Finding and Serving African-American Clients

But more than anything else, it is the change in investment management, namely the irreversible dynamic that’s getting rid of defined benefit plans and replacing them with defined contribution plans instead, that Rozier believes is changing the investment outlook of many African-Americans.

“Historically, a lot of our community worked in public sector jobs with pensions, and in their minds, their employer would take care of their retirement,” he says. “Now, the onus has shifted to the individual, so more African-Americans are having to learn about investing.”

Many more would be encouraged to learn even more if they could learn from someone who looks like them, Rozier says. But anyone can be equally successful in reaching out to them, he says, if they understand certain specifics such as:

• Most African-Americans have grown up thinking that real estate is the be all and end all in investments.
• They are not comfortable with idea of the stock market.
• Many of them take care of their parents so there is a limit on how much they can invest personally.
• For this community in general, financial education is critical and should be the jumping off point for advisors.

Rozier does believe that a greater number of African-American advisors will kickstart things for the population at large. But his advice to all other advisors is “network, network, network” – with any and every African-American professional associations and even with the local chapters of the National Urban League where many successful African-Americans devote their time to community activities.