Protecting Your RIA From a Recession: 4 Smart Business Strategies

As a financial professional, you spend the majority of your time supporting your clients along their unique financial journeys. You’re the guiding force that empowers them to make smart, forward-focused decisions, keep focused during periods of persistent volatility, and stay committed to their long-term plan.

But as a business owner (with only so many hours in the workweek), some of your time and effort should be spent securing your firm’s future stability as well.

When economic uncertainty hits, it’s not just your clients’ well-being to look out for—your firm could also be impacted. A recession is one of the least liked words in our industry, but that doesn’t mean you should avoid thinking about it altogether.

In fact, it’s possible a recession could happen in the coming years (or months), and it’s better to be prepared to face the challenges head-on than to be caught off guard and struggling to stay afloat.

The good news? With the right planning, communication, and strategizing, your firm can better withstand a major economic downturn. In fact, you just might come out the other side stronger. Here are four steps you can take to recession-proof your RIA and reinforce your value to the clients who count on you most.

Step #1: Step Back and Take Stock of Your Firm

Before you can forge ahead to build a protection plan or implement recession-proofing strategies, you first need a clear understanding of where your business stands today. Consider this your proactive call-to-action to perform a business-level stress test. The purpose here is not necessarily to uncover your firm’s weak spots, but to figure out what’s working and where there’s room to improve, especially when you have the luxury of time on your side.

Services

Start with the basics and review your existing suite of services. Do these offerings still align with the needs of your target audience? Review your tech stack as well. Are your current tools helping you engage clients, operate efficiently, and deliver on your promises, or are they creating more work than they solve? If not, are there better, more effective alternatives available? Efficiency in your systems and workflows can help save your firm time and money, both of which will become a hotter commodity once a recession strikes.

People

Take a look at your team. Do you have the right people in the right roles? Are you seeing any operational bottlenecks that could become problematic in a tougher economy? What skills do you want your team to have?

Consider your clients here as well. What does a typical client of your firm look like? While you may have defined what your “ideal client” looks like, that may not necessarily be who makes up your book of business.

Think about how long your average client has been with you. Are your relationships long-term or more transactional in nature? Are you still primarily attracting your target audience? Or have you shifted your focus to a certain niche more organically?

Marketing

Review your existing marketing efforts, and your lead generation strategy in particular. Are new clients primarily finding you through referrals, webinars, online searches, in-person seminars, or something else entirely? The purpose here is to know what’s working well and what may be costing your firm more than it delivers. If a recession hits and your balance sheet is impacted, knowing where to focus your limited resources to drive leads will be critical.

Step #2: Prepare Recession-Focused Communications Ahead of Time

If you feel there’s a period of calm before the storm, use this opportunity to think through a comprehensive communication plan for your team members, network, and clients. Sometimes, an economic downturn moves in swiftly without much warning (think March 2020). Other times, you may see the writing on the wall and give yourself time to prepare. In either case, your clients will be looking for immediate guidance, and your ability to communicate in a timely and consistent manner will set the tone for how they perceive your value.

Just like a coach prepares plays before game day, a strong communication strategy needs to be built in advance. The same notion should apply to your communication strategy during a downturn.

While there’s still time to think ahead, build up some critical client communications. Draft templates for emails, newsletters, blog posts, video scripts, social media updates, and anything else you think will resonate with your clients and target audience.

For example, you might find it helpful to create content now that covers the basics like:

How to stay calm during market turbulence
Understanding the economic cycles
How our firm is preparing behind the scenes
What you can expect from us

In the event a recession does hit, you can make a few quick adjustments to these premade pieces of content and send them off in a timely manner. This way, you’re one of the first people your clients hear from when they’re feeling anxious over the economy.

Step #3: Focus on Your Most Valuable Clients

While every client deserves your care and attention, you may be forced to go into triage mode when things take a turn for the worse. During a recession, for example, your focus may shift from business development to client retention. That means identifying who your most valuable clients are and putting systems in place to support them.

Once you’ve shared some general communications with clients, prioritize making personal contact with those clients who are most valuable to your firm. This may include your most engaged clients, multi-generational families, ultra-high-net-worth individuals, or long-term relationships that regularly refer new prospects. Define what “most valuable” means to your firm, whether it’s AUM, referral potential, or strategic fit, and make sure your team understands who these clients are and why they matter.

Once the list is defined, build a strategy with your team for how you’ll personalize communications with this group in particular during a downturn. This could be a phone call, an invitation to the office, a video meeting, or even a handwritten note—anything that reinforces the strength of the relationship and shows them you’re paying attention.

These clients are the foundation of your practice. When they feel reassured and supported, they’re far more likely to stick with you, refer others, and even increase their level of trust and engagement when the markets are shaky.

Step #4: Keep Communication Clear and Open

As anxious and nervous as you feel during periods of economic turmoil, assume your clients feel it even worse. Even the most experienced advisors feel the pressure when the going gets tough. But for those who can buckle down, push through the uncertainty, and communicate clearly, opportunity lies ahead.

Transparency, empathy, and proactive outreach become more important than ever during an economic downturn. This is not the time to hide behind email or avoid hard conversations. Show up for your clients, speak clearly, answer their biggest questions, and reinforce your value as their trusted guide and partner.

Don’t wait for clients to reach out: Be proactive. Remind them consistently of your value and show them you’re in their corner. Use tools like Nitrogen’s Check-ins, for example, to gauge client sentiment in real time, then follow up with personalized touchpoints that make your clients feel seen and supported.

Forge Ahead With Nitrogen

No one can predict when, exactly, the next recession will happen, and your clients don’t expect you to have all the answers. But what you can do is think ahead to how your firm will respond and react when uncertainty and volatility do arise.

At Nitrogen, we equip financial professionals with the tools they need to engage clients, set expectations, and weather tough markets with confidence. From behavioral-driven risk assessments to client check-ins, proposal tools, and portfolio analytics, Nitrogen is built to help you support clients, and protect your business, through all economic conditions.

When the next downturn comes, be the steady hand your clients can rely on. Schedule a demo to see how Nitrogen can help your firm stay recession-ready and trusted for the long haul.

How the Nitrogen + Advyzon Integration Supercharges Your Tech Stack

Advyzon Integration Spotlight

When your goal is to scale effectively, you must rely on streamlined, intuitive platforms that enable you to balance competing priorities. To help your firm address the need for greater efficiency and scalability, we offer an integration between Nitrogen and Advyzon that’s proven to be a powerful asset for Advyzon users.

