Acehistr8,
I was a Financial Advisor at Merrill Lynch in their US Private client Group for about two years. My branch was located in Northern New Jersey. I hope to help you as much as I can, although our situations upon interviewing are different.
To give you a little background on myself and my experiences there, I was hired by Merrill right out of school (May 2001). I was placed in their Paths of Achievement (Training) program and also assisted one of the larger Financial Advisor teams in the office. During my time there I got fully licensed passing my Series 7, Series 66, NJ Life and Health Insurance exams, as well as, the Merrill Lynch Certified Financial Manager exam (CFM), which is eqivalent to the first of six sections of the CFP and a requirement to complete before LOS month 12. I personally had some success there, but not enough to make myself and Merrill satisified. I was right out of school and had very few business contacts. My father has been in the business elsewhere for over 25 years and had most, if not all, prospects in my (and friends of the) family. Furthermore the DOW had dropped 3500 points during my tenure there. The business I did do was primarily mortgages (which was booming at the time), 529 Accounts, and various Managed Money products (Consults and Mutual Fund Advisors--MFA). In short, I realized that the Retail Sales is not for everybody. I left Merrill this past December.
I wanted to give you that background so you take any advice I might give for what it's worth. I am 24 and was learning as I went, but will try to help you if I can.
Salary:
Most entry level Financial Advisors make 40,000. There was one woman my age, who said she made 55,000. Whether it is true or not, is not for me to say, but I have gotten indications that candidates that are not entry level (as yourself) received their base salarys on an individual basis. Being that you have your MBA and six years of work experience under your belt, you would have more leverage in comparision to an entry level applicant. If you negotiate around what you're looking for, whatever that figure might be, and present yourself as a valuable asset to Merrill, you may get it. Realize, however, that your base salary is only temporory. I'm not sure of the exact time period, but after 2-3 years, Merrill slowly scales back your salary, in hopes that by that time you have gotten your Financial practice off the ground and the commissions are coming in at a steady pace.
Keep in mind that what sets Merrill apart from other firms is that their payouts (commissions) are generally higher than their competition. I may have some commission figures to give you, but i'm not sure. They vary for each product you sell, as well as the type of investment within each product (Equities, Fixed Income, and Cash).
Suggestions:
Go in there tomorrow with a pipeline in mind. Think of everybody you know. Who do they know? Influential figures? Wealthy areas/groups to penetrate? Do you belong to any clubs or organizations? The more people you know, the less cold calling you will do. I hated cold calling, but for me, is was one of my only options.
Merrill's goals/requirements are steep. They say they look for a "top flight" Financial Advisor to bring in a million a month. Lower (3rd tier) goals might ask you to bring in 500,000-600,000 a month.
Down the road they might ask you to develop a business plan. If you need a million a month.........How many seminars are you going to do a month? How many cold calls are you going to do a week, a month? How much of each product do you plan to sell each week, month, year? More or less...how or what road are you going to take to succeed?
I don't know if I put down too much information or not enough, but I hope you find this useful. I know that this is only my second or third post and nobody really know who I am around here, but all of the cappers on this board have helped me immensely, with not only picks, but on how to be a consistent, disciplined handicapper. I have learned that no matter how much I know or how good a game looks, there is no such thing as a "lock" or a season is "a marathon, not a sprint", and so on and so forth. I have been "lurking" around here for a while, primarily in the Baseball, NFL, and NHL rooms and have been sharpening my skills, but am not in the stage of my life where I can wager as much as some do on the boards. In addition, I do not always have the techincal and exact statistical information to back up the picks that I make (that so many people in here do so well) and would feel bad if I would steer others in the wrong direction. I do, however, have a lot of knowledge of sports. I've been following the four major sports for as long as I can remember. I understand the game(s) and the importance of information/statistics/trends/conditions/etc.
Anyways, I hope that this information on Merrill will help you. If I can answer any specific questions that you may have, please don't hesitiate to ask.
Ltrain
