From 17 Clients to £500M+ AUM: How Marc Norris Built a Thriving Financial Planning Firm

Title: From 17 Clients to £500M AUM: How Marc Norris Built a Thriving Financial Planning Firm

In this episode of Financial Planner Life, Sam Oakes is joined by Marc Norris, founder of Twelve Wealth Management, to explore how he went from estate agency to building a financial advice business with over £500 million under management.

Marc shares his journey from day one of the St. James’s Place Academy, through the early years of client acquisition, to leading a team of 38 advisers and staff, with big plans to triple the size of the business in the next five years.

🔥 What you'll learn in this episode:

• How Marc used his estate agency background to win early clients
• The role the SJP Academy played in helping him build the foundations
• Why mortgages were a strategic way to keep cash flow going and build trust
• How he built powerful introducer relationships, especially with accountants
• How he supports an accountancy firm with 8,000 clients through education and webinars
• Why relationship-building still beats technical knowledge in the early years
• How he plans to scale towards £1 billion AUM with a long-term mindset

💬 Marc’s story is a real-world example of what it takes to grow a successful advice business from the ground up and it’s packed with practical insights for anyone building a career in financial planning.

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Transcript

From Estate Agent To Planner

Sam Oakes 0:00

From estate agent to half a billion under management. That's your journey at St. James's place.

Marc Norris 0:07

And a few of them asked me, look, what else can you do? Can you do anything on the tax side, the structure side, the investment side? And I was like, well, look, not now, but I'm actually on this path and this journey to be able to do that. Would you be interested in a conversation when I come out? And a lot of them said yes. Persistence, consistency. You know, I did a lot of chasing. Sometimes I was sat in the office till 11 o'clock at night making phone calls. First year, I think we signed 17 clients. And in my second year, we signed 70.

Sam Oakes 0:42

I think social media, this kind of idea that everyone should be running their own businesses, has been a bit toxic over the last few years. It's put a lot of pressure on people. You're not as successful as you're running your own business.

Marc Norris 0:51

You know, I think the world we're in at the moment with compliance regulation, you know, servicing senior clients, I think it's made it harder to become a business owner from day one. This is quite a lonely business when you do it on yourself. But actually, when you've got like-minded individuals that buy into your vision, your culture, your plans, it's a lot easier.

Sam Oakes 1:16

Okay, so Mark, thanks so much for joining me today on the Financial Planner Life podcast. How are you? Yeah, very well. Thank you. Thanks for having me. Oh, you're absolutely welcome. Look, from estate agent to half a billion under management, that's your journey that's in James's place.

Marc Norris 1:28

Yep.

Sam Oakes 1:29

So today you're going to tell us a little bit about how you got there.

Marc Norris 1:31

Okay.

Sam Oakes 1:32

So let's just start with the beginning. Estate agent to financial planner. What are those transferable skills? Why did you do it? And do you recommend it?

Marc Norris 1:38

Yeah, look, I mean, uh, you know, I didn't plan to do this. I was, as I said, an estate agent in central London, um, working for a nice business, relatively small business. But, you know, 2012 kind of post-Olympics, and I'll get onto that story later. Uh, just fancied a change. And I was going to go back to university and study finance and economics. And actually, a very close friend of mine who'd been at SJP 20 years or so said, look, why don't you come and try this? And I had no idea what financial planning was, what wealth management was. Uh, went for a couple of interviews at SJP and thought, you know what? I mean, it's a relationship business. It's a business within a business, and I was really keen to kind of grow, push out, you know, show my entrepreneurial spirit. I had a lot of ambition in drive at that point. I was a lot younger. Uh, and it just was such a natural fit. And yeah, I transitioned

Early Hustle And Olympic Pivot

Marc Norris 2:30

over, I think, in 2014.

Sam Oakes 2:32

So, this entrepreneurial spirit that you talk about, tell us take us back to when you were an estate agent. Where did you know, how did that show up in that job role?

Marc Norris 2:39

Well, so we we were a small estate and based in Queen's Park in London. Uh, Letton's agent probably had about 150 landlords, so really small. And over the space of probably three or four years, I developed a couple of good relationships with some big um administrators in London around the time of the kind of financial crisis. A lot of portfolios, properties have been repossessed. Uh, and I built a sales arm to that business quite quickly, and we were selling a lot of properties for probably 25 pence on the pound to lawyers, doctors, uh, business owners, private equity guys, hedge fund managers all across London. And then we had this uh we had this block in East London in uh Hackney, Hackneywick, actually. It was opposite the Olympic Park, and we owned the whole block, or we had the whole block under our under our management to sell. And I had a very good idea to shortlet all the apartments to all the television networks so they could film the building and film the whole of the Olympic Stadium and kind of add that to their catalogue, if you like, of information when they're doing their their shows during the Olympics. Uh, and so I kind of put out calls to everyone, you know, CNN, BBC, seven in Australia, uh, and turned out and had real legs. And we started letting these properties at about a thousand pounds a night. Uh, one of them we let for a year, you know, landlords at that point that own those properties made a lot of money, you know, off the back of that. I I I own a fair bit from commission. So it was kind of like an early Airbnb before Airbnb. I should have really pursued it into Airbnb, and I'd probably be in a very different position. But no, and and and look, I think that just kind of shows, you know, I was given an opportunity, took advantage of that opportunity to help out the agency, to help out all the landlords, but also to to help my own kind of personal development, and I really enjoyed it.

Sam Oakes 4:27

Fantastic. So you you obviously earned some pretty good money at that point. Was that also a catalyst for you thinking, right, I've got an opportunity here to move on? Did you see that as a lump sum of money to invest in your future career? Had you had enough by then?

Marc Norris 4:38

Yeah, look, and and what I did is is off the back of that kind of relationship, I I actually bought one of those flats from the administrator. Uh I flipped it a week after I bought it and and made some more commission off of some profit off the back of that with my now wife, who was actually my girlfriend at the time. Uh, and then the decision was, you know, after speaking to my my buddy at Bin at SJP, do I go down this route and start a business and use these funds to look after myself for a year or two, however long it took to build the business, or do I go and buy a property for us to move into? And, you know, obviously I didn't choose the property route for us to move into. We carried on renting in London and I kind of put the money behind myself and joined SJP to start this business. So yeah, it was a real catalyst and gave me a bit of freedom to not have to worry, I suppose, about my day-to-day rent, living expenses. Uh, obviously, when you train in the academy, you don't get paid to do it. Well, you get paid expenses, but not enough to survive on. Uh, yeah, and that was a real, real big help for me.