As an Advyzon user, you’re already familiar with its extensive capabilities as a portfolio management system and client relationship tool. But when paired with Nitrogen’s state-of-the-art growth and engagement solutions, Advyzon’s already robust suite of systems becomes even more powerful. Through its integration with Nitrogen, advisors can benefit from direct access to advanced risk alignment and proposal-generation tools that work within their existing workflows—meaning you can work faster, communicate more effectively, and operate seamlessly.

Let’s take a look at how this integration unlocks even more capabilities for your firm.

How Nitrogen Supports Advyzon Users

By leveraging the existing Nitrogen and Advyzon integration, your client accounts sync directly into Nitrogen. The result? Advyzon users can harness the powerful risk analytics offerings without redundant data entry (resulting in fewer mistakes or omissions). Having a seamless two-way sync means every client’s Risk Number is accurately reflected in both systems without the ongoing need for manual updating.

This integration also supports single sign-on, meaning you can jump from Advyzon into Nitrogren quickly and effortlessly—no juggling logins or navigating multiple tabs required. Instead, you benefit from a clean, unified experience that saves time and reduces friction in your daily workflow.

See Client Risk Numbers in Advyzon

One of the most helpful and prominent features of this integration is Advyzon users’ ability to see client Risk Numbers directly within Advyzon’s interface. Users can view risk alignment data alongside portfolio allocations and account details right on the platform they already use to manage performance and client reporting.

Beyond providing a level of convenience for Nitrogen and Advyzon users, this integration reduces the need to toggle between systems to search for key metrics (which takes time and disrupts workflows, especially when repeated over and over again). Instead, users can enjoy a comprehensive view of each client’s risk profile and investment plan in one place.

Why Risk Alignment Matters

Each of your clients brings a unique set of values, goals, and preferences for risk to the table. Nitrogen’s flagship offering, Risk Number, helps advisors quantify a client’s risk tolerance on a scale from 1 to 99, bringing clarity to otherwise abstract conversations.

By using a consistent, data-driven risk metric, advisors can align portfolios to client expectations, create personalized proposals, and demonstrate alignment over time. This ability to quantify risk and present it in an easy-to-understand way is critical to establishing and maintaining trust with your clients, especially during periods of market volatility.

As an Advyzon and Nitrogen user, you’ll have access to this essential risk alignment data and functionality within the tools you use every day—ultimately supporting more productive conversations and clearer insights.

Sync Advyzon Accounts with Nitrogen

Through this integration, you have the ability to pull Advyzon’s aggregated accounts into Nitrogen, unlocking powerful analytics of holdings, accounts, and overall portfolio structure.

Advyzon users will then be able to accomplish important ongoing responsibilities within the Nitrogen platform like:

Set a target Risk Number for each client
Leverage risk assessments to evaluate portfolio alignment
Run stress tests and what-if scenarios
Track progress toward long-term goals

Within the Nitrogen platform, Advyzon users can gain deeper insights into how each client’s portfolio performs under varying market conditions. As a result, you have the tools you need to proactively address concerns and fine-tune your client’s investment strategy over time.

Build Custom Proposals

With a client’s Risk Number in hand, Nitrogen users can craft tailored proposals that reflect the client’s (or prospect’s) preferences and long-term goals, as well as present proposals in a visually appealing way, making it an engaging experience for both you and your client.

Once your client is ready to implement the recommended action items, you’ll have the ability to make portfolio changes in Nitrogen and carry them through to Advyzon in a streamlined and efficient manner.

With this integration, Advyzon users can also pull their investment models directly into Nitrogen. That means you can apply prebuilt or custom models to proposals without switching systems or re-entering data. This not only saves time, but also ensures consistency across your recommendations and implementation.

Plus, once proposals are built and portfolios aligned, you can easily generate Nitrogen’s client-ready reports—either within the Nitrogen platform or directly in Advyzon through the integration. Whether you’re preparing for a client review or running a quick stress test, you’ll have the reports you need, right where you need them.

Delivering a More Comprehensive Client Service Experience

Beyond ensuring your client’s portfolio aligns with their unique tolerance for risk, one of your top priorities is always to instill financial confidence and trust in your clients. While that starts with an understanding of their Risk Number, it also requires ongoing communication and a comprehensive plan that addresses each of your client’s goals and needs.

By bringing together the best of Nitrogen and Advyzon, you’ll gain access to critical data and capabilities within the tools you’re already using. You can also run Nitrogen reports directly within Advyzon, allowing you to streamline prep for client meetings and present data-backed insights with ease. Through this integration, you’ll be able to view your client’s Risk Number and integrate data seamlessly. When small efficiencies are multiplied across your book of business and entire team of advisors, their impact compounds to improve firm operations over time.

Advance Your Capabilities with Advyzon + Nitrogen

Beyond improving your tech stack, this integration delivers a strategic advantage to your growth focus. By combining Nitrogen’s risk alignment tools with Advyzon’s client management and reporting capabilities, you’re able to amplify the impact each of these unique offerings have in improving workflows and supporting an engaging client experience.

Are you already a Nitrogen user? Learn how to integrate with your Advyzon account here. Interested in learning about the Nitrogen platform? Request a demo with our team today.

How Top Advisors Deliver What Clients Really Want

As markets continue to shift and client expectations evolve, even the most seasoned financial professionals are asking themselves: Am I still delivering what my clients value most?

Whether you’re focused on aggressive growth goals or maintaining a high-performing book of business, staying aligned with client priorities isn’t just important, it’s essential. If clients begin to question your value, the relationship is at risk.

That’s why understanding and aligning your actions with your client’s priorities isn’t just good service, it’s the foundation for a strong, lasting relationship and a thriving practice.

Below, we’re sharing three powerful strategies you can use to stay aligned with what your clients value most.

1. Turn Discovery into an Ongoing Conversation

For many advisors, the discovery process happens in the early stages of a new client relationship. Before a prospect even signs on the dotted line, you’re likely spending your first few meetings together discussing their goals, values, and initial risk assessment. But life changes, and often faster than anyone expects.

It’s not unusual for your clients to experience a career change, divorce or marriage, a child starting college, or other major life events while working with you. Even macroeconomic factors, like a shift in global markets or geopolitical unrest, can dramatically alter someone’s financial priorities.

