February 7, 2025 • 21 mins
Are you scrambling to keep pace with the AI revolution?
Kelly Waltrich sits down with Eric Clarke, a renowned influence in the financial services arena, to explore how AI is poised to transform the advisor-client journey.
Eric shares insights from his adventures, from sitting on multiple boards to advising companies on leveraging technology for growth. With AI still in its first inning, its potential to personalize client communication and scale advisory services is immense.
Kelly and Eric discuss:
- 04:08 The untapped potential of AI in the advisor-client journey
- 05:40 How Eric is staying on the AI cutting edge
- 10:31 Creative ways firms are starting to use AI
- 12:04 Why AI is shifting from back-office to front-office applications
- 12:58 What firms should look for in an AI analyst
- 18:50 How advisors can start leveraging AI today
- 20:19 Final advice: Don't let AI pass you by
- And more
Connect with Kelly Waltrich:
Connect with Eric Clarke:
About Our Guest:
Eric Clarke is the founding CEO of Orion Advisor Tech, launching the firm in 1999 to provide portfolio accounting software to help independent financial advisors scale their businesses. Eric retired as Orion’s CEO in 2023 and continues to serve as an active member of the Board of Directors.
Over Eric’s nearly 25 years of leadership, the firm grew and evolved into Orion Advisor Solutions - a premier provider of wealthtech solutions for fiduciary advisors. Today, Orion supports over five million technology accounts and thousands of independent advisory firms with an integrated suite of fully connected, disruptive technology and investment solutions on an open architecture platform.
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Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Unknown (00:01):
AI is a technology that is very similar to, you know,
when I entered this industry andhelping advisors move from
install based systems to theweb. You know, now we are at
that same tech evolution period,if you will, where AI can really
come in and help augment thatadvisor client journey in a way
(00:24):
that we just have not been ableto do at scale before.
Welcome to the don't do thatpodcast. I'm Kelly Walter, CEO
and co founder of intentionally,and like me, this show is no
fluff and no. Bs, just smartadvice to help you learn from
the best and level up faster. Sowhat are we not doing today?
(00:48):
Let's find out.
Hi everyone. Welcome to thedon't do that podcast. I'm Kelly
Walter, and today I have with meone of my favorite people in
this industry, Eric Clark, whoabsolutely needs no
introduction, this formerfounder and CEO of Orion and now
(01:08):
probably the growth catalyst ofmore firms than we all know, and
one of my favorite people, likeI said, I had a great privilege
of working for Eric for forseveral years, and He took a
chance on me, Eric, when youwere a bunch of male executives
in Omaha, and I was allowedPhilly girl and gave me the
(01:31):
autonomy and the resources to besuccessful. And I look back on
that time that I had with youevery single day, and I tell
everyone that will listen that Ihave a what would Eric do
mindset as I approach the restof my career and the growth of
intentionally? So I needed tosay
that to you as we started. Sothank you. Yeah. So why don't
you start by telling everybodywhat you're up to these days?
(01:54):
Well, so first off, I'd like toclarify that we work together.
We you didn't work for me, butwe did have an absolute blast
working together, and I learneda ton from you about all things,
you know, marketing and how wecould grow Orion to the next
level. So the feeling is isdefinitely mutual Kelly and just
(02:16):
very appreciative of the timethat we did spend together. So
thank you. Today I am serving onfive boards, including Orion,
which I'm still very optimisticand excited about, as well as
I'm also a senior advisor toMcKinsey and Company, and so I
have an opportunity from time totime to go in and and help
(02:38):
companies evaluate their techstacks and and look at ways that
they can, you know, take theirgrowth trajectory to the next
level by leveraging technologyin different ways. And so that's
been an absolute blast, andcontinue to learn from industry
friends and colleagues you knoweach and every day, and this
(03:00):
industry has continued to blessmy life and my family's life in
a myriad of ways. But I wouldsay, you know, right at the top
of that list are the continuedfriendships and relationships
that that I have. You knowthat's that's the best part of
being in this industry, ofhelping advisors help their
clients, are the relationshipsthat you can build along the
(03:22):
way. And so it's been great, andI think that this industry's
best days are yet to come.
Oh, that's awesome. For those ofyou who are listening, you
should know that we have Eric asa phone a friend when we're
talking about clients that we'retrying to serve or clients that
we're trying to create newstrategies for, and Eric's
always willing to help us hereand intentionally figure out
(03:43):
what that should look like.
