Welcome to the Web site of the National Association of Online Investors (NAOI), a unique organization that works with both the investing public and the financial services industry to meet the goals of each.

Founded in 1997, the NAOI is the market’s premier provider of comprehensive, objective and actionable investor education to the public. Thousands of individuals have taken our online courses, read our books and/or attended our college classes. As a result, we are a major influencer on how investors choose an advisor to work with.

Based on 25+ years of teaching and working with investors, the NAOI has an unmatched understanding of what the investing public wants and needs from the financial services industry to enable them to take full advantage of the wealth creation potential of participating in equity markets. We use this valuable information in the following ways:

1. To continuously update our education content as markets and investing products/services change.

2. To develop innovative investment types and investing methods that enable our students to enter the market with confidence, with success and without fear.

3. To show our financial consulting clients how to attract far more clients than they have today by offering investing products and services that better meet the wants/needs of the investing public.

This Home Page provides an overview of how the NAOI is structured to meet the goals of both investment buyers (our students) and investment sellers (our consulting clients). Links are provided to pages on the site that provide more details for each.

Introductions

Hello. My name Leland Hevner. I am the President and CEO of the National Association of Online Investors (NAOI) an organization that I founded to teach individuals how to successfully navigate the world of investing.

This is done via comprehensive investor education, the use of online resources and the creation by the NAOI of innovative investment products and methods. By combining these components we empower our students to enter the market with confidence, with success and without fear. And we enable financial organizations to create and offer investment products that will attract far more clients than they do today.

The Organization Chart and the Evolution of the NAOI

Just below is the current organization chart of the NAOI. It has grown and evolved over the course of the past 25+ years to provide investors with the knowledge and resources needed to successfully navigate the world of investing. The NAOI has evolved significantly since our initial offering of a single investing course in 1997.

The NAOI Divisions

The purpose of each NAOI Division shown in the above chart is described below on this page. Links are included to areas of this Web site where more detailed information is found.

The NAOI Education Division

A major problem with investing today is that nowhere in academia, at any level, are individuals taught how to successfully participate in equity markets. They may be taught how investing works, but they are NOT taught how to navigate this complex field in a manner that increases their wealth and avoids significant losses.

The NAOI addresses this problem by offering to the public comprehensive, objective and actionable investor education. The “NAOI Individual Investor Certification Program” that includes the courses pictured below is the gold-standard for investor education today. For more information related to NAOI education go to this link.

While not all individual investors need the level of education provided by the above Certification Program, any advisor or financial organization that offers at least a basic investor education course, customized with the help of the NAOI as offered by our Consulting Division, will hold a massive competitive advantage in the crowded field of financial services. More information on this topic is found at this link.

The Investor-Market Research Division

The purpose of this Division is to listen to and learn from our students who represent a broad cross-section of the investing public. By doing so we have gained an unmatched understanding of how they view the investing world, their expectations and their fears. We also know the factors that they consider when searching for financial advisors and organizations to work with.

This incredibly valuable information is used by three NAOI Divisions. It is used by our Education Division to continually update our education course content. It is used by our R&D Division to create innovative investment products and investing methods that better meet the wants/needs of the public. And it is used by our Consulting Division to show financial advisors how to attract far more clients than they do today.

The NAOI Financial Planning Center

The NAOI’s recognizes that Financial Planning is a critical element of wealth creation. As a result, we have created a Financial Planning Center as a part of our Education Division. In this area we provide students with a set of online, interactive financial planning calculators and worksheets that enable them to document their financial profile, set investing goals and take the actions needed to reach their goals.

These proprietary NAOI calculators and worksheets can be accessed for free on this site and are also available for licensing and branding by third parties. They can be found at this link.

The NAOI Research and Development Division

For over a decade after our founding in 1997 we took for granted that the only way to build investment portfolios was via the use of a portfolio design and management methodology called Modern Portfolio Theory (MPT). Introduced to the market in the 1950’s, this approach dictates that portfolios be designed to match the risk tolerance of each investor and then held for the long-term, through all economic conditions. A major goal of our education content, therefore, was to teach MPT methods to our students. As time passed, however, we found that this thinking was wrong.

Following the market crash of 2008-2009, when the MPT portfolios we had taught our students to create lost significant value, we had to face the harsh reality that static, buy-and-hold, MPT portfolios simply could not cope with modern dynamic markets. It became clear to us that more then education was needed to empower investors; also needed was innovation. With this realization the NAOI R&D Division was tasked with finding an alternative for, or supplement to, MPT methods for portfolio design.