The initial discovery conversations you had at the beginning of your advisor-client relationship helped get things off the ground. But eventually, they become less effective guides as your client’s life circumstances change. As their advisor, you’ll need to engage in a rediscovery process throughout the relationship.

Ongoing discovery means regularly revisiting your clients’ goals, values, and most pressing concerns. While annual reviews are an effective way to connect with clients, you don’t have to limit your discovery process to once a year. Engage as often as needed to keep the plan relevant and ensure decisions remain aligned with their needs and goals.

Prioritize client communication strategies and tools like structured reviews and life-event check-ins.

Nitrogen’s client engagement platform makes this easy. With built-in goal tracking and dynamic updates to client risk tolerance, you can monitor progress in real time and proactively address changes as they happen. Instead of relying on assumptions from years-old discovery meetings, Nitrogen users can adjust client portfolios and planning strategies with greater precision based on what’s happening right now.

2. Beyond Financial Performance, Address Your Clients’ Emotional Needs

Yes, your clients care about the numbers; that’s why they’re working hard to build lasting wealth, after all. But beyond portfolio performance, they want to know how their wealth will be used to support the life they’ve dreamed of living. Despite what has historically been the norm, financial advice is no longer transactional, it’s now viewed as a deeply personal journey.

With such broad, easy access to brokerage tools, roboadvisors, and other advisors, your clients are looking to you for more than adequate portfolio performance. Today’s clients expect their advisor to help them feel secure and confident in their ability to achieve their financial goals. Beyond talking dollars and cents, you need to prioritize your clients’ emotional needs just as highly as their financial ones. They want to feel heard, understood, and supported, especially during turbulent markets or major life transitions.

When you take the extra time and energy to understand your client’s emotional relationship with money, the results are mutually beneficial. You gain a better sense of what drives their decision-making, motivates them to do better, and what keeps them up at night. In return, they feel more connected and understood. As a result, you can deliver a more personalized plan and effective recommendations.

Nitrogen’s behavioral finance tools, including its signature Risk Number®, help bridge the gap between numbers and emotions. By accurately identifying a client’s comfort with risk and aligning it with their portfolio, you can offer personalized guidance that reinforces that all-important sense of trust.

3. Feedback Isn’t Optional, Let It Be Your Growth Engine

Advisors pride themselves on being reliable financial experts. But staying relevant in a competitive industry means evolving alongside client expectations…and that requires some form of feedback. Most people don’t like opening themselves up to potential critiques or criticisms, which is why asking for feedback may not be at the top of your to-do list. Plus, affluent families and high-earning professionals are busy, so asking for feedback could feel like a bother.

It’s also easy to assume that no news is good news. But in reality, silence could be a sign your clients are disengaged from the process (or worse, unhappy with the relationship).

Instead of guessing what your clients are thinking or how they’re feeling about your working relationship, create opportunities to hear from them. You can accomplish this in a few different ways, depending on how in-depth you’d like your feedback to be. A quick and simple satisfaction survey may be enough to help you gauge general client sentiment, but you may find it more valuable to schedule a check-in focused solely on the advisor-client relationship. Tools like Nitrogen’s Check-ins make it easy to initiate meaningful conversations and uncover how clients truly feel, without adding friction to your workflow.

When clients have the power to shape their experience, they become more engaged in the process and relationship. At the same time, you can get some clarity on what matters most to them.

Advisors using Nitrogen benefit from clear, measurable insights that reflect both the financial and emotional health of their client relationships. From real-time risk alignment to performance reporting that resonates with individual goals, Nitrogen empowers you to adapt and improve continuously.

Create Greater Client Engagement With Nitrogen

Building and maintaining successful, long-term client relationships takes work, as well as a willingness to listen, acceptance of feedback, and evolving your offerings to exceed client expectations.

Nitrogen enables you to deliver a seamless, customized experience for clients, from the moment they first engage with your firm. When clients feel understood, not just managed, they’re more likely to stick around, become your champions, and grow with you.

Interested in learning more about Nitrogen’s client engagement offerings? Schedule your demo with our team of experts today.

Wealth Management News: April 2025

The spring season is still a little cold and wet across most of the United States, but the news in advisor WealthTech is definitely starting to heat up. Here’s your roundup of the must-know news from April 2025.

LPL Unveils Interesting Recruitment Plan for Commonwealth Advisors

https://www.thinkadvisor.com/2025/04/24/what-to-make-of-lpls-loan-forgiveness-pledge-for-commonwealth-advisors/

What Happened:

Following its acquisition announcement of Commonwealth Financial Network, LPL listened to Commonwealth advisors and heard how much the firm’s culture and brand means to them. As a response, it stated that if LPL stops using the Commonwealth name, then Commonwealth advisors will have their retention loans forgiven.

Why It Matters:

The greatest concern that Commonwealth advisors have is whether LPL will make an effort to preserve the unique culture that they’ve previously enjoyed. By offering loan forgiveness tied to the retention of the Commonwealth brand, LPL seems to be extending an olive branch that’s not only designed to ease concerns, but show they understand the emotional attachment that these advisors have had to Commonwealth.

Docupace Acquires Hubly

https://www.thinkadvisor.com/2025/03/21/Docupace-Snaps-Up-Workflow-Management-Platform/

What Happened:

Docupace, a leading digital workflow management system for financial services, announced the acquisition of competitor Hubly, another RIA-centric workflow platform.

Why It Matters:

Docupace is solidifying its place in the market with another aggressive move to take a competitor off the board. Nearly four years ago, it did the same by acquiring digital onboarding firm PreciseFP. Hubly’s acquisition is not just a way to take a chess piece off, though. It should also enhance Docupace’s capabilities, especially with its modern, client-experience-focused platform.?

Altruist Pulls in $152 Million Funding Round

https://www.thinkadvisor.com/2025/04/23/altruist-secures-152m-in-new-funding-for-growth/

What Happened:

Altruist, a digital-first custodial platform for RIAs, announced it has raised $152 million in a Series F funding, which sets its current valuation at a staggering $1.9 billion. Other notable investors include Salesforce Ventures, Geodesic Capital, Baillie Gifford, Carson Family Office, and Iconiq Growth.?