Absolutely. Yeah. All right,Eric, you know, the premise of
this podcast, my thesis, good orbad, is that we learn better
from our mistakes and ourchallenges and our missteps than
we do from our wins, and Socollectively, I'm trying to get
us to learn from each other's sothe question for you today is
very simple. It's, what are wenot doing today as as an
(04:04):
industry?
We Well, it's a great question.
And what we are not doing todayas an industry is using AI to
augment the advisor clientjourney, augment the client
relationship. There's so muchmore that we can do to leverage
AI to add scale to ourbusinesses, to help advisors
(04:25):
serve more households. You know,at scale, help these firms that
are doing a lot of M A and ourindustry, help them achieve the
scale and profitability thatthey need to really be able to
help clients, and, you know,help clients in a way that they
will best understand. So AI isbeing used today, I think, for
(04:48):
meeting notes or action itemsand next steps. But there's so
much more that AI can do to helpadvisors communicate with their
clients in a way. Way that theclient, from a behavioral
perspective, will best respondto, best understand and really
help the advisor meet the clientwhere they are, and help them
(05:09):
get to the next level. AI is atechnology that is very similar
to, you know, when I enteredthis industry and helping
advisors move from install basedsystems to the web, you know now
we are at that same techevolution period, if you will,
where AI can really come in andhelp augment that advisor client
(05:32):
journey in a way that we justhave not been able to do at
scale before. SoEric, the last time you and I
talked, and just to prove thatyou practice what you preach,
you told me that you were takingclasses and you were learning
how to build gpts and all kindsof stuff. Tell us a little bit
about what you're doing to makesure you're staying on the
cutting edge so that, so thatyou can help the clients that
(05:52):
you're consulting with do thesame.
Yeah, that's that has been thecase. You know. People say, Hey,
are you playing golf? Are youdoing this or that? You know, my
wife told me I needed a hobby,something to, you know, keep me
busy, and so I signed up for acouple of AI classes through the
(06:13):
University of Utah, and it'sbeen great. I've just done those
classes remote and online, andlearned a lot about AI, the
foundations of AI. How AI canyou know, be used in a myriad of
ways? How we can you know withinminutes, create these custom
gpts to help our serviceworkflows, help our connections
(06:36):
with our clients, help firmswith all types of different
areas of their business, youknow, it's it's been somewhat of
a hobby, and it's been anabsolute blast. But beyond that,
you know, when you think aboutAI and the way that we can use
language to forge connections,AI can be infused with
(06:57):
behavioral tendencies from aprompting perspective and really
craft and shape the way thatwe're messaging clients so that
they can understand what whatwe're trying to communicate. You
know, our industry is full ofaccountants, finance people,
people that love numbers, andoftentimes we need to
(07:21):
communicate in very differentways. And AI, I think, is an
excellent tool as to as to howwe can, you know, achieve that,
but then also create betterservice experiences for our
clients along the way. One ofthe last projects that that I
was working on with Mike Wilson,you know, while I was was the
(07:43):
CEO of Orion, was a projectcalled Smart summaries. And
these smart summaries reallytook data from Orion, you know,
not the PII, but foundationalaccount level data that we had
passed it over to open a eyes,APIs, and then it would return
back language in a variety offormats that the advisor can
(08:06):
then use to communicate with theclient. And that was a big, big
hit, but it was just scratchingthe surface of of what we can do
with AI here, you know, today.
And the reality is, the reason Isay that we're not doing that
today is that, well, one we'renot, but the other thing is,
Kelly, is that that thistechnology exists today.
There's, there's nothing holdingus back or or making us wait in
(08:27):
getting AI effectivelyimplemented, you know, within
our businesses. Soit's interesting that you, you
mentioned that project with MikeWilson. So what we're working on
it intentionally right now is,is trying to figure out how we
can use AI to take all thedisparate data sources that we
have for marketing, whether thatbe website data, social data,
(08:48):
email, tool data, you know, SEOdata, everything that we deliver
to a client, and put that givethem a narrative to explain.
