This month marks the launch of a brand new collection of interviews with corporations that just lately made their debuts on the Finovate stage. I had a fantastic alternative earlier this month to meet up with plenty of corporations demoing at FinovateSpring in San Diego, and am trying ahead to introducing our weblog readers to those revolutionary fintechs!
First up, we checked in with Joe Steuter, Companion and Chief of Shopper Technique with Intention.ly. Based in 2021 and headquartered in King of Prussia, Intention.ly is a development consultancy and advertising company for monetary companies corporations. At FinovateSpring this yr, Intention.y demoed its Advisor Model Builder platform that allows breakaway advisors, fast-evolving corporations, and buying enterprises to construct skilled, high-impact grand identities and model tales.
What downside does Intention.ly remedy and who does it remedy it for?
Joe Steuter: Intention.ly helps monetary companies corporations develop by fixing one of many {industry}’s most persistent challenges: model differentiation. Past that, the problem of differentiation with pace to market and considerate measurement to hint ROI to advertising efforts. Advisors, RIAs, enterprises, fintechs, financial institution managers, insurance coverage reps, and asset managers are all competing in a market that may really feel like a sea of sameness, the place corporations typically sound alike, look alike, and battle to obviously articulate why they’re completely different.
That downside turns into particularly acute for monetary advisors and advisor enterprises. Constructing a powerful model has historically required an extended, labor-intensive course of with an outdoor associate that will not deeply perceive the monetary companies {industry}. The choice is usually a quick, templated web site construct or model message that saves time however leaves corporations trying, sounding, and positioning themselves like everybody else.
Advisor Model Builder (ABB) was created by Intention.ly to get rid of that tradeoff. It provides advisors and enterprises a quicker, smarter approach to construct genuine, differentiated manufacturers grounded in who they’re, who they serve, and why they matter.
Extra broadly, Intention.ly solves development challenges for monetary companies corporations by combining technique, model, advertising, expertise, content material, and execution. We assist corporations transfer from ambiguity to readability, from disconnected advertising efforts to cohesive development programs, and from generic positioning to a model presence that may really help enterprise improvement.
How does Intention.ly remedy this downside higher than different corporations?
Steuter: Intention.ly solves this downside in a different way as a result of we mix deep monetary companies experience with expertise, inventive technique, and execution. We aren’t a generalist company studying the {industry} from the skin. Our crew has spent many years constructing manufacturers, shaping narratives, and serving to monetary companies corporations differentiate in a extremely complicated, extremely regulated, and sometimes extremely commoditized market.
Advisor Model Builder, which was the expertise proven to the group at FinovateSpring 2026, is a powerful instance of how we strategy innovation. The normal branding course of can take months and even years, particularly when a number of stakeholders, decision-makers, and rounds of discovery are concerned. ABB condenses that course of right into a guided, AI-backed expertise that may construct a model basis in weeks.
However pace is just a part of the story. ABB is not only an automatic template. It combines guided discovery, industry-specific intelligence, AI-assisted model improvement, and human experience from strategists, writers, designers, and entrepreneurs. The result’s quicker, however nonetheless substantive.
The platform captures the advisor’s genuine story, creates messaging and visible identification, builds a cohesive model information, generates belongings, and extends that basis into digital presence and web site path.
That mixture of executional pace with actually differentiated campaigns and messaging is the place our crew stands out. We assist corporations transfer quicker with out sacrificing authenticity, high quality, or differentiation. And in an {industry} that’s evolving at a quicker tempo than ever earlier than, this couldn’t be extra essential to a agency’s development.
Who’re Intention.ly’s main clients? How do you attain them?
Steuter: Intention.ly’s main clients are growth-minded monetary companies corporations. That features unbiased RIAs, breakaway advisors, hybrid corporations, broker-dealers, custodians, asset managers, fintechs, banks, massive insurance coverage corporations, and revolutionary enterprises that help advisor communities.
With Advisor Model Builder particularly, we’re fixing for each particular person advisor corporations and the enterprises that serve them. For an advisor or breakaway crew, ABB gives a quicker path to a reputable, differentiated model, full with messaging, visible identification, model belongings, and web site path. For bigger enterprises, ABB creates a scalable approach to help many advisors with out forcing each agency by way of a sluggish, customized, one-off branding course of.
We attain our clients by way of a mixture of relationships, {industry} presence, referrals, thought management, partnerships, occasions, and direct engagement with corporations which are actively attempting to develop. As a result of Intention.ly is deeply embedded within the monetary {industry}, a lot of our conversations start with belief and shared context.
The corporations that come to us are normally going through a transition level: launching, rebranding, going unbiased, coming into a brand new market, scaling advisor help, or attempting to create a extra fashionable development engine. Our price helps them transfer from intention to execution with readability, pace, and confidence.
Are you able to inform us a few favourite implementation of your expertise, or a very worthwhile partnership expertise?
Steuter: One current instance is Brick by Brick Wealth Administration, a agency shifting from a big wirehouse setting into the unbiased area. That type of transition requires way more than a brand new identify or emblem. The crew wanted to create a whole model identification, make clear its worth proposition, reframe the worth they delivered to shoppers, develop a differentiated story, and launch a digital presence that might help the following stage of the enterprise.
By Advisor Model Builder, we helped carry that work collectively in roughly six weeks. The method began with the idea for the agency’s identify and advanced right into a full model story, visible identification, messaging system, model belongings, and web site presence.