Why It Matters:

Another significant funding round underscores investor confidence in Altruist’s mission to provide tech-driven services tailored to support RIAs and not compete with them. The capital infusion is expected to accelerate platform enhancements and expand support for the more than 4,700 advisors currently on the platform. If you didn’t think it was already, Altruist is now positioned as a formidable competitor to the establishment.

Vanilla Partners with Mariner for Estate Planning

??https://www.investmentnews.com/rias/vanilla-lands-wealth-tech-partnership-with-560b-mariner/260192

What Happened:

Estate planning tech provider Vanilla announced a partnership with RIA giant Mariner Wealth Advisors, providing over 700 advisors with access to Vanilla’s digital estate planning solutions.

Why It Matters:

The estate planning tech wars are heating up. For Vanilla, collaborating with a $560 billion RIA like Mariner signifies a substantial expansion in its influence within the wealth management sector and a vote of confidence from a significant player.? This partnership also equips Mariner’s advisors with enhanced services, a critical move in the competition for new clients.

Schwab Invests in Wealth.com

https://www.investmentnews.com/fintech/schwab-takes-strategic-minority-stake-in-wealthcom/260182

What Happened:

More estate planning news? That’s right. This time, Charles Schwab has made a strategic minority investment in Wealth.com, an estate planning platform built for RIAs and their clients. What’s more, in addition to this news, Wealth.com also announced an integration with eMoney, a financial planning titan who’s notoriously stingy in who they choose to integrate with.

Why It Matters:

Schwab’s investment in Wealth.com reflects the trend within the advice industry that planning needs are becoming more complex, and advisors are looking for ways to expand services and maximize the value they add to clients. Likewise, Wealth.com’s integration news with eMoney suggests they’ve established a strong foothold as one of the most premier estate planning technologies available to RIAs today..?

InvestCloud Hires New COO for Managed Accounts

https://www.wealthmanagement.com/smas/investcloud-taps-new-coo-of-apl-to-help-with-its-private-markets-push

What Happened:

WealthTech giant InvestCloud announced the appointment of Josh Mayer as Chief Operating Officer of APL, its managed accounts platform. Mayer, formerly the COO at Envestnet, brings extensive industry experience to the role.

Why It Matters:

Mayer’s leadership is expected to add growth and innovation to the APL platform. Additionally, this appointment signals InvestCloud is committed to expanding its managed accounts platform and looking towards integrating more private investments into SMA management. As tech options for advisors grow, the focus for InvestCloud is to bring more of their work under one roof.

Former TD Ameritrade Exec Launches Digital Financial Planning App

https://www.wealthmanagement.com/financial-technology/pete-dorsey-launches-client-led-digital-financial-planning-app

What Happened:

Pete Dorsey, a financial services executive with previous experience at LPL Financial, Altruist, and TD Ameritrade, has launched Wing, a digital financial planning application currently available to advisors but planning a direct-to-consumer launch.

Why It Matters:

Technology attempting to assist and connect advisors with next-gen clients isn’t scarce. There have been a number of startups over the last several years attempting to solve the digital problem. Will Wing be different? The firm says it already has several thousand users, and with Dorsey’s experience at the helm, it may be that they have the chops to set themselves apart.

2025 Annual Growth Study: Key Insights from Nitrogen’s Survey of Financial Firms

Advisory firms want to know how to scale and what it takes to grow aggressively in an increasingly competitive space. If you’re wondering how your firm stacks up against some of the fastest-growing advisory firms in the industry, you’re certainly not alone. To help advisors gain a better understanding of what’s happening within the financial services industry, we recently surveyed 1,400 participants—including both individual investors and financial professionals.

In our 2025 Advisor Growth Survey, we set out to accomplish two goals: Uncover what separates the top performers from the pack, and give every advisor the blueprint for accelerating growth. Gleaning insights from over 250 wealth management firms established across the country, we gathered some incredible and eye-opening data points on advisors’ top areas of concern including client acquisition, retention, marketing, firm-wide efficiency, and more.

This year’s survey set out to help us answer some critical questions including:

What dictates an advisory firms’ growth goals?
Which methods are proving most effective in achieving year-over-year AUM growth?
What do investors find most valuable about working with a financial advisor?

We collected answers to these questions and more from a diverse set of firms—ranging from solo advisors to teams managing billions in assets—to uncover common patterns and key differentiators. The result is a rare glimpse into the behaviors and strategies that fuel real growth in the financial services space.

Let’s take a quick peek at the results.

About the Participants

On the advisor side of the survey, around 60% of respondents identified as operating within an RIA or hybrid firm model. Average firm size hovered just under $400 million in AUM, though responses spanned everything from solo practices managing smaller books of business to large, multi-office enterprises overseeing billions.

We also captured data on team composition, technology adoption, and marketing strategies to identify how different operational models influence growth. By incorporating such a wide array of perspectives, the survey provides a more complete and realistic look at what’s working (or what isn’t, as the case may be).

With this being the first year our Advisor Growth Survey collected responses from individual investors, we were pleased to see that nearly half of respondents had worked with an advisor for at least eight years, while 23% worked with an advisor for 15 years or more.

Capturing the unbiased thoughts and opinions of long-time advisor clients felt especially insightful, as these individuals have ample experience with financial service professionals and firms.

Our Biggest Takeaway

This year, we were happy to see that the majority of advisors experienced 11% or more in organic growth (57%) over the past year (this does not include market movements). Notably, this was quite an improvement over last year’s reported results, where many respondents indicated a slow growth rate of 5% or less.

As you’re likely aware, success in attracting and retaining clients depends on your ability to deliver the services and experience investors expect. Yet, as our investor survey results indicate, there may be some disconnect between advisor assumptions and client expectations. Around 72% of investors indicated that the most valued service provided by their advisor was investment selection and portfolio management, while nearly 92% rated the importance of risk tolerance understanding as 8 or higher (on a 10-point scale).

But here’s the problem: 72% of advisors indicated that specializing in services aside from traditional investment management is the key to differentiation and growth.

This difference in perceived value is significant, especially in a time where advisors assume specialization is the key to differentiation. Naturally, this has led advisors to assume their services must expand in order to justify their fees and attract new clients. But according to the survey results, this may not be the case.

It seems as though, despite the omnipresence in media of robo-advisors and online brokerage firms, investors (particularly high-net-worth individuals) value the advisor-client relationship—especially when their advisors are able to integrate user-friendly tech tools to better demonstrate their guidance and strategies.

