Brooke’s Note: On Friday morning Heather, Nevin and I all participated in a demonstration of the Orion Advisor Services software used by 200 advisory firms that control 350,000 accounts. I was grateful that Eric Clarke, CEO of the Omaha, Neb.-based firm took the time to walk us through the demonstration. He takes an unassuming approach and I had the bonus of asking him questions for a more in-depth article about the company for later this week. I had been meaning to catch up with Eric for a while because his company’s software has definitely made its way onto the short list of many an RIA seeking an alternative to the bigger names in portfolio management systems. Impressive was that Clarke, an ex-resident of the Bay area is — from his new domicile in Omaha — bringing a decidedly Silicon Valley flair to his technology. Further down in this review you’ll read how he’ll be releasing a concept that borrows heavily from Facebook to help financial advisors better manage their practices.

Ten years after leaving the RIA business to focus on the technology side of portfolio management, Eric Clarke, CEO of Orion Advisor Services is continuing to develop a custom web-based system that competes effectively in today’s RIA software market. In our demo of Orion’s technology last week, Eric gave us an inside look at some of the things that differentiate his company as well as some of the new features that will be rolled out in the June quarterly release.

We began the demo by looking at Advisor Desktop, Orion’s “home page” for advisors. In contrast to FinFolio’s use of the Microsoft Office Suite’s ribbon strip navigation and easily-recognizable icons, the interface for Orion’s Advisor Desktop parallels the Window’s Operating System to the extent that I half expected the animated XP search puppy (similar to, but less annoying than Microsoft Office’s Mr. Paperclip) to pop up and ask if I needed help managing my accounts. Similar to FinFolio, the familiarity of the Orion’s sidebar navigation and overall look-and-feel makes the system intuitive to any Window’s user and provides a clear picture of the functionality Orion has to offer.

Reports Made Easy

Orion’s services are largely aimed at making reporting easier, more customizable, and less time consuming for RIAs. Report Builder gives advisors the ability to simply drag and drop a wide range of reporting elements into a single customized report template tailored to clients’ preferences. These templates can be saved and used for future reporting, substantially speeding up the reporting process and giving clients more customized reports without creating more work for the advisor.

Customizable report generator with easy drag
and drop interface

In addition to making it simpler for advisors to prepare custom, visually appealing reports for their clients, Orion distributes reports of its own to advisors using its services: a Business Metrics Report and Advisor Report Card. These quarterly reports give advisors some stats on how they measure up to other Orion clients based on assets under management, growth and retention, and performance.

Service-oriented Error Checking

Orion meets the daunting task of error reconciliation with dedicated team of analysts, in contrast to other portfolio management systems that are tackling this issue with complex software solutions. These back end accounting analysts are responsible for reconciling data from the custodian, number-checking corporate actions, and comparing prices from multiple sources before giving the “all clear” to advisors. This approach requires some flexibility and scalability on the part of Orion’s service team, but it seems to be successfully adjusting to client growth with efficient organizational structuring and advanced technological tools.

Web-Based Pros and Cons

Orion’s entirely web-based service allows advisors the flexibility of working from multiple offices or multiple nation-wide branches — a big plus for advisors who demand more mobility. In addition, being a web service allows advisors to extend their offerings outside of their firm and create a unified and consistent database they can access from anywhere…with an internet connection.

Which brings me to a potential drawback of Orion’s services: You have to have a web connection to use Advisor Desktop services. This means that if the Internet connection in your office happens to go out, you’re out of luck. However, Orion does allow advisors to export online data to their local machine, so it can be accessed (but not manipulated by Advisor Desktop) without connectivity.

Some general benefits of web-based services include the ability to push updates and new features to the server without requiring upgrades to desktop software. Additionally, security and reliability are always frontrunners of concern with web applications, but Orion seems to have covered its bases with backup generators for its server facilities, hardware redundancies, and a disaster recovery system. (Although this hasn’t been put to the test in a real disaster scenario, monthly inspections are conducted to make sure things are in working order.) These safety measures on Orion’s part substantially reduce the risk of data loss due to personal machine failure and provide IT support on the back end so advisors can focus on clients instead of computers.

June Feature Preview

A transaction history that allows advisors
to track past sales

Eric kindly us a first look at some of the features Orion plans to unveil in its June release. First on the list is a new reporting template, the Trade Analysis Report, that lets advisors track securities they have sold in addition to those they currently manage. This will give advisors a bigger picture when it comes to the benefits and detriments of past transactions.

Facebook factor

Secondly, Orion is planning on integrating some well known social media constructs, most notably the Facebook Newsfeed or “Wall”, to its arsenal. This addition will keep advisors abreast of their clients’ accounts on a more real-time basis. For those of you unfamiliar with Facebook, the Newsfeed is a rolling account of current events; things like “Your high school sweetheart just got engaged to the head cheerleader” or “Your little sister posted photos of your awkward junior high years.”

In the RIA world, current events might include client deposits directly at the brokerage firm, real-time contributions and distributions, etc. As Eric mentioned during the demo, “A lot of our technology today is static” and Orion wants to give RIAs a better way to keep a finger on the pulse of day-to-day client activity. I am excited to follow up with Orion in June to see how advisors respond to the Newsfeed and how Orion tackles the challenge of incorporating this “fun and interactive” feature with its existing functionality.

Overtime

As with most tech demos, the list of features and functionality being demoed would take more than one article to discuss. So here are few other mentionable items from our demo with Orion:

• The built in Trade tool simplifies the trading process by eliminating cumbersome exporting and importing of data to/from third party tools.
• The Due Dilligence Center web portal gives advisors an “under the hood” look at the Orion system and provides training videos, fact sheets, and module info.
• User-defined fields, a notes section, and the ability to upload scanned documents customize the Advisor Desktop to fit the needs of RIAs and their clients.
• Orion also offers an Integrated Web Portal for clients. Clients can access and track their investments and advisors can tailor the interface to show pertinent graphs and reflect their brand and/or private label.

The Wrap Up

Eric and his team have dedicated the last ten years to providing RIAs with pertinent tools that allow them to run a better business. With its forward thinking incorporation of social media tools and its fast paced, web-based platform, Orion is definitely a company worth keeping up with.

Heather Underwood is the latest addition to the RIABiz tech review staff. She’s designed software for Microsoft, Zillow.com and IBM, and holds a bachelors degree in Computer Science from the University of Washington. You can reach her at heather@riabiz.com.