Firms should address the pain points holding clients back from interacting with them online. They should assess which functionality will nudge costly-to-serve customers to do more wealth management themselves, as well as which platform features would grow the volume of UHNW assets under management.

Disrupting Advisory through Design

For wealth managers, using design and visualization to add value and generate trust is vital to remaining competitive. Challenger banks and robo-advisors have altered the relationship management model by offering online-only wealth management at scale. While these solutions will not be attractive to all clients, their very existence is changing expectations about what clients want to see when it comes to a digital experience.
A byproduct of today’s data-driven world is the growing importance of visualization to help both businesses and consumers draw more meaningful conclusions from the information in front of them. This is a clear priority for wealth firms, given that two thirds of investors feel that their wealth managers should be doing more to visualize the information they provide.

Specifically, 59 percent of clients state that they find it difficult to discern the key points from graphs and charts, rising to 63 percent among advisory and self-directed investors. Clearly, wealth managers need to do more to distill complex information for clients.

Data visualization can be a key way for firms to improve their insight delivery and drive trust and engagement with customers. A key aspiration should be ensuring that the digital touchpoint reflects the values of quality, knowledge, and trust that clients receive from their advisors.

Empowering Client Service with Personalization

Used appropriately, highly personalized content can empower firms to supply clients with the tools and insights needed for a better digital experience, while boosting both firm competitiveness and advisor efficiency.

While data security remains important, the evolution in client behavior suggests that investors are gearing up to expand their relationships digitally. In exchange for sharing sensitive information about their personal lives, our research shows that investors anticipate enhancements to three specific areas: information delivery, the client experience, and the wealth management proposition. At the same time, accessing clients’ data more frequently and from more varied sources will allow wealth managers to build a more holistic picture of their clients and better enable advisors to deliver on wealth goals.

As advances in technology continue to permeate investors’ lives, wealth advisors should become more comfortable with using digital tools and asking clients to engage with them on new channels. Through segmentation beyond the usual demographics and risk profiles, and sophisticated data capture, advisors can grow their understanding of the client’s context and online behaviors to deliver more targeted and suitable content.

Ultimately, access to additional information from broader sources will allow wealth managers to develop more holistic views of their clients, making the value proposition, online experience, and information delivery more relevant to each of them as individuals.