharing that, which is about culture, you know, you know, collaboration, not competition, which goes back to you guys when you very, very first met.
• 25:17
  SPEAKER_00: You were about helping each other.
• 25:18
  SPEAKER_00: You weren't seeing each other as competition.
• 25:20
  SPEAKER_00: Therefore, that's only going to then bleed into the culture of any business that you're going to create because it becomes those fundamental foundations.
• 25:27
  SPEAKER_00: And it is something that I have experienced from sitting with you guys over the last few weeks and understanding your business and lifting up the bonnet and taking a good look.
• 25:35
  SPEAKER_00: And most importantly, speaking to the advisors now that make up Titan Wealth International.
• 25:40
  SPEAKER_00: But there was a little bit before that, right?
• 25:42
  SPEAKER_00: So AHR was Arlo and Harrison Rowe.
• 25:46
  SPEAKER_00: So how did that come about?
• 25:48
  SPEAKER_00: Because you were doing well on your own, you were building good teams.
• 25:51
  SPEAKER_00: Why did you have to go and merge with somebody else?
• 25:55
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, I I think when we when we left and we established Harrison Rowe, we established it on we obtained a couple of regulated licenses, and then we we were partnered with Arlo.
• 26:06
  SPEAKER_02: So from the very outset, we were partnered with them locally for regulated advice.
• 26:11
  SPEAKER_02: Um and we built a very good strong relationship with them.
• 26:14
  SPEAKER_02: I I knew Mart from many years before and I'd known Dan uh for a few years as well.
• 26:19
  SPEAKER_02: Um and we sat down and had a conversation, weirdly, just before COVID kind of became big news.
• 26:26
  SPEAKER_02: And I think perhaps a little bit like the Tyson deal, it we realized very quickly that we I think we had four on our side, two uh on Arlo's side in terms of board member shareholders.
• 26:37
  SPEAKER_02: And I think we just quite quickly realized after a couple of conversations that we were all pieces of a jigsaw puzzle that fitted together very nicely, and that the skill sets that we had would very much complement the Arlo Wealth business, the skill sets they had would very much complement what we needed at Harrison Row.
• 26:55
  SPEAKER_02: And both uh both businesses were in this kind of position where growing would be difficult, not difficult, but we'd need to bring in outside resource to take those businesses as separate, isolated businesses to the next level, but actually by putting them together, it was going to give us everything we needed as one.
• 27:12
  SPEAKER_02: Um so I think it wasn't it wasn't a very difficult decision at all.
• 27:17
  SPEAKER_02: It was a uh few conversations.
• 27:19
  SPEAKER_02: I I mean it was done pretty quickly as well.
• 27:22
  SPEAKER_02: I mean the initial conversation was January, we were merged and in this office in June.
• 27:27
  SPEAKER_02: So it didn't take didn't take nearly as long as the Titan deal.
• 27:30
  SPEAKER_00: Um yeah, well, we'll get on to that.
• 27:32
  SPEAKER_00: So all of a sudden it became how many owners of a business?
• 27:36
  SPEAKER_00: Six.
• 27:37
  SPEAKER_00: Six.
• 27:37
  SPEAKER_00: Six.
• 27:38
  SPEAKER_00: That's quite a lot of owners of a business.
• 27:39
  SPEAKER_00: How many staff were there at the time, for instance?
• 27:42
  SPEAKER_01: It could be a hundred, I must imagine, maybe.
• 27:44
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 27:44
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, not far off.
• 27:45
  SPEAKER_00: Some business uh owner-led is one owner, and other businesses you have multiple people who are making decisions.
• 27:52
  SPEAKER_00: Some would say too many cooks.
• 27:54
  SPEAKER_00: What's what was your experience of that?
• 27:56
  SPEAKER_00: Of working with multiple different people who had an agenda, all had thoughts and feelings about the business.
• 28:01
  SPEAKER_00: Was it tricky?
• 28:02
  SPEAKER_00: Is it difficult?
• 28:02
  SPEAKER_00: Because a lot of people kind of feel quite protected about their business, and they don't really want to bring people in because they want to make those decisions themselves.
• 28:09
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, from my point of view, I don't think it's been difficult at all.
• 28:12
  SPEAKER_01: I think we all compliment each other, we we all respect each other's opinion, but we're there to make a collective decision.
• 28:19
  SPEAKER_01: And I think one thing that I think both sides, and I think Dan at Arlow and with Mark have also had this same foundation.
• 28:26
  SPEAKER_01: We're very transparent.
• 28:27
  SPEAKER_01: We've always been transparent.
• 28:28
  SPEAKER_01: We tell our guys absolutely everything within reason that we can tell them.
• 28:32
  SPEAKER_01: Any decision that we've always made, we have ensured that before we've made that decision, we've pulled them in, we've explained the situation why, and let them think about solutions with us.
• 28:41
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, so they really do feel valued.
• 28:44
  SPEAKER_01: And I think that's came from the relationship that our six have got.
• 28:47
  SPEAKER_01: We've always respected each other's um feelings, we've not always made, we've not always been on the same page.
• 28:51
  SPEAKER_01: It's taken time, we've always we've not always um we've we've always we had arguments as everyone does, right?