Following a multi-year effort we met this goal in the form of Dynamic Investments, an innovative investment type that provides higher returns with lower risk than virtually any investment product being offered by advisors today. More information is found at this link.

Introducing “Dynamic Investments”

The most recent development from the NAOI R&D Division is the creation of an alternative approach to MPT for designing and managing portfolios called Dynamic Investment Theory (DIT). This theory sets the logic and the rules for the creation an innovative investment type called Dynamic Investments (DIs) that automatically change the ETFs they hold based on a periodic sampling of market price trends.

By being “market-sensitive”, extensive testing shows that DIs are capable of producing significantly higher returns with lower risk than virtually any ETF, Mutual Fund or even MPT portfolio being offered today. And they provide investors with absolute protection from market crashes - a critical element of successful investing.

The NAOI is currently teaching the use of Dynamic Investments in our education courses using the “DI Users-Manual” shown above, at right. NAOI students who have learned about DIT and DIs tell us that this is finally the approach to investing that will enable them, and thousands like them, to enter the market with confidence and without fear.

You can learn more about the DIT investing approach starting at this link. And the User’s Manual can be purchased in the NAOI Store.

The NAOI Consulting Division

The NAOI Consulting Division was created to share our education content, investor research data and innovative investing products/methods with the financial services industry.

Via an NAOI Consulting Agreement we show financial professionals how to create and offer investing products and methods that better meet the needs of the investing public than those being offered today. By doing so, our consulting clients are able to significantly expand their client base, increase revenues and gain a massive competitive advantage in a very crowded field. For more information related to NAOI Consulting go to this link.

The NAOI has also created a Research Report entitled “The Power of ETF Combinations” that is pictured nearby. It shows how DIT and DIs work and how advisors and financial organizations can use this new portfolio design and management approach to create superior products and attract far more clients than they do today.

We are currently making pre-release access to this seminal Research Report available to a select group of financial professionals and financial organizations that we believe will benefit most from learning about this 21st Century approach to investing first. To be considered for pre-release access to the Research Report go to this link.

NAOI Partnerships

The NAOI offers Partnerships to financial organizations that share our passion for empowering individuals to invest with confidence, success and without fear.

Based on 25+ years of working with the investing public we have gained a sterling reputation as a strong advocate for the individual investor. A Partnership with the NAOI will elevate any organization’s “trust-factor” with the investing public. This is a significant competitive advantage in a field where a recent CFA Institute survey showed that only 23% of individual investors completely trust their financial advisor.

We offer Research and Development Partnerships that enable organizations to work with the NAOI to create new products in conjunction with our development team.

More information related to NAOI Partnerships is found at this link.

NAOI Advisory Assistance

NAOI President Leland Hevner is available to join financial organization Advisory Boards. In this role he draws on his 25+ years of working with the investing public to show organizations how to create marketing plans, investing products and investor solutions that will give them a significant advantage over their competitors. Hevner’s CV is found at this link.

True Investing Evolution

Many organizations today are attempting to “evolve” the world of investing to meet the challenges of modern markets via a variety of fintech methods. And the NAOI sees much value in these efforts. But our experience in working with the investing public tells us that average investors have little interest in them.

The NAOI believes that true investing evolution comes only from questioning and continuously updating how investing works to enable investors to profit in changing markets. This means challenging the use of Modern Portfolio Theory (MPT) as the only way to design and manage investment portfolios. The NAOI is doing so with the introduction of Dynamic Investment Theory (DIT) as discussed beginning at this link.

Financial Organizations and Investment Advisors - Let’s Talk

There is absolutely no simpler, quicker or more cost effective way for a financial organization to gain a massive competitive advantage in the crowded field of investing services than by working with the NAOI. We know what the public wants/needs to participate in the market with confidence and without fear. As leaders in the world of investing education we are well positioned to make our students aware of the financial advisors that offer the innovative investing products and methods created by the NAOI.

Feel free to contact NAOI President, Leland Hevner directly at LHevner@naoi.org, or on LinkedIn to learn more about how we can work together to enable your organization to attract far more clients than you do today.

“The Future of Investing Starts Here” is a registered trademark of Leland Hevner and the NAOI.