Building a successful company isn’t easy. It takes lots of focus, hard work, and determination to realize long-term goals and build a profitable organization.
Often, business owners struggle in their early years. This is the time when the foundation for a well-performing organization is built. Those who find their footing and are able to build profitable revenue streams, retain customers, and build strong vendor relationships will scale over time.
Some of the biggest challenges when building a business include developing a niche, finding an appropriate marketing strategy, and attracting customers. Business owners who are able to create a strong operational strategy will see the rewards of their hard work for years to come.
Ty Young, the founder of one of the country’s top wealth management firms, Ty J. Young Wealth Management, knows the struggles that face a growing business and has spent years honing his skills as an entrepreneur.
From a young age, Ty was determined to build a successful wealth management business. He did everything in his power to attract customers and provide insight into personal finance management through the use of seminars and strategic marketing.
Today, Ty J. Young is a highly successful wealth manager with over 7,000 clients. His firm successfully manages an impressive $1B in assets, and it continues to grow. The strategy and niche that he’s found involve ensuring that individuals have the money they need to retire.
He stays away from high-growth finance tools and instead prefers to play it safe, keeping his clients’ assets protected from severe market downturns. Learn more about Ty J. Young’s success and business strategies in our exclusive interview.
GritDaily: When did you start Ty J. Young Wealth Management and what did the early days look like?
Ty Young: Ty J. Young Wealth Management was founded in 1998. In the early days we ran the business out of our garage in Woodstock. We practiced seminars in that same garage even with little children at home. Eventually, we ran seminars in libraries, then community centers, eventually leading to churches and then restaurants.
Our marketing consisted of flyers on cars in the Walmart parking lot. We did anything and everything to be successful, as long as it was moral and ethical. It was incredibly difficult, and we worked very hard.
We failed over and over and over again, but we learned from those failures and became better incrementally over time.
Twenty-four years later, we manage over $1B in assets on behalf of around 7,000 clients. God has been good to us!
GD: How did you carve out a niche for yourself in what is often a competitive market?
TJY: Every other advisor was talking about growth, growth, growth. We talked about protection.
We talked about safer money. We talk about achieving financial security and what that really means.
Essentially, there are three main elements to a winning, long-term investment strategy: income, growth, and protection. You have to be set up for income-either now or in future. You have to be set up for growth to support income. You have to protect the income against the black swan event that we know—based on history—that will come.
Our niche is: our clients don’t get hurt when the market goes down.
GD: You have also acquired more than 20 other wealth management firms in the last few years. Can you tell us about that?
TJY: The average age of an advisor in our industry and the niche we work with is 68-70 years old. And that is retirement age, and they want to retire. They deserve to retire. As they retire, they’re very concerned about their clients.
The same desire to service and take care of their client remains. They know we have award-winning white-glove service. They seek us out to provide high-level customer service for their clients. When they seek us out, we may acquire their company, and then we will immediately implement our white-glove customer service for those clients.
It’s a win-win-win.
GD: What are some of the lessons you have learned as a successful entrepreneur in growing a large company?
TJY: The greatest entrepreneurs are not afraid to fail. Failures are only failures if you don’t learn from them. I’ve also learned that the harder I work, the luckier I get.
The best entrepreneurs never, ever quit because their calling is greater than themselves. But you can’t do it alone; you need great people around you.
Lastly, when you’re wrong, accept it, admit you’re wrong quickly, make corrections, and move forward.
GD: After advising so many thousands of clients on wealth over the years, what’s a key piece of advice that more investors should follow?
TJY: You can have growth and downside protection at the same time. It’s essential for every investor to add protection to your portfolio.
Build a winning long-term investment portfolio by incorporating all three elements for success:
- Income
- Growth
- Protection
