Grant Millar, founder and adviser at Inspired Financial Planners, revealed to ifa his journey towards specialising as an adviser for healthcare professionals under 45, guided by his business coach’s advice to identify a niche that aligned with his passion and the market’s unmet needs.
“Around that time, my daughter, who was still under one, had some health stuff going on so we were going around to different health professionals and such,” he said.
“As I always do, I would have conversations about money and, as my wife puts it, ‘financey stuff’, and I noticed that a lot of them either had no idea what was going on or just trusted their financial adviser without question.”
When considering niching with healthcare professionals, Millar said from a business perspective, it looked like a good decision.
“I reflected on that and thought, ‘Alright, well, they should be getting better advice and be better informed,’” he said.
“They are typically earning enough to benefit from financial advice, and if they’re healthcare professionals, then usually they are focused on their own health, which is good from an insurance perspective.
“So, all those factors kind of combined led me to say, ‘Hey, this is a reasonable niche.’”
Spotting a gap in the market, Millar said although there were already some advisers specialising in working with medical professionals, those who weren’t at the higher end of the earning spectrum were often being left behind.
“There are some others who work with medical professionals that are doctors and those who earn a lot more than say, physios and nurses and things like that,” he said.
“But that’s what made me focus on that, because I didn’t think there were too many focusing specifically on that niche.”
Regarding the age demographic of his clients, Millar said due to his advice being delivered almost 100 per cent online, it was important to work with clients who are, generally, more adept at using technology.
“The kind of people that I enjoy working with are usually pretty good with technology, which is a big factor because I am paperless, and I hate dealing with paper,” he said.
“I see a lot of benefit there because there’s opportunities that exist for the younger clients that don’t necessarily exist with the older ones.
“You get to see a lot of the milestones that they’re achieving along the way as well, where I feel like those who do retirement advice, there’s still the milestones, but they’re completely different.”
Working within his specific niche has led Millar to specialise in certain areas out of necessity, resulting in other advisers referring clients to him when they lack expertise in those areas.
“One area that I like to focus a lot on is first time buyers. Using things like the first home super savers scheme, I’ve found that a lot of advisers just don’t know how to use it or don’t know anything about it and haven’t invested the time to learn about it,” he said.
“We have other advisers refer clients to me specifically for that. So, there’s definitely a benefit for working with younger clients because they have their own niche opportunities that wouldn’t necessarily exist for the older clients.”
Earlier this month, speaking on an episode of the ifa Show, financial adviser Nathan Fradley explained how niching in financial advice can have a positive impact on the client experience.
Having recently taken on a new approach to advice under his self-named brand, Nathan Fradley Advice, he explained how greater specialisation can improve the client experience as the adviser is able to better prepare for issues that may arise due to their expertise in the area.
“When you’re sitting in front of someone and you can say to them: ‘I know your situation because I’ve seen it before and I’ve helped people in the exact situation that you’re in and I know what you’re going through and here’s some other things that are going to happen as part of this process, here’s some things you’re going to experience,’” Fradley said.
“You’d be able to pre-empt that and when they happen, that builds greater confidence. That’s really, really powerful and all three areas that I work in, that’s very easy to demonstrate. But I think in all areas of advice, it’s easy to demonstrate.”
He added that niching, for him, was done by focusing on a particular kind of client rather than a life event.
“I think when you’re thinking of niching, it’s more that I niche with a kind of person and these are the things that they go through … it’s then not about a life event as a reason, it’s about them coming to the realisation that you will understand their situation and you can improve,” Fradley said.
“If everyone looks at their favourite 10 clients they like working with, I bet you there’s some similarities across them. In fact, you could probably have a barbecue with all of them in the same place and they’d all get along.”