Because right now, we give thembeautiful dashboards, and then
we go in manually, and we writethe summaries, and that is time
intensive, so we're workingright now to figure out what's
the next iteration of that sothat we could give these reports
(09:10):
to our clients and make them bemeaningful, but also not have
them take us three days to doevery single month,
right? So if an advisor islistening to this and you're
thinking like, Okay, give me anextreme but yet practical
example of, you know what, whatwe're talking about here, AI,
(09:31):
for instance, instead ofcreating a market commentary for
the month or for the week or forthe quarter that you send out,
You know, to the clients, youcould actually create a market
commentary that is specific andtailored to each and every
client that you work with,depending on their situation,
(09:52):
depending on their portfolio,depending on their behavioral
tendencies, and craft thatmessage very. Uniquely to them.
So you could do that today, ifyou wanted to, with the help of
AI, and you could do it at scaleand do it quite effectively. And
yet, I don't, I'm not aware ofany firm that's, that's that's
(10:13):
using the technology toaccomplish that. That's just one
example of many that I canprovide for you as to how AI
could practically be used, youknow, by advisors, to better
connect with clients.
So the firms that you're you'reworking with, do you see any
(10:34):
creative ways that people arestarting to explore using AI?
Are we still in the firstinning?
Well, we're definitely in thefirst inning or two, you know,
firms, they're leveragingtechnology that has AI embedded.
They're starting to leverage it,whether it's in a Zoom meeting,
you know, saying, hey, take thenotes for me and yeah, and help
(10:57):
me with the action items and thenext steps, or if it's inside
their CRM helping them processservice workflows. You know,
those are examples that that Ido see some firms starting to
adopt and leverage. I see somefirms using AI to help answer
questions that their employeesand staff members have about
(11:22):
benefit plans, or how can Ieffectively onboard a new team
member quickly? AI tools can bebuilt out to assist with those
types of processes and functionsin a way that you know will help
create scale. But what I'mreally excited about is, is
(11:42):
seeing AI go from being a backoffice tool or more of a you
know, hey, we're getting rid ofthe grunt work of note taking
and action items to being moreof a front office communication
tool, and actually seeing AIhelp build a better relationship
between the advisor and theclient. Yeah,
(12:04):
I think that's a I think thatmakes a lot of sense. So Randy
Lambert, who you and I both knowand love, he has joined me here
at intentionally, and he said,Hey, I had lunch with Eric, and
we need to hire an AI analyst.
And I, you know, he hits me withsomething new every day. So I
was like, Okay, I'll think aboutit. And then I started to think
about it, and I you weresimilar, Eric, I don't want to
(12:27):
be left behind. I'm going tomake sure that we evolve so that
we're we're doing all the thingsthat we need to do. So I posted
this job for an AI analyst,having no idea what I was
looking for, or what thecapabilities of people are, or
what school and classes thatthey're going to just to learn
about, what types of people areout there. Do you have any
guidance in terms of like, whatam, what are people? What are Ra
(12:50):
is? What are people like me?
What are we looking for in termsof support to make sure that
we're staying ahead of thecurve?
Well, because Kelly, we are inthe first inning. It's going to
take someone with not only anunderstanding of AI, but also an
understanding of how you canapply AI within your business,
(13:12):
right? So, so the AI expertisearound prompting, and, you know,
the latest and greatest AI toolsand things like that, that's a
nice to have. But what I thinkwill differentiate those
candidates that you're talkingto are the candidates that say,
I understand your business. Iunderstand how we can help you
(13:33):
specifically implement thesetools to augment everything from
those back office functionsclear to be, you know, the front
office relationships. So Ijokingly say that, you know,
hey, I think at this point, whenan advisor responds to a client,
the AI response, when using thethe correct prompts will sound
(13:57):
more human, more human like,then the advisor will and so
this is the type of ofcapability that's out there for
us to leverage. And, you know,really, the only thing holding
us back is, is that expertise,having that individual come in,
be able to be a catalyst to helpour firms adopt this, this
(14:20):
awesome technology that's that'savailable to us? Yeah, I
think that's, I think for us,that's definitely something we
want to explore. And you know,even the small things, you're
right? So we work with a clientcalled zocs. I don't know if
you're familiar with them, butthey are one of those note
taking tools we love we lovethem. We love what they're
working on. We love what they'redoing. Jiffy. AI is another one
that that we talk to a lotthat's doing a lot of cool
(14:41):
things with AI. And I think forus, there's a million marketing
tools, Eric, there's a millionlike, you can't even keep up.
