millennials

Targeting (the Parents of) Millennials

Posted by Mike McLaughlin on May 18, 2016, in Thoughts , tagged with ,

I’ve argued in the past that the asset management industry is overrating the importance of Millennials. While Millennials rank among the most consistent topics of discussion in our work, a senior distribution executive at a client of ours recently framed the issue of engaging them as concisely and, even better, humorously, as anyone I’ve heard.

In talking about the potential value of addressing Millennials, he said:

You know who firms like us need to focus on? Me! I’m 51 and it’s me and my generation who are going to be inheriting wealth. I haven’t inherited anything yet. Forget about my 20-something kids, I’m the target!

We can cite research that the bulk of the wealth transfer to Millennials is more than 15 years away from starting, or that the transfer will be highly concentrated among just a small percentage of that generation.

But sometimes a good anecdotal zinger is all you need to have an interesting conversation.

[ image credit: Optician Training ]

Are We Overrating Millennials?

Posted by Mike McLaughlin on Jun 23, 2015, in Thoughts , tagged with ,

Millennials are a hot topic in the industry. We have done multiple millennial-centric projects this year, and every day seems to bring another conversation focused on the same set of questions:

  • How can we help millennials overcome their conservative, fearful attitudes about investing?
  • How should we leverage their (self-stated) interest in socially-responsible (ESG) investments?
  • And most importantly, how do we make sure we capitalize on the $41 trillion (or is it $59 trillion?) in wealth they will inherit over the decades to come?

This has made for interesting discussion and interesting work. Yet at the same time I can’t shake the feeling that the importance of millennials to asset managers over the next 10 years is being overrated.  … [read more]