Sam Oakes 5:38

Fantastic. So you decided to join through um the St. James's Place Academy. Yeah. Tell us about your experience with that. Was it useful? Was it helpful? Did it give you the insight that you needed to be able to hit the floor running?

Marc Norris 5:49

Yeah, no, I think it was brilliant. I I, you know, I had my first stage interview with Adrian Batchel, who was the head of the academy at the time, uh, just to give me a bit of information about what it was, how it worked, and you know, I thought, yeah, this this could be for me. And then you go for a five-stage interview process at the time was with an American guy, Tom Haran. Uh, he was a bit of a cool dude, but very particular, should we say. Um, and it was everything from building a business plan, which I'd never done before. I'd never started a business, building a marketing plan, network analysis, what you're going to do on day

Betting On SJP Academy

Marc Norris 6:20

one, how the academy structured. And that was very kind of thought-provoking for me and allowed me to kind of plan my first year, my second year, my third year. Um, and I actually liked it. I love the interview process, I like what it taught me. I love the structure of the academy and and everything I learned because I was so new to this, I didn't even know what the FCA was when I joined SJP. And within that kind of six-month period of doing my exams and classroom learning, you know, I felt like a different person when I came out of it.

Sam Oakes 6:49

When you went through it and you were learning about the FCA, you're learning about financial planning, you're learning about the regulatory requirements, and maybe starting to see there's a huge opportunity, but maybe starting to think, well, actually, this is very highly regulated. This could take time for me to build a business. Did it put you off in any way coming from an environment which was probably a quicker turnaround in respective earnings and commission, etc.?

Marc Norris 7:11

Uh well, I think post probably RDR, which is when I joined, it was a very heavily regulated industry. I think the R01, which is your first kind of regulation ethics exam, that was a bit of a dry one for me. Um but a necessity, you know, you need to understand that kind of stuff. And, you know, during the learning process, during the education process in the academy, it was more about relationship building. This is how you'll build a practice. You know, in some senses, it kind of made it sound easier than it probably was. But, you know, I think having that knowledge on the kind of FCA, the ethics, the regulation, helped me build a compliant business because you still got to do it within the framework of your regulator. But fundamentally, we do run a relationship business and advice business, so we are dealing with people, which yeah, I found very similar to my previous role as an estate agent.

Sam Oakes 8:04

You kind of like going back to when you were an estate agent, you built this network of yeah, mentioned sort of solicitors, accountants, hedge funds, managers, all that type type of network. Like not everyone does that. So, how much did that impact your career by connecting with those types of individuals?

Marc Norris 8:23

Yeah, I think when you're selling properties at 25 pence on the pound, you'll build a network pretty easily, right? Um But you know, when when I first joined the academy, I did do a bit of network analysis where I spoke to some of those people, some I had a really good relationship with. And a few of them, we'd we'd been involved in refinancing portfolios for our partners, we'd been involved in yield analysis and increasing yields for clients. And a few of them asked me, look, what else can you do? Can you do anything on the tax side, the structure side, the investment side? And I was like, Well, look, not now, but I'm actually on this path and this journey to be able to do that. Would you be interested in a conversation when I come out? And a lot of them said yes. Some of them didn't respond and didn't answer, but that's natural.

Sam Oakes 9:04

Yep.

Marc Norris 9:04

Uh, and a few I still contact today, even though they're not clients. And, you know, a good example of this is I hadn't heard from one of my landladies for 10 years, and she's now one of my biggest clients. She just came to me out of the blue and said, meaning, been meaning to get back to you. And I was like, Well, I've been chasing you for 10 years, and she became a client this year, and she's now a fantastic client and one of my biggest clients.

Sam Oakes 9:25

It just tells you the power of persistence and prospecting, you know, never let go because you never know when that person might come back to you, and they're probably a whale. I've not met her, so what can I say? Um, so listen, look, building the business from the ground up, okay, um, it's tricky. Um, I speak to lots of different people that come into the financial planning profession, they always find those first couple of years really, really tricky. Some people excel, but some people take a long time, right? A long time to build those client relationships and network and find the right people. Tell us a little bit about your journey. How did you approach it? And what did you do to if you did, accelerate your learning and client development?

Marc Norris 10:05

Uh I think uh in the early years I had a had a buddy, as I said, who brought me into SJP. So he was a very good mentor to me, in a sense that he allowed

Learning Compliance And Craft

Marc Norris 10:15

me to kind of sit in on his meetings, you know, like a fly on the wall and just listen and absorb. And that was really helpful. He was quite a technical guy, very good on the tax and investment planning side. And that still serves me today in a lot of meetings. I sit in on with with clients, and also I spoke to other partners in the building. You know, can I just come and sit in on some of your meetings? How do you explain the investment side? How do you explain the structure side, the tax side? So mentorship was fantastic. Um, you know, when I went live, it was kind of day one, you got no clients, and I tried everything, you know. I cold called, I cold emailed, I went to networking events, I ran seminars, I ran webinars, I contacted all the old clients I ever knew. And, you know, it wasn't that fruitful. I mean, in the first year I got 17 clients. And I also, personal development, you ask a question there, you know, what else could I do that differentiated me from other partners at the time? And and I'd been in property, so I decided to get the mortgage qualification quite early on as a way to kind of de-risk. If I wasn't out there working with a lot of clients on their investments and pensions and protection and everything else we do, well, could I still do some mortgages with my existing network to keep me, you know, above water in a sense? And that worked really well. I did a few buy-to-elect mortgages for a client of mine from my previous days, and she became my biggest client off the back of doing a really, really good job on the mortgage side.

