Beaufort Financial Planning has joined Sifa, a business development firm for financial advisers and solicitors, signing up for their professional service.
Sifa offers partner firms marketing support, both adviser to solicitor and solicitor to client, as well as newsletters, individual seminar and consultancy support, and the inclusion on the Law Society’s directory of professional advisers.
Simon Goldthorpe, executive chairman of The Beaufort Group, said: “There are so many changes in the legal landscape with new competition for solicitors and crucially new regulation that mirrors the member firms of our own group.
“We realised that we could not possibly keep abreast of all the implications ourselves and saw this as a key element of what Sifa Professional offers”.
Dave Seager, development director at Sifa, added: “When working with solicitors and their referrals, a consistent, robust and reviewable investment process is important. We believe that by including a solicitor in client reviews advisers can assist them improve their client relationships.”
He has been pushing the adviser and solicitor integration message for some time, telling FTAdviser last summer that advisers should be forging deeper relationships with solicitors due to the regulatory issues that both are encountering and impacting profitability.
“RDR brought professionalism to the adviser industry and advisers can now add value to solicitors as advisers have client relationships which solicitors don’t,” commented Seager at the time.
“All the work that solicitors refer to an adviser, whether that be matrimonial, pensions, etc, will always have an investment element and a relationship element so advisers can add value. Solicitors are not doing well profitability-wise, so now is the time.”
peter.walker@ft.com
