How to Uncover $40M in AUM through Estate Planning (w/ Eric Negron of Forefront Wealth Advisors)

Summary

In this case study with Forefront, we sat down with Eric Negron (CEO and Certified Exit Planner) to learn how he and his team were able to end their clients' estate planning procrastination, and how incorporating estate planning services and leveraging EncorEstate Plans grew their practice by $40M in AUM in the first 12 months.

What's Forefront?

Forefront is an innovative financial advisory firm that integrates wealth planning, tax strategy, divorce planning, insurance services, and now, estate planning. Led by CEO Eric Negron, the team is passionately committed to delivering holistic solutions to create lasting, multi-generational wealth, and true financial freedom.

As Eric puts it, "Everyone in our firm is on a mission to become our client’s second thought, serving clients and their families while building a lifetime bond."

Challenges:

• Many clients avoided or delayed estate planning due to perceptions of complexity, inconvenience, and high attorney fees.
• Clients regularly postponed estate planning, leaving their financial plans incomplete and their assets potentially unprotected.
• Other estate planning platforms all came came across as "trying to reinvent eMoney with their estate planning twist on it," which according to Negron, is "not really what estate planning is about."

Solution:

• Culture eats strategy and technology for breakfast: An estate planning solution for advisors powered by a team that is truly passionate about estate planning, and always puts advisors in the driver's seat. It wasn't just about the tech, but the character, heart, and core values of the Encore team.
• Compliant and protecting advisors first: A way to help clients complete their estate plans while avoiding unauthorized practice of law (UPL) and staying in compliance with the Compliance Team (Forefront incorporated estate planning services language into their disclosure documents with the SEC).
• Easy, streamlined, and cost-effective: The Forefront team wanted a solution that made it as easy as possible for their clients, and is streamlined with their financial planning process with clients.

Results:

• "$40M in additional new assets as a result of partnering with Encore":  Encore covers all 50 states, and gives advisors all the resources to be successful so that they can run the exact same process wherever they and their clients are in the US, so advisors have endless opportunities to uncover more assets.
• More information under management (IUM): Working with Encore empowered the Forefront team to uncover more assets AND information, which according to Negron, "The more IUM you have, the more personalized and valuable your client relationships become.”
  
• Stronger client relationships: Forefront advisors always discuss estate planning at every financial planning review meeting with their clients, but implementing the Encore platform enabled the team to strengthen their overall financial planning process and positions as "the family advisor" to their clients. 
• More referrals and more prospects: By offering estate planning services, Forefront was able to 1) ensure their current clients had estate plans in place (strengthen retention) and 2) help people who weren't clients get their estate plans done while building that relationship (get more prospects while also diversifying their offerings beyond just financial planning).

Challenges

Clients kept procrastinating on getting their estate plans done

The Forefront team are excellent stewards for their clients, oftentimes becoming the trusted family advisor for many of them. That ethos and dedication is a reflection of Eric Negron, CEO and Certified Exit Planner, his philosophy, and how he's approached his work as an advisor.

Despite Forefront’s expansive service offerings, Negron identified a critical gap in how his firm executed estate planning: Traditional approaches to estate planning had been slow, inconvenient, and costly, deterring clients from completing essential plans – those approaches didn't solve for client procrastination. According to Negron:

"When we would go through and do our financial reviews [with clients], we would ask questions like, ‘Hey, we've been talking about estate planning for the last two, three, four, five, six, seven years. When are you going to get around to it?’ And there was always some excuse."

Clients don't want to think about estate planning, and existing solutions like advisors referring clients to estate attorneys went nowhere on account of lack of client follow-through. And it wasn't for lack of trying, either, on the Forefront team's end: advisors can only do so much in hounding their clients to get an estate plan done.

Eric and his team already knew how powerful estate planning is, and what they needed was a tool that actually solved for client procrastination:

"Estate planning is the biggest love letter that you will ever help your clients write. When you do estate planning, you know who's in the family, who's important, who's benefiting from financial assets, and who people love that want to make sure that are taken care of if something happens to them."