You can't even you could. Youcould spend every waking hour in
a week looking at all the new,new tools that come out. So we
try to as a team. We threw them,pick the best ones, and we have
morning meetings where we'll doa demo of. New tool, the AI
(15:01):
tools that I'm loving right noware we, of course, our content
team, of course, uses them, butI'm loving the tool, the AI
tools that give you an avatarthat looks like they're speaking
like think about how much moneyat Orion you you spent on
trainers for the Orion platform,and now you could feed scripts
(15:22):
to these AI avatars, and theycan go out and do your training
on your your behalf. I thinkthat is amazing. Agreed, there's
just so many things, so we'retrying to keep up. But you're
right. It's like we have to findpeople who really understand the
business and all of the possibleapplications, and try to figure
out the best ways to moveforward. And
(15:42):
if you, if you think about thatexample, that that you just that
you just shared about training,yeah, instead of having to
listen to a pre recorded five or10 minute training session, you
could jump in ask an AI tool theexact specific area that you
need training or assistancewith. Yeah, and have it on the
(16:04):
fly. Create that experience foryou so that you're not having to
sift or wait through Hey, youknow, the first five minutes of
that video didn't do me anygood. I already knew that. But
then here, here's the part Ineed. You know, you can get
right to that part that you needon the fly, because that type of
training can be created, youknow, in real time with those
(16:27):
avatars. So, you know, that's anexample that that is not only,
you know, practical, but it'salso a time saver and makes the
user more efficient as well. Soeven if you think of things in
terms of, you know, at Orion, wewould have our product teams
writing a lot of release notes,right every single time
(16:49):
something changed, you know,what did what changed? Why did
we change it? And how does thatmatter to the advisor, and they
would spend hours writingrelease notes, and to the
chagrin of our product teams,I'll share some news with them.
Many times those release notesdon't get read or utilized
because nobody cared about thatparticular item, per se at that
(17:13):
level of detail. However, thinkof leveraging AI to create your
release notes. You know, thosecould be created on demand
depending on what's of mostinterest to the user, or if
those release notes were matchedor married to utilization data,
then they could be served upbased on the portions of the
(17:35):
system that the client is isactually utilizing, and
therefore they would, they wouldmost likely care about so these
are examples of how we canleverage AI within our
businesses in a way thatactually drives, you know, more,
uh, more happiness, if you will,for the client serving, yeah,
(17:58):
all the way around. It's, it'sjust simply an incredible
opportunity for us. Yeah,all right, everybody that's
listening. So what we are notdoing today is we are not
letting this AI revolution passus by. We're getting we're
making sure that we are takingeverything that's available to
us, all the tools, all theresources, and we're figuring
out how to evolve our businessesso that we keep up with the pace
(18:20):
and the crazy change that'shappening all around us. And
Eric, I know that we are goingto rely on you to make sure that
you keep us at intentionally onour toes as we move through that
process, too.
It's an absolute blast, and whatan opportunity we have. Some
Yeah,all right. So leave us with
(18:41):
advice for the RAS for thefintechs that are listening to
this podcast, how do they how dothey figure out where to start?
Well,I would start by just using open
AI's chat, GPT, go in there andsee if it can help you with
responses to clients. See, askit questions. Hey, if I change
(19:03):
this client's risk tolerancefrom, you know, 70 to 85 What
should I consider, describe ingeneric terms, the scenarios
that that you're facing asfinancial advisors in open AI
and start seeing how the promptswill create better and better
responses for you to leverage.
(19:27):
It's, it's just like, I think,you know, back to my days of
being a teenager and teachingkids how to swim. You know,
it's, it's hard to swim if youdon't get in the water and give
it a try, right? So oftentimeswe find ourselves like the kid
who's who's afraid of gettinginto the pool, you just need to
(19:49):
get in and and you know, you'llfind the water's warm, it, it
won't hurt you, and and you'llbe able to swim before you know
it. And so I would. Encourageadvisors just to get into open
AI, it's free by the time youbuy a subscription for your
business. I mean, you're talkingabout a very, very small amount
(20:09):
that you'll be paying, maybe $60a month or something, but the
impact that that will have theROI will be, you know,
astronomical for you.