Using Nitrogen to Attract and Retain Clients in 2025 and Beyond

When asked whether clients would consider actually leaving their current advisor for someone who provides more personalized communication and technology-driven insights, 68% said they would consider it—especially if the benefits were made clear.

As we shared above, risk tolerance and its alignment to investment management are top investor priorities. The most direct path to organic growth is demonstrating excellence and differentiating on the advisors’ ability to do what clients most value—investment portfolio management and retirement planning.

Today, Nitrogen is a leading growth and client engagement platform designed to transform investors into leads, leads into clients, and clients into referral champions. Through groundbreaking features like the Risk Number tool, Nitrogen delivers powerful touch point opportunities for advisors to connect with investors on what matters most to them—their investment performance and financial well-being.

Ready to explore the platform so many firms use to grow and scale effectively? We invite you to schedule a demo with our team today.

Nitrogen Stands Out in 2025 T3 Software Survey: More Than Just Risk Software

Every year, the T3/Inside Information Software Survey offers a rare glimpse into what programs, software, and tech tools advisors actually use, and how much they value them, within their tech stack.

We like to think of the T3 Survey as a benchmark that enables advisory firms, technology providers, and the larger financial services industry to understand which platforms are delivering real results.

For us here at Nitrogen, the 2025 survey brought encouraging news. Not only did we maintain our leading status in several key categories, but we also expanded into new ones. This expansion is an indication that advisors are using Nitrogen beyond its risk-assessment capabilities. Now more than ever, Nitrogen clients are leaning into our full suite of tools to grow their businesses and better serve their clients.

Before we dive into the details of Nitrogen’s performance, it’s worth taking a step back to recognize what makes the T3 Survey such an essential resource for advisors and tech providers alike.

About the T3/Inside Information Software Survey

Now in its 22nd year, the T3/Inside Information Software Survey was created by Joel Bruckenstein, CFP® and Bob Veres—two of the industry’s most esteemed professionals and recognized authorities in technology for financial professionals.

Today, the T3 Survey is one of, if not the most, comprehensive studies of financial advisor software usage and satisfaction available. With input from thousands of advisors across varying firm sizes and business models, it captures both quantitative adoption trends and qualitative insights about the tech stacks shaping modern advisory practices.

From CRM and financial planning to marketing, investment analytics, and portfolio management, the survey encompasses 45 categories with results spanning an impressive 85-page report. For technology partners like Nitrogen, these results offer invaluable feedback and an unbiased look into how advisors are feeling right now about their technology options. For advisors, it provides a peer-driven guide to what tools are truly delivering value.

With that introduction, let’s take a look at what advisors had to say about Nitrogen in the 2025 survey.

Risk Tolerance Instruments

Once again, Nitrogen topped the Risk Tolerance Instruments category with the largest market share at 16.73%, and an improved user rating over last year. As the survey noted, Nitrogen remains a standout growth-focused platform for advisors, thanks in part to its ability to support both portfolio construction and client conversations.

Risk has always been our foundational offering, but we’re thrilled to see advisors increasingly use the Nitrogen platform to support their client acquisition and retention strategies. Today, they’re leveraging Nitrogen’s wide array of user-friendly offerings to attract qualified prospects, lead important client conversations, set realistic expectations, and guide investment decisions through various market conditions.

Investment Data/Analytics

Another bright spot was the Investment Data/Analytics category, where Nitrogen grew its market share to 11.65%, and improved its average user rating to 7.93 (up from 7.39 in 2024).

While most platforms in this space focus primarily on traditional investment screening services, Nitrogen delivers something different. Advisors who use Nitrogen are better able to bring context to each client conversation by offering volatility and risk insights that are easy for clients to understand.

Economic Testing

In the Economic Testing category, Nitrogen earned the highest market share at 12.59%, up quite a bit from 9.60% in 2024. The report remarked that Nitrogen has “strengthened its hold on the lead for tools that evaluate portfolio risk and the potential consequences in different future environments.”

We understand why advisors find this to be such a valuable feature within the Nitrogen platform. When market uncertainty hits—whether from inflation, interest rate shifts, or geopolitical events—your clients turn to you for reassurance, guidance, and answers. Nitrogen’s stress testing capabilities empower advisors to illustrate how a client’s portfolio may respond in different economic scenarios, helping clients feel more grounded during difficult times.

Digital Marketing Tools – Lead Capture

We were also proud to see Nitrogen’s Lead Capture tools rank highly in the Digital Marketing category, where we came in with the third highest market share. Our average user rating in this area reflects a clear trend: advisors are actively using Nitrogen to attract and close more qualified prospects.

Nitrogen offerings serve as effective drivers of growth for advisory firms that want to stand out in a competitive market. As marketing and prospecting become bigger priorities for firms, we’re committed to building the technology that helps advisors do it better.

Thank You For Your Continued Support of Nitrogen

Each year, we’re honored to be included amongst such an esteemed group of platforms, services, and providers. We’re especially grateful to our users, not just for choosing Nitrogen, but for taking the time to share their experiences through the T3 Survey.

The upward momentum in our market share and satisfaction ratings tells us something important: Nitrogen is helping advisors do more. What started as a tool for measuring risk has become a platform for growth, empowering firms to deepen relationships, scale effectively, and enable more meaningful conversations with clients.

We are continually inspired by the successes of the advisors and financial professionals leveraging the Nitrogen platform, and you are the inspiration behind what we do. As your needs continue to evolve, so does our ingenuity, offerings, and goals as a company. Your feedback doesn’t just provide validation that we’re on the right track, it helps us build a roadmap for the future. These insights help our team prioritize new features, improve your user experience, and continue raising the bar for tech companies across the financial services space.

Want to See Nitrogen in Action?

As your needs evolve, so will we. From our foundational risk assessment tools to stress testing, lead generation, and more, we’ll keep building the tools you need to grow your business and deliver exceptional value to your clients.

If you haven’t yet seen what Nitrogen can do, or you’re ready to explore new parts of the platform, now’s a great time to take a closer look. Discover what other advisors are using to draw qualified leads to their website and increase close rates across the board.

Schedule your demo to see how top-performing firms are using Nitrogen to power growth in 2025 and beyond.

