The Influential Advisor Podcast

A client came in with statements from more than ten different financial institutions. Her parents had passed away within six months of each other. The paperwork took nearly a year to sort through — and she later told John she never had the proper time to grieve because she was so buried in the chaos they left behind. That story drives everything about how John Pavelka runs his practice. After near...

Matt Knoll walked into Baylor in 1997 and told the local paper his goal was to win a national championship. The reporter laughed out loud. At the time, that reaction was fair. The program hadn't won a conference match in eight years. The courts were slanted. There was no bathroom, no equipment room, no stands. Twenty-two seasons later, Knoll left with a 510-150 record, 13 Big 12 titles, and B...

She had a million dollars in her account and she was convinced she'd lose her house by the end of the month. That's not a financial problem. That's grief lying. And if you don't know how to recognize it, you'll either rush your client into decisions she'll regret, or lose her trust entirely. Episode Summary In this episode, Brandon L. Hayes, CFP, founder of Compass Fi...

How can financial advisors get found in AI search, build trust faster, and use online reviews in a compliant way? In Episode 111 of The Influential Advisor Podcast, Paul G. McManus interviews Brian Thorp, Founder and CEO of Wealthtender, about one of the biggest opportunities in advisor marketing today: compliant online reviews as a trust signal for Google, ChatGPT, Gemini, Perplexity, Claude, and...

How can financial advisors use podcast guesting to build trust, attract ideal clients, and turn their expertise into new business opportunities? In this episode of The Influential Advisor Podcast, Paul G. McManus interviews Gabe McManus about his book, Sharpen Your Message: Guest Podcast Preparation for Financial Professionals. Gabe shares how financial advisors and financial professionals can pre...

In this episode, Gabe McManus sits down with Jeremy Lederer, CPA and founder of XIT CPA, to explore what separates a tax preparer from a true tax strategist. Jeremy brings more than 16 years of experience working with entrepreneurs, business owners, and high-income professionals to zero (yes, zero) out their federal tax liability using legal, government-backed strategies. From film financing deduc...

A couple had done everything right — dual income, debt-free, millions saved in tax-deferred accounts — and they were on track to hand $10 million to the IRS. Not because they made bad decisions, but because nobody had ever shown them what "doing everything right" actually costs without proactive planning. In this episode, Gabe sits down with Rob Bedinghaus, Ph. D., CFP® — founder of Bedi...

Imagine going into business with a partner who tells you upfront: at the end of every year, I'll decide how much of the profits I keep. You'd never agree to that. But Ira Work says millions of Americans already did the day they opened a traditional IRA. That's one of several hard truths Ira Work, a 42-year financial industry veteran, addresses head-on in his new book and in this con...

Scott Leibfried's grandfather sold the family business at 60 with more money than he'd ever seen. He was generous, he lived long, and he ran out. That story is why Scott has spent 28 years in wealth management — and it's why he wrote Climbing Wealth . Episode Summary In this episode, Gabe sits down with Scott Leibfried, a Midwest-based financial advisor with 28 years of experience,...

Most successful people have a retirement number. Very few have a retirement reason. That's the gap Jason Wendt has spent 15 years closing. After watching client after client arrive with a solid portfolio and a hollow plan, he wrote a book about it. And now, fresh off an Amazon bestseller ranking and a feature segment on NBC Chicago, he's bringing that message to a wider audience. Episode...

Most business owners assume their advisory team is working for them. A CPA here, a financial advisor there, an attorney on retainer. What they don't realize is that those advisors are working in parallel, not together. No one is seeing the full picture. No one is coordinating. And the business owner, without ever signing up for it, becomes the quarterback of their own financial life on top of...

She called her advisor on closing day. Boxes still everywhere, no movers available, hours until she had to be out. He showed up in his truck, spent four hours hauling boxes to a friend's garage, and wouldn't let her pay a dime. That's the kind of advisor Dan Carver is, and that story tells you more about his practice than any credential ever could. Dan Carver is a St. Louis-based fi...