Awesome. All right. Well, Eric,I really appreciate you as
always. I will keep using mywhat would Eric do as we
continue to build intentionally,and I'll talk to you soon. And
(20:32):
for those of you that arelistening, guys, we are not
letting AI pass us by. Thanks,Eric, thanks. Kelly,
thanks so much for tuning in. Ifyou enjoyed today's show,
subscribe to be notified whennew episodes become available,
and please consider giving us afive star review on Apple or
Spotify. This podcast issponsored by intentionally a
(20:55):
financial services growth enginedesign consultancy and agency.
If you want to learn more,please email me at Kelly, at
grow intentionally.com, thankyou again for listening and
check back to hear what we'renot doing next.
The information covered andposted represents the views and
opinions of the guest and doesnot necessarily represent the
(21:15):
views or opinions of KellyWaltrip. The content has been
made available for informationaland educational purposes only.
So.
AI is a technology that is very similar to, you know,
when I entered this industry andhelping advisors move from
install based systems to theweb. You know, now we are at
that same tech evolution period,if you will, where AI can really
come in and help augment thatadvisor client journey in a way
(00:24):
that we just have not been ableto do at scale before.
Welcome to the don't do thatpodcast. I'm Kelly Walter, CEO
and co founder of intentionally,and like me, this show is no
fluff and no. Bs, just smartadvice to help you learn from
the best and level up faster. Sowhat are we not doing today?
(00:48):
Let's find out.
Hi everyone. Welcome to thedon't do that podcast. I'm Kelly
Walter, and today I have with meone of my favorite people in
this industry, Eric Clark, whoabsolutely needs no
introduction, this formerfounder and CEO of Orion and now
(01:08):
probably the growth catalyst ofmore firms than we all know, and
one of my favorite people, likeI said, I had a great privilege
of working for Eric for forseveral years, and He took a
chance on me, Eric, when youwere a bunch of male executives
in Omaha, and I was allowedPhilly girl and gave me the
(01:31):
autonomy and the resources to besuccessful. And I look back on
that time that I had with youevery single day, and I tell
everyone that will listen that Ihave a what would Eric do
mindset as I approach the restof my career and the growth of
intentionally? So I needed tosay
that to you as we started. Sothank you. Yeah. So why don't
you start by telling everybodywhat you're up to these days?
(01:54):
Well, so first off, I'd like toclarify that we work together.
We you didn't work for me, butwe did have an absolute blast
working together, and I learneda ton from you about all things,
you know, marketing and how wecould grow Orion to the next
level. So the feeling is isdefinitely mutual Kelly and just
(02:16):
very appreciative of the timethat we did spend together. So
thank you. Today I am serving onfive boards, including Orion,
which I'm still very optimisticand excited about, as well as
I'm also a senior advisor toMcKinsey and Company, and so I
have an opportunity from time totime to go in and and help
(02:38):
companies evaluate their techstacks and and look at ways that
they can, you know, take theirgrowth trajectory to the next
level by leveraging technologyin different ways. And so that's
been an absolute blast, andcontinue to learn from industry
friends and colleagues you knoweach and every day, and this
(03:00):
industry has continued to blessmy life and my family's life in
a myriad of ways. But I wouldsay, you know, right at the top
of that list are the continuedfriendships and relationships
that that I have. You knowthat's that's the best part of
being in this industry, ofhelping advisors help their
clients, are the relationshipsthat you can build along the
(03:22):
way. And so it's been great, andI think that this industry's
best days are yet to come.
Oh, that's awesome. For those ofyou who are listening, you
should know that we have Eric asa phone a friend when we're
talking about clients that we'retrying to serve or clients that
we're trying to create newstrategies for, and Eric's
always willing to help us hereand intentionally figure out
(03:43):
what that should look like.
Absolutely. Yeah. All right,Eric, you know, the premise of
this podcast, my thesis, good orbad, is that we learn better
from our mistakes and ourchallenges and our missteps than
we do from our wins, and Socollectively, I'm trying to get
us to learn from each other's sothe question for you today is
very simple. It's, what are wenot doing today as as an
(04:04):
industry?
We Well, it's a great question.