• 28:56
  SPEAKER_01: It's been healthy, and it's got to a stage where we just respect each other's decision, we know what each other's good at, and ultimately at the end, we will come to a solution.
• 29:04
  SPEAKER_01: So I don't think it's been that difficult, to be completely honest.
• 29:08
  SPEAKER_02: We all wanted the same thing, right, as as leading the business, and so we I mean it's you know, we we would sit down for four hours every week, just as the six, to go through what happened the week before, what's going on, what's what's happening within the business.
• 29:23
  SPEAKER_02: And you know, that's a it's probably more time than is spent with any other one person individually throughout the week, and any challenges, arguments, differences of opinion, they were never anything other than everyone's aiming for the same thing, it's just what direction do we go in to get there, and then let's let's understand each other's views if their views are different.
• 29:44
  SPEAKER_02: But it I it wasn't difficult at all, it was you know, it was really enjoyable.
• 29:48
  SPEAKER_00: Um what I take from that as well, it's like uh a brainstorming session, right?
• 29:53
  SPEAKER_00: So you've got six people within the business, all different pieces of the Jigasaur puzzle, all different with different skill sets.
• 29:58
  SPEAKER_00: It's like you're testing out an idea together, and then you've got those four hours a week, which it's gotta be super healthy to be doing that anyway.
• 30:05
  SPEAKER_00: Again, it's that debrief, it's that feedback, it's what can we change, what improvements can we make.
• 30:10
  SPEAKER_00: You're testing out ideas together and then bringing the advisors or the staff into that conversation to see how it lands.
• 30:18
  SPEAKER_00: So if it's if it's got the majority vote, say from six of you, and you're all on the same page, the likelihood probably, because it's different personalities and understandings of the different levels of the different sides of the business, you've got a deep understanding of it, it's only going to have a positive impact when it comes to the advisors.
• 30:34
  SPEAKER_00: And then from that position, the people that are in the business can kind of, which I like, feel involved, right?
• 30:41
  SPEAKER_00: Feedback is heard, things of um concerns are heard, perhaps, or worries are listened to.
• 30:47
  SPEAKER_00: And then consensus again, like, okay, brilliant, let's move forward with the idea or whatnot.
• 30:51
  SPEAKER_00: So I like that, you know, from my perspective, that works for me.
• 30:53
  SPEAKER_00: I'm a ideas man.
• 30:55
  SPEAKER_00: I love, you know, I can sit on a, I can sit down with you to have a cup of coffee and just chat shit.
• 30:59
  SPEAKER_00: You know, it's like, come on, let's do this, let's do that, let's do that, and we're exactly the same.
• 31:01
  SPEAKER_00: And, you know, by the end of it, we've probably got a list about this long of things that we're not gonna do.
• 31:05
  SPEAKER_00: But you would take a couple of things out of there and go, right, that's a hundred percent we need to do that.
• 31:09
  SPEAKER_00: So I love that.
• 31:10
  SPEAKER_00: And I think creativity runs through the business, and I like that a lot.
• 31:14
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, so I just want to, at this stage, though, um, talk about the next stage, which was Titan Wealth.
• 31:22
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 31:22
  SPEAKER_00: So Titan Wealth have come to come to you, right?
• 31:25
  SPEAKER_00: And um next thing I know, you guys are Titan Wealth International, the international arm of Titan Wealth.
• 31:31
  SPEAKER_00: They're a fast growing business, four years been going.
• 31:34
  SPEAKER_00: I think it's 1,300 staff.
• 31:37
  SPEAKER_00: It's gonna only get bigger, isn't it?
• 31:39
  SPEAKER_00: You know, you're now out there acquiring business internationally and growing at quite a rapid pace.
• 31:45
  SPEAKER_00: How did this come about?
• 31:47
  SPEAKER_00: You know, like tell me a little bit about that.
• 31:50
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, so look, we spoke to a few people over the years to kind of um who was interested in acquiring us or taking a stake.
• 31:58
  SPEAKER_01: Um, look, we was never looking to sell, we was never in the market for that.
• 32:02
  SPEAKER_01: And whenever we spoke to people in the past, we just didn't think it felt right for our staff, for our clients, for everyone involved, right?
• 32:08
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and then when we spoke to Titan, in all honesty, I just wanted to see what we was, if we was how we was valued and what we was valued at.
• 32:15
  SPEAKER_01: It's the reality with it.
• 32:15
  SPEAKER_01: So I said, Dan, let's just do a little meeting with them.
• 32:17
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 32:18
  SPEAKER_01: Done the meeting, I thought, actually, that's I like what they're saying.
• 32:21
  SPEAKER_01: I'm enjoying this conversation, let's continue further.
• 32:23
  SPEAKER_01: So I've gone back to the others and said, Look, guys, I know we're not looking to sell, however, let's just continue this conversation.
• 32:29
  SPEAKER_01: And as time went on, we just really felt and understood what the Titan vision was, what we're trying to build.
• 32:35
  SPEAKER_01: And then once again, a bit like when we merged our businesses, it was a bit like, can we do it on our own?
• 32:40
  SPEAKER_01: We're doing an amazing job.
