How some advisors are expanding their geographic footprint

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When Jonathan Rivard was knocking on doors to meet prospective clients in Richmond Hill, Ont., two decades ago, he couldn’t have imagined building a practice with a reach extending thousands of kilometres from home.

Now located in downtown Toronto, the financial advisor with Edward Jones not only has clients in Ontario but in British Columbia, Alberta and Quebec.

“In 2004 … people would look at a radius around their home, for example, and they would pick an advisor close to where they worked or lived,” Mr. Rivard says.

“There’s a mutual benefit to financial advisors to have this wide pool of potential clients across the country they can identify and work with, and likewise from a client standpoint to have access to a financial advisor they like and want to work with whom could be located in Vancouver or Halifax.”

Working with clients in multiple provinces or territories comes with an administrative and financial burden, though. Advisors must be licensed to sell investments and insurance in each jurisdiction and should make sure they’re covered by errors and omissions insurance wherever they operate. They also need to become familiar with provincial tax and estate planning differences and, ideally, build up a robust professional network in each location.

But there’s an opportunity as well – specifically, to continue serving clients who move and to accept referrals from clients with family, friends and colleagues elsewhere in the country.

While Mr. Rivard says his practice’s geographical expansion began before 2020, the pandemic sped up improvements in communication technology and increased people’s comfort with virtual meetings.

“There’s cultural acceptance now versus even five years ago,” he says. “That’s transformative for the financial services industry and also for clients who may reside in small communities yet have access to an advisor who they enjoy working with who is 2,000 miles away.”

Mr. Rivard does make the effort still to travel to see even far-away clients at least once every two years because he feels face-to-face meetings continue to be important to foster and build relationships. In between, the biggest hurdle to serving clients in different time zones is that it isn’t uncommon for him to have appointments late into the evening.

Alex Carter, senior wealth advisor with the Carter Private Client Group at CI Assante Capital Management Ltd., was based in Toronto but bought a ski chalet in Collingwood, Ont. in 2019. When COVID hit, he moved his family and transferred his children to school in Collingwood. He had already been in talks with another CI Assante advisor about buying a book of business in that part of the province, and he closed the deal in 2021.

Now, Mr. Carter spends most of his time in Collingwood, serving clients in surrounding communities, but he also maintains a home and clients in Toronto. Furthermore, he is licensed in British Columbia, Alberta, Ontario, Quebec and Nova Scotia, and takes advantage of mobility exemptions to continue serving existing clients who have moved to Nunavut or the U.S. He estimates that 70 to 80 per cent of his client meetings are online – even with Collingwood clients.

“Proximity certainly is no longer a hurdle, [and] it’s very efficient for both parties. You can jump on a quick meeting, and most people appreciate the quicker, shorter touchpoints,” he says.

Mr. Carter’s team is also dispersed geographically, with those outside Collingwood working remotely. They stay connected through regular virtual meetings, chat groups, linked e-mail, and quarterly in-person strategic planning and team-building meetings in Collingwood.

To establish a foothold in a new community, Mr. Carter recommends connecting with local accounting firms. Purchasing a book of business worked well for him, too. He adds it’s important to pursue your passions and tell clients and potential clients about them – because authenticity and enthusiasm resonate.

Chris Warner, a wealth advisor and client relationship manager with Nicola Wealth Management Ltd. in Victoria, quips that he’s ended up with a far-flung client list in part because he has a problem saying “no.” Referrals from clients and centres of influence have helped to expand his practice across Vancouver Island and the Gulf Islands into Vancouver and the Interior, and across the country to Ontario.

Mr. Warner says it’s critical for advisors interested in expanding their geographical footprint to understand that a virtual meeting demands a slower, more deliberative approach with more visual aids. It’s also essential to be adept at using virtual meeting features without hesitating or stumbling.

“Just to do the normal things of building rapport, building credibility and showing the EQ [emotional quotient] – doing that while distracted with technology issues can be its own art.”

He continues to try to meet in person whenever possible because it makes it easier to read body language and untangle overlapping conversations. However, with his clients in Ontario, he establishes expectations for few or no in-person meetings from the outset. He also tends to partner with a Nicola Wealth advisor in Ontario who is available for face-to-face meetings as needed.

Mr. Warner says attracting clients from a wider geographical area allows him to specialize in the type of work he enjoys most.

“If you have a target market in mind, and you have it with some degree of specificity, you don’t just have to take whatever’s around you and try and morph yourself and your skills to service each of these disparate groups,” he says.

“We have a wider reach to service the clients we want to work with and with whom we can do good work.”