RFG Advisory, the Birmingham, Ala.-based hybrid RIA platform with about $4.8 billion in client assets, has hired CAIS’ former chief marketing officer Abby Salameh to serve as chief growth officer.
RFG has also added Brendan Frazier, founder of Wired Planning, as its new chief behavioral officer, and Kenneth Kim, who previously led corporate development and strategy for FNZ’s North America region, as chief financial officer.
All three positions are new to the firm, which has retained an existing controller who now reports to Kim and a head of marketing who now answers to Salameh. According to RFG President Shannon Spotswood, both were invited to approve or veto the choices.
“All of these roles are about growth,” she said, noting a deliberate focus on organic growth. “We're at the very open innings of building RFG 3.0 and defining what it means to be the platform of the future serving the advisor of the future.”
Recognized as Chief Marketing Officer of the Year at the 2023 WealthManagement.com Industry Awards, Salameh joined RFG to oversee advisor recruitment, marketing and organic growth initiatives for more than 50 partner practices. She leads a team of 15 growth officers after the firm combined its business development and marketing teams.
Before joining alternatives platform CAIS in November 2021, Salameh spent about two years as CMO for Hightower Advisors and six years in the same role at Private Advisor Group, a hybrid RIA and super office of supervisory jurisdiction of LPL. Prior to that, she was senior vice president and CMO of Fusion Advisor Network.
“RFG is the most industry-awarded firm advisors have never heard of and we are about to change that,” Salameh said in a statement. “RFG empowers advisors to define success on their own terms. Joining a team that's so focused on innovation and defining what the future of the industry means is incredibly exciting for me.”
Salameh is joined by Frazier, who has been a pioneer in the world of behavioral finance and has built a community of advisors mastering the human side of advice. The work he's been doing at Wired Planning will be incorporated into RFG's platform.
“We're actually integrating Wired Planning into our value proposition," said Spotswood. “We believe very strongly in delivering strategic planning to our advisors, so he's bringing his podcast, he's bringing Wired and we're incorporating all of that into the platform of services we offer.
"The data shows that the client of the future is looking for a financial life coach,” she said. “It's table stakes to be able to show up and do great investment management and risk assessment and financial planning and goals assessment, but it's the emotional factor that is so critically important for building that bridge to the next generation, that client retention, that emotional connection with prospects and clients.”
Kim rounds out RFG’s executive leadership team. He brings over two decades of experience in fintech, investment banking and corporate development.
"For a company of our size and at the beginning of our growth cycle of RFG 3.0, post our partnership with Long Ridge, to attract the talent of Brendan and Ken and Abby is a hat trick,” Spotswood said.
Last August, RFG announced Long Ridge Investments had become its first capital partner with a “significant” investment that was to be put toward additional talent, improved technology and the launch of an equity ownership program in February. New recruits are already taking advantage of the equity program, and it will become available to existing partners in the near future.
RFG will introduce the new executives at its Annual Growth Conference next week in Naples, Fla.