And what we are not doing todayas an industry is using AI to
augment the advisor clientjourney, augment the client
relationship. There's so muchmore that we can do to leverage
AI to add scale to ourbusinesses, to help advisors
(04:25):
serve more households. You know,at scale, help these firms that
are doing a lot of M A and ourindustry, help them achieve the
scale and profitability thatthey need to really be able to
help clients, and, you know,help clients in a way that they
will best understand. So AI isbeing used today, I think, for
(04:48):
meeting notes or action itemsand next steps. But there's so
much more that AI can do to helpadvisors communicate with their
clients in a way. Way that theclient, from a behavioral
perspective, will best respondto, best understand and really
help the advisor meet the clientwhere they are, and help them
(05:09):
get to the next level. AI is atechnology that is very similar
to, you know, when I enteredthis industry and helping
advisors move from install basedsystems to the web, you know now
we are at that same techevolution period, if you will,
where AI can really come in andhelp augment that advisor client
(05:32):
journey in a way that we justhave not been able to do at
scale before. SoEric, the last time you and I
talked, and just to prove thatyou practice what you preach,
you told me that you were takingclasses and you were learning
how to build gpts and all kindsof stuff. Tell us a little bit
about what you're doing to makesure you're staying on the
cutting edge so that, so thatyou can help the clients that
(05:52):
you're consulting with do thesame.
Yeah, that's that has been thecase. You know. People say, Hey,
are you playing golf? Are youdoing this or that? You know, my
wife told me I needed a hobby,something to, you know, keep me
busy, and so I signed up for acouple of AI classes through the
(06:13):
University of Utah, and it'sbeen great. I've just done those
classes remote and online, andlearned a lot about AI, the
foundations of AI. How AI canyou know, be used in a myriad of
ways? How we can you know withinminutes, create these custom
gpts to help our serviceworkflows, help our connections
(06:36):
with our clients, help firmswith all types of different
areas of their business, youknow, it's it's been somewhat of
a hobby, and it's been anabsolute blast. But beyond that,
you know, when you think aboutAI and the way that we can use
language to forge connections,AI can be infused with
(06:57):
behavioral tendencies from aprompting perspective and really
craft and shape the way thatwe're messaging clients so that
they can understand what whatwe're trying to communicate. You
know, our industry is full ofaccountants, finance people,
people that love numbers, andoftentimes we need to
(07:21):
communicate in very differentways. And AI, I think, is an
excellent tool as to as to howwe can, you know, achieve that,
but then also create betterservice experiences for our
clients along the way. One ofthe last projects that that I
was working on with Mike Wilson,you know, while I was was the
(07:43):
CEO of Orion, was a projectcalled Smart summaries. And
these smart summaries reallytook data from Orion, you know,
not the PII, but foundationalaccount level data that we had
passed it over to open a eyes,APIs, and then it would return
back language in a variety offormats that the advisor can
(08:06):
then use to communicate with theclient. And that was a big, big
hit, but it was just scratchingthe surface of of what we can do
with AI here, you know, today.
And the reality is, the reason Isay that we're not doing that
today is that, well, one we'renot, but the other thing is,
Kelly, is that that thistechnology exists today.
There's, there's nothing holdingus back or or making us wait in
(08:27):
getting AI effectivelyimplemented, you know, within
our businesses. Soit's interesting that you, you
mentioned that project with MikeWilson. So what we're working on
it intentionally right now is,is trying to figure out how we
can use AI to take all thedisparate data sources that we
have for marketing, whether thatbe website data, social data,
(08:48):
email, tool data, you know, SEOdata, everything that we deliver
to a client, and put that givethem a narrative to explain.
Because right now, we give thembeautiful dashboards, and then
we go in manually, and we writethe summaries, and that is time
intensive, so we're workingright now to figure out what's
the next iteration of that sothat we could give these reports
(09:10):
to our clients and make them bemeaningful, but also not have
them take us three days to doevery single month,
right? So if an advisor islistening to this and you're
thinking like, Okay, give me anextreme but yet practical
example of, you know what, whatwe're talking about here, AI,
(09:31):
for instance, instead ofcreating a market commentary for
the month or for the week or forthe quarter that you send out,
You know, to the clients, youcould actually create a market
commentary that is specific andtailored to each and every
client that you work with,depending on their situation,
(09:52):
depending on their portfolio,depending on their behavioral
tendencies, and craft thatmessage very. Uniquely to them.
So you could do that today, ifyou wanted to, with the help of
AI, and you could do it at scaleand do it quite effectively. And
yet, I don't, I'm not aware ofany firm that's, that's that's
(10:13):
using the technology toaccomplish that. That's just one
example of many that I canprovide for you as to how AI
could practically be used, youknow, by advisors, to better
connect with clients.