Sam Oakes 11:38

So it's actually quite a few people I've spoken to at um St. James's place who did exactly the same thing. They let they did lean into the mortgages quite early on, and it kind of did keep them, you know, their head above water, but it also opened up a huge amount of opportunities for the investments in the pension side. Sort of mortgages, protection leaning into that. Um so yeah, it's not a a strategy that um is just because you worked in you know the estate agency background, quite a few people with SJP I've spoken to have done it and been successful in it. What about networking then? You know, you obviously were a strong networker, a state state agency background, you know, they had a strong network. Surely that came into play at some point.

Marc Norris 12:10

Yeah, a list of contacts that worked for the NHS. There's about 850 contacts consultants, and I emailed them all and said, Look, would you be interested in attending a seminar in the Kingsway office at the time? And I think I had about 29 people turn up in a 14-person boardroom. So it and I didn't know that many people were going to show up. And so I'm in the boardroom, it's absolutely packed. And I'm giving a seminar on the NHS pension, and off the back of that, I got four or five clients, and they're still great clients today. And I lent a lot on SJP. There were a lot of people, you know, in the in in in in when I first came out the academy, I didn't know a huge amount of get about pensions and tax and everything else, but there were some people at head office who really did, who'd been here 20 plus years, and actually they came in and did seminars for me. So all I had to do was fill the seats. And sometimes you'd only get four people turn up, sometimes you'd get 50 people turn up. And you know, I just tried everything.

Sam Oakes 13:07

So besides to me, uh running these events, running these seminars, they became an opportunity for you to progress forward. They that was a catalyst of you starting to generate clients, that face-to-face networking, seminars, events via persistent outreach.

Marc Norris 13:23

Yep. Yeah, and you know, I think being visible, being available to clients, you know, now we do everything on Zoom and we do Zoom webinars and seminars, and yes, we might have 200 people turn up, but in the early days, actually being around clients, uh face to face, building those relationships. You know, we hosted one once in an Indian restaurant in Croydon for a GP, a good friend of mine at the time, and he bought about eight GPs along. Uh, we had a big meal, uh, a couple of beers. I did some talks around tax planning, investment planning, and it went great. And because he brought a few clients along, we showed up. I had a a another person there at the time with me. We picked up quite a few clients off the back of it. But you know, my first year, I think we signed 17 clients, and then my second year we signed 70. And that was through probably a bit of a shift. Uh, we built some introducer uh relationships, and that started to really drive business growth.

Sam Oakes 14:19

Tell me a little bit about those introducer relationships then, because that obviously came a little bit later on. So, what did you lean into? Again, was it your network previously? Was it a new network? How did they come about?

Marc Norris 14:28

Yeah, one of the one of them was a friend of mine

Mentors, Mortgages, And First Clients

Marc Norris 14:30

who I'd known from school, hadn't seen him in probably 10 years, and uh he left a role at HMRC and went and set up uh his own accountancy with another friend. Uh, I saw it come up on LinkedIn, I reached out to him and said, you know, hey, do you want to do you want to go for a beer or some lunch? And we did. We got on, we reconnected, and you know, they have become a partner of ours to this day. You know, they started as a really small accountancy firm and they've grown into a top 100 accountancy firm in the UK. So that was very powerful. Uh solicitors uh in the early days, you know, we'll wheel writers. We used to give a lot of clients across. And I'm a big, big fan in kind of giving a lot before I get, yeah. And that typically happens with accountants. Um, I always give a few clients to them first.

Sam Oakes 15:17

So let's get back to that because we were having a chat, me and Luke earlier about referrals and people saying, Oh, I'll give you a referral fee and all of that. So when you say give, you were talking like, yeah, just here you go. This person wants to speak to you. Were you asking for anything in return?

Marc Norris 15:30

Yeah, so all we want in return is clients, you know, a lead that we can then deal with that need that have a need, and accountants can really identify that. When we refer a client to someone, we don't expect anything back in terms of monetary remuneration or fees. We just want someone to take care of our clients like we would, give them a great service. When someone refers to us, we do pay referral fees, and we're happy to do that. Some people take it and some people don't. Uh, and I think that really solidifies the relationship because ultimately we are going to get more from an accountant than we can give because these guys probably have more self-employed clients than us.

Sam Oakes 16:04

Interesting then, right? You you do pay referral fees. A lot of people do, and some people accept them, some people don't. Who refers you the most business? The one who accept the referral fee or the ones that don't?

Marc Norris 16:14

Absolutely. The ones that accept the referral fees give us the most business, and the ones we tie in on a referral basis. So generally, how we do it very differently to other firms is we will give them a referral fee of the initial work we do for a client, and then we will give them a referral fee of the ongoing work we are doing for a client. Okay. Yeah. And the reason why is when we're dealing with the accountants on an annual basis, you know, claiming things on the tax return, we are expecting the accountant to say, How's the relationship going with Mark? You know, can you get this data from them? So they're helping us give that ongoing service. Right. And so we pay them. That embeds them in our practice. Yeah. And it's a lot more difficult for them to leave and find someone else. That's so true.

Sam Oakes 16:52

It's less transactional. Yeah. It becomes part of the journey. Yeah. Yeah, I love that. That's a really great explanation, actually.

Marc Norris 16:57

Yeah.

Sam Oakes 16:57

Yeah, we really like it. Yeah. Very good. I've not heard that one before, actually.

Marc Norris 17:02

Yeah, look, I mean, we we we now have trained or taught our advisors to do a similar thing. So the way to embed a true introducer and really be aligned to one another is tie them in for the long term. You know, it's what we do with our clients. We want them to be with us long term, we want that loyalty, we want the exact same from introducers.

Sam Oakes 17:20

Where else would you go above and beyond in respect of that relationship? So you tie them in on the ingoing basis. Do you do anything else with them to make them deeper rooted with you?

Marc Norris 17:32

Yeah, so we do. So for this particular introducer, we do a quarterly webinar for all of their clients. Uh, you know, and they've got 8,000 clients. So we get them to offer their clients the chance to join a webinar. And we'll do it on financial planning for business owners, we might do it on estate planning, we might do it on mortgage planning, we might do it on end-of-year tax planning. It's a free seminar that we run, looks great for the accountant because they're providing an opportunity to look at a webinar from someone who's regulated to give that advice. Uh, so that's really helped. You know, I think it's just about how you would treat a friend. It's kind of you see them often, you go and sit in their office. I do training sessions for their own staff because a lot of these are very junior accountants. I talk to them about how best to spot opportunities with their clients. If a client sat with hundreds of thousands of cash in their business account earning 0%, well, how can we how can we better that? How can we help them achieve more from their cash in the bank? Things that they wouldn't necessarily know, and that's been really valuable for them being able to recruit good people and spot that opportunity. Education. Education, yeah.

