Technology and Segmenting your clients
The value of the service you provide, as an adviser, is to be agreed and demonstrated to the client. Commission as an income is fading fast and not all your clients have the same requirements. You may wish to categorise your clients by the type of advice that you provide for them, or the level of service that they will receive. You could offer a generic service to one segment while focusing on a more individual approach to another.
To assist with segmentation and your adviser charge processing ensure you have a back office system (BOS) - also called CRM/ practice management system - and a process that, amongst other things, can:
- Help you understand your client base, that allows you to interrogate and accurately define your segments
- Flag, very quickly, the segment to which the client belongs
- Support your business proposition e.g. this may mean having different client report templates for Segment A versus Segment B versus Segment C
- Link to other product provider systems so that valuations (via Contract Enquiry Service) can be obtained quickly and accurately, and then populated into the client reports. Reconciling payments and capturing up-to-date valuations of client investments are two processes that can now be heavily automated for the vast majority of back office systems
- Record time spent on activities and track regular reviews and remuneration structures in line with RDR requirements. Some systems can show new business submitted, monies outstanding and income earned, all broken down by consultant and/or introducer
Association of Independent Financial Advisers
AIFA has created an interactive online academy to help firms successfully transition their business in readiness for the RDR requirements. Carefully put together by practitioners who have been through a successful transition so firms can draw on their experiences, the online academy provides:
- Insight into how change can benefit your firm
- Ideas to help you get more value for your business
- Tools to help you implement transition
- Actions to help deliver greater profitability
And it's free to all AIFA members.
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