The client is then presented with a series of recommendations to help them achieve these goals.
The platform also identifies how much the client needs to save into their pension each month to achieve their desired retirement income and lifestyle.
If they don’t already have a pension, a chat bot provides guidance on pension types and can refer the client to a human adviser for fully regulated advice, if required.
3. Retain new clients for the longer term
Having a holistic digital and automated advice platform in place can significantly increase client retention.
Once a client has been successfully digitally onboarded, they’re likely to feel inclined to continue with digital and automated advice at other key intervals, such as annual reviews, consolidation, or changes in circumstance.
Automation also simplifies and speeds up the process where a client has complex circumstances or higher wealth levels.
So key advice processes can be accurately streamlined with a digital and automated approach, and because every action is recorded by the platform, there’s no need for re-keying data and the compliance trail is exact and readily accessible.
4. Start small with big results – build your advice platform piece-by-piece
Procuring new technology in the advice sector has traditionally been regarded as costly and complex. This is changing.
Advancements in technology driven by APIs have allowed for digital and automated platforms which are modular. In simple terms, this means wealth firms can pick and choose the modules that work best for them at any given time – anywhere in their processes.
Onboarding new technology has also become far simpler. Wealth advisory firms can have their own in-house technical teams integrate the modules into their own ecosystem or use a vendor’s implementation experts.
This ‘plug and play’ approach ensures the technology is adaptable to every business’ advice needs and sits with its advice permissions at any given point.
5. Significantly increase your revenues
Automation can help a business scale and therefore increase revenues. Take the recent example of a top-tier financial institution, which wanted to track the productivity of one of its advisers using automation for the ‘at-retirement’ process.
Over the course of Quarters 1 and 2 in 2021, using the system, the following results were recorded:
The results were highly encouraging with key highlights including a 225% increase in projected completed cases and total revenues projected per adviser.
Also uncovered were some equally encouraging results when it came to adviser productivity.
Using automation, the proposed hours spent per case was reduced from 35 to 11 – a saving of 24 hours per case. Based on average adviser salaries, 260 working days per year and 7.7 hours per day, the savings per case are projected at £800.
Digital and automated financial advice is increasingly popular and as both technology and attitudes towards automation mature, we’re going to see a significant increase in productivity in the coming years.