Solution

An estate planning platform built by a team that's sincerely committed to advisors' success long-term

Forefront chose EncorEstate Plans not merely because of technology, but primarily due to the Encore's values and sincere commitment to client success and passion for estate planning:

Eric explains:

" I looked at a lot of the ultra expensive, more sophisticated...estate planning platforms out there. And to me, everybody is trying to reinvent eMoney with their estate planning twist on it. And to me, that's not really what this is about. What this is really about is about facilitating an important conversation."

Encore’s streamlined platform simplified the estate planning process dramatically, providing accessible and easy-to-understand resources to empower advisors and ensure their clients can easily have a high-quality and affordable estate plan:

"Encore [makes] it very easy for clients to walk away with something they've been putting off for a long damn time, because nobody wants to think about estate planning."

Eric chose Encore for two reasons:

Reason #1: Encore's Culture and Team

"First and foremost, it had nothing to do with technology. It had to do with culture: Who are the people leading the organization? What sort of character, heart, and core values do they have? I knew [Matt and Encore] were the right type of human beings."

Reason #2: Encore Makes It Easy for Financial Advisors to End Client Procrastination on Estate Planning

"Encore [makes] it very easy for clients to walk away with something they've been putting off for a long damn time, because nobody wants to think about estate planning."

Encore’s streamlined platform simplified the estate planning process dramatically, providing accessible and easy-to-understand resources to empower advisors and ensure their clients can easily have a high-quality and affordable estate plan.

Forefront seamlessly integrated Encore into its practice, both as an added service for existing clients and as a standalone offering for prospective clients:

• Clear Communication: Existing clients were informed about the new, simplified, and cost-effective estate planning process.
• Transparent Pricing: Pricing was structured transparently and affordably, positioned strategically below what local estate attorneys would charge.
• Client Convenience: The planning process was adapted to fit into clients’ schedules, conducted virtually or in off-hours meetings.

Results

Increased AUM, deeper client relationships, and more IUM (and more referrals!)

Integrating Encore directly translated into tangible business growth and deeper client relationships:

• Asset Growth: Forefront added substantial new assets under management, thanks directly to estate planning discussions:

"The effect of estate planning on our business has resulted in $40 million dollars in additional new assets as a result of partnering with Encore."

• Business Development: Estate planning with Encore as a partner opened new doors and significantly bolstered Forefront’s prospecting pipeline:

"We've brought in 15 clients year-to-date using [our estate planning marketing] strategy."

• Expanded Service Impact: Estate planning conversations with clients facilitated broader financial planning and tax conversations, enabling Forefront to consistently move upmarket:

"The two biggest conversations that you can have as an advisor, if you want to go upmarket and get bigger clients, are to talk estate planning and talk tax."

Encore’s robust advisor resources played a pivotal role in alleviating initial hesitancy among Forefront's advisors. Eric emphasizes this:

"The team at Encore have done a phenomenal job. They built an entire resource library...that explains almost everything you could possibly want to know about estate planning. They literally tell you exactly what each document does, what its purpose is."

Advice for Advisors Considering Estate Planning and Encore

Forefront’s journey with EncorEstate Plans proves the tremendous value estate planning brings in enriching client relationships and in growing your firm.

Eric encourages other financial advisors who may feel hesitant to take that crucial step forward into estate planning to recognize the incredible opportunity it represents:

"If you're even considering adding estate planning as a service to your financial planning capabilities, I would recommend that you go ahead and do it. It is huge."

By fully embracing Encore, Forefront now enjoys a strategic advantage: building richer relationships, capturing critical client insights, and growing its market footprint substantially.

"Over 67 percent of people don't have an estate plan. And a lot of those people are high net worth. Even big money people don't have their estate plan in order. There are so many ways to leverage estate planning as the ultimate growth vehicle for your practice. And I can't think of any better partners than Encore."