The leaders of Australia’s key financial planning licensees will get an exclusive insight into CoreData’s analysis of which licensees are winning and losing in the eyes of their own financial planners, on June 5 and 6 at the Professional Planner Licensee Summit.
Now in its eighth iteration, the two-day summit is a key event for the senior executives and managers of financial planning licensee businesses. Previously known as the Dealer Group Summit, the event has been refocused in 2017 to recognise the growing influence of independently owned licensee businesses and the interests of their advisers.
Professional Planner and CoreData will reveal the names of Australia’s best independently owned, institutionally affiliated and institutionally branded licensees, as assessed by financial planners.
Last year, Fortnum Financial Advisers and GPS Wealth were joint winners of the Independently Owned Licensee of the Year Award, while Financial Services Partners was named Institutionally Affiliated Licensee of the Year, and ANZ Financial Planning picked up the Institutionally Owned Licensee of the Year Award.
Exclusive analysis of winners and losers
The director of Australian financial services for CoreData, Sean Allen, says licensee heads at the summit will be provided with an exclusive analysis of the methodology, findings and implications of the underlying research.
“We will benchmark the overall proposition of each licensee,” Allen says. “It’s a market-to-market benchmarking piece, so each individual licensee will be able to understand where they’re positioned with regard to the rest of the market. Licensees get a report on how their offer is perceived and understood in the market, and they’re able to benchmark against key competitors in their chosen segments.
“We’re able to measure which licensees are growing and why, with regard to which components of their proposition are valued, and which ones aren’t; and we can see which businesses are supporting practices’ growth, and which ones aren’t.”
Allen says financial planners will learn from the research how their licensee stacks up against others.
Financial planning firms routinely use the CoreData research to help identify an alternative licensee in cases where their incumbent doesn’t stack up. Licensees will learn whether they’re at risk of significant numbers of advisers leaving.
“One of the big measures we get is around intention – intention to stay and intention to go,” Allen says. “We measure the attrition risk that sits inside individual licensees. And we measure whether the growth in the trend towards own-licensing has [happened] or” remains under consideration but hasn’t yet happened.
Exclusive understanding
Allen says summit attendees will “exclusively get an understanding of what elements of their offer are resonating with advisers”.
“As a licensee head, what you’ll exclusively learn is what you’ve got to do to win,” Allen says. “Winning could be growing your network, or ensuring all of your advisers are totally engaged and advocates for you.”
Licensee businesses already attending include GPS Wealth, Infocus, Futuro, Madison Financial Group, Commonwealth Bank, National Australia Bank, Westpac, ANZ, Sunsuper and UniSuper – with others soon to confirm.
Top line-up
The 2017 Licensee Summit features a top line-up of presenters and panellists, including:
- The Financial Ombudsman Service’s lead ombudsman, investments and advice, June Smith
- Financial Advisers Standards and Ethics Authority (FASEA) directors Dr Mark Brimble, professor of finance at Griffith University, and Matthew Rowe, chief executive of Countplus
- Australian Securities and Investments Commission senior executive leader, financial advisers team, Louise Macaulay
- AZ Next Generation Advisory chief executive Paul Barrett
- Leading-edge technology providers, including Red Marker founder Matt Symons, Adviser Ratings founder Angus Woods, and Ignition Wealth chief technology officer Mike Giles
The 2017 event also features a keynote by journalist Peter Greste on how integrity, ethics, and the pursuit of free speech and democracy landed him in an Egyptian jail – and how he survived through resilience.
Licensee executives and senior management can register to attend the 2017 Professional Planner Licensee Summit online. Registrations are limited.