• 32:41
  SPEAKER_01: We love what we do, but you only can grow at a certain pace organically, right?
• 32:45
  SPEAKER_01: And what we can build with Titan, which I think there's a huge opportunity in the market right now for what we're trying to achieve, we can really make something special, polite to the people.
• 32:55
  SPEAKER_01: I felt I could trust the people, I felt they were going to look after our people, most importantly.
• 33:00
  SPEAKER_01: And when we set up the company, and I think I even said it maybe on the podcast years ago, I said, if you come and as a AHR and as a Harrison Row, we want to make sure that everyone has long-term benefit from this company.
• 33:12
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 33:12
  SPEAKER_01: So we set a share scheme up back then, which when we did sell, we paid out to all staff.
• 33:18
  SPEAKER_01: And part of the even part of the conversation with Titan was we need to make sure that we give our guys the ability to have equity like we've got in this in this venture.
• 33:27
  SPEAKER_01: And that was a non-negotiable for us.
• 33:29
  SPEAKER_01: And Titan wasn't against it, but they'd never done it for any of these transactions at this at this level.
• 33:35
  SPEAKER_01: So we then said it needs to be the same shares as us, and and everything that comes with it.
• 33:39
  SPEAKER_01: And that delayed the deal, probably three or four months, in all honesty.
• 33:42
  SPEAKER_01: But we gave our word to our people and we said we need to follow through on that, and obviously all come together in the end, which was amazing.
• 33:49
  SPEAKER_00: But you will.
• 33:50
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, I think I agree with everything Tyler said.
• 33:53
  SPEAKER_02: I think we were, you know, we hadn't taken a dividend out of Harrison Rowe, we hadn't taken a dividend out of AHR, everything was going back into reinvesting, into which of those, you know, ideas and initiatives we thought were going to help develop the business and build it further.
• 34:06
  SPEAKER_02: Um and then, you know, following the conversations that were had initially, I think we realized that in order to really get to the next level that we really wanted to achieve, we needed more capital.
• 34:19
  SPEAKER_02: Um and we needed support, and we needed the skills and expertise and the experience that all of the team at Titan have.
• 34:28
  SPEAKER_02: And that it was almost like there are pieces missing in our jigsaw that we didn't know were missing until we met with them and then realized actually this is going to make it even better.
• 34:37
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and as Tyler said, you know, it did take a while, I think it was 18 months, maybe even start to finish uh just to get to SBA.
• 34:44
  SPEAKER_02: But that was because we were trying to make sure everything was put in place that needed to be put in place and everybody was catered for.
• 34:51
  SPEAKER_02: And, you know, I think Tyler mentioned earlier, we we've never we've always tried to avoid any decision that needed to be made, let alone one that we want to make, that negatively impacts anyone within the business.
• 35:04
  SPEAKER_02: And if there is a decision that has to be made, the that that becomes a byproduct, we'll do something else to make sure that that isn't the only thing that happens in that scenario that the person's looked after.
• 35:14
  SPEAKER_02: Um but I think it was it was vitally important that we did all of that.
• 35:20
  SPEAKER_02: But yeah, I think that's I love it.
• 35:22
  SPEAKER_00: So obviously, fantastic opportunity, your ambitious bunch and Titan wealth coming to the table with being the first PE back business out there that's acquired in the international space.
• 35:34
  SPEAKER_00: I think that's exciting in its own right.
• 35:36
  SPEAKER_00: You talked about to get to where you want to get to.
• 35:38
  SPEAKER_00: Where is it?
• 35:38
  SPEAKER_00: What what you know what was that vision in your head of where you wanted to get to?
• 35:42
  SPEAKER_00: And why was Titan Wealth that rocket ship to get on that was going to get you to the moon?
• 35:48
  SPEAKER_02: I I th for for me, I think it's it's the word expat financial advice is just synonymous, synonymous with Time Wealth International.
• 35:55
  SPEAKER_02: That's just where you go.
• 35:56
  SPEAKER_02: Um, I think you know the reason why one of the reasons why we continue to build is not because we're looking at a really difficult proposition or ability to build, the market's wide open.
• 36:07
  SPEAKER_02: You know, there's a huge opportunity to to move into additional territories, different additional jurisdictions.
• 36:12
  SPEAKER_02: That there's obviously now, based on you know, following the last couple of budgets, there's an enormous exodus from the UK.
• 36:18
  SPEAKER_02: So from our side, there's just this immense opportunity.
• 36:22
  SPEAKER_00: Like you, Tyler, being part of Titan Wealth then right now, what's impact has that had, do you think, on the people within the business around their confidence when it comes to international financial advice?
• 36:33
  SPEAKER_01: I think it's made a huge impact.
• 36:35
  SPEAKER_01: I think the the size of the company now and the presence that we now have as a group and as a business is really ensuring that when they're having conversations with clients, clients feel comfortable, right?
• 36:46
  SPEAKER_01: They know who we are, especially in the international space, as we mentioned, the reputation hasn't been great.
• 36:52
  SPEAKER_01: And that's not because all firms are bad at all.
