The Alternative Investment Opportunity
An RIA firm has built a successful practice serving high-net-worth clients across multiple market segments. As their client relationships matured and portfolios grew, demand for alternative investment opportunities increased, especially in recent years. Clients were specifically requesting access to the types of institutional-quality private placements and alternative strategies they knew were available to larger investors and family offices.
However, the firm faced a complex challenge in meeting this demand. While individual advisors within the firm had varying levels of experience with alternative investments, there was no consistent framework for evaluating opportunities, conducting due diligence, or presenting complex investment structures to clients. Some advisors were comfortable with certain types of alternative investments, while others lacked the expertise to properly evaluate and recommend these strategies.
The inconsistency created several problems. Clients served by different advisors within the same firm were receiving varying levels of access to alternative investment opportunities, creating potential issues. The administrative burden of managing multiple alternative investment relationships individually was becoming unsustainable as demand increased.
The Vision for Centralized Excellence
The firm’s leadership recognized that alternative investments represented both a significant opportunity and a potential risk. Done well, a sophisticated alternative investment platform could differentiate their firm in a competitive market and provide genuine value to clients. Done poorly, it could create compliance issues, damage advisor relationships, and undermine the trust that formed the base of their client relationships.
The partners envisioned creating a centralized marketplace that would combine the firm’s brand identity with institutional-quality alternative investment access. This marketplace would need to maintain the existing advisor-client relationships that were central to their business model while providing ongoing oversight and consistent due diligence standards while having professional presentation capabilities accessible across the entire advisor team.
The challenge was finding a solution that could balance centralized quality control with individual advisor autonomy. Advisors needed to maintain control over their client relationships and investment recommendations, while the firm needed assurance that all alternative investment presentations would meet their standards for due diligence and professional quality.
Evaluating Infrastructure Solutions
The firm’s leadership team spent several months evaluating different options to building their alternative investment capabilities. Hiring internal specialists would require substantial overhead without guaranteeing access to quality deal flow or the operational infrastructure needed to manage multiple offerings efficiently. Existing alternative investment platforms typically required surrendering brand control and client relationships, fundamentally changing the firm’s business model in ways that didn’t align with their strategic vision. Building their own infrastructure would provide complete control but would require technology expertise, regulatory compliance knowledge, operational capabilities, and time. The time and cost required to develop these capabilities internally would delay their ability to serve client demand for alternative investment access.
After extensive evaluation, the firm selected 1776ing to create a custom marketplace solution. 1776ing’s approach offered the combination of centralized infrastructure and brand control that the firm required, while maintaining the advisor-centric relationship model that was fundamental to their business approach.
Creating a Branded Marketplace Experience
The process began by identifying the firm’s brand standards, client communication approaches, and advisor workflow requirements. Rather than adapting to a generic platform, 1776ing worked with the firm to create a completely customized marketplace that appeared to be an integrated extension of the firm’s existing client services.
The white-label marketplace incorporated the firm’s visual branding, messaging tone, and client communication standards throughout every aspect of the user experience. Clients accessing the marketplace would see a seamless extension of the firm’s brand identity, reinforcing the relationship with their advisor and the firm rather than being introduced to a third-party platform.
The due diligence framework was standardized across all offerings, ensuring that every alternative investment opportunity presented through the marketplace met the firm’s quality and transparency standards. Each offering included comprehensive due diligence materials, multi-media presentations explaining complex investment structures, and role-specific data room access that provided appropriate information based on whether users were advisors, clients, or other stakeholders.
A critical feature was the “Assigned Advisor” functionality that preserved existing client relationships while enabling the centralized marketplace approach. Every client interaction within the marketplace was connected to their specific advisor, ensuring proper oversight, communication, and alignment. Advisors maintained complete control over which opportunities they recommended to specific clients, while benefiting from the centralized infrastructure and standardized due diligence.
Implementation and Advisor Training
The rollout process required training the advisory team on both the technical aspects of the marketplace platform. Advisors learned to position the marketplace as a competitive advantage that provided their clients with institutional-quality access while maintaining the personalized advisory relationship.
Training focused on helping advisors understand how to help clients use the platform to evaluate different alternative investment opportunities using the firm’s standardized due diligence framework and how to use the marketplace’s multimedia capabilities to enhance client education and communication.
The implementation also involved establishing operational procedures for vetting new alternative investment opportunities, maintaining the marketplace content, and coordinating with fund managers and issuers to ensure accurate, current information was always available to advisors and clients.
Immediate Results and Market Differentiation
The firm’s proprietary marketplace featured more than 25 vetted alternative investment opportunities spanning real estate, private equity, and other structured products. The standardized due diligence framework ensured consistent quality across all offerings, while the multimedia presentation capabilities allowed advisors to explain complex investment structures more effectively than traditional paper-based materials, especially when considering that materials on the offerings were sourced directly from the issuers of offerings.
Advisor confidence in alternative investments increased significantly due to the comprehensive due diligence support and professional presentation tools. Advisors who had previously been hesitant to discuss alternative investments with clients became active participants in the firm’s expanded capabilities, knowing they had institutional-quality access and support.
Client responses were overwhelmingly positive. The professional marketplace experience reinforced their perception of the firm’s sophistication and capabilities, while the advisor-controlled recommendation system maintained the personalized relationship quality that clients valued.
Competitive Advantage
The combination of institutional-quality opportunities, standardized due diligence, and personalized advisor relationships created a unique competitive position that attracted both new clients and new advisors.
The marketplace became a significant differentiator in new business development. Prospective clients recognized that the firm could provide access to investment opportunities easily, while maintaining the personalized service and attention that boutique firms offered. This position attracted clients from both larger and smaller advisory firms.
Disclosures:
The content published on the 1776ing Blog is for informational and educational purposes only and should not be considered financial, legal, tax, or investment advice. The insights shared are intended to promote discussions within the alternative investment community and do not constitute an offer, solicitation, or recommendation to buy or sell any securities or investment products.