Sam Oakes 18:35

Yeah, I love that. And also giving giving you time. Yeah. Means you care, space time, people remember you, you're adding value. Yeah, yeah. It goes back to that kind of you know, you're passing somebody a lead, you're adding value, you're not expecting something in return. Here's some value, here's some value. And people go, oh, thank you very much for that. And they remember you and they want to continue using you.

Marc Norris 18:51

I think I also think it cements the relationship the client has with their accountant. Accountancy is very transactional, right? Once a year, it's very rare that you know someone will call up their accountant two times a week to get advice because otherwise they get billed a lot of money for it. It's usually my end of year accounts happen. Can you draft my accounts? So, actually, throughout the year, because we're having multiple touch points with the client, we're talking to them about their accountant, we'll provide the data to your accountant. It kind of solidifies that relationship between client, accountant, and advisor.

Seminars And NHS Networking

Marc Norris 19:20

So it's more of kind of an incubator for the client, if you like.

Sam Oakes 19:22

Interesting. Goes back, you know, when you I run podcasts and I produce podcasts. There is a huge opportunity in that space for that level of social proof and uh connection between the small family office style that you've built between the accountant and yourself and how you can co co-create podcasts that then would go on a weekly basis around a specific subject matter that's relevant to that audience. It could be the markets, what's going on in the markets, the turmoil what's going on. That's an interesting one, actually, at this point, because I know that you um you've done really well in markets when there is a little turmoil and people are a bit concerned. What's your strategy to calming clients down then in times of worry?

Marc Norris 20:04

We we we uh take it kind of head on. We produce a lot of content on volatility, we produce a lot of content on the markets. SJP are very good at giving us the tools to enable us to do that. Uh, you know, our job is to get that out to our client bank. When we bring a client on board, you know, we talk to them about the journey of investing. You know, it's not always very linear and just follows a trend upwards. It can be up and down. And there's a very good chart that we've got that shows kind of a one-year volatility versus a 10-year volatility. And over 10 years it's relatively smooth. Yeah, but clients don't notice that, right? They notice the emotional journey of the ups and downs on a monthly basis. So we say to them, look, you'll probably hear from us a lot more when times are negative, when times are positive. When times are positive, clients feel happy, they feel optimistic. When times are negative, clients feel scared, they feel worried, they want reassurance. That's where, in my opinion, an advisor should be working very hard with their clients. And actually, because we take it, you know, and and and we're on the front foot, we get a lot more business and we do it, you know, we say to a client, look, Mr. Client, if you are going or Mrs. Client, if you're going to do your ISA this year anyway, why wait until the 4th of April or 5th of April next year? We're in a time where the markets are down. Why not do it now? Get it done early. And, you know, there's a proven uh, you know, it there's a proven chart that shows by doing your investments early in the tax year versus later in the tax year can add value over a 10-year period, you know, not ignoring the fact that the markets are down massively. And we've generally seen our best months from a productivity perspective uh in times where markets have been very difficult.

Sam Oakes 21:37

So make sure you're communicating, make sure you're reaching out and reassuring and having those conversations because they're probably panicking and they're probably thinking maybe I should take my money out, and that might be the worst thing to do. And being there and have a having a a kind of rational conversation is only going to keep them at ease. Is the status now, right? I can't remember which one it was now. Y charts. The number one reason clients leave their financial planner is due to lack of communication.

Marc Norris 22:05

And you and you're exactly right. I mean, when clients are at home uh showing in their own mind about what's happening in the markets, you do not know what they are thinking. And they could be thinking about leaving, they could be worried. Someone else has reached out to them from another advice firm that says, I'll coach you through this. But if you're not dealing with those clients or you're not talking to the client, someone else may be. So I think communication is absolutely key. And whether that's marketing, social media, picking up the phone, dropping them a WhatsApp or a text, I think it's really important.

Sam Oakes 22:34

But do you react to or do you sort of preempt problems that might be coming up and things that are going on? So do you put content out before uh the end of the tax year or what how do you approach sort of specific uh points in time that might cause uh the client uh anxiety or concern?

Marc Norris 22:50

Yeah, like there's certain events throughout the year. You can preempt a budget, for example. You know, we put a lot of content out and and SHAP are very good at this, uh kind of preempting what's going to happen during a budget and what that could mean. Now, a lot of it is speculation from clients that you know, particularly the budget we've just had around pensions and tax-free cash and what's going to happen there. Do I need to take my money out? What should I do? And you know, for the for those points, we can only reassure. Uh, for a lot of times, though, you have to be quite reactive if things happen suddenly in the market. I mean, COVID was a great example of that. You know, this this stuff that's just happened in the US with tariffs and Trump, and the market has been very volatile. So you can be slightly more reactive in those times, but I think there is a world where preempting what's happening, tax year end, for example, is a great one. So we put a lot of content out before these events happen, and then we do

Introducers And Referral Strategy

Marc Norris 23:40

a lot of post kind of event happening content as well.

Sam Oakes 23:42

And what's the most successful piece of content? And what's the most successful type of content do you put out? Uh is it email, is it social media, is it video? You know, what what medium and what platform?

Marc Norris 23:53

I mean, we use so for all of our kind of um email content, we use MailChimp to get our kind of mass emails out there for people. I suppose more personalized emails is probably the most successful. Yeah, you know, nothing beats picking up the phone to a client and have a conversation with them or sitting down with them face to face. But if we're doing it on that mass basis, then I think those personalized emails really help. But you know, unfortunately, there's only so many hours in the day, we can't reach out to X amount of people in one day. So sometimes we have to do mass mail outs. But, you know, that coupled with the insights, the e-briefings that SJP put out there, uh, our LinkedIn, our Instagram all get quite a lot of views nowadays. So it's hard to tell. But I'd say personal emails and telephone calls are the best.