How to Talk to Clients During a Recession: A Step-by-step guide for advisors using Nitrogen

Recessions are nothing new—they’re a natural part of the economic cycle. But every time the markets experience a deep downturn, it brings on a fresh wave of worry for investors. As an advisor, your focus now is to not just navigate recent volatility but calm your clients’ concerns as well.

Recent headlines spotlight economic uncertainty like tariffs and inflation. These sources of financial unease can increase recession chatter and make it difficult for clients to stay focused on the future. But as you know, recessions are a normal movement in the investment landscape. The challenge now is to help your clients feel grounded and secure during the ups and downs of impending economic uncertainty.

Calming Clients’ Recession Worries with Nitrogen

Nitrogen was built to equip financial professionals with the tools they need to respond in real time to evolving economic conditions while reinforcing clients’ long-term planning goals.

Consider this: When uncertainty takes hold, your clients’ default reaction is most likely fear or anxiety. They may be concerned about their declining portfolio values, job security, political turmoil, retirement timeline, or something else entirely. Whatever’s remaining top of mind for your clients, recession-related anxiety could lead them to make reactive decisions that ultimately jeopardize their long-term plans—thankfully they have you there to step in.

The key to supporting your clients through their recession worries is to communicate proactively and leverage personalized data that can add context and reassurance to the uncertainties they may be feeling.

Your Step-by-Step Nitrogen Playbook

Here’s a step-by-step guide to using your Nitrogen toolkit to calm client fears during periods of economic uncertainty and market downturn.

Step 1: Send a Check-In

To start, you need to gauge how your clients are feeling, not just what they’re thinking. Don’t assume every client shares the same level of concern. Or, for that matter, don’t assume every client is concerned about the same issues. Checking in with each client can help you pinpoint which of your clients could use some extra care.

Nitrogen’s Check-In feature enables you to quickly send an engaging pulse check that goes beyond basic performance metrics. By asking clients how they’re feeling, the Check-In feature helps open the door to more meaningful conversations that target each client’s specific concerns.

Step 2: Pull Up the Risk Number

One of the scariest things about recession worries is the unknown. When left to face recession fears on their own, your clients don’t have the data-driven assurance that can help them feel secure in their own financial life and prepared for what may come. That means when markets fluctuate, your clients might start to feel like their entire financial future is at risk.

But with Nitrogen, you can ease their fears using current data showing that their plan hasn’t changed, even if the market has.

Nitrogen’s Risk Number enables financial professionals to remind clients that their portfolio is aligned with their personal risk tolerance. Having data-driven reassurance goes a long way toward reducing emotional decision-making—it’s certainly more effective than receiving a generic “don’t worry, keep calm, and carry on” email that’s meant for the masses.

Step 3: Use the Retirement Map

The average length of a recession is about 17 months, according to the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER). But your clients’ financial journey is much, much longer than that—most likely spanning decades.

Nitrogen’s Retirement Map helps put short-term turbulence into long-term perspective. By showing that a client’s current trajectory remains aligned with retirement goals, even in a down market, you can help your client stay the course with greater confidence.

In other words, this Nitrogen feature helps your clients better understand why it doesn’t make sense to upend their existing trajectory to accommodate a short-term upset.

Step 4: Run a Stress Test

At the end of the day, your clients want to know how today’s headlines affect them personally. They need to understand, “Am I going to be okay?” and they’re looking to you for that guidance.

Whether it’s tariffs, inflation, or a market correction, Nitrogen’s Stress Test tool lets you model specific economic scenarios and apply them to a client’s unique portfolio. Seeing how their investments would have performed during a similar past event can help you transform abstract fears into manageable insights while providing a realistic view of potential outcomes.

Again, the purpose of running a stress test for today’s economic climate is to take away the unknown, demystify what your clients hear and see on the news, and consider today’s factors against their unique financial situation. In doing so, you’re helping your clients address their biggest money fears head-on using the most up-to-date information available.

Engage in Dynamic Client Discussions with Nitrogen

Remember, your clients’ fear isn’t a sign that you’re failing as an advisor. Rather, it’s an opportunity to reinforce the trust you’ve already worked hard to build. When you’re proactive in acknowledging your clients’ concerns and providing actionable, personalized guidance, they walk away feeling heard, supported, and more confident in their long-term plan.

Nitrogen was built to help support advisors through these tough conversations. With tools that enable you to visualize data in a way that makes sense to clients, validate their existing risk alignment, and model real-world outcomes—you can have smarter, more productive discussions with less stress.

Recessions are inevitable, but the panic that often accompanies them doesn’t have to be. With Nitrogen, you can stay one step ahead of client concerns and deliver the clarity they desire during turbulent times.

Not using Nitrogen yet? Schedule a demo to see how it can help you lead confident client conversations—through this market cycle and beyond.

How to Enhance Client Conversations with a Portfolio Analyzer Tool

How do you replace confusion with clarity for your clients? By approaching their portfolio with an analytical lens.

When you’re able to effectively break down the numbers and calculations that go into making important decisions about risk and growth potential, your clients gain a better sense of your perspective and expertise. Ultimately, clear portfolio analysis and clean data are trust-builders that help demonstrate your expertise to clients (and prospects).

Did you know Nitrogen was built to help advisors like you analyze a client’s portfolio through the lens of risk? Advanced portfolio analysis is a clear game-change for advisors, plain and simple. Now, with powerful, tailored analytics and detailed stats, Nitrogen users can elevate client conversations while continuing to address each client’s unique goals and needs.

In this blog, we’re showcasing Nitrogen’s powerful portfolio analyzer tools and their ability to empower advisors in delivering better client outcomes.

Why Is Nitrogen the Best Tool for Portfolio Analysis?

Nitrogen’s portfolio analyzer tools are like a sandbox—you can get your hands dirty, play around with different scenarios and models, and see what’s possible before implementing changes to your clients’ portfolios.

Analysis tools give advisors access to some of the industry’s gold standards in analytics—Sharpe ratios, Beta, Drawdown, and much more—so you can have the information and formulas needed to make informed, data-driven decisions.

As with other features within the Nitrogen platform, it should come as no surprise that our portfolio analyzer capabilities are not only functional—they integrate seamlessly into your operational workflows and client data management software as well.

With an easy-to-use interface, you can choose between leveraging portfolio analytics in your back-office research or presenting it face-to-face with clients to showcase scenarios and run live portfolio stress tests.

