“It’s going to drive traffic onto your website because it’s what is going to drive your campaigns,” Pearson said. “Prospects aren’t prospects at first, they’re leads and suspects, and SalesForce is the best tool to manage them. It’s an investment, but as you grow your business the return on that investment for us has been exponential.”
Bruckenstein pointed towards TD Ameritrade research suggesting that clients are demanding more attention and prompter responses from their financial advisors, linking technology with a better experience.
Regardless of size, planning firms need to embrace the challenge of implementing technology, said Mark Pearson, chief investment officer of Nepsis Capital Management.
“When you’re smaller and starting out, it doesn’t have to be complicated or expensive,” Pearson said. “It depends on size and how you want to do integration. I suggest that you get yourself in a platform that gives you plenty of expandability and flexibility.”
Pearson said that smaller RIAs should explore whether they can use a custodian’s resources for free or at a reduced cost.
The panelists said that they were becoming more technology-focused not just in their client outreach, but also in their marketing. Bruckenstein noted that technology may be the only way to effectively communicate with younger clients, especially those under the age of 35.
“Millennials have the attention span of fleas,” Bruckenstein said.”Younger people want shorter messages and prompter responses. If your technology doesn’t support that, that’s problematic.”
That messaging starts with a website, which is where panelists suggested advisors should broadcast their core appeals to current and prospective clients.
Keeping in mind the short millennial attention span and the minimalist aesthetic conventions of today’s Internet, many advisors’ websites fail to put a positive face on their business, panelists said.
“Keep it simple, don’t say too much,” Pearson said. “People don’t need 50 pages on a website giving them all the intricate details.”