Sam Oakes 24:38

Let's go back to the first couple of years. So you went from 17 to 70 clients, right? At that point in time, what were you thinking about your business? Were you thinking about I'm gonna build a half a billion pound business in a few years' time, or were you thinking this is a lifestyle business?

Marc Norris 24:50

Yeah, I think you know, in the early years it's always a lifestyle business. I think when I joined, that was generally the path advisors trod, you know, in SJP and in the industry. Um, I think as time has gone on, you know, developing bigger businesses has just naturally happened in this industry. Um, you know, I always thought, you know, getting back to where I was after three years in terms of what I was earning, what success looked like to me after kind of three years, I'd be quite happy. And then a couple of opportunities came along, probably end of 2017, early 2018, to uh acquire a book of clients from an advisor who had a bit of a unique family situation at the time with health issues with with with with one of his children. He came to me and said, Look, would you be interested in uh managing the clients and acquiring my practice? And you know, I I I didn't plan to create a big business at that point, and it was just me, and I think I had a PA at the time and outsourced everything else. And you know, I said, Well, I'm young, gonna be in this business a long time, why not start creating a bigger opportunity or bigger business for myself? So, you know, with the powers that beard, SJP, we agreed on a deal, and that transaction went ahead, and the business suddenly went from you know hundred clients to probably five hundred clients. Uh, and then, you know, at the same time as that happening, I actually acquired another business at the same time, which probably took me up to about 800 clients. Uh, but one of the stipulations of those two transactions was I had to get some back office staff, I had to restructure the business from a partnership at the time to a limited company, and I had to bring on more advisors. So my work was kind of to go out and build the infrastructure of people I wanted to work with trust, and you know, I lent a lot on a lot of friends in the early years, partners I knew at SJP who were great at what they did, but not as good at at potentially building a business and bringing on new clients, but I knew they fit really well with me. Right. So that's how the journey began. It was kind of by accident, really. I kind of fell into being a big business owner.

Sam Oakes 26:57

Well, interesting, because you said at the beginning when you joined uh St James's Place, you'd never built a business plan. So many years later, I don't know how many years it was, three or four, five maybe years later, you all of a sudden of acquiring businesses. I think from not knowing, not ever building a business plan to all of a sudden being an acquirer of businesses. That wouldn't have happened, I take it, if you were out in the world on your own trying to build a financial advice business.

Marc Norris 27:21

No, absolutely not. I think the support you get for acquiring these businesses, you know, both on the monetary side, the due diligence, um, the support once that transaction has happened, the integration is fantastic, you know. And those are areas in the kind of outside world I would have had to employ people to do and fill, and the big cost that comes attached to that. So there's a lot of support that goes on internally to support these acquirers and obviously people that are retiring. So I think that was kind of fundamental. Um yeah, and and also I think we we had a very different model where we tried to acquire businesses where we could add a value to clients because at the end of the day, it's all about servicing your clients very well, advising them, planning with them, and adding value. And you know, no zero disrespect to anyone out there who is retiring, but you know, people do end up getting a bit complacent and maybe not keeping up with the times on what's new, what's happening, what we can do to add value to clients. And you know, a big big tool that came out in 2018. Well, it was new to me at the time, was cash flow modelling and voyant. So

Embedding Accountants For The Long Term

Marc Norris 28:30

we were quite an early adopter, I'd say, for SJP and in cash flow modeling. Our promise to all our clients was we will offer every single client a cash flow model, regardless of size of client. And that was probably the most powerful tool when I integrated these businesses because they'd never seen one, they'd never done one because it wasn't a big thing in the industry then, and that helped us secure a lot more businesses off the businesses we purchased.

Sam Oakes 28:55

I love that. Yeah, very, very cool. So uh how many people have you got working for you now?

Marc Norris 29:01

Uh well, we've just made a couple more hires. So we're around 38 people.

Sam Oakes 29:06

Okay, so approaching 40.

Marc Norris 29:07

Yeah, approaching 40, yeah.

Sam Oakes 29:09

You strike me as somebody who's always been quite very independent. You're a hunter, you're in a you're a relationship man, you you you seek opportunities by the sounds of it. You're driven by that kind of dopamine rush to build, right? And to grow and to meet people and to seek out the deal. But that's how you kind of strike me. Yeah. Going from that to then having 40 people in your business nearly, uh must have been some must have been a bit wobbly at times, maybe, or were there areas where all of a sudden you thought, hang on, like I I've not built a team before? How did you cope with that? Because not everybody is meant to build a team, not everybody is meant to manage. What was your biggest learning experience during that period, and how did you deal with it to be able to be happy in the role that you were the most happiest in?

Marc Norris 29:52

Yeah, I think building a business is is is like a roller coaster of emotions. You have your ups and downs, you have your good days, you have your bad days. And you know, I'm I I I love the client work. I really do. I'm very technical, I'm very good at solving problems, but I also love the strategy side of running and growing a business. I'm also very good at that. And you often get caught between these two places on what you love more. And honestly, there's not one I love more. I love them both the same. So we've had to employ people who can really support what I do, who are embedded on our vision and our journey on on how we're going to grow this business and what it means to us, you know, finding the right advisors that can deal with your stuff, you know, and fortunately, we've been quite good on the advisor side. You know, we've lost one in the last 10 years, and that was more a different of personalities than anything else. And she was fantastic, just not the right fit for our business and our culture and our vision, and that's that's fine. And staff members, you know, a couple of them have been with me since not quite day one, but probably 2017, and they've been integral to the business growth. You know, one of them now has gone from my PA to practice manager to ops director, so there's been that real progression in the in the business, and and one of the other guys leads the technical team, and they've helped me, they've helped me employ people, they've helped me select personalities that maybe fit with me but don't fit with the whole business. So I think having the right support and the right people behind you can really help. This is quite a lonely business when you do it on yourself, but actually when you've got like-minded individuals that buy into your vision, your culture, your plans, it's a lot easier.

Sam Oakes 31:34

You mentioned PA to operational director.

Marc Norris 31:37

Yep.

Sam Oakes 31:37

So that person stayed with you for for since the beginning, right? And it sounds like always been in a position of organization and support. How important was that higher in the beginning in respect of your actual development as a business and yourself?

