What advisors and their clients don’t know about each other may hurt them, according to new research.

There’s a knowledge gap between financial advisors and their affluent clients, according to business management specialists at The Spectrem Group. Advisors at times harbor misconceptions about what wealthy investors want and high-net-worth clients are often unclear about what their advisor does, they said.

Advisors may not be aware that most millionaires have between $1 million and $5 million in net worth and are beginning to skew younger, said George Walper, Spectrem’s president, while presenting research at last week’s TD Ameritrade 2016 National LINC conference.

“Few are under age 35, but the average net worth of a young millionaire is the same as those who are older,” Walper said. “Two-thirds of them are two-income households. Most are college educated and over half are retired. About a third have some type of graduate degree. That’s important because clearly they’re smart people.”

Younger millionaires tend to have higher annual incomes than older ones, Walper said, and in general have higher levels of education and entrepreneurship.

But not every millionaire is a doctor, lawyer or heiress—a surprising number of them are teachers, he said. “Educators are among the top occupations for millionaires,” Walper said. “They still have this wonderful thing that we call a defined benefit plan.”

Over the past few months, as markets globally have experienced a pronounced decline, affluent investors' outlook, as measured by Spectrem’s Millionaire Investor Confidence Index, has declined.

Walper says that the wealthy are being frightened away from investing.

“When we asked how people are investing right now, we find that they haven’t really panicked, but they’re starting to get nervous about the markets,” Walper said. “On average, 12 percent of their assets are in cash, and that’s a high number. Traditionally, they would have about five percent in cash. They’re in between as opposed to panicking.”

Stock market conditions have the biggest impact when affluent investors are choosing their investments, according to Spectrem’s research.

Advisors might be better off thinking of the recent volatility as both a challenge and an opportunity. Cathy McBreen, president of Spectrem’s Millionaire Corner, said. That puts pressure on advisors serving the mass affluent to show value to their clients by guiding them through troubled waters, she said.

“When people swtich advisors, it often comes down to two things: being proactive and being responsive,” McBreen said. “We hear that advisors aren’t reaching out to them frequently enough. Responsiveness is also critical."

This partly due to the 2008 financial crisis, which still lingers in the minds of investors, she said.

"Things have changed over the last seven or eight years for two reasons: the financial crisis and mobile technology," McBreen said. "When a client wants to talk to their advisor, they want to talk to their advisor right now.”

Advisors are going to have to make themselves available to clients on evenings and weekends, and the industry will have to solve compliance issues surrounding text and social media communication, McBreen said.

As they pivot to serve younger generations of investors, advisors are likely to find different demands for response and communication, Walper said. “Client satisfaction increases with client age," he said. "I suppose that’s a good thing, but right now the satisfaction of younger investors is nowhere near that of older investors.”

Clients of all ages are still finding advisors through referrals from friends, family and professional centers of influence, but younger prospects are more likely to vet an advisor before scheduling an introductory meeting, he said.

The vetting process is taking place on the Internet, Walper said, where it’s important that advisors are represented by a professional, up-to-date website. Social media presences are also an important source of information for prospective clients.

“Younger millionaires are increasingly turning to social media for financial purposes,” Walper said. “ Younger investors are likely to see how you’re using social media. If you want to attract younger investors, you have to have a social media presence. Today, it’s become one of the things they think about.”

This is the case not just with millennials, he added. Spectrem’s research showed that older investors, even those over 65, are using social media, especially Facebook, in large numbers and with greater proficiency than younger generations.

As more older clients begin withdrawing from their retirement accounts, and younger clients become responsible for a larger portion of revenue, advisors may need to diversify their services and the pool of experts they refer to clients.

“Today, millionaires want help investing, diversifying and crafting a financial plan,” Walper said. “In the future, they’re going to want and need tax-advantaged strategies and to establish an estate plan, they want advice-oriented, planning-oriented solutions for their life across stages. They want an expert on long-term care—if you’re not already pairing up in your community with an expert, you should.”

Walper said that these non-investment services were low-hanging fruit for advisors looking to add value to their practice.

Younger investors are more likely than their elders to want to use robo-advisory services, McBreen said, but that may also present an opportunity for traditional advisors.

“At certain points of their lives, technology and robo-advisors may be the best solutions for investors,” McBreen said. ”It’s an interesting way to rethink the robo-advisor issue at to position yourself as a tech-based solution for these investors.”

Advisors looking to add additional assets and revenue to their practices may not have to look far, according to Walper.

“Your wealthy clients, on average, are only allocating around 22 percent of their wealth with you,” Walper said. “You should be asking on a regular basis to make sure you have a current pulse on your clients’ assets. It’s easier to get additional assets from a current client than it is to get additional clients.”

The misconceptions don’t stop at assets—the Department of Labor’s implementation of a fiduciary standard for the financial services industry has brought conversations about the standard to the forefront.

The problem, Walper said, is that many wealthy investors don’t know what defines a fiduciary relationship.

“Eighty percent of millionaires say their relationship with their advisor is a fiduciary one, but what’s important is how they define fiduciary,” Walper said.

The distinctions between financial planners, RIAs, brokerage representatives and asset managers also tend to be blurred by wealthy investors, according to Spectrem’s research.

McBreen says there’s also uncertainty among consumers as to what defines a robo-advisor.

“We’ve found that some people who think they’re using a robo-advisor aren’t actually using one,” McBreen said. ”A lot of these people are in managed solutions or target-date funds. They’re using digital solutions in their every day life and for their retirement plans, but not necessarily robo-advisors.”