Success Story

YellowWood Financial Advisors

Advisor X Pays Big Dividends For YellowWood Financial Advisors

In today's fast-changing business environment, standing still is rarely a recipe for success. Successful enterprises are agile. They evolve, adapt, and innovate. As an early adopter of outsourced services, Maryland-based YellowWood Financial Advisors was one of the first to realize the tremendous advantages of outsourcing back-office operations. And, for nearly five years, their outsourcing solution worked: data uploads were completed and positions were reconciled each day. In 2009, YellowWood undertook an initiative to innovate once again by transforming its technology platform into an integrated solution.

"It just made sense to look into a complete solution," recalls Dave Walker, Director of Operations at YellowWood. "We understood the impact that integration would have on our bottom line. It would help to streamline our processes and make more efficient use of our time."

YellowWood had been an Advisor Rebalancing customer for years and was already impressed with the service Tamarac provides. While they spoke to a number of vendors, after reviewing the different solutions, the company selected Tamarac AdvisorServices as its outsourcing provider for portfolio management.

Because of its experience with Advisor Rebalancing, YellowWood felt extremely comfortable adding services from Tamarac. "What led us to Tamarac AdvisorServices was our confidence with Advisor Rebalancing and the history we had with them," Dave explained. "If it wasn't for our experience with Tamarac and Advisor Rebalancing, we would have been uncomfortable with bundling multiple products and services with a single vendor. But their quality of service eliminated those concerns."

AdvisorServices began managing many of YellowWood's back-office tasks. Portfolios were updated daily with data from the appropriate custodians, data was being downloaded, missing prices and cost basis was filled in, and data was uploaded into Advisor Rebalancing. The service was consistent and the data was accurate.

Information when you need it

By partnering with Tamarac AdvisorServices, YellowWood has the flexibility to access its fully hosted database via a Citrix connection.

"On our previous platform, I could make some changes, but I couldn't do everything," says Dave. "Thanks to the speed of the Citrix connection, I feel like I'm running a locally installed version of PortfolioCenter. Now, I can just do the quicker things, like entering basis information for a new account, myself. By the time it would take me to write an email, I can just have it done. It has been a huge time savings."

Users who aren't familiar with PortfolioCenter access client and portfolio reports using Advisor View, Tamarac's web-based dynamic performance reporting application that runs on daily performance intervals. YellowWood's previous solution ran on monthly performance intervals, which meant the information wasn't always up-to-date. With Advisor View, YellowWood creates custom reports for any custom date range, and Advisor View instantly displays the most current performance data.

"Before we switched to AdvisorServices, if a client wanted to see some information for the previous day, I couldn't do it on-the-fly," Dave recalls. "With Tamarac, I can get the information I need from Advisor View, and I have the flexibility to log in to the PortfolioCenter database."

The future looks bright ahead

Over the years, YellowWood has been continually impressed with the quality of service delivered by Tamarac AdvisorServices, and is assured of prompt, reliable support. "Tamarac is readily available and really knows PortfolioCenter inside and out," Dave explained. "With our previous partner, I sometimes felt that I knew the software better than they did."

After realizing the value of Advisor Rebalancing and AdvisorServices, YellowWood has begun implementing additional components from the Advisor X suite. They have rolled out Advisor CRM and are working with Tamarac to integrate it with MoneyGuidePro. YellowWood is also increasing its value-added service by implementing the Advisor View Customer Portal. With the Customer Portal, customers can access their information securely from any location at their convenience. "We are always looking for ways to deliver the best possible service to our clients," Dave says. "Tamarac provides a foundation for that vision."

Partnering with Tamarac has greatly improved the level of service YellowWood provides. YellowWood feels confident about relying on Tamarac because they continuously improve their products and listen to client feedback. "We've had a great partnership with Tamarac," Dave attests. "They listen to our needs and incorporate our product suggestions. Tamarac is by far the best vendor we've worked with. We count on Tamarac as a thought leader who has our back in providing first class client service."