• 36:54
  SPEAKER_01: A lot of our competition now are very good firms, to be honest, and the advisors are a lot better than when I got here 11 years ago.
• 37:00
  SPEAKER_01: But being part of a company of that size, with that expertise, with the services that we now offer has really probably made our guys feel a lot more comfortable.
• 37:09
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and I think the opportunity for them to grow professionally now is there.
• 37:12
  SPEAKER_01: Whereas most of our firms are very much glass ceiling, limited role opportunity.
• 37:17
  SPEAKER_01: And here they now have the ability to move jurisdiction, move department, have complete um confirmed progression plans, right?
• 37:26
  SPEAKER_01: Which I think is really important because some people, even financial advisors or wealth planners, right, they're doing a wealth planning job and they don't really know what else they can do.
• 37:33
  SPEAKER_01: What else can they do afterwards?
• 37:34
  SPEAKER_01: Whereas they might actually feel they want to move into something else.
• 37:38
  SPEAKER_01: And I'm hoping we can now facilitate that.
• 37:40
  SPEAKER_01: One thing for me is I wanted to build a company that outlives all of us, right?
• 37:43
  SPEAKER_01: That we can sit there in the pub when we're when we're older and just talk about the memories and the stories of what we created and something that we can be really proud of.
• 37:51
  SPEAKER_01: And the environment for our advisors or our staff to feel like they are happy and want to work for us for the whole of their career, and for clients to continue with us for the whole of their journey.
• 38:00
  SPEAKER_01: I think that was really probably the statement that I would have kind of wanted to build.
• 38:04
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I love that.
• 38:05
  SPEAKER_00: Like a borderless financial planning business is key, isn't it?
• 38:08
  SPEAKER_00: Especially in this globally mobile world.
• 38:10
  SPEAKER_00: People are moving around for work, but also at the same time, they're they're going back to the UK, aren't they?
• 38:14
  SPEAKER_00: They're repatriating back to the UK.
• 38:16
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 38:16
  SPEAKER_00: You know, and being able to deal with that and go back to a business which is so strong in the UK, not just now internationally, I think just gives that level of confidence.
• 38:25
  SPEAKER_00: Why do you, why does a client need to go anywhere else?
• 38:28
  SPEAKER_00: Realistically, you should never, you should never lose a client, right?
• 38:31
  SPEAKER_00: So that's a massive selling point to anybody that's part of the business and starting a career within financial planning.
• 38:36
  SPEAKER_00: Whether you're in the UK and one of your top ultra-high net worth clients are gonna move to Dubai, if they did that, what could you do about that?
• 38:43
  SPEAKER_00: Now they can just hand them over to you guys, and there's a beautiful concierge service, essentially, this white glove service, if you like, that's gonna look after that client from start to finish.
• 38:52
  SPEAKER_00: Is that something in your vision as well?
• 38:53
  SPEAKER_00: Is that something that you want to build, this kind of almost, I dare I say it, this family office type feel where the client gets this top level of experience?
• 39:00
  SPEAKER_00: Is that something you're working towards or doing now?
• 39:03
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, I think it's the a lot of the relationship, you know, uh clients come on board initially and they stay because of the levels of service, right?
• 39:11
  SPEAKER_02: And I think so everything we strive to is white, you know, as cheesy as it sounds, is this white glove, red carpet, concierge level of advice and support.
• 39:19
  SPEAKER_02: And I think where again linking it back to the Titan piece is where the value is, or our objective is to have the ability for a client to get the exact same level of service, whether they're engaged in with an office in Newcastle, in Harrogate, in London, in Bristol, or whether they move to Florida and they engage, or Australia or the Middle East, is having this highest high level of service that is replicable across the business.
• 39:46
  SPEAKER_02: So they don't feel like there is a difference between dealing with one entity and another.
• 39:50
  SPEAKER_02: And you know, really you look at various different organizations that have grown internationally from big international named banks to accounting firms, and even though they are global, if you deal with one division or one office and then you want them to refer you to another, they're at separate entities.
• 40:06
  SPEAKER_02: They're a global business, but they're disconnected.
• 40:08
  SPEAKER_02: And the goal for us is to be a global but completely connected business.
• 40:13
  SPEAKER_02: So the client feels completely looked after and catered for wherever they wherever they go, essentially.
• 40:17
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and you're right, it is that family office style approach where we can cater for every within reason, almost everything you know that they might want or need.
• 40:27
  SPEAKER_02: We don't do car insurance and things like that.
• 40:29
  SPEAKER_02: But you we you know you've done a good job with a client if they come to you and ask you about the things that you don't do, yeah.
• 40:34
  SPEAKER_02: Right?
• 40:34
  SPEAKER_02: So if a client comes and says, Oh, do you do home insurance or can you advise on that?
• 40:38
  SPEAKER_02: Then you know that client positions you in their mind as the go-to financial support for them and their family.
• 40:45
  SPEAKER_02: Um so yeah, I think that's that's that's the objective, that's the key that we always strive towards.
• 40:50
  SPEAKER_00: I love it.
• 40:50
  SPEAKER_00: What about like let's just get into a little bit of detail about the actual um advisors within the business?
