Family Office Directory Due Diligence ~ market folly

Wednesday, May 6, 2009

Family Office Directory Due Diligence

Family Office Directory

How to choose a directory of family offices:


When selecting a directory or database of family offices to purchase there are 4 points to consider or investigate before making a purchase. By following these tips you will avoid purchasing something built for a different audience, working with information that is largely outdated or receiving data which has not been thoroughly prepared for commercial use with Excel or common CRP systems.

Top 4 Tips for Family Office Directory Selection

1. Length: Many family office directories come with 400 to 1,500 total contacts. In the last year how many firms has your team had time to effectively reach out to? 400? 800? Do you only speak with family offices while marketing your products? While it may be nice to obtain a directory of 1,000+ family offices make sure you don’t pay too much for a database built for a Fortune 500 company instead of a small team of 3-5 marketing and relationship development professionals. Often times just 300-900 contacts may be more than enough to expand your firm’s reach within this industry

2. Statistics Matter
: Ask the owner of the family office directory for the percentage of contacts which come with email addresses AND phone numbers. Many databases have poor data quality and only 60-70% of their contacts even list a single email address for the firm. Look for 80-90%+ of listings to have both an email address and phone number for each firm.

3. Price < $1,000
: Hiring professionals to efficiently use a database of family office contacts can be expensive; don’t spend more than $1,000 on your directory of family offices. It does take hundreds of hours to build a great product within this space but any firm selling such a product could make you a deal and sell a version of the database to you for $700-$900.

4. Check the Source
: Who is providing the database of family offices? It is a firm which naturally speaks with family offices day-to-day? Can the professionals behind the product provide advice on how to approach family offices and HNW wealth management firms? The quality of the organization behind the product can often give you clues as to how valuable their end family office directory product may be. A quick example: The Family Offices Group is a family office networking association of 5,000 plus professionals. Due to their day-to-day contact with family offices and the firm’s history in raising assets from family office investors they know how to create a valuable directory of contact details on firms in the industry.

- Adriana

Adriana Albuquerque is the Managing Director of the Family Offices Group and responsible for developing the associated directory of family offices. To learn more please see FamilyOfficesDatabase.com.


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