Banking on Information with Robyn Sechler, Head of partnerships at GoodTrust

Banking on Information with with Robyn Sechler, Head of partnerships at GoodTrust

In this episode we speak with with Robyn Sechler, Head of partnerships at GoodTrust about her WHY, WHAT and HOW when it comes to Estate Planning for both physical and digital assets.

Transcript

0:00
[Music]
0:08
hello and welcome to another episode of
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banking on information today my guest is
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Robin seckler from good trust she is the
0:18
VP of
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Partnerships welcome to the podcast
0:22
thank you thank you for inviting me
0:24
today I'm
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excited yeah and we're going to start
0:27
with a very important first question
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that's always the first question on the
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podcast which is why do you do what you
0:34
do so why do you do what you do Robin
0:36
yeah oh man this is such a great
0:38
question you know I I come to this with
0:42
some you know my background has brought
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me to where we are today and I'm just
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going to share a little story with you
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quickly to help you sort of understand
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why I find any of this to be important
0:53
um you know it's about 15 years ago now
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that I lost my dad and when he passed
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away um I I didn't really do a good job
1:03
of capturing his stories or his his life
1:07
or you know anything really about who he
1:10
was as a person but when he was sick I
1:13
sat with him in his hospice room day
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after day and I ran out of things to
1:19
talk about and so I just started asking
1:22
him questions about his life and I asked
1:25
him things like you know who had the
1:27
best room in the house and why did you
1:29
become a teacher
1:30
and you know my father was an
1:32
entrepreneur so I was asking him
1:34
questions about that and then I realized
1:36
there were smaller things that I didn't
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know like what kind of ice cream did you
1:40
like and what kept you up at night and
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so one of those days when my dad and I
1:45
were we having a conversation my husband
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walked into the room and he picked up my
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Blackberry which dates me a little bit
1:53
but he pressed the record button on that
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BlackBerry device put the phone down and
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walked out of the room my dad and I
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didn't know what he had done and we just
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kept talking um and the next day my dad
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passed away with all that comes from
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losing somebody my husband didn't really
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realize the importance of what he had
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done that day and of course I didn't
2:15
know that he pressed record so we fast
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forward about eight years later when my
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youngest daughter we have three kids and
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they were all born after my dad had
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passed away and my daughter who was two
2:28
at the time found this Blackberry from
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some box in some closet who knows where
2:35
and when my husband saw that Blackberry
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he said literally like hold the phone
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you need to take that from her come into
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the other room I'm going to tell you a
2:47
story and he told me how he had recorded
2:50
this conversation between my dad and me
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I knew in that moment that I had to get
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that recording off of the Blackberry
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which of course I didn't have a password
3:00
for or a charger for it
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anymore and I won't bore you with all
3:06
the steps it took for me to get that
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recording off of the Blackberry but I
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knew that once I did and I put it onto
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my computer that I was going to have to
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put it somewhere safe yeah I allowed my
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kids to watch this or listen rather to
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the audio um which was the first time
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they had ever heard my dad's
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voice and when I expected them to say
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you know Technology's come a long way
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this old grainy recording is uh is not
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as cool as the technology we have today
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but instead they started asking me more
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questions about him they asked things
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like how did he meet grandma and why do
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we live in Pittsburgh and I realized
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that you know we weren't the only ones
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who who needed help to be able to
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protect the stories of our families that
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other people do too so I set out to find
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a solution to manage our digital assets
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photos videos the place where we keep
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our stories and that really then
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developed into I I have an estate
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planning background I've been in the
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estate planning space for about 15 years
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as well so really being able to marry
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this idea of our digital assets and our
4:22
Digital Life and when I met the founder
4:24
of good trust rard dyber we realized
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that we could build this machine
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together
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where we can help families to protect
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not only their digital assets but also
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their physical assets and their families
4:37
and bring Peace of Mind through all of
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that so together we built good trust as
4:43
it is
4:45
today wow that is a great story and uh
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that really gives me a window into why
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you're doing what you're doing um this
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is obviously very important right
4:56
memories that we have of our loved ones
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and the stories that we that we have
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about them um and just like we have
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physical uh things that we leave behind
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actually the the memories are are very
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important too and and more and more they
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they live in digital spaces so that is
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that is a great great story there um so
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how did that turn into what you are
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doing now how are you helping um your
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customers at good trust um capture those
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memories and and what do you do for them
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yeah so we know that you know estate
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planning is the the action of writing a
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will or a trust power of attorney
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Healthcare directive assigning Guardians
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and and deciding who gets what right we
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know that today you can do that by
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driving down to see an attorney you know
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parking downtown paying to park going
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upstairs six flights to meet somebody
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that maybe you do or don't know very
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well and so by transitioning this estate
5:55
planning experience into a technology
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format it allows us to reach people in
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the moment where they are if there are
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you know accessibility becomes easier
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it's certainly more affordable it's
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easier to share with family members you
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know today or tomorrow and and it
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becomes much more you know accessible
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when you can complete your estate plan
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from your phone or your computer or your
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laptop as opposed to having to do it in
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person and so really you know our goal
6:26
is to democratize Estate Planning and
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this is one way that we can help to do
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that right so you help your customers uh