• 40:56
  SPEAKER_00: Let's just talk about some of the um the structure within here because a lot of the advisors that were part of AAHR did very well out of the um acquisition from Titan Wealth.
• 41:08
  SPEAKER_00: And I think there's this common uh idea out there that they were forced to, you know, merge their clients into Titan Wealth or sell them or something like that.
• 41:19
  SPEAKER_00: That's the you know the language that's being used.
• 41:22
  SPEAKER_00: What's the reality?
• 41:23
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, we forced everyone into it, yeah.
• 41:27
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, yeah, look at it if you like.
• 41:29
  SPEAKER_01: It's it's funny, really, that that's that's said to be honest.
• 41:32
  SPEAKER_01: But look, we no one was forced to do anything, right?
• 41:34
  SPEAKER_01: It was business as usual.
• 41:35
  SPEAKER_01: People can turn up the next day with a new logo and all of the expertise that come with the the uh the acquisition, right?
• 41:41
  SPEAKER_01: Or we gave the ability for people to participate in kind of releasing some capital for some of the hard work they've done.
• 41:49
  SPEAKER_01: And it was purely an option, yeah?
• 41:51
  SPEAKER_01: And it was also an option that they can pick how much of that they participate, as opposed to, and you know, a lot of advisors, they work their whole career, they're if they're successful, they end up becoming income rich and asset poor, and they're waiting for the end goal to potentially retire one day and find a home for someone to take over that client, that take over that relationship of client bank to actually release their money, right?
• 42:10
  SPEAKER_01: We gave an option to say if people do feel that they want to take advantage of that now for some or all of that, that's just an option for them.
• 42:19
  SPEAKER_01: But ultimately, if they don't want to, don't have to.
• 42:21
  SPEAKER_01: It was purely an option that we wanted to make sure that we gave as part of that, um, which a lot of them then kind of took up.
• 42:28
  SPEAKER_01: And if you ask them how they're feeling now, I think they're they're really enjoying it and probably wouldn't have any regret at all.
• 42:34
  SPEAKER_02: No, I think it's it's a great career being an advisor, right?
• 42:38
  SPEAKER_02: I I think it's a brilliant career, and people that get into it tend to love it if they've been good at it in the first few years and they've spent that, you know, most advisors spend the first five to ten years building their client book, which is their if they're on a revenue share model, they're long-term income.
• 42:50
  SPEAKER_02: But as Tyler said, they can't release any value from that.
• 42:53
  SPEAKER_02: But what you also have is you have advisors that spend 10 years building up a client book, but they're also leveling up their own knowledge, experience, expertise, and capabilities.
• 43:03
  SPEAKER_02: So at the end of that five or 10 years, they end up with clients within that client book that are clients they really want to look after because they're the big problems they've solved recently.
• 43:11
  SPEAKER_02: But they've also got the clients that they took on 10 years ago that were the small problems to them now, but with the you know the clients that they were really happy they onboarded 10 years ago.
• 43:18
  SPEAKER_02: They don't have the time anymore with a full client book to continue growing their advisory book because they don't have capacity.
• 43:26
  SPEAKER_02: So, as a byproduct of not only being able to offer the advisors initially and on an ongoing basis the ability to sell some of that recurring income, um, it also frees up their time to focus on bringing on new clients that are the clients they really want to be engaged in.
• 43:41
  SPEAKER_03: Right?
• 43:42
  SPEAKER_02: If an advisor started taking on clients with a hundred thousand, two hundred thousand of assets that they started initially managing.
• 43:47
  SPEAKER_02: There are some advisors out there now will only take on a client if it's if the client's got two, three, four, five million.
• 43:54
  SPEAKER_02: But they were previously still looking after the clients they took on years ago.
• 43:57
  SPEAKER_02: So that's that's enabled them not only to liquidate some of that value.
• 44:00
  SPEAKER_02: But also free up their time, gain a new sense of purpose, and really a lot of them we found have been reinvigorated during that last 12 months because they're now enjoying what they do on a daily basis in terms of problem solving again for that new potential client, but a new potential client that's got a different problem or a bigger one than they've not experienced before.
• 44:19
  SPEAKER_02: And it's actually worked out really well for the client because the clients, yes, are being looked after, but if we're honest, not even just here, anywhere in our sector, a client that's been looked after by an advisor that's far superseded them as a match, that client's not really being looked after properly with the same level of care.
• 44:37
  SPEAKER_02: And so we've built out, we've now got 27 people in our client service team that now are solely there and employed on servicing and looking after those existing clients.
• 44:48
  SPEAKER_02: So actually, what we've found is client satisfaction goes up because they're now really being looked after by somebody whose job it is just to look after them, and that advisor is looking after those type of clients in that same banding.
• 44:59
  SPEAKER_02: So their knowledge and experience of dealing with that client is better, but their enthusiasm and care for dealing with that client is better.
• 45:05
  SPEAKER_02: So it's it's almost like as a byproduct of being able to allow advisors to release some value initially through the transaction, but we also run it as a quarterly program.
• 45:15
  SPEAKER_02: Clients have actually benefited dramatically, and advisors have become reinvigorated as a byproduct, which we hadn't anticipated at the time.