Marc Norris 31:49

Well, it was it was more at the time. I was looking uh for a PA, and a friend of mine uh just happened to be between jobs. And in fact, she was at the Ombudsman at the time as a adjudicator, so quite organized, knew the industry a little bit. Her mother was quite high up at the Ombudsman, and said, Look, do you fancy a change and do you want to come and work with me? And we got on very well, and she did. Uh, and she's probably the person who knows my business better than anyone, apart from my FD now who who who knows the business inside out from a financial perspective, she knows it from an ops perspective. And so, as she has grown with the business from kind of humble beginnings to a small financial advisory practice to being involved in those business purchases, those acquisitions, client acquisitions, staff acquisitions, you know, she's helped mould and shape what we need as a business. So initially, she kind of led as a practice director the admin and advice team, uh, sorry, the admin team and the technical team, and I was always in charge of the advice team. Um, and you know, we've tried to find someone to kind of solve the advice team side for me as in sales director or commercial director, but a couple of hires hasn't quite worked out, so that's kind of a piece of the puzzle we're looking to solve at the moment.

Sam Oakes 33:04

Why do you think that's uh been a struggle?

Marc Norris 33:07

Um, why has it been a struggle?

Calming Clients During Volatility

Marc Norris 33:10

It's it you know, it's finding the right person that understands our industry. Now, there's a lot of people out there who have done commercial roles, sales management roles in in other industries, but actually understanding the advice process, understanding the compliance side, the regulation side, understanding the people side. You know, I think an advisor wears many hats, and so you've got to have someone who knows all the hats they're wearing. So, you know, ideally at the moment we're looking for someone who has potentially been an advisor, who has done very well for themselves, who's maybe gone into a more managerial career afterwards. Um easier said than done, but we're getting there. Uh but yeah, that's that's probably the main reason is understanding what we do and how we do it.

Sam Oakes 33:52

And also has their finger on the pulse.

unknown 33:53

Yeah.

Sam Oakes 33:54

Understands what's going on at the c at the moment as well, the changes that happen in technology and everything. You don't really want somebody who's kind of had their career and then go, oh, sit back and be a manager now. It doesn't quite work that way. You want somebody who's driven to be a manager and who's all got their finger on the pulse and wants the business to grow, but is dedicated to being a manager. And then there's the other part, player manager. You don't really maybe want that player manager because you've got one foot in that camp, one foot in the other camp. And I've seen that pull sales managers apart. You know, they're so stressed in one space over here trying to make money from themselves with their own clients, and then also at the same time trying to drive the business forward and manage people, whilst also maybe taking a kickback on the performance of these individuals as well. So you kind of want somebody 100% in the right role that wants to do it, and there's evidence and proven to do it. Worth their waiting gold mate sales managers. Like if you can find a really good one, you're away.

Marc Norris 34:42

And it is a struggle to find. You know, we find a lot of people at the moment who want to wear two hats. Yes. Uh, and that's that's a challenge. We're also finding people who, you know, we are a fast-moving industry in terms of AI technology, I think using AI to support the advice journey, both for advisor and client. And you either get someone who doesn't understand that journey, who maybe doesn't quite buy into that, or has no experience in that. Um, and then it's also we are a very fast-moving practice. You know, we've grown hugely in the last year, the year before, the year before that. So we've got to have somebody who's got that same drive, same ambition, can cope with it, can cope with the stresses. Yeah. Um and again, that's that's easier said than done, right? To find someone.

Sam Oakes 35:27

And also that are going to be, I think, financially rewarded. So both in the short, medium, and long term. Yeah. I think there has to be a mechanism, there has to be something in place that is like you're here for the long term, this is what you're gonna get. But in the medium and short, this is what you're gonna get as well. Because if they come from a sales background or they come from an advice background, whatever it might well be, they are used to probably managing their own levels of income. And they are still going to be driven by an idea of how much they can actually earn. So I think it's really, really important that there is a clear blueprint that is realistic and pays well to keep them really, really interested. And there are those wins, whether it's quarterly, whether it's monthly, whether it's yearly, and obviously are they part of any kind of long-term incentive plan, an L tip or something along those lines, or even equity if you find the right person.

Marc Norris 36:13

Yeah.

Sam Oakes 36:13

And also one thing I would say is like somebody who's very good at managing and has been around a bit knows really good people. And if they are well respected, people will come and work for them. So all of a sudden they become amazing talent attraction tools as well. So that's well worth taking consideration as well. I think is like, has that person got a decent network? Are they likable? Are they willing to put themselves out there as well? Because all of a sudden you've got somebody that can draw new talent into your business also.

Marc Norris 36:40

Yeah, and and that we understand that. And I think we are on a very strong growth journey at the moment. So, you know, ultimately we want someone to step into a board role eventually, you know, and and that will probably come with incentive plans, you know, equity, whatever that looks like, growth equity. Uh, so I think we understand that we're trying to find the right person, you know, that network's quite important for us and actually attracting talent, being an advocate for the business as well. Uh, and we've we've you know, we've solved the kind of operations side and the finance side. This is the last piece of the puzzle on the on the board side that we're trying to solve at the moment.

Sam Oakes 37:15

Yeah, you're not the only one. You know, everyone's out there trying to look for that individual as

Content, Communication, And Timing

Sam Oakes 37:20

well. So you're not you're definitely not the only one. It's just getting out there. I think you need to be out there more as an individual yourself, talking about your business because you come across so well, and I think people would be drawn to want to work for you. The more you elevate yourself out there as the front face of your business, yeah, the more people are going to be drawn to you anyway. Because they'll start to look at you and go, I like the cut of this jib. I would like to go and work for him. So you might find off the back of this podcast people listening to it, you might get a few people come coming in and offer you a job.

Marc Norris 37:46

Might offer you the sales manager job.

Sam Oakes 37:48

Oh, there we go. Job done. There we go, job done. Right. So let's just quickly, I want to talk about um, I do want to talk about niching down on clients because throughout your career you have jumped into different kinds of niches. Now there is one, private equity. Tell us a little bit about that niche and how you've kind of developed that and what's the opportunity perhaps in uh private equity without giving the game away. Everyone be running after your uh running after your niche. But is there a niche there? Is it exciting? Are you are you dipping into it?