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with their estate planning both from an
6:37
A a money perspective and physical
6:40
assets but also help them capture those
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memories that were so important to them
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exactly exactly so with good trust
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alongside you know traditional estate
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planning things that you might think
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about like the will trust power of
6:52
attorney Etc we built a digital vault
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which is the piece that allows you to
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include your online life into your
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estate plan we are the only company out
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there who offers this today and you know
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I think we could agree that our online
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lives are just going to continue to grow
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rather than than shrink you know from
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this day forward but that allows you to
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include things like you mentioned photos
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and videos which you know obviously tugs
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on my heartstrings but also things like
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online bill pay or ongoing subscriptions
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the ability to share things like my
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social media information with my husband
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maybe I want him to close those accounts
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if something were to happen to me or
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access my email address or even access
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my phone with things like two-factor
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authentication and all of the things
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that we store in our phones or other
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devices today so it's really bringing
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those things to awareness to our our
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loved ones to say hey these assets exist
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and they do have a value whether
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sometimes that's sentimental and
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sometimes of course that's Financial as
8:01
well yeah and so that sounds very
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valuable to do that what what do you
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hear from your customers how they get
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value from that in what type of ways do
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they get value yeah the most the the
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number one thing that people say in fact
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we just did a survey on this as well but
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the number one thing that people say
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when they complete their estate plan is
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that they have peace of mind yeah and
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peace of mind of knowing that their
8:27
their wishes are going to be followed
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that their family members have Clarity
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on what it is that they would want they
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don't have to leave these difficult
8:36
decisions up to somebody else during an
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already difficult time it's really
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knowing that they have taken those steps
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to protect their family to protect
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themselves and to make things as
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seamless and as easy as they can be yeah
8:51
that that is very clear peace of mind is
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very very valuable knowing that
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everything is is well taken care of
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especially during ult times right when
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when someone passes obviously that's a
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very difficult time to think about that
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and it's great if it's if it's well
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taken care of um I I like to do this
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thing on the podcast called Futures
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thinking and we all don't know what the
9:14
future holds but we can think about what
9:16
possible Futures could look like um I'd
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want to do that exercise with you Robin
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and sort of let's think 10 years out and
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um what do you see 10 years from now
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2034 what is sort of a planning look
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like what does the world look like and
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and how does a service like this fit
9:34
into that yeah you know if I could dream
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estate planning would be something that
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everybody has access to and we tend to
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think of estate planning as something
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that you know either the elderly or the
9:46
wealthy need but in reality there are
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all these moments in our lives where
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estate planning matters getting married
9:53
having kids getting divorced retiring
9:56
buying a home or other or other other
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important as
10:00
and if I could imagine where everybody
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would have access to be able to protect
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those things that matter to them that's
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where I hope we're going and I think
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it's interesting to think about you know
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maybe it's five years ago the idea of of
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visiting your physician online or on
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your phone may have been something that
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people were not as comfortable with and
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I imagine that five years 10 years from
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now creating your estate plan for from
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you know your phone or your other device
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is going to be the norm similar to how
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the norm is to to uh visit your
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physician or other healthc care provider
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on online so I I see that we are heading
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that direction and uh I also believe
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that AI is going to become more
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important in this role in helping people
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to you know answer questions
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appropriately in the moment and be able
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to uh to provide them with real time
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information yeah now that that is a
11:03
great vision for the future 10 years out
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possible future but um if if we assume
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that that is going to be reality what do
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people need to do today to get ready for
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that future that you were just painting
11:16
yeah you know the two out of every three
11:19
people out there don't have an estate
11:21
plan today and I think that there's a
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barrier there with understanding what an
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estate plan can do for you so I think
11:31
that education is a huge piece of this
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and if I could if I could leave a piece
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of advice it would be just to educate
11:39
yourself on what an estate plan can do
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for you outside of managing you know
11:44
money or assets because again those are
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the things that we tend to think about
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but Health Care decisions and uh digital
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assets as we talked about assigning
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Guardians for miners thinking about all
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of these other pieces is is going to be
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a very important part of
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that great well that that is a great way
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I think to wrap this up so for everyone
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out there get peace of mind go get your
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estate plan done and for the the the
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Watchers and the listeners to this
12:15
podcast who are in financial services
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maybe you should think about offering
12:18
this to your own customers because they
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will need this as well uh thank you very
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much Robin for being on the podcast
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today absolutely thank you so much
12:30
and until next time choose to be curious



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