Why Financial Simplicity For Your Business ?
With many years of experience, we have worked with the industry to understand some of the challenges that face investment advice businesses, and have identified a multitude of areas and roles that we bring benefit to, whether private practices, or large firms.
For a summary of such, click on the various roles below:
Investment Advice Practice
We find that typically and investment advice practice contains a handful of practitioners serving clients with a small support team. Practices are generally largely dependent on some key practitioners and seek outsourced business infrastructures.
Investor
WHAT MATTERS
- Returns
- Sleep at Night
- Safety of assets
- Trusting Relationship
METRICS
- Recency and Relevance of Communications
- Reputation / Client Portals
- Statements
- Reports
- Actual Returns
WHAT CHALLENGES
- Fees in absence of value
- Cost of Advice
- Getting up to date information on demand
IMPACT OF CHALLENGES
- Unclear fees or items erode trust
WITH FINANCIAL SIMPLICITY
- Real sense of client first
- Gives sense of options
- Answers questions about direct ownership and hence trust
Owners
WHAT MATTERS
- Top Line
- Bottom Line
- Business Risks
- Recruiting Advisers
- Brand and Reputation / Independence
METRICS
- Assets Under Advice
- Revenues
- Costs
- Client Win Rate
- Adviser Numbers
- Leads
- Complaints
WHAT CHALLENGES
- Margin squeeze
- Ever changing regulations
- Skills and expertise to change business model
- Obtaining execution resources and skills
- Shrinking market
- Proposition without tainted perception
IMPACT OF CHALLENGES
- Uncertain Future
- Business Valuation Threatened
- Independence Position Threatened
WITH FINANCIAL SIMPLICITY
- New Value Proposition – Increase Win Rates, Reduces cost to Service
- Independence Highlighted
- Path To Enhanced Relevance
- Enhanced toolkit to recruit advisers
- Provide advisers with Improved Productivity and Time Allocation
- Business Model for Value Creation
- Increased Valuation
Responsible Officer
WHAT MATTERS
- Client Proposition within Contained Risks
- Regulatory Reporting and Disclosures
METRICS
- Complaints
- Board enquiries
- Time to deal with changing regulations
WHAT CHALLENGES
- Ever changing regulations with conflicted remuneration
IMPACT OF CHALLENGES
- Increasing cost of conflicted or embedded fee products / services
WITH FINANCIAL SIMPLICITY
- Up to date confidence of client portfolios to agreed mandates
- Reduced complaints and increased defensiveness
- Increased confidence of regulatory disclosures
Client Adviser
WHAT MATTERS
- Fee Income
- Client Relationships
- Time Efficiency
- Reputation
- Proposition Tool Kit
METRICS
- Assets under advice
- Time allocation
- Win rate
- Cost to recruit
- Cost To Service
WHAT CHALLENGES
- Time poor
- Declining margins
- Perspective in changing world
- Reliant on licensee
- Fragmented Technologies
- Competition
IMPACT OF CHALLENGES
- Inefficient client recruitment and servicing leading to more work – Cost to Recruit and Service going up
- Win rates down
- Paralysis
WITH FINANCIAL SIMPLICITY
- New Value Proposition – Increase Win Rates, Reduces cost to Service
- Enhanced toolkit
- Improved Productivity and Time Allocation
- More Time on growth increase Assets Under Advice
Investment Advice Business
Typically an investment advice business is characterised by having a number of client advisers supported by an integrated set of business functions with some specialist resources. Generally a business is less dependent on key individuals and is more a function of it’s management team and supporting processes.
