Data sourced from Dakota Marketplace, the global LP and GP intelligence platform trusted by thousands of investment professionals. Learn More | Book a Demo
Wealth manager RIAs are one of the first channels Dakota points emerging managers toward, and the reason is simple: they have discretion, and they are always looking for specialist ideas that help them grow their own business.
Dakota Marketplace now tags roughly 8,000 of them that use outside managers, up from about 650 seven years ago.
Here are 10 things every emerging manager should know before building an RIA pipeline.
10 Things Every Emerging Manager Should Know About RIAs
1. RIAs Are Built for Emerging Managers
RIAs have discretion over client assets, and they need unique, interesting investment ideas to differentiate themselves and attract clients.
For an emerging manager, whose strategy is usually a specialist or niche one, that is a natural fit. It is why cold outreach to RIAs is the starting point Dakota recommends for most boutique firms.
2. Only a Subset of RIAs Are Your Targets
There are roughly 32,000 SEC-registered investment advisory firms, with 100 to 150 new RIAs registering every month.
The firms that matter to you are wealth manager RIAs: about 95% of the time they do not manage money themselves, and instead select outside managers to build portfolios for their clients. Dakota Marketplace tags approximately 8,000 of them.
3. The Opportunity Keeps Growing
Dakota tracked about 650 wealth manager RIAs seven years ago, and the number is now roughly 8,000. In September 2026 alone, 90 new wealth manager RIA firms formed, following 70 in August and Dakota tracks the newest additions.
A channel that adds new buyers every month rewards managers who keep showing up.
4. Don't Judge by Size
Everyone wants to get in front of the largest RIAs, but Dakota prefers the $100 million, $200 million, and $500 million firms. Many of them are likely to be acquired by roll-ups such as Dynasty, Focus, or Cerity.
If you are already working with a $500 million RIA when that happens, you become part of a much larger platform.
5. Large RIAs Now Act Like Wirehouses
Aggregators such as Pathstone have grown so large that they resemble wirehouses, and many are bigger than most institutions. Expect a long line to get on the platform, similar to Morgan Stanley, UBS, or Merrill Lynch, and expect leverage on fees, because they can allocate in size.
Work both the home office research team and the underlying offices, which can support your approval. Their reach now spans wealth and institutional too: Cerity acquired Agility and Verus.
6. Custodian Approval Is a Scale Step, Not a Prerequisite
Custodians like Schwab, Fidelity, and Pershing are where RIAs go to buy strategies, much like a grocery store.
Getting your strategy approved there matters for scaling over the long term, and it takes time, but support from RIAs can help you get through it. An RIA can still invest directly in your mutual fund, LP, or SMA without custodian approval.
Want to see which RIAs fit your strategy, city by city? Book a demo to explore them inside Dakota Marketplace.
7. Eat the Elephant One City at a Time
The RIA channel is fragmented and spread across the country, so break it up by city and metro area.
Pick five cities and keep coming back to them.
In the Northeast corridor, for example, that could be Boston, Stamford, New York City, Philadelphia, Baltimore, and D.C. The Philadelphia metro alone has more than 126 RIAs, and New York City has about twice that.
8. Cold Outreach Does Three Jobs
A cold email books meetings, keeps your brand in front of people in a form that is easy to take in, and works as marketing.
Even when an allocator doesn't reply, a clear email can get your strategy filed in the right folder, such as private credit, for later. No reply doesn't mean no interest, since allocators are busy and their searches start on their own timeline. Stay consistent.
9. Keep Five Cities Active, and Keep the Email Short
Always be scheduling five cities at any given time, offering meetings at 9:00, 11:00, 1:00, 3:00, and 4:30.
The email should take one to two sentences to say who you are, what you do, and why they should care, followed by a specific ask like "Can you meet in Chicago on May 4th at 3:00?"
Send the emails, book the meetings, do the meetings, add the next city, and repeat.
10. A Quarterly Webinar and a CRM Are Table Stakes
A quarterly webinar asks nothing of the audience: send a save-the-date and two invitations, then deliver a 20-minute presentation covering your firm, strategy, and process, and how your investments tie back to that process.
Keep it micro, with no macro commentary.
Each one becomes a replay, transcript, and summary for your website and outreach, and it saves the PM from running 40 separate quarterly update calls.
Pair it with a CRM, which Dakota calls 10x leverage from day one: log every meeting and call note (Claude or ChatGPT can write them), use past activity reports for follow-up, and review pipeline reports daily and share them with your PMs and CEO.
Start with Five Cities and Stay Consistent
The RIA channel rewards managers who stay focused: a handful of cities, a short email with a clear ask, and relentless consistency over time. Two conferences are coming up for emerging managers, EMEX Americas on October 22 and GAIM Ops West on October 25, and both are tracked in Dakota Marketplace along with hundreds of others.
Ready to build an RIA pipeline instead of guessing at one? Dakota Marketplace tags the wealth manager RIAs that use outside managers, organized by city and metro area so you can schedule five cities at a time. Book a demo.
