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Vishal, could you take us through your distribution business journey? How did you get into mutual fund distribution?
I started my career with a co-operative bank in 1995. Despite having a well-settled life and job security, I was looking for an opportunity to motivate and challenge myself to embark on a more rewarding journey. Around the same time, I came to know about a B2B mutual fund distribution platform - NJ Wealth. I contacted their team and they gave me clarity on the growth opportunity in this business and on building a successful career.
However, being a father of a 3-year-old and the sole bread earner, this decision was tough. Hence, I started distributing mutual funds on a part-time basis. Eventually, I left my job and became a full-time mutual fund distributor in 2003.
Today, I am happy to share that I have completed 20 years in the industry. Over the years, SAFEinvest has set up systems and processes to institutionalise itself. Now we have a team of 50+ employees who take care of sales, operations, human resources, admin, and business process management. Currently, SAFEinvest manages assets of Rs.1,600+ crore from around 3,000+ families. SAFEinvest has built a monthly SIP book of Rs.7+ crore.
Vishal, you cater to 3,000 families. How did you go about acquiring them; what are the things that have worked in client acquisition?
The SAFEinvest team first tapped into their natural market i.e. family, friends, and relatives, and gradually moved to acquaintances running businesses. Over time, we received references from existing clients and today, we manage assets of 7,000+ investors from across 3,000+ families.
We believe that when it comes to building wealth and fulfilling personal needs, there is no ‘one-size-fits-all’ model. Hence, we stick to a customer-centric approach wherein we analyse the unique needs and wants of each client, their risk profile and provide them guidance based on that.
Over the years we saw three things that made a difference in client acquisition - marketing, regular client meetings, and a need-based approach to the entire process. In the early stages, we used a traditional approach to promote our business by distributing pamphlets in the textile markets of Surat. These pamphlets carried educational messages on the importance of mutual fund investments, the benefits of SIPs, and more about investing in general to generate interest.
Another activity that played a key role in building trust and expanding business is regular client meetings. We meet the clients on a one-on-one basis to understand their changing needs and aspirations which helps us to guide them and overcome clients' behavioural biases.
Finally, we simplify the numbers so that clients can understand them easily. Many people do not understand CAGR, rolling returns, TER and other jargon about mutual fund investing. Our job as a distributor is to simplify this, make it easy to understand and guide them to invest in mutual funds through SIPs while remaining patient.
How do you retain your clients? What activities do you do to keep your engagement going with them?
The key things to keep in mind here are review meetings and client segmentation. We have a predefined process to track review meetings and reviews are done using a review tool available to us.
Talking about segmentation, we have segregated our clients based on their asset size and the preferred mode of communication/meeting i.e. physical or digital. We send our clients regular communications, and greetings on birthdays, anniversaries, and festivals to build a personalised touch. All these put together - regular reviews, meetings, and communications in a disciplined manner have greatly helped us retain our clients.
You manage assets of over Rs. 1,600 crore with NJ. However, many MFDs believe that MFDs should move on after reaching scale. What’s your view on this? Why did you choose to stick around?
While some may believe that it is a better idea to move on after reaching scale, I hold a different view.
The one thing that encourages me to work with NJ Wealth, is the ease of doing business. With their support, I don’t need to bother about changes in regulatory norms, operational hurdles and so on. All I need to do is focus on the actual business only. The 360-degree support provided by them helps me execute my business decisions swiftly and effectively.
Without any platform, I would have to spend more money, time, and effort dealing with different software vendors, transaction platforms, day-to-day queries, marketing materials, customer care, and much more. Since I am free of all this, I and my entire team can focus solely on acquiring clients, servicing them, and expanding the business.
Many MFDs do not want to partner with platforms like NJ Wealth fearing brand recognition and poaching of clients. What’s your comment?
NJ Wealth is a B2B platform and has never approached any of SAFEinvest's clients. If any client directly approaches them, they reach out to their sub-distributor, called NJ Partners, and pass on the relationship and then the NJ Partner guides the client further.
The platform instead aids us greatly in creating and promoting our own brand with clients with the requisite marketing resources and communication solutions. We have personally benefited greatly from the same and see increased efficiency in our sales pitch.
At SAFEinvest we believe that any business or relationship needs three values to grow - trust, talent, and transparency. When a client invests through you, they not only give money but also place their trust in you. How you help them to build their wealth is your talent. Moreover, by remaining transparent i.e. disclosing relevant information, can strengthen your relationship with clients.
With such values in place, we don’t think there is a need to fear brand recognition or client poaching.
Why do you think mutual fund distributors should join a platform like NJ Wealth?
Partnering with a mature platform like NJ Wealth comes with a wide range of advantages including – hand holding to set up the business, knowledge enhancement through continuous training as well as a regular review to ensure optimum business growth with help of their dedicated team.
Most importantly, NJ is an extremely trustworthy organisation due to the level of ethical standards it strictly follows. They treat all their partners with utmost respect creating a healthy and positive working environment where everyone is valued hence contributing to our well-being. Their contribution to society constantly motivates us and reminds us to make a positive impact in this society. Our values align perfectly with that of NJ making us proud to be associated with them.
Summing up, when someone is offering 360-degree support, in terms of sales, marketing, training, technology, customer care, and research, life really becomes very easy. It is like outsourcing all non-core activities to someone you trust and who is much better at managing those things than you. You kind of get the best together and are able to scale beyond your imagination, like we did and are doing even today.
You can become NJ Wealth Partner by visiting this link https://njwealth.in/mf-distributor/.
