Founding Senior Business Development Manager

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About the Role

Forbes Advisor is seeking a Founding Senior Business Development Manager to help build and scale Wealthroute, our financial advisor lead-generation business.

This is a hands-on, full-cycle sales role focused primarily on building partnerships with Registered Investment Advisor (RIA) firms and other wealth management organizations across the United States.

As the founding business development hire for Wealthroute, you will not only own the sales cycle from prospecting through signed agreement and activation, but also help shape the partner acquisition strategy, sales process, messaging, targeting, and operating model as the business grows.

The successful candidate will identify and source prospective partners, build a strong pipeline, conduct outreach, lead sales conversations, communicate Wealthroute’s value proposition, negotiate commercial terms, and drive prospects through signed agreement and activation.

This is an opportunity for an experienced business development professional to have an outsized impact on an early-stage growth business and help build a scalable sales function from the ground up. As Wealthroute scales, there may be opportunities to take on broader responsibilities and help build and lead a larger business development organization.

About Wealthroute

Wealthroute connects financial advisory firms with prospective clients generated through high-intent paid search traffic.

Our goal is to build a scalable network of high-quality financial advisor partners that can serve consumers looking for professional financial advice while creating a meaningful and growing acquisition channel for participating firms.

What You’ll Do

Build and Manage the RIA Sales Pipeline

• Identify and source prospective RIA firms and wealth management partners across the United States.
• Build and continuously expand a target account list using existing Forbes Advisor resources, prospecting tools, industry research, referrals, and other sourcing methods.
• Prioritize prospective partners based on fit, capacity, business model, and growth potential.
• Maintain an organized and actionable sales pipeline.
• Develop a repeatable sourcing approach that can scale as Wealthroute grows.

Own the Full Sales Cycle

• Conduct outbound prospecting through email, phone, LinkedIn, referrals, and other channels.
• Generate qualified meetings with prospective RIA and wealth management firms.
• Lead discovery and sales conversations.
• Clearly communicate the Wealthroute value proposition and explain how the program can help firms acquire new prospective clients.
• Understand partner needs, economics, capacity, and potential objections.
• Manage follow-up and move opportunities efficiently through the sales process.
• Negotiate commercial terms in coordination with internal leadership.
• Drive opportunities through signed agreement and initial activation.
• Coordinate a smooth handoff to the appropriate account management or operating team following launch.

Help Build the Wealthroute Sales Function

• Help define and refine the Wealthroute sales playbook.
• Develop best practices for targeting, outreach, qualification, pitching, objection handling, negotiation, and partner activation.
• Test and improve messaging based on market feedback.
• Help establish the processes, tools, and reporting needed to manage the sales pipeline effectively.
• Identify opportunities to make the partner acquisition process more scalable and repeatable.
• Contribute to the design of the future Business Development organization as Wealthroute grows.

Develop the Market

• Build a strong understanding of the RIA and wealth management ecosystem.
• Identify new segments, partner profiles, and sourcing opportunities.
• Develop relationships across the financial advisor community.
• Gather feedback from prospective partners and communicate market insights back to the Wealthroute team.
• Help refine messaging, positioning, partner requirements, and the overall commercial approach based on market feedback.

Partner Internally

• Report directly to the Head of Financial Services Owned Products.
• Work closely with leadership on commercial strategy, target accounts, pricing, and partner prioritization.
• Coordinate with Marketing and Paid Search teams to understand partner capacity and growth requirements.
• Work with Operations and other internal teams to support partner onboarding and activation.
• Provide regular reporting on pipeline, meetings, agreements, partner feedback, and sales performance.

What Success Looks Like

• Success in this role will be measured through clear commercial outcomes, including:
• Building a consistent pipeline of qualified RIA and wealth management prospects.
• Generating qualified sales meetings.
• Converting opportunities into signed agreements.
• Activating new financial advisor partners.
• Increasing partner capacity available to Wealthroute.
• Developing a repeatable and scalable partner acquisition process.
• Improving the effectiveness of the Wealthroute sales playbook over time.
• Contributing directly to the growth of Wealthroute’s revenue and paid media capacity.

What We’re Looking For

• Approximately 3 to 5+ years of B2B sales, business development, partnerships, or related experience.
• Proven experience owning or materially contributing to a full sales cycle.
• Strong outbound prospecting and pipeline-building capabilities.
• Ability to communicate credibly and effectively with senior financial professionals and business owners.
• Strong executive presence, commercial judgment, and relationship-building skills.
• Comfortable leading sales conversations, handling objections, negotiating, and closing agreements.
• Self-directed and highly motivated, with the ability to build pipeline rather than relying exclusively on inbound opportunities.
• Comfortable helping build processes and structure in an early-stage environment.
• Strong organizational skills and disciplined pipeline management.
• Entrepreneurial mindset and interest in helping build a business development function from the ground up.
• Excellent written and verbal communication skills.

Preferred Experience

• Experience in one or more of the following is highly desirable, but direct RIA experience is not required:
• Registered Investment Advisors
• Financial Advisors
• Wealth Management
• Financial Services
• Fintech
• Financial services partnerships
• B2B SaaS or other consultative B2B sales environments

Experience selling to RIAs, financial advisors, wealth management firms, or other sophisticated financial services buyers is a strong advantage.

Growth Opportunity

This is a founding commercial role within Wealthroute. The person joining will have the opportunity to help shape how the business approaches partner acquisition and to build many of the processes that future team members may use.

As the business scales, there may be an opportunity for the role to expand into broader commercial or leadership responsibilities based on performance and the needs of the business.

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This policy applies to all terms and conditions of employment, including recruiting, hiring, placement, promotion, termination, layoff, recall, transfer, leaves of absence, compensation and training.

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