21st May 2020
[Brendan Johnson, General Manager, TenFifty] “We chose to create a new name and brand to represent what is a new advice community focused on growth and focused on the future. To create the new name and brand, we engaged the different advisory boards, and worked with our MLC Marketing team, and the broader MLC Advice team. The new name is TenFifty. TenFifty is derived from the translation of MLC in Roman numerals, reflecting MLC's strong heritage and expertise in advice and licensing. It offers a new way of connecting advice businesses and owners through community and partnerships. We have built the TenFifty network on the foundation of confidence, true community, and strength in partnerships. I'll now hand over to Analisa Kirby, the General Manager of Marketing Strategy and Planning at MLC, to speak to the inception and evolution of this new brand.”
[Analisa Kirby, General Manager, Marketing Strategy and Planning, MLC] “Thank you, Brendan. I'm very excited to be here today to talk to you about the launch of the TenFifty brand. It's been a wonderful project to be involved in and I've been personally invested in it. One of the things that's been fabulous has been the opportunity to talk to you and your colleagues and get your feedback and insights, which have gone into the development of the brand. Today I'm gonna talk you through the narrative, and how we describe TenFifty and what it stands for, and I'm also excited to show you some of the wonderful visual identity that we've developed, which will be what the brand looks like when it goes into market. So as Brendan said, TenFifty is derived from the translation of MLC in Roman numerals. This reflects MLC's strong heritage and expertise, but importantly, creates a standalone brand and identity for TenFifty. TenFifty offers new ways of connecting advice businesses and owners with two core pillars: community and partnerships. Looking at confidence through community, this is all about empowering our community to co-create a sustainable advice future. As a TenFifty member you'll connect with a broad range of advice professionals who are united by the common goal of providing quality financial advice. You'll have opportunities to learn, to share, and collaborate with peers, which will provide you with confidence you need to provide outstanding client experiences and sustained success for your business. The strength in partnership pillar is all around us bringing the strength of our network and alliances to propel your success. As your trusted partner we'll connect you to expertise and resources within TenFifty, the broader MLC Group, and via external partnerships to help you grow and evolve your business. So I'm excited to show you the brand identity we've developed for TenFifty. The expression reflects the entrepreneurial spirit of the business owners, you, who are driven by results for your clients and have a passion to grow a unique business in your own signature style. TenFifty has a fresh and modern identity system, which is designed to stand out in the advice industry. The bold graphic language supports the idea of growth, expansion, and the idea that as part of this network you can create your own future, your way. It's been really exciting to see this brand come to life and I'm excited to show you some examples. I'd like to start with the adviser website. This will allow you to explore the TenFifty value proposition and also see how the visual identity comes to life. Importantly, as a public website, it will also be available for other advisers in the community to understand the TenFifty value proposition. So next, I'd like to show you some collateral that's been developed to support the launch and to provide you with more information on the TenFifty value proposition. You can also see how the visual identity plays out in printed material. Finally, this shows you how the new brand will show up in email communications, and you can expect to see these coming through into your inbox soon. Over the coming days and weeks we will launch the TenFifty brand into the wider advice market, and you will see it come to life across a number of channels, including trade media, digital, and social. So keep an eye out.”
[Brendan] “We've had a lot of interest and questions from many of you. Analisa and I will answer the most common questions now and we'll provide further detail over the coming weeks. TenFifty represents us as an adviser community. It is a business-to-business brand that we will use when communicating with you. You'll continue to promote your own unique advice brand to your clients. GWM Adviser Services will continue to be the licensee name that you will disclose on your legal and advice documents. You will see TenFifty when you log on to My Licensee in the future, and TenFifty will be used to promote our advice network to attract advisers and business owners who would be a fit within our advice community. If you are leveraging one of the licensee brands today, you will need to transition to your own advice brand over the coming months and we will support you through this process.”
[Analisa] “The TenFifty brand has been created with feedback from you and your colleagues. You were very clear that you wanted your own identity and to be able to build a sense of community. We wanted to deliver a new and contemporary licensee brand that visually embodies a fresh approach to advice. The development of TenFifty reflects MLC's commitment to this licensee and our passion for advisers and advice businesses. MLC will be undertaking a brand refresh as we move to become a standalone organization. As you know, advice is a key part of our value proposition and one of the core fundamental pillars of our business. MLC will be in market demonstrating its commitment to the advice profession. But we will also continue to build the reputation for TenFifty across the advice business and within the MLC Licensee Network. We've got an exciting pipeline for TenFifty coming up. We've got the public website, which I've already shown you, which will enable you and your colleagues in the industry to learn more about the brand. We're also investing in trade media as we launch the brand externally, both through the MLC brand, as well as the TenFifty brand. You will also start to see TenFifty in market for awareness with advertising and sponsorships in the coming months.”
[Brendan] “Thank you all for listening and for your feedback and questions. We are very excited to be launching TenFifty and to have you as part of this new advice community. The website is now live, tenfifty.com.au. We'd like to thank the Marketing team for their support on this piece of work, and also the different advisory boards. A special thank you to our adviser talent who featured in a suite of TenFifty videos. I will leave you with some of your peers talking about what TenFifty means to them.”
[Mark Connell, Managing Director, Up Wealth Management] “So one of the great things about the licensee is we've got access to the key people that make decisions. So we've been talking with the Head of Advice and Professionalism in regards to placing our support person through that program and how that may work. There's also the revenue collections and payment system that works really well. We've benefited from the Connect for Growth program where we've been able to look at other businesses within the group, and when we're looking to grow through acquisition, that's worked well for us. Other things, client management system, access to research, et cetera.”
[Adam van de Water, Director & Owner, Brava Financial Services] “We had a few compliance challenges through 2019, in terms of just getting the right processes and systems in place to have great outcomes for our clients. So after our compliance order recently, we had a post-team huddle facilitated by the licensee team. We included our practice development manager, practice implementer, Xplan coach, and compliance coach, that we found invaluable, in terms of re-engineering our processes, and that led to some much better client and advice outcomes and a lot happier team in terms of delivering that advice.”
[Sarah McDonald, Principle & Founder, Lifetime Solutions] “Partnering with TenFifty will help us meet our challenges and goals in the next few years. I've found it great. I've been able to tap into the licensee. They've done the auditing of different providers for me, given me a shortlist and actually negotiated some really reasonable rates. And I'm just starting my bridging courses through one of the licensee recommended, as really the price was so competitive.”
[Adam] “The network over the many years has provided me great opportunities to connect to peers and I feel this is where the goal really is. Talking to peers, their problems, their challenges, their successes, their triumphs, both inspire you but also want you to be better for both you and your clients.”
[Mark] “We've had the opportunity of going into other advice businesses, seeing what they're doing day-to-day, how they run meetings, how they use technology, and we've taken that away and embedded that into our business to provide greater client experiences.”
[Sarah] “The licensee has got a focus on compliance and it's also got a focus on support for businesses and this fits into where we see ourselves going.”
[Adam] “With TenFifty, the licensee, there is real power in community, and strength and comfort in numbers, and that is what we really value in this offer, both now and well into the future.”