So the firms that you're you'reworking with, do you see any
(10:34):
creative ways that people arestarting to explore using AI?
Are we still in the firstinning?
Well, we're definitely in thefirst inning or two, you know,
firms, they're leveragingtechnology that has AI embedded.
They're starting to leverage it,whether it's in a Zoom meeting,
you know, saying, hey, take thenotes for me and yeah, and help
(10:57):
me with the action items and thenext steps, or if it's inside
their CRM helping them processservice workflows. You know,
those are examples that that Ido see some firms starting to
adopt and leverage. I see somefirms using AI to help answer
questions that their employeesand staff members have about
(11:22):
benefit plans, or how can Ieffectively onboard a new team
member quickly? AI tools can bebuilt out to assist with those
types of processes and functionsin a way that you know will help
create scale. But what I'mreally excited about is, is
(11:42):
seeing AI go from being a backoffice tool or more of a you
know, hey, we're getting rid ofthe grunt work of note taking
and action items to being moreof a front office communication
tool, and actually seeing AIhelp build a better relationship
between the advisor and theclient. Yeah,
(12:04):
I think that's a I think thatmakes a lot of sense. So Randy
Lambert, who you and I both knowand love, he has joined me here
at intentionally, and he said,Hey, I had lunch with Eric, and
we need to hire an AI analyst.
And I, you know, he hits me withsomething new every day. So I
was like, Okay, I'll think aboutit. And then I started to think
about it, and I you weresimilar, Eric, I don't want to
(12:27):
be left behind. I'm going tomake sure that we evolve so that
we're we're doing all the thingsthat we need to do. So I posted
this job for an AI analyst,having no idea what I was
looking for, or what thecapabilities of people are, or
what school and classes thatthey're going to just to learn
about, what types of people areout there. Do you have any
guidance in terms of like, whatam, what are people? What are Ra
(12:50):
is? What are people like me?
What are we looking for in termsof support to make sure that
we're staying ahead of thecurve?
Well, because Kelly, we are inthe first inning. It's going to
take someone with not only anunderstanding of AI, but also an
understanding of how you canapply AI within your business,
(13:12):
right? So, so the AI expertisearound prompting, and, you know,
the latest and greatest AI toolsand things like that, that's a
nice to have. But what I thinkwill differentiate those
candidates that you're talkingto are the candidates that say,
I understand your business. Iunderstand how we can help you
(13:33):
specifically implement thesetools to augment everything from
those back office functionsclear to be, you know, the front
office relationships. So Ijokingly say that, you know,
hey, I think at this point, whenan advisor responds to a client,
the AI response, when using thethe correct prompts will sound
(13:57):
more human, more human like,then the advisor will and so
this is the type of ofcapability that's out there for
us to leverage. And, you know,really, the only thing holding
us back is, is that expertise,having that individual come in,
be able to be a catalyst to helpour firms adopt this, this
(14:20):
awesome technology that's that'savailable to us? Yeah, I
think that's, I think for us,that's definitely something we
want to explore. And you know,even the small things, you're
right? So we work with a clientcalled zocs. I don't know if
you're familiar with them, butthey are one of those note
taking tools we love we lovethem. We love what they're
working on. We love what they'redoing. Jiffy. AI is another one
that that we talk to a lotthat's doing a lot of cool
(14:41):
things with AI. And I think forus, there's a million marketing
tools, Eric, there's a millionlike, you can't even keep up.