What made the implementation particular was the stability between pace and authenticity. Brick by Brick wanted to maneuver rapidly, however in addition they wanted a model that felt actual, private, and credible. ABB allowed us to seize the agency’s underlying story and translate it into one thing polished, differentiated, and usable.
That’s precisely the type of second Advisor Model Builder was constructed for. We’ve taken greater than 25 corporations of each measurement by way of this technique, and it typically works most successfully when advisors have to make a significant enterprise transfer, however they can not afford to spend months caught in an identification disaster. They want a model that provides them readability, confidence, and momentum.
What in your background gave you the boldness to reply to this problem?
Steuter: My confidence comes from the crew I encompass myself with and the greater than 20 years I’ve spent serving to monetary companies corporations and startups inform their story. Collectively, as a corporation, our confidence comes from having spent many years contained in the monetary companies {industry}, working immediately on the identical challenges our shoppers face. Our CEO, Kelly Waltrich, constructed the agency to reply to the problem she noticed as most prevalent in monetary companies: an absence of purpose-led technique and development pushed by disciplined execution and measurable objectives. Each member of our crew carries that very same intensive {industry} expertise the place they’re drawing on years of getting constructed manufacturers, formed messaging, led advertising methods, supported advisor development, launched campaigns, guided corporations by way of transitions, and helped monetary companies corporations inform extra compelling tales.
Advisor Model Builder is only one product of that have. We now have seen firsthand how troublesome it may be for advisors to distinguish themselves. Many corporations have a strong story, however they battle to articulate it. Others know they want a extra fashionable model, however the conventional course of feels too sluggish, too costly, or too disconnected from the realities of their enterprise.
Over time, we noticed the identical sample many times: advisors wanted each strategic depth and pace. They wanted {industry} experience, not generic branding workout routines. They wanted a course of that might uncover what made them completely different and switch it into messaging, design, belongings, and a digital presence.
We weren’t ranging from concept. We had been translating years of actual monetary companies brand-building expertise right into a extra scalable, technology-enabled course of.
You latterly opened new places of work in Omaha, Nebraska. How does the opening of a Midwest hub drive Intention.ly’s mission?
Steuter: Opening a Midwest hub in Omaha is an strategic step in Intention.ly’s development and mission. It was additionally a really private endeavor for me, as I stay in Omaha and perceive simply how a lot of a monetary hub the town is to this {industry}. Omaha has a deep connection to monetary companies, wealth administration, fintech, and advisor platforms, and it provides us a powerful presence in a market with distinctive {industry} expertise.
Our mission is to assist monetary companies corporations develop with extra readability, intention, and impression. To try this effectively, we have to keep near the corporations, advisors, platforms, and folks shaping the way forward for the {industry}. Omaha provides us one other middle of gravity for that work, situated in the course of all over the place.
It additionally displays a perception I’ve all the time held: innovation in monetary companies is just not restricted to the coasts. Among the most necessary corporations, platforms, and advisor communities in our area have been constructed proper right here. Having a hub that’s centrally situated permits us to deepen relationships, increase our crew, and help shoppers from a spot that understands the advisor ecosystem.
You demoed at FinovateSpring in Could of this yr. How was the expertise?
Steuter: FinovateSpring was a fantastic expertise as a result of it gave us the chance to indicate Advisor Model Builder in motion to a completely new nook of the {industry}. The convention introduced collectively corporations in accounting, banking, credit score unions, non-public capital, insurance coverage tech, and different sectors exterior our regular realm of publicity (wealth administration). Branding can really feel summary when described conceptually, however the demo allowed us to stroll the viewers by way of the precise expertise: guided discovery, AI-assisted model improvement, messaging, visible identification, model belongings, and web site path.
The format was particularly worthwhile as a result of ABB is designed to unravel a really particular rigidity out there. We had been in a position to exhibit that there’s a higher path—one that gives pace with out shedding substance.
The demo additionally helped us inform the broader Intention.ly story. We’re a branding and advertising development engine design agency with many years of monetary companies expertise, and ABB represents how we’re turning that experience into scalable expertise.
The conversations after the demo had been energizing. The suggestions bolstered what we already believed: advisor differentiation is an actual downside, enterprises want scalable methods to help it, and the market is prepared for options that mix AI with human experience.
What are your objectives for Intention.ly?
Steuter: Our aim is to change into the main advertising and development associate for the {industry}’s prime 100 corporations. We need to assist formidable corporations construct stronger manufacturers, clearer methods, higher advertising programs, and simpler paths to sustainable development.
For Advisor Model Builder, our aim is to vary the equation round advisor model improvement. We imagine advisors shouldn’t have to decide on between an extended, costly branding engagement and a generic template that makes them look and sound like everybody else. ABB provides them another choice: a guided, AI-backed, human-refined course of that creates a differentiated model basis in weeks.
On the enterprise degree, our aim is to make differentiated branding scalable—fairly a contradiction historically. Massive wealth administration organizations want methods to help many advisors effectively, however with out stripping away individuality. ABB provides enterprises a framework for serving to advisors present up with extra readability, consistency, and authenticity.
Extra broadly, Intention.ly is targeted on serving to monetary companies corporations spend much less time caught in identification, messaging, and execution challenges, and extra time incomes new enterprise. Stronger manufacturers create extra confidence. Extra confidence creates higher development conversations. And higher development conversations create stronger corporations and better-served shoppers.
That’s the work we need to preserve main.
Picture by Aditya Siva on Unsplash
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