Advisers today make a significant monthly investment into all sorts of technology to enhance their business, from cash-flow planning, CRMs, to quote comparison tools, but little is ever invested in the most important aspect of business, keeping in touch with pension clients.
The issue is that there has never been technology to provide a simple yet effective solution for year-round engagement with pension scheme members. The A-clients are always serviced well, with yearly meetings, mid-year updates, and regular phone calls but the service level and frequency of contact quickly fall away as we go down the alphabet until we get to the schemes who are lucky to get a Benefit Statement and 15-minute AVC chat once a year.
The traditional engagement options often fail to reach sufficient numbers of clients, particularly scheme members, or else they smack of mass marketing when they do. While website blogs and LinkedIn posts can help to build the adviser's brand, they can be more of an exercise in article writing than client engagement if web traffic is low.
Touch-points are gold
No more than the friendly broker consultant needs to get continual airtime with the advisers on their panel, advisers need to get continual airtime with their scheme members. We have all seen the client surveys showing why clients stop doing business with their adviser; not the fees, not the advice but that they felt that their business was not valued, and they rarely had any contact. Without continual touchpoints, the client relationship gets diluted, and the adviser becomes the person they bought the product from and not an ongoing source of information or financial guidance.
Many events occur in the client’s finances throughout the year and without a strong adviser connection, the client will often seek guidance elsewhere, tapping into the vast array of information sources at their fingertips.
Globally, client engagement technology has shifted. Client experience trumps everything else the adviser offers. Scheme members want year-round guidance, more than one meeting a year, they need thought leadership, education, and insights, but in their time, on their terms.
When it comes to small group pensions, engagement technology is critical. Advisers need to be able to take control of communication away from the life offices, where their client is focused on their brand…not the pension providers. Client portals turn the heads of the members from the insurer to the adviser and provide an interface to feed client-tailored material directly to the client throughout the scheme year and beyond.
Where the member engagement meets rocket fuel.
From the PensionsVault portal, the adviser can upload documents and send alerts and messages to scheme members.
Auto campaigns can be scheduled whereby all members of all schemes get certain messages throughout the year, such as new year investment updates, AVC reminders, or a simple end-of-year message, driving engagement and revenue opportunities.
Client-branded portals transform the adviser’s value proposition providing a client experience that shifts the dial and scales the adviser’s brand and revenue opportunities.
This is fintech for financial advisers. Creating a paradigm shift in what the adviser offers, amplifying their brand and their business value.
PensionsVault is Ireland’s only platform where advisers can control scheme communication and scheme members can save all their pension records in one place helping them to see their future in a single view.
Karl O Meara
Founder/Manging Director
PensionsVault
0872151007