Your youngest advisors are too early in their careers to win over prospects, and that is fine. Their most valuable marketing move is building relationships with future centers of influence (COIs): peers their own age who will become the attorneys, CPAs, and other professionals who referr clients a decade from now. The time to start those relationships is while everyone involved is still early.
Why Would a 25-Year-Old Advisor Focus on COIs Instead of Prospects?
Because the credibility gap with prospects is real, and the peer advantage is just as real. A 25-year-old advisor cannot easily connect with a 55-year-old business owner who needs exit planning. The gap in age and experience is too wide, and the relationship feels forced. That same advisor can connect naturally with a 26-year-old attorney or a 27-year-old CPA, because they are peers building their careers at the same time. The relationship is comfortable instead of transactional.
What Makes Peer Relationships So Valuable?
Timing. These young professionals are growing their own practices right now, during a window before they have locked in their referral partners. In five or 10 years, that attorney may be a partner sending estate planning clients who need wealth management. That CPA may have a book of high-net-worth clients. When that day comes, they think of the advisor who built a real relationship early, before everyone else was competing for their attention.
How Do You Set the Right Expectations?
Set them low, on purpose. These relationships are not built to produce referrals this year, and treating them that way will backfire. Make three things clear to your advisors:
These young COIs are not established enough to be consistent referral sources yet, and that is not the goal.
Some may work at firms where they can occasionally refer, but the occasional referral is a bonus, not the point.
The point is a genuine relationship built now, during the window before these professionals already have their referral partners in place.
This is relationship-building without the pressure of immediate results. Your young advisor is not asking for referrals. They are building a network of peers who will grow alongside them.
Where Should They Start?
Point them toward the peers most likely to matter. A niche narrows the field: the attorneys, CPAs, insurance specialists, and fellow professionals whose clients look like your ideal client are the ones worth knowing early. Give your advisors a clear, consistent way to describe what the firm does, so that when a peer eventually has someone to refer, they know exactly who the firm helps. The Messaging Formula and Niche Positioning Statement in your Blueprint in the OnNiche® app are built for this.
From there, keep it light and consistent. Coffee, industry events, and the occasional useful check-in do more over time than an intense burst of outreach that fades. Consistency beats intensity.
The Bottom Line
You do not need to wait until your youngest advisors have credibility with prospects to put them to work. Their peers today are the referral partners of the next decade. Have them build those relationships now, while the connection is natural and the window is open. It is an investment that compounds for years.