Investor
WHAT MATTERS
- Returns
- Sleep at Night
- Safety of assets
- Trusting Relationship
METRICS
- Recency and Relevance of Communications
- Reputation / Client Portals
- Statements
- Reports
- Actual Returns
WHAT CHALLENGES
- Fees in absence of value
- Cost of Advice
- Getting up to date information on demand
IMPACT OF CHALLENGES
- Unclear fees or items erode trust
WITH FINANCIAL SIMPLICITY
- Real sense of client first
- Gives sense of options
- Answers questions about direct ownership and hence trust
Client Advisers / Brokers
WHAT MATTERS
- Fee Income
- Client Relationships
- Time Efficiency
- Reputation
- Proposition Tool Kit
METRICS
- Assets Under Advice
- Time Allocation
- Win Rate
- Cost To Recruit
- Cost To Service
WHAT CHALLENGES
- Time Poor
- Declining Margins
- Perspective in Changing World
- Reliant on Licensee
- Fragmented Technologies
- Competition
IMPACT OF CHALLENGES
- Inefficient client recruitment and servicing leading to more work – Cost to Recruit and Service going up
- Win rates down
- Paralysis
WITH FINANCIAL SIMPLICITY
- New Value Proposition – Increase Win Rates, Reduces cost to Service
- Enhanced toolkit
- Improved Productivity and Time Allocation
- More Time on growth increase Assets Under Advice
Portfolio Managers
WHAT MATTERS
- Service quality to implement portfolios to mandates
- Efficiency of resourcing to achieve service levels
- Quality and compliance monitoring
- Investment Returns
- Client Satisfaction
METRICS
- Performance
- Number of Portfolios
- FUM
WHAT CHALLENGES
- Conflicting value message threatening margins
- Lack of intelligent monitoring and decision support tools
- Role relevance in more technologically advanced world
- Lack of detailed processes
IMPACT OF CHALLENGES
- Increase pressure to scale function with less resources
WITH FINANCIAL SIMPLICITY
- Service more portfolios with less resources
- Improve relevance and value of resource
Compliance Manager
WHAT MATTERS
- Client Proposition within Contained Risks
- Regulatory Reporting and Disclosures
METRICS
- Complaints
- Board Enquiries
- Time to deal with changing regulations
WHAT CHALLENGES
- Ever changing regulations with conflicted remuneration
IMPACT OF CHALLENGES
- Increasing cost of conflicted or embedded fee products / services
WITH FINANCIAL SIMPLICITY
- Up to date confidence of client portfolios to agreed mandates
- Reduced complaints and increased defensiveness
- Increased confidence of regulatory disclosures
Owners
WHAT MATTERS
- Top Line
- Bottom Line
- Business Risks
- Recruiting Advisers
- Brand and Reputation
METRICS
- Assets Under Advice
- Revenues
- Costs
- Client Win Rate
- Adviser Numbers
- Leads
- Complaints
WHAT CHALLENGES
- Understanding to Change Business Model
- Obtaining Execution Resources and Skills
- Shrinking Market
IMPACT OF CHALLENGES
- Uncertain Future
- Business Valuation Threatened
WITH FINANCIAL SIMPLICITY
- New Value Proposition – Increase Win Rates, Reduces cost to Service
- Path To Enhanced Relevance
- Enhanced toolkit to recruit advisers
- Provide advisers with Improved Productivity and Time Allocation
- Business Model for Value Creation
- Increased Valuation / PE Ratio
Researcher
WHAT MATTERS
- Performance
- Reputation
- Placement / institutional relationships
METRICS
- Performance
- Funds Under Management
- Client Time vs Research Time
WHAT CHALLENGES
- Need for more transparency
- Pricing power declining
- Move to Flat fees
- Growth of Passives and ETFs
IMPACT OF CHALLENGES
- Work harder / more communications to achieve clarity and maintain reputation
WITH FINANCIAL SIMPLICITY
- Easier to communicate with advisers and clients
Platform Selection
WHAT MATTERS
- Asset security
- Service levels to investors
- Data to support business systems
- Supporting tax wrappers (Super, pension etc)
- Related administration overheads
METRICS
- Costs to investor
- Costs to business
- Costs to interact with as an adviser
WHAT CHALLENGES
- Understanding of investor security issues
- Integrating with business systems (2 way)
- Business risk management
- Ever changing environment
- Business and reputation dependency
IMPACT OF CHALLENGES
- Hard to put all eggs in one basket for a custodial solution
WITH FINANCIAL SIMPLICITY
- Supports a strategy of ever changing platforms to remain competitive
Proposition Owner (Chief Client Officer)
WHAT MATTERS
- Engaging client offer
- Competitive offer
METRICS
- Costs to investor
- Proposition engagement to investor
- Proposition to match uniqueness and strategy
- Customer satisfaction
- Referral Rates
- Revenues
- Control over proposition
- Outsourcing components
WHAT CHALLENGES
- What to out-source vs in-source
- Identifying what of the proposition is ‘sameness’ vs ‘difference’ compared with competition
- Alignment of any suppliers to the firm’s brand and desired customer proposition
- Accentuating compelling differentiators
IMPACT OF CHALLENGES
- Need a clear proposition design with sameness and differences to achieve optimal operating model and brand support
- Careful review required of past operating model and component suppliers
WITH FINANCIAL SIMPLICITY
- Enaging proposition for many segments to increase customer satisfaction, referral
- Control over proposition to maintain firms’ standards, brand and uniqueness