As an accessible and powerful tool, Portfolio Analyzer is able to evaluate portfolios efficiently through an all-new interface for Nitrogen users.

Key Features of Nitrogen’s Portfolio Analyzer Tools

Let’s dig into some of the specifics of Nitrogen’s advanced analytics, as these are the features, benefits, and differentiators that help advisors stand out from the crowd and deliver greater levels of service and guidance to clients.

Detailed Portfolio Statistics

Are you a math geek at heart? Our portfolio stats enable you to take a deep dive analysis into just about everything you can think of from modeled performance comparisons to sector breakdowns, regional exposure, and much more.

You’ll have access to critical metrics that are important to both you and your clients, including risk-adjusted returns, diversification levels, and historical performance.

Anytime your client has a question or concern about their portfolio performance or asset allocation, easily access the portfolio statistics that can put them at ease, provide important answers, and support data-driven conversations.

Scenario Analysis

Nitrogen gives advisors the ability to project portfolio performance in various market conditions. In other words, you can use historical market data combined with the unique factors of your client’s portfolio and financial landscape to make more educated decisions about the future.

Our Stress Tests incorporate some of history’s most remarkable market periods (2008 financial crisis, 2022 inflation, 2013 bull market, and more) to paint a picture of how your client’s portfolio might perform in almost any given market condition.

Will it withstand a historical-sized shakeup?
Does it capture an adequate amount of returns during periods of prolonged prosperity?
Can it withstand persistent volatility?

Stress Tests help you and your clients determine the answers, giving you the data and logic needed to make important decisions about risk, growth opportunities, stability, income, and more.

Side-by-Side Portfolio Comparison

Through the Stats Multiview, we enable advisors to compare a client’s portfolio against their proposed strategies, benchmarks, and other key indicators.

The goal? Bring clarity and understanding to conversations that, up until now, may have felt too hypothetical or created more confusion.

When your clients and prospects are able to see your strategies and proposed recommendations visually represented beside their existing portfolio, it creates a powerful image and sends a clear message—you’re an expert at what you do.

Risk Alignment with the Risk Number®

Every investment has risk, and every client has a unique Risk Number®. If you’re a long-time Nitrogen user, you likely already have some understanding of the power of the Risk Number®.

Within our portfolio analyzer tool, we enable advisors to quantitatively measure the true risk of a client’s portfolio and accounts, and use that information to drive all conversations and decision-making regarding their investments.

With your client’s Risk Number® in hand, you can more effectively evaluate whether their portfolio matches their exact tolerance for risk and long-term goals.

How to Enhance Client Conversations with a Portfolio Analyzer Tool

Simply put, Nitrogen’s portfolio analyzer tools are essential for building trust and credibility with your clients.

When used effectively, expert portfolio analysis demonstrates a deep understanding of your client’s investing history and financial goals—all while simplifying complex, dense data into clear reports and actionable insights that improve overall client engagement.

Perhaps most important of all, these tools help your clients feel more confident in the decisions they make about their portfolio—as well as more trusting in your guidance and expertise.

Knowledge truly is powerful, and the data gleaned from Nitrogen’s advanced portfolio analytics can help your clients stay the course during all types of market conditions (including periods of intense volatility or uncertainty).

See the Complete Nitrogen Platform in Action

The Nitrogen platform delivers a competitive edge for growth-focused advisors who want to operate more efficiently and elevate their client experience.

See our complete client engagement platform in action to understand all of Nitrogen’s capabilities. Schedule a demo with our team today.

Our NPS Score Is In—And It’s Worth Sharing

The best way for a software platform to improve is by listening to the people who matter most—its customers. Here at Nitrogen, that belief is the foundation for why we recently conducted a Net Promoter Score (NPS) survey to understand how financial professionals feel about our platform.

The results? A stellar NPS of 69, up from 62 in November—an achievement too good not to share.

To put that into perspective, an NPS above 20 is considered good, while anything above 70 is excellent. We’re knocking on that ‘excellent’ door, and that’s thanks to the financial professionals who trust Nitrogen to power their growth.

Why NPS Matters

For those unfamiliar, NPS is a simple but powerful way to measure customer loyalty. It asks one key question:

How likely are you to recommend our product or service to a colleague?

Responses range from 0 to 10, categorizing respondents as:

Promoters (9-10): Enthusiastic advocates who love the product.
Passives (7-8): Satisfied but not as vocal.
Detractors (0-6): Unhappy users who may cancel or discourage others from signing up.

An NPS score is calculated by subtracting the percentage of detractors from promoters. It’s a clear signal of how customers feel about a company—and for us, the upward trend is a sign that we’re on the right path.

And we don’t run an NPS survey to check a box. As Justin Boatman, Nitrogen’s Chief Product Officer, explains:

“The NPS survey is not just something we do to say that we do it; it truly guides our development decisions. Our senior leadership team pours through the feedback we receive, and we engage our entire organization with the responses—both good and bad.”

What Our Customers Are Saying

The latest survey brought in some incredible feedback, reinforcing the real impact Nitrogen has on advisors’ businesses. Advisors praised our intuitive platform, strong risk analysis tools, and the measurable difference Nitrogen makes in their client relationships.

For Gabe, Advisor from CA, Nitrogen’s ability to compare risk tolerance with portfolios has made winning business effortless:

“It’s the easiest thing in the world to win business by comparing their risk tolerance to their existing portfolio and then comparing that portfolio to one you’ve designed specific to their score. It’s literally shooting fish in a barrel.”

Financial professionals also emphasized how Nitrogen fosters deeper client engagement. Thomas, Advisor from DE, shared:

“It’s the best tool in our tech stack to really engage a client in who they really are as investors. No other piece of technology comes close to the results we’ve gotten by using it.”

And for Cynthia, Advisor from OR, Nitrogen has been instrumental in expanding client relationships:

“The side-by-side comparison has helped me win over more full wallet share than any other tool at my disposal so far.”

Turning Feedback Into Action

Listening to financial professionals is at the heart of everything we do. As Justin Boatman puts it:

“There’s nothing we appreciate more than when the advisors who love using Nitrogen take the time to share their ideas about how to make the platform even better. Delighting those customers with results has become a core principle that guides our team.”

Constructive feedback is just as valuable as praise—it helps us refine and improve Nitrogen in ways that directly benefit the advisors who use it daily.

