Adam says that the company is structured entirely around the customer journey—the only way to put the customer first is to make every team ultimately accountable to the end consumer. Also, Adam says that they cultivate the idea of using the more modern tools, like remote presentations or digital screen presentations without paper (or minimal paper), which is really the way that business is going.

As for development, Asset-Map uses a combination of Waterfall and Agile methodologies. For back-end, they use AWS and Python Django; for front-end, it is Javascript and HTML5.

Outlining the roadmap

Early on in the establishment of the company it was up to Adam to outline the direction of Asset-Map. Today, there is a 50-person field advisory board covering different segments of the market and even tax and law professionals providing context on how they want to communicate with the customer when giving advice and guidance. This perspective is complemented by a product-management team, which also influences the roadmap and priorities.

Adam says that the company has a very open feedback and support center, as well as an app chat that receives and shares tips and feedback. Also, they track usage and click-through from Intercom and HubSpot.

“We get a lot of feedback from our customer service and customer success reps who are talking all day long to advisors, educating them and getting their feedback. We have hundreds of points of data validation on why we should build certain features.”

According to Adam, building something disruptive or unique in the financial services space has required them to make certain decisions about the product that customers have not asked for. A lot of their secret sauce comes down to the behavioral finance of decision making and how humans actually absorb information to the point where they do not become overwhelmed.

“Asset-Map is the thing that the customer has always wanted from their Advisor, but they don’t know how to ask for. In many ways, we’ve had to have the vision for an empathetic approach of what people really want without them knowing that they need it.”

Future plans and challenges

The plans for Asset-Map are very much populated with integrations. Like all fintech today, their peers have to address the UI and UX, ease of use, speed and integrations that the platforms can provide.

“Today, people are really competing for attention […] People are used to convenience and they want convenience over cost, especially in my marketplace. That’s what we’re focusing on.”

Adam says that they receive requests for a direct customer experience, a nonadvisor-based solution where the end customer can own their map.