Creating an Amazon like experience for your clients
In a new whitepaper, Brett Davidson & Dominika Sieradzka-Maccuirc tackle the problem of how to make your business stand-out in a crowded market when most of your peers are offering very similar services.
The white paper focuses on two key strategies:
- Being extraordinarily helpful in resolving the clients pain points (and as a result being easy to do business with)
- Niching
Most financial advisers claim that ‘client referral’ is their number one source of leads. Yet, when pressed, they’ll also ‘fess up that they only get a few referrals per year. It’s not good enough.
The first strategy of being extraordinarily helpful in resolving the clients’ pain points is aimed at dramatically increasing referral rates. In their opinion, this doesn’t generate more referrals simply by asking for them. You need to blow the client’s mind with your fanatical focus on their experience and make it easy to do business with you at every step of the way. The natural end-result they say is that clients can’t stop telling everyone how great you are. As the white paper concludes, creating this outcome is not easy to achieve. There’s work in it. Maybe your life’s work and the goal posts are constantly moving.
The second strategy, niching, makes your job far easier as you attempt to:
- Create a client experience that blows your clients’ minds, because you’re doing it over and over for a relatively narrow cohort of people, and
- Position yourself as the go-to expert in your particular niche.
Throughout the white paper they provide examples of what good looks like in the marketplace and examples of firms that are already doing it. For your copy of the white paper and a very good read please click here.
So, what does the future look like?
To be magnetic to your clients so you can easily be found, they recommend that you focus on being noticed by intelligent use of technology and your ultimate client experience. While all firms have the potential to be extraordinary, only a few will invest the time and energy into first understanding their clients and empathise with them to create outstanding client journeys and propositions.
They advise that being held back by legacy software and operational bottlenecks is not an option if you want to remain relevant in the years to come. The requirements of your future clients will need to be addressed with the intelligent use of technology.
In their view, clients want an ‘Amazon-like experience’ of financial advice, a way of engaging with advice that is really easy and hassle free. They recommend embracing technology and making it part of your strategic plans. It’s no longer just about ‘making your back office system work’ but creating a digital experience that is both client centric and operationally efficient.
And think Mobile-First.
As more and more people access information through applications on mobile devices than any other media, still half of financial service providers aren’t mobile friendly. It’s critical, in their view that you offer your clients an app-based access to you and their information. In the era of WhatsApp, Facebook and other apps, we are all used to push notifications as they provide real time alerts and access to information. UK adults are now using messaging apps more frequently than SMS texts. So, it’s no longer a question of whether you use a client portal but rather, which app.
Their conclusion - If you want to be future proofed, you must engage with technology.
To understand how your own branded app can draw you out of the haystack like a magnet, click here to organise a personal demonstration.
sales@moneyinfo.com
+44 (0)3303 600 300
Brett Davidson is the founder of FP advance and rated by Professional Adviser as one of the top 50 most influential people in financial services and Dominika Sieradzka-Maccuirc is the founder of RIE Solutions, a specialist consultancy offering Financial Planning firms effective practice management support, operational advice and mentorship for those who want to make a real difference with their business.