Most retirees nail the math. Then they hit a wall. Jim Charles retired in 2021 after more than three decades in financial services. He had the savings, the freedom, and a 90-year-old house full of doors that needed rehanging. Within 18 months, he decided to un-retire. Not because the money ran out, but because the meaning had. That experience became the foundation for Sanctuary Financial Planning,...

At the Exit Planning Institute CEPA Summit in Nashville, 1,200 credentialed advisors gathered in one room. The first night, they held an awards ceremony. Every single person who walked on stage had one thing in common. It wasn't their credentials, their AUM, or their years in practice. It was a book. Episode Summary Paul and Gabe McManus just returned from four days in Nashville at the EPI CE...

The Authority Operating System: Turn Your CEPA Credential Into Deal Flow You earned your CEPA credential. You know how to help business owners navigate the biggest financial decision of their life. But the business owners who need you most don't know you exist. Right now, someone in your market is asking ChatGPT who they should trust with the sale of their company. They're searching Goog...

A $200 million exit — and the client who should have been celebrating, but wasn't. That's what started the Exit Planning Institute. And it's the same story Scott Snider has lived himself: a successful business sale in his mid-20s followed by two years of feeling completely lost. Identity, purpose, what comes next — these are questions the transaction doesn't answer. Exit planni...

Most business owners assume their CPA is doing everything possible on taxes. They aren't. And the reason isn't incompetence. It's access. The strategies that allow 18% of Fortune 500 companies and America's wealthiest individuals to legally pay zero in federal taxes are real, documented in the tax code, and available. The problem is that most CPA firms, even highly successful o...

When you go independent, nobody tells you that you're just trading one set of constraints for another. When Conor Delaney went independent in 2012, he started with $40 million in AUM and a blank whiteboard. What followed was a 14-year education in becoming a CEO, a shareholder, and a leader, all while still serving clients. Today, Good Life Companies supports more than 200 advisors across the...

Most financial advisors will tell you to save more and invest wisely. Mark Rasner will tell you that's not enough. After 32 years of watching people succeed and fail financially, he has the track record to back it up. Mark grew up poor on a dairy farm in Upper Michigan, worked his way through college without taking a single student loan, and watched his father transform from a struggling farm...

Most people doing the right things financially still have no idea if they're actually on track. They're saving, investing, contributing to the 401k — and still lying awake wondering if retirement will actually work out. That gap between doing well and knowing you're okay is exactly what Bernd Steinebrunner has spent nearly two decades helping families close. Episode Summary In this...

He built a successful practice — and it was quietly destroying your life. That's exactly where Stanley C. Leong found himself a decade ago. Making $600K in revenue, working nights and weekends, falling asleep on the floor while his daughters played around him. On paper, everything looked great. In reality, the business was running him. Today, Stanley averages 34 hours a week, takes every Frid...

Episode Summary Ron Phelps, a wealth advisor with nearly 30 years of experience, joins the Influential Advisor Podcast to discuss his book Beyond the Sales Pitch: A Roadmap for Finding the Wealth Advisor You Deserve . Ron shares his journey from growing up in a tough Milwaukee neighborhood to military service to building a client-centered advisory practice. The conversation covers what separates a...

Joseph Falbo has spent 30 years helping people navigate retirement, from the 1999 tech boom through COVID and beyond. In this episode, we explore his concept of the "functional retirement advisor" and why modern retirement demands a completely different approach than what worked for previous generations. About Joseph Falbo Joseph is the founder of Falbo Wealth and Amazon #1 bestselling a...

In this transformative webinar, Paul and Gabe McManus reveal why your most powerful marketing assets—your client transformation stories—are trapped in your head, and exactly how to turn them into a book that builds your practice. What You'll Discover: The "You have my faith" story that made Gabe triple his life insurance immediately Why Steven's Target bag story about throw pil...

Episode Summary: A tech professional in her 50s had everything planned—enough saved to retire at 55. Just one problem: 80% of her net worth was company stock. Stanley Leong warned her to diversify. She agreed but couldn't bring herself to sell, feeling it would betray the company that made her successful. Then 2008 hit. The stock crashed. Her retirement at 55 vanished—she worked another decad...