7 Must-Have CRM Features For Financial Advisors

In 2018, it’s hard to imagine the financial world without the Internet and mobile devices. A new software segment – fintech – has brought banking, wealth management and insurance companies to the new level of customer relations management, with broader access to data and AI-powered analytics. Every year, new fintech solutions appear on the market to meet the demands of financial companies and their clients. Today we are going to speak about one of the popular pieces of software – CRM system.

Why it is important to customize

Personalized approach and 24/7 support – that’s what most customers demand from their financial advisors. With CRM, it has become possible. However, only a custom-made solution can meet the requirements of all types of services and clients, starting from individual entrepreneurs to large corporations and allow you to manage their assets, liabilities within financial accounts. Here are at least five reasons why you should work with custom CRM:

  1. All the financial history of clients is at your fingertips, with all transactions and connections, so that you can analyze it in the form of graphs, charts, and dashboards.
  2. The data is structured, detailed and up to a point – you may concentrate on better solutions for their clients rather than struggle with paperwork.
  3. Third-party integrations allow you to have one-click document signatures, financial plans templates, business intelligence tools for individual decision-making, and more.
  4. CRM can be your only client management software as it aggregates dozens of other tools and data sources which saves you a lot of time and effort.
  5. The system is automatically updated in real time – you can adapt to changes on the fly.

But again, CRM may not be as amazing as it sounds, unless you stuff it with custom features for successful financial consulting.

7 best CRM features:

1.    Multiple Account Management

Even if you’re a solo entrepreneur, you usually manage 2-5 accounts. These features suit best companies who manage different types of accounts: leads, individual clients, legal entities, and partners like CPAs, attorneys, insurance brokers, etc. Thus, a company may assign an advisor to several accounts and apply sharing rules to distribute duties to different employees.

2.    Check Process

Capturing the details about customers is a complex process of manual data input, database migration and integration of third-party services, which is impossible without errors, duplicates and faulty formats. For a wealth management company, customers are the asset of the highest worth, that’s why they cannot afford to make any mistakes like this. That’s where check process come into play and verifies data, conducts deduplication, regulation compliance and logic revision.

3.    Know Your Customer or KYC compliance:

It is imperative for any financial consulting company to keep their processes compliant with KYC requirements. Integrating KYC software allow you to prevent data leakage, fraudulent activities and money laundering. With KYC registrations, you get certified ID copies, info on customer’s employer, risk tolerance, salary and other sources of income, tax bracket, and more. The other critical thing is to review this data automatically based on risk score of each of the accounts to avoid issues with government regulations.

4.    Portfolio Management

The work of wealth management companies is closely connected to dynamic investment tools, such as Mutual Funds, Antiques, or Gold ETF. Being integrated into CRM system for a financial advisor, product and portfolio management system enable these instruments to give a comprehensive view of the customer.

5.    Relationships and Household Tree

The other important feature for each wealth management CRM is relationships and household tree. It joins spouses together, ties clients to other dependent family members, households, partners, and business groups and creates a picture of customer connections investment perspectives.

6.    Self Service

Not only the financial advisor benefits from the custom CRM but also a client. It’s critical that your client knows what your company is doing, is able to log their queries and complaints and see the dashboard with the current portfolio of investments and products, and actionable analytics on top.

7.    Robo advisors and AI

Don’t be afraid that robo-advisors will take your job, while experts report only about 3% of investors who use a robo-advisor. People still appreciate human advisors for their trustful judgment, clear understanding of their goals and personal touch. However, the power of artificial intelligence may be of great help to you, providing automated, portfolio-based advice and future outcomes predictions without human involvement.

With all benefits in mind, it’s no surprise that everybody from retail banks to financial advisors and insurance companies showing ever more interest in financial services CRM. It is the investment aimed at established companies who are looking to streamline their decision making process.