Whether it’s enhancing risk analysis tools, streamlining workflows, or introducing new features, every piece of feedback helps shape our roadmap.

Why Feedback Matters for Every Business

Running an NPS survey isn’t just about getting a score—it’s about fostering stronger client relationships, increasing retention, and even generating referrals. Advisors who truly value a platform or service become its greatest advocates.

Just as we use NPS to shape and improve Nitrogen, financial professionals can use it to better understand their own clients. Regularly measuring your clients’ sentiment can reveal opportunities to enhance service and even identify your most enthusiastic advocates—the ones most likely to refer new business your way.

We’re grateful for the financial professionals who took the time to share their thoughts with us. Your feedback fuels our innovation, and we’re committed to making Nitrogen the best possible platform for your success.

We want to help you and your business grow too. Click here to take an interactive tour and see what Nitrogen is all about.

Navigating Morningstar Office’s Closure and the Importance of Integrated Portfolio Management and Analysis

In a recent—and rather surprising—announcement, Morningstar shared its decision to shut down Morningstar Office. Eliminating this widely used portfolio management system has left many advisors scrambling for an alternative option—and ideally one that works just as well (if not better) within their existing tech stack.

Having an integral piece of your operations taken away certainly underscores the importance of adaptability and agility, especially when it comes to delivering seamless portfolio management and analysis solutions for your team and their clients.

If you’re among the advisors affected by this change, here’s some good news: You have viable alternatives available to you (and ones you may even come to prefer over the capabilities and offerings of Morningstar Office!).

Choosing a solution that integrates with your entire tech stack can help keep backend operations running smoothly while preserving your firm’s efficiency.

Let’s dive into what options you may have for replacing Morningstar Office and how they’re able to integrate with your existing tech (including Nitrogen).

The Importance of Integrated Portfolio Management and Analysis

You’re moving from Morningstar Office, which means you need a new (and ideally, even better) online portfolio management platform. As you start researching your options, consider how any new tool you choose to integrate into your platform will work with your existing tech stack. With portfolio management and analytics software, there’s a certain amount of added pressure to make the right decision for your team and your clients.

When you leverage systems that fully integrate with one another as part of your firm’s day-to-day operations, it streamlines workflows by reducing the amount of time needed to enter (and often re-enter) data manually. Not to mention, integrated systems reduce the potential for errors and better ensure all platforms are relying on the most up-to-date information available.

Platforms that are able to work together cohesively can more effectively provide your operations team and advisors with comprehensive insights that foster better, clearer communication between advisors and clients.

Ultimately, having integrated systems helps ensure data consistency across the firm’s operations and analysis functions, leading to informed decision-making and more scalable workflows.

Alternative Platforms for Morningstar Office Users

As you continue your search for other options, here are some notable portfolio management platforms that could serve as alternatives to Morningstar Office:

Black Diamond Wealth Platform

Morningstar has announced an official partnership with Black Diamond, likely in an effort to facilitate a smoother transition for current Office users. Black Diamond provides robust portfolio management, reporting, and client portal capabilities, making it a strong option for firms seeking a direct migration path.

It’s also worth noting that Nitrogen integrates with the Black Diamond Wealth Platform, enabling advisors to easily implement proposals, sync client and account data, and more.

Advyzon

Another option available to advisors is Advyzon, an all-in-one platform that bundles portfolio management, CRM, and other necessary functionalities under one roof. Its robust capabilities include performance reporting, billing, and client engagement tools, making it a strong contender for those transitioning from Morningstar Office

Advyzon recently shared its commitment to helping former Morningstar Office users transition fully within just a few weeks of their past program’s sunset. With several former Morningstar employees already working on Advyzon’s leadership team, including Kartik Srinivasan, a veteran of both Morningstar and Schwab, the firm has developed a transition strategy that offers personalized support with a deep understanding of Office technology.

Addepar

For firms requiring advanced portfolio analysis, Addepar’s data aggregation and customizable reporting tools stand out. The platform’s focus on high-net-worth and institutional clients makes it particularly useful for advisors serving complex portfolios.

Orion Advisor Tech

Orion offers an all-in-one solution for portfolio accounting, trading, and risk intelligence. The platform’s comprehensive suite of tools, combined with its built-in Nitrogen integration, makes it a compelling choice.

Did You Know Nitrogen Can Enhance Your Portfolio Management Tech Stack?

Nitrogen isn’t a complete replacement for Morningstar Office, but it can play a vital role in ensuring your transition to a new portfolio management software is seamless and fill the gap in replacing portfolio analysis tools you have enjoyed in Office.

We integrate with leading platforms like those listed above while providing additional integral features including:

Advanced risk assessment used to align your clients’ portfolios with their goals and unique needs.
In-depth performance metrics to enhance investment decision-making.
Sophisticated integrations with over 45 platforms, tools, and software to help bring cohesion and scalability to your advisory firm’s operations.

4 Steps for Ensuring a Smooth Transition from Morningstar Office

Anytime you’re forced to change something about your tech stack, it can inevitably lead to disruptions and potential headaches.

To help make this transition a little easier, here are a few key steps we recommend starting with during this move away from Morningstar Office and into a new portfolio management platform.

Assess Your Needs: Consider which features may be essential to your firm’s operations; these will be the non-negotiables when finding your new portfolio management system. Think about important capabilities like reporting, trading, and analytics as you determine the best fit.

Explore Integration Capabilities: Ensure that your chosen platform integrates seamlessly with other tools in your tech stack, including risk analysis and financial planning software. For example, you can always check which platforms already integrate with Nitrogen here.

Plan Data Migration Carefully: When migrating large quantities of sensitive data, your priority should be to maintain historical records and ensure accuracy. Work closely with your new provider to facilitate a smooth transfer.

Leverage Training and Support: Take advantage of onboarding resources, training, and customer support offered by your new provider to maximize benefits and get the most out of your tech stack’s newest platform.

Nitrogen Is Here to Support You During This Transition

What may initially have felt like an unwelcome disruption to your firm’s operations may very well be an opportunity to refine your technology infrastructure, improve efficiency, and enhance client service with a new portfolio management system.

Nitrogen is committed to supporting advisors during this period of change, offering powerful portfolio analysis tools, industry-leading risk tolerance, and seamless integrations to help you make the most of your new tech stack.

Schedule a demo of Nitrogen to learn more about how we can support your firm’s success.