• 45:21
  SPEAKER_02: It wasn't part of the plan, but as a byproduct, kind of it worked in full suite in a multitude of benefits.
• 45:27
  SPEAKER_00: I think as well, like you know, the international space has always been predominantly self-employed within businesses.
• 45:33
  SPEAKER_00: The servicing team allows you then to build out that employed model, which creates opportunity for financial planners, perhaps, who don't have the level of experience of being able to go out and win business, the relationship side.
• 45:44
  SPEAKER_00: So they can go in, build relationships, understand it.
• 45:47
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, you've got a really unique opportunity here at the moment, isn't it?
• 45:50
  SPEAKER_00: You want somebody with series 65, okay, which is the uh the qualification over in America to be able to advise American clients, right?
• 45:57
  SPEAKER_00: Uh or people that have American assets.
• 45:59
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 46:00
  SPEAKER_00: And somebody who also has level four qualification.
• 46:04
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 46:04
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 46:04
  SPEAKER_00: So UK.
• 46:05
  SPEAKER_00: So UK, America, they sit in the servicing team.
• 46:08
  SPEAKER_00: There's a load of clients there to look after.
• 46:10
  SPEAKER_00: What an amazing way to get stuck into working with those difficult, so typical types of clients that you're not going to see in the UK.
• 46:18
  SPEAKER_00: Gain that international experience without the risk involved of coming out here and losing everything.
• 46:24
  SPEAKER_00: You know, so I think that's a really exciting opportunity that you guys are actually offering.
• 46:27
  SPEAKER_00: And that only really came about uh essentially through the ability to be part of Titan Wealth International.
• 46:34
  SPEAKER_00: So I can only really ever see that grow as you acquire more businesses as well, because then they're going to go into the servicing side.
• 46:40
  SPEAKER_00: Advisors want to relinquish some of their um book because they want to continue, you know, grow it or focus their energy and attention on other clients.
• 46:47
  SPEAKER_00: And also, it's exciting.
• 46:49
  SPEAKER_00: So it gives them the opportunity to work on the things that excite them as well.
• 46:52
  SPEAKER_00: So I love that.
• 46:53
  SPEAKER_00: That's a really lovely part part of that journey.
• 46:55
  SPEAKER_00: What about things like business development and stuff?
• 46:57
  SPEAKER_00: Is there an entity within the business where people can come in and perhaps they have not qualified, but they can get stuck in, get trained, understand how the business works, and get in the business development side, which is often seen as like the trainee advisory route within the international space?
• 47:10
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, no, of course, yes.
• 47:11
  SPEAKER_01: We have a team here in in Dubai and we have a team in Spain who follow that program of being a business development manager.
• 47:17
  SPEAKER_01: We then have people in the associate roles.
• 47:19
  SPEAKER_01: So they really are supporting one of our more senior advisors as a kind of paraplannerslash uh associate, which gives them that exposure to meetings, shadowing, learning, best practice.
• 47:29
  SPEAKER_01: So then when they do step up to the role, they are kind of feeling prepared.
• 47:33
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 47:33
  SPEAKER_01: And we have the two routes.
• 47:34
  SPEAKER_01: We have some advisors that are on a um a share of revenue, and some obviously on a salaried model, which is in our we call it the client services, but it's not really just client services, it's they're growing a business, um, taking on new clients as well.
• 47:46
  SPEAKER_01: And we've seen some huge success recently of advisors that have moved out here, qualified, really experienced, good UK advisors, that the biggest challenge when you first come here, otherwise, is activity.
• 47:58
  SPEAKER_01: If you have no activity, you could be the best advisor in the world.
• 48:00
  SPEAKER_01: If I had no meetings, what am I going to do?
• 48:02
  SPEAKER_01: And then you sit one meeting a week, you're nervous, you're not as good, you come across poorly, and if you don't do well, it's going to impact you massively.
• 48:10
  SPEAKER_01: So getting the guys in now with a mature client base, with clients that actually are engaged, who want to go through the process, who are looking already clients, makes a huge impact on the success of these people.
• 48:25
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and I think that's what you the common theme is.
• 48:27
  SPEAKER_01: People come out here and you get some great people that have come out here over the years that have gone back home and not kind of cracked it.
• 48:33
  SPEAKER_01: And it's because they never had the chance, they've never had activity.
• 48:36
  SPEAKER_00: On the subject of activity, Will, I know for you you're very passionate about marketing, very passionate about financial education.
• 48:43
  SPEAKER_00: What have you done to implement in this business the ability for advisors to think less about the things that they think they should be doing?
• 48:50
  SPEAKER_00: Everyone thinks they should be on social media, everyone thinks they should be doing marketing.
• 48:53
  SPEAKER_00: That's the way it's to generate leads, right?
• 48:55
  SPEAKER_00: What have you done to kind of allow them to focus on the things that make them money whilst supporting them with lead generation?
• 49:01
  SPEAKER_00: What have you done around that?
• 49:02
  SPEAKER_02: Well, I think it's it's you look back at the the the as you said, the items an advisor needs to think about.
• 49:08
  SPEAKER_02: There's so many plates that you potentially need to spin.