Marc Norris 38:15

Yeah, look, I think there's a niche in in, you know, typically with private equity, a lot of the managers in private equity tend to be self-employed, partners, uh LPs on their funds. So, you know, there's always a world where we find an in with them in terms of what benefits do you not get now. You know, you're not employed, and that could be anything from protection, it could be pensions, it could be organizing their finances, their mortgage, their tax planning. Uh, and that that's the same whether they're a law partner, you know, it doesn't matter, it's just the partnership motto. I think a lot of people have this misconception of private equity that they know everything about finances because they're in the investment world. Uh, but actually they do a lot of corporate finance, they pick a lot of businesses and investments that they would invest in as a firm and tend to neglect their personal finances. Uh, and we've helped a lot of PE managers structure funds. So if they are personally investing in a company or typically in their own funds that have a 10-year life cycle, we help structure those investments for them. And we do that on offshore. We can do that with family investment companies, and it's it's more of a tax play for them and kind of flexibility for their family, and you know, depending on where they're going to end up in the future. Can they maybe encash those tax efficiently or tax-free? Uh, so we found the structure side of it is has worked very well. You know, we're not teaching them about investments, we're not telling them what to buy and how to buy it, they're doing that themselves. We're just providing them the structures to be able to do it. And there's very limited people that can do that. Yes, lawyers can do it and some sort of tax accountant, but rarely someone can do it who can also manage their personal finances, their family's personal finances. So that's been a very kind of good niche for us, but also helping with things like their mortgages and their investments and debt. You know, when these people are buying things, they're buying things that are usually very expensive. And, you know, when they're taking debt, it's usually quite a lot of debt. So, again, there's very specialist lenders and specialist finance houses that can do that for these people, you know, way outside the norm, and that's kind of where we found a real uh I suppose niche in in working with these guys and girls.

Sam Oakes 40:27

Yeah, I love it. So you've done really, really well, really quickly. Okay, you've scaled quite fast. What's your goal for the next five years? Are you is it is it grow, grow, grow, grow, grow? What's in your mindset?

Marc Norris 40:37

Yeah, look, we we so every year now what we do is we update our business plan um and then we review it on a quarterly basis. Uh, the plan for the next five years, we'd like to double or triple the size of the company in five years, and that will be through organic growth or introducer relationships, uh, strategic purchases for the business across probably

From Lifestyle To Acquirer

Marc Norris 41:00

you know everywhere from Birmingham down. We're you know, that's the model we're operating at the moment. A lot of my advisors are in the south or in the surrounding counties of London, so that's the kind of goal for the business. And yeah, continue to be a hub where clients can thrive, where they get value, where we can advise well, and we we really want to kind of expand that skill set. We want to create our own private client division in 12 and start dealing with a lot more high net worths, and you know, private equity form will form part of that, definitely. But there'll be other niches that we're looking to move into. You're almost like a mini family office, like we talked about at the start. You know, there's a very, you know, there's a there's a bucket of family offices that sit in the kind of hundred to five billion mark, you know, and then there's a uh an area of kind of micro family offices between probably four million and ten where they don't get the same level of service as maybe a family office would. That's an area we're looking to kind of press into.

Sam Oakes 41:54

Yeah, it's a huge opportunity. I know quite a few people who are developing stuff in that space, uh, and it is a massive opportunity. So you're definitely in the right ballpark without it. Well, you know it. Uh there is a huge opportunity there. Um let's just like review that you've had a fantastic, you've had a fantastic career so far. You know, it sounds great, and it sounds like you're full of energy, uh, enthusiastic. Uh aiming for that one billion mark, I believe.

Marc Norris 42:16

Yep. How quickly? Well, look, I it's we've modelled this, and I think we can do it in about four years. Um, I'd like to think we can probably do it in three. You know, the the the four-year model was there was a few assumptions in there, obviously, but that was not assuming any acquisitions to the to the business. Now we're acquiring at the moment, we're looking for partnerships and purchases that that align with exactly what we want in locations we want, where we can add value to maybe clients that haven't had necessarily the level of value they should have. Uh so I'd love to do it in three years.

Sam Oakes 42:51

Listening to you, I've obviously chatted to you before anyway, prices podcast. One of the things that I I'm not just saying this because I'm on a St. James's Place, you know, partnership podcast episode. You definitely have benefited from being part of the partnership. Like there's certain things that you said along the way on your journey that I don't think if you had the infrastructure or the ecosystem would have accelerated you so quickly. Am I way off the mark, or is it all you?

Marc Norris 43:19

No, absolutely not. Um, I you know, we've we've got an we we have uh uh an infrastructure at SJP that allows us to lean on a lot of areas for support and help. You know, in the early years, that was the trainers, it was the people that supported me through the academy, you know, post academy, it was the technical team at head office, had Chris Ralph, who used to do a few meetings for me and you know, support me in those really big client meetings that maybe I wasn't as confident to do in my early years. And actually, a couple of those clients came on board and they're still fantastic clients today. When I do acquisitions, you know, the finance department have been amazing and helped create models, you know, for what good lux looks like when you're when you're purchasing business and how that model fits in with our business, how you know we're looking to fundamentally increase our e-bit dial, we're looking to grow the business and actually how can we do strategic purchases that align with that? You know, yes, client numbers matter, funds under management matter, but but but what does good look like from a business relative to us? They've been absolutely amazing in that on the due diligence side, they've they've they've helped with accountants, they've helped with legal teams, and I just think the you know, everything down to kind of tax and technical. When you've got a problem, and you know, I'm not afraid to say to a client, listen, Mr. Client, I don't know, but I'll know in the next half an hour if you let me make a call, I'll make a call, get a get a get a response from tax and technical, and I go back to the client. It's fantastic, and the support you get for growing a business in that framework, I think is brilliant.

