Last month, I had the pleasure of speaking at the In|Vest Conference in New York City. I enjoyed meeting many of you at Accenture’s innovation luncheon, happy hour and breakfast session. For those who couldn’t attend, I’ll share a few key observations:
Robo, robo, robo has become hybrid, hybrid, hybrid.
The conference buzz was about how to best combine humans and robo-advice, because investors are clearly stating their preference for a hybrid model. Accenture recently published a study, The New Face of Wealth Management, on this very topic. The key takeaway? Hybrid firms rank higher than all others in several dimensions critical to customer loyalty and satisfaction, from customized service to low-cost products. Hybrid is here to stay—and conference attendees were keen to discuss the ins and outs of that model.
Established players are making their hybrid moves.
While digital startups pioneered robo-advice, incumbents have the benefit of being able to take the best of the robo-advice model and combine it with the best of their already established human advisor model. It was great to see so many industry players taking the stage to show leadership on the future direction of the industry.
‘Customer insights’ is at the heart of wealth management.
I shared the stage with Ilan Davidovici, global head of wealth and asset management for Salesforce and John Almeida, director for Salesforce financial services industry solutions to elaborate on Salesforce’s new Financial Services Cloud Einstein. The product brings a single, intelligent view of the client and respective household—connecting customer context and advisor action in a seamless loop. Accenture is an integrator of choice and a Salesforce partner on several of the largest Financial Services Cloud implementations around the world. As many of you remind me, your advisors are one of your most important user groups. Advancing their toolset is a top priority. Now this could be done on a modern digital platform.
Help is on the way to sort through the overcrowded fintech landscape.
I hear often from clients about their frustration in sorting through far too many fintech product and partner options. To help guide better decision-making, Accenture is planning to release a program later this year to help identify smart choices for wealth managers in the fintech sector. We aim to declutter the landscape and identify differentiated vendors that could help you drive innovation.
So many exciting changes are happening in wealth management at one time. If we were unable to connect at the conference, but you would like to discuss the implications of these shifts for your firm, email me, Kendra Thompson. I’d be delighted to have a more in-depth conversation. I hope to see you all again at the In|Vest conference next year.
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