• 49:11
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and whilst you can, it's very easy to take away from them fixed operational ones, administration or associate, power planner, etc., finding new prospects is always the most difficult.
• 49:21
  SPEAKER_02: It's always the one that everybody really wants.
• 49:23
  SPEAKER_02: And it's ultimately if you can lock in sources of new prospective clients, you're really bulletproofing your business for the future as a as a group, but also as individual advisors.
• 49:34
  SPEAKER_02: Um and we'd invested very, very heavily over the last few years into our marketing team, into the framework and infrastructure, the new website structure, the content production, and ultimately, without going into too much detail and boring you in it, um, it's about taking all the knowledge and information the advisors have through the advice they give on a day-to-day basis, and that in and converting that into content that's available to the reader or the potential client that's searching for a problem online.
• 50:01
  SPEAKER_02: And the more we do that, the more that generates actually people that are coming through to the business booking in directly through the website.
• 50:08
  SPEAKER_02: And when we have 20, 25 people a day booking meetings, not even just downloading guides or downloading pamphlets, whatever it might be.
• 50:16
  SPEAKER_02: People actually leaving booking in a calendarly meeting with an associate or with an advisor directly, leaving notes as to what they want to solve during that initial 15-minute call.
• 50:26
  SPEAKER_02: And we've allowed advisors to be part of this through a funding mechanism where we fund all of the staffing costs, all of the operational costs, and we allow the advisors to purely contribute into the ad spend alone.
• 50:39
  SPEAKER_02: So it's exceptionally efficient for them, but then they own all of the leads.
• 50:43
  SPEAKER_02: So we don't have any leads as a business, then none of them come to us.
• 50:46
  SPEAKER_02: Everything is distributed based on an algorithm that's put into the system, and the CRM system and our technology framework that sits behind the business disperses those leads according to the contributions that the advisors have put in.
• 51:00
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and that's been very successful over the last 12 months.
• 51:04
  SPEAKER_02: Uh, it took a few months to get going because a lot of the work we do is search engine optimized.
• 51:08
  SPEAKER_02: It takes a while for Google to start picking it up.
• 51:10
  SPEAKER_02: But now when we launch a new article, it'll be number one uh within a couple of days.
• 51:15
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and then we follow up with a variety of campaigns that go around that.
• 51:18
  SPEAKER_02: But it just eases the pressure.
• 51:20
  SPEAKER_02: However good as an advisor you are, you're always in the back of your mind thinking about where are my prospects coming from in three months, in six months, in nine months.
• 51:29
  SPEAKER_02: And if you can relinquish that pressure by having another well-old machine that works, that you can see working, that gives you complete integrity over what you put in, you get out, then it removes that anguish and you don't have to focus or think about that or worry about that.
• 51:44
  SPEAKER_02: It actually allows advisors, specifically those on revenue share, to think a little bit more long term about their life as opposed to worrying about what the next three, six, nine months looks like in terms of onboarding new clients.
• 51:55
  SPEAKER_00: And that's gonna compound over time as well.
• 51:57
  SPEAKER_00: You know, when you put content out there, it compounds over time.
• 52:00
  SPEAKER_00: You know, if you're writing it in a certain way that's AI optimized as well, it's gonna be found on Chat GPT, which is the new way that research.
• 52:06
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, it gets found regularly.
• 52:07
  SPEAKER_00: And I've done some research on it, and I mean it's exceptional.
• 52:09
  SPEAKER_00: James Baldwin, what a great guy in the marketing team, super intelligent.
• 52:12
  SPEAKER_00: And then having him lean into Titan Wealth from the marketing team there.
• 52:17
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, who's gonna touch that?
• 52:19
  SPEAKER_00: You know, this is only gonna get better and better.
• 52:21
  SPEAKER_00: And I've been privy to some of those conversations, and that's what excites me because I'm a marketing guy, I'm a brand guy, you know.
• 52:27
  SPEAKER_00: I want to be able to work with companies that are being seen and being heard in the right way, and it's refreshing and it's very interesting for me to see behind the scenes, and there's lots of incredibly exciting things coming about coming out, and it's just gonna position you as an absolutely dominant force within the international space.
• 52:43
  SPEAKER_00: It's just as simple as that, really.
• 52:44
  SPEAKER_00: Um, okay, excellent.
• 52:46
  SPEAKER_00: Sounds like you really do look after the advisors in every angle possible.
• 52:49
  SPEAKER_00: So that was something I definitely wanted to dig into.
• 52:52
  SPEAKER_00: Titan wealth, right?
• 52:53
  SPEAKER_00: Now you're now part of Titan Wealth.
• 52:54
  SPEAKER_00: Um, there's a phrase that's going around Titan Wealth, okay?
• 52:57
  SPEAKER_00: Um one Titan.
• 52:59
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, it's very, very important.
• 53:00
  SPEAKER_00: What does one Titan mean to you?
• 53:03
  SPEAKER_00: I'm gonna ask you that first, Will.
• 53:05
  SPEAKER_02: Okay.
• 53:05
  SPEAKER_02: Um I I think it's similar to what I said a bit earlier on.
• 53:09
  SPEAKER_02: It's from a it's it's one place, so it's not a disjointed global business.