Sam Oakes 44:50

No, I well you've you've done a really good job of explaining that, and I think on this podcast episode is to hear that you, you know, to come from the state agency background and to now have uh you know half billion under management within a short period of time. You there is talent within you, you can sense it. You know, you've obviously got you've got it about you. You're good at relationships,

Building Team And Culture

Sam Oakes 45:10

you are persistent, you prospect well, you articulate yourself really, really well. I can see why people want to work with you uh and for you, and that's a massive added benefit. And I think if anybody's listening to this, look, it is a lot of the time it is about those interpersonal skills. You know, you've got to work on those interpersonal skills. One of the things I've picked up with you is that you're not afraid to pick the phone up and talk to people. And the only way you're going to get better in life is by speaking to people, whether that's face-to-face, whether that's running an event. How many times did you fail? This is the bit we're not talking about. The fact that you probably failed numerous times until you found some sweet spots. And when you found the sweet spot, you lent into the sweet spot and you went even deeper and deeper and deeper. And this is the thing, you you make your own luck, don't you? You get better at interpersonal skills the more you speak to people, the more experiences that you have. But doing it on your own is hard. And um one of the things I would definitely say at 43 years old, and I've ran my recruit or had a recruitment business for 16 years, I didn't lean, I didn't ask for help enough, I didn't lean into communities of support enough. I stayed in my own head, and it definitely had a negative impact on the ability for me to grow without a shadow of a doubt. But when there's an ecosystem that is created to actually recognize when you need the support and probably reach out to you as well as you reaching out to them, it's like having a bloody good gardener, isn't it?

Marc Norris 46:28

Yeah, and you know, yes, I've made a lot of mistakes along the way, and you know, there's been some some some big ones, you know, when I've when I've when I've done things wrong, you know, maybe I did a pitch that didn't work, and you know, I've learned from all of those things. And you know, I've looked at businesses in the past to acquire and I've missed out on them, but actually in hindsight was probably, you know, my due diligence, but actually has been a a blessing for me.

Sam Oakes 46:52

Yeah.

Marc Norris 46:53

Uh but I've had the ability to always ask for help.

Sam Oakes 46:57

Yep.

Marc Norris 46:57

And I think, you know, whether that's from the partnership and people who have trodden your path, whether that's from successful businesses, you know, clients who have become who are business owners who've got very successful businesses. I always get a view externally from financial, you know, what do you do that's very successful? I've had clients who are CEOs of companies, big listed businesses in in the UK and US. I've asked them, you know, what is the what's the recipe for success? What do you do that's been very successful? Because you're obviously a really successful guy. And normally when I ask clients that there, and and I'd say, how would you build a business if if you were me? And they'll say, Don't worry, I'll just refer you to a few mates. And I'm like, Thank you very much. And you know, if you don't ask, you don't get. So I've always been very forthcoming with people. Yeah. I've always picked up the phone. You know, I had this thing when I was starting out, and I ever once a month, I'd just text a client and just say, How are you? Any anything you need help with. And occasionally, it wasn't often, but I'd get a text back saying, Need to meet you. I've got some money, I need to do something with. Can you help?

Sam Oakes 47:54

Yeah.

Marc Norris 47:55

And I think it's, you know, as we said at the start of this, a relationship business. You're in, you know, you're talking to be you're looking after one of the most important parts of someone's life. You know, it's their their goals, their plans, their financial future. So you've got to treat that with respect. And, you know, you should be touching base with your clients very regularly to reassess that.

Sam Oakes 48:16

We get a lot of young individuals thinking about becoming financial planners, people considering coming into the profession, maybe they're making a career transition. What's the one bit of advice you would say to them to be a success within financial planning?

Marc Norris 48:28

Well, there might not be one, but yeah, I'd say find a good mentor, find someone who has trod this path. I think in the early years, it's going to be very difficult to ascertain whether you're going to treat this as a lifestyle business or a company that you're going to build and grow. But I'd say speak to as many successful people as you possibly can about yourself, what make what makes you a good person in the sense of relationship building, because the rest you can learn. You can learn pensions and tax and investments and structures and protection and mortgages. But actually, if you haven't got the attributes to be a good business owner or uh uh you know grow a company, it might not be the right path because it is very, very difficult.

Sam Oakes 49:12

Yeah.

Marc Norris 49:12

You know, and that's why a lot of people now in this industry are joining advice and joining firms because they can go out, they can advise, they can be that relationship person, but don't have to worry about the stresses of growing that company.

Sam Oakes 49:23

Yeah, makes total sense. As a stat, I think it's 70% of the people that are going through the St. James's Place Academy now go into advisor roles as opposed to running their

Operations, Gaps, And Hiring A Sales Lead

Sam Oakes 49:30

own partner practices.

Marc Norris 49:31

Yeah.

Sam Oakes 49:31

So obviously there's a growing need and demand for that, and people are leaning into that. And obviously, it sounds to me like the ecosystem is being able to support those people to do exactly that, is to go and do the bit of the job maybe that they're best suited to. Because not everybody needs to run their own business. And I think social media, this kind of idea that everyone should be running their own businesses, has been a bit toxic over the last few years. It's put a lot of pressure on people. You're not a success unless you're running your own business.

Marc Norris 49:50

Yeah, yeah.

Sam Oakes 49:51

And it's like, well, not everybody needs to run their own business, and actually running your own business can not can be quite horrible at times.

Marc Norris 49:58

Oh, exactly right. And and you know, when when I joined the academy, I think it was more you know the other way, 80% of people went out and became single partners. Yeah. And actually, from my cohort, there aren't many of the guys left out on their own. You know, there's probably only a couple of us. And you know, I think the world we're in at the moment with compliance regulation, you know, servicing seeing your clients, I think it's made it harder to become a business owner from day one. Now, to do that with a client bank, you've got to have the infrastructure in place. So there's no harm in someone joining a uh a practice for a few years, really understanding the nuts and bolts of how a business is run, how you service, see your clients, the regulatory environment, and then spinning out and starting their business. You know, I've seen some very successful partners who have started their journey in a practice, come out of a practice and build some of the most fantastic businesses I've ever seen. Yeah, fantastic.

Sam Oakes 50:51

Mark, listen, thank you so much for sharing your career journey with us on uh Financial Planner Life today. Um it sounds like it's it's not slowing down, um, and obviously we wish you all the success.

Marc Norris 50:59

Thank you. Thank you for having me.