You can't even you could. Youcould spend every waking hour in
a week looking at all the new,new tools that come out. So we
try to as a team. We threw them,pick the best ones, and we have
morning meetings where we'll doa demo of. New tool, the AI
(15:01):
tools that I'm loving right noware we, of course, our content
team, of course, uses them, butI'm loving the tool, the AI
tools that give you an avatarthat looks like they're speaking
like think about how much moneyat Orion you you spent on
trainers for the Orion platform,and now you could feed scripts
(15:22):
to these AI avatars, and theycan go out and do your training
on your your behalf. I thinkthat is amazing. Agreed, there's
just so many things, so we'retrying to keep up. But you're
right. It's like we have to findpeople who really understand the
business and all of the possibleapplications, and try to figure
out the best ways to moveforward. And
(15:42):
if you, if you think about thatexample, that that you just that
you just shared about training,yeah, instead of having to
listen to a pre recorded five or10 minute training session, you
could jump in ask an AI tool theexact specific area that you
need training or assistancewith. Yeah, and have it on the
(16:04):
fly. Create that experience foryou so that you're not having to
sift or wait through Hey, youknow, the first five minutes of
that video didn't do me anygood. I already knew that. But
then here, here's the part Ineed. You know, you can get
right to that part that you needon the fly, because that type of
training can be created, youknow, in real time with those
(16:27):
avatars. So, you know, that's anexample that that is not only,
you know, practical, but it'salso a time saver and makes the
user more efficient as well. Soeven if you think of things in
terms of, you know, at Orion, wewould have our product teams
writing a lot of release notes,right every single time
(16:49):
something changed, you know,what did what changed? Why did
we change it? And how does thatmatter to the advisor, and they
would spend hours writingrelease notes, and to the
chagrin of our product teams,I'll share some news with them.
Many times those release notesdon't get read or utilized
because nobody cared about thatparticular item, per se at that
(17:13):
level of detail. However, thinkof leveraging AI to create your
release notes. You know, thosecould be created on demand
depending on what's of mostinterest to the user, or if
those release notes were matchedor married to utilization data,
then they could be served upbased on the portions of the
(17:35):
system that the client is isactually utilizing, and
therefore they would, they wouldmost likely care about so these
are examples of how we canleverage AI within our
businesses in a way thatactually drives, you know, more,
uh, more happiness, if you will,for the client serving, yeah,
(17:58):
all the way around. It's, it'sjust simply an incredible
opportunity for us. Yeah,all right, everybody that's
listening. So what we are notdoing today is we are not
letting this AI revolution passus by. We're getting we're
making sure that we are takingeverything that's available to
us, all the tools, all theresources, and we're figuring
out how to evolve our businessesso that we keep up with the pace
(18:20):
and the crazy change that'shappening all around us. And
Eric, I know that we are goingto rely on you to make sure that
you keep us at intentionally onour toes as we move through that
process, too.
It's an absolute blast, and whatan opportunity we have. Some
Yeah,all right. So leave us with
(18:41):
advice for the RAS for thefintechs that are listening to
this podcast, how do they how dothey figure out where to start?
Well,I would start by just using open
AI's chat, GPT, go in there andsee if it can help you with
responses to clients. See, askit questions. Hey, if I change
(19:03):
this client's risk tolerancefrom, you know, 70 to 85 What
should I consider, describe ingeneric terms, the scenarios
that that you're facing asfinancial advisors in open AI
and start seeing how the promptswill create better and better
responses for you to leverage.
(19:27):
It's, it's just like, I think,you know, back to my days of
being a teenager and teachingkids how to swim. You know,
it's, it's hard to swim if youdon't get in the water and give
it a try, right? So oftentimeswe find ourselves like the kid
who's who's afraid of gettinginto the pool, you just need to
(19:49):
get in and and you know, you'llfind the water's warm, it, it
won't hurt you, and and you'llbe able to swim before you know
it. And so I would. Encourageadvisors just to get into open
AI, it's free by the time youbuy a subscription for your
business. I mean, you're talkingabout a very, very small amount
(20:09):
that you'll be paying, maybe $60a month or something, but the
impact that that will have theROI will be, you know,
astronomical for you.
Awesome. All right. Well, Eric,I really appreciate you as
always. I will keep using mywhat would Eric do as we
continue to build intentionally,and I'll talk to you soon. And
(20:32):
for those of you that arelistening, guys, we are not
letting AI pass us by. Thanks,Eric, thanks. Kelly,
thanks so much for tuning in. Ifyou enjoyed today's show,
subscribe to be notified whennew episodes become available,
and please consider giving us afive star review on Apple or
Spotify. This podcast issponsored by intentionally a
(20:55):
financial services growth enginedesign consultancy and agency.
If you want to learn more,please email me at Kelly, at
grow intentionally.com, thankyou again for listening and
check back to hear what we'renot doing next.
The information covered andposted represents the views and
opinions of the guest and doesnot necessarily represent the
(21:15):
views or opinions of KellyWaltrip. The content has been
made available for informationaland educational purposes only.
So.
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