• 53:14
  SPEAKER_02: I think from a client's perspective, it's one Titan is I deal with Titan wherever they're on the world, and I get one level of service.
• 53:21
  SPEAKER_02: It's the level of service I want, it's the level of service I expect, and it's the level of service I get.
• 53:25
  SPEAKER_02: And that is it from any office in any jurisdiction, whether it's in with the wealth services, the investment teams, the advice teams, it's the same across the board.
• 53:34
  SPEAKER_02: And I think in reverse, from the inside out, one Titan is everybody's role is a role that leans into getting to that point where we can deliver one level of service to the outside world that encompasses everything the client needs.
• 53:47
  SPEAKER_02: Um I don't think it's more complex than that, really.
• 53:50
  SPEAKER_02: I think if if our day day-by-day focus coming in is that, then we're kind of onto a onto a winner.
• 53:57
  SPEAKER_00: Love it.
• 53:58
  SPEAKER_00: Tyler, what about you?
• 53:59
  SPEAKER_01: I think the obviously I completely agree with what Will said there, but I think the only other thing to add is internally making sure that the one Titan is they have the ability to go out and speak to anyone else within Titan to help them with any problems or or challenges they've got.
• 54:13
  SPEAKER_01: So for instance, a guy in France in the UK has a prospect or an existing client that is either on boarding or reviewing, that client is considering moving to France.
• 54:23
  SPEAKER_01: Knowing that you've got someone in the business that you can speak to, you can kind of partner with to support you on delivering that either knowledge to the advisor and then ultimately onto the onto the client.
• 54:34
  SPEAKER_01: So I just feel the one titan is making sure we've got some amazing people in the business when that business is only growing and the ability that we as one can kind of work together to deliver the best kind of outcome for clients and also for the enjoyment of the staff.
• 54:48
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, 100%.
• 54:49
  SPEAKER_00: And one of the things that I'm gonna sort of layer on top of that is I was invited kindly to one of the strategy meetings in London, and everybody came in from all walks of life and all different sides of the business.
• 54:59
  SPEAKER_00: And I think it feeds into the mentality that you have of that kind of group brainstorming.
• 55:04
  SPEAKER_00: And it was a really, really interesting session.
• 55:05
  SPEAKER_00: It was great to be a fly on the wall from that because I got so many ideas from it.
• 55:09
  SPEAKER_00: And one of the things I've noticed is as well picking up the phone and speaking to people within the business, everyone's welcoming me, they're welcoming my conversation, they're welcoming my questions.
• 55:17
  SPEAKER_00: Um and just being out here, James Cabery, he was out here, and yesterday he's there talking to all the brand new people that have joined your business.
• 55:24
  SPEAKER_00: There was a selection of people out there, he's there, he's talking, and he's visible.
• 55:28
  SPEAKER_00: And I think that is super important because when you're an owner or a founder of a business and you've got thousands of people, it's very, very important that you're still seen.
• 55:37
  SPEAKER_00: And I think if he is doing it and the other founders and the senior individuals within the business, that's just going to filter down through the company.
• 55:44
  SPEAKER_00: And I really love that.
• 55:45
  SPEAKER_00: And I think it's something that just needs to carry on.
• 55:47
  SPEAKER_00: And in a business, when the people look on the outside, well, they're just acquiring, they're just you know building a business, it's not.
• 55:52
  SPEAKER_00: There is connectivity, even things like this.
• 55:55
  SPEAKER_00: This creates connectivity.
• 55:56
  SPEAKER_00: We're helping you with the Titan Wealth podcast.
• 55:58
  SPEAKER_00: Not only to kind of share what it's like to build a business like this externally, like build in public, which I think is very cool.
• 56:04
  SPEAKER_00: I think it's again, well, people don't get the chance to have FaceTime with senior people within the business.
• 56:10
  SPEAKER_00: So if we can create conversations that then get distributed internally, you're only going to build a buzz and connectivity, and then you're going to create that beautiful one Titan environment.
• 56:19
  SPEAKER_00: So thank you so much for your time today.
• 56:22
  SPEAKER_00: Um, it's really, really been a pleasure getting to know you anyway over the last few months.
• 56:26
  SPEAKER_00: Obviously, I've known you both for a little while, but it's brilliant to get to know you even further.
• 56:29
  SPEAKER_00: And also, fantastic office.
• 56:31
  SPEAKER_00: Absolutely love it.
• 56:32
  SPEAKER_00: The environment is incredible.
• 56:34
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and what a beautiful place to do it on the marina.
• 56:37
  SPEAKER_00: Yesterday I was sat out there in the sunshine doing my work.
• 56:40
  SPEAKER_00: Absolutely loved it.
• 56:41
  SPEAKER_00: Some of the lads telling me to go to the gym round the corner, you've got the mall, we've got some amazing food there at peer view.
• 56:46
  SPEAKER_00: So, what a spot for any financial planner who's interested in the financial advice in the international space.
• 56:52
  SPEAKER_00: This is without a doubt the best environment to do it.
• 56:54
  SPEAKER_00: So thanks, Chubs.
• 56:55
  SPEAKER_01: Thanks for having us.