Most Popular ArticlesJune 16, 2009
Interoperability with business applications
According to a survey conducted by Advisor Perspectives, the single biggest frustration among advisors is the lack of integration between CRM, email, advice and planning, document management and custodial systems. Disparate systems mean advisors do not have a complete picture of the client or spend hours manually entering client information into multiple applications. This leads to inconsistency and errors.
Once you determine the applications (portfolio management, financial planning software, etc) to be integrated with your CRM system, the main selection criterion is how well the CRM system aligns with your advisory practice and work processes. A successful CRM implementation is not necessarily determined by the features of the system, but how well your business processes and peripheral applications are coordinated and reflected in the CRM.
The CRM challenge: Separating the good from great
A CRM system increases productivity and efficiency by automating, tracking and improving client engagement tasks. This can range from something trivial like an account opening procedure to everything you need to do with a client when they change marital status.
A lot of CRM projects go awry because of ill-defined processes, not using the system 100% of the time, or a lack of understanding of what is required to make the system work. Failure can be a result of poorly defined or immature processes as much as software limitations.
Too often monolithic CRM systems with large feature sets overwhelm advisors and lead to a failed implementation or unjustified costs for the portions of the system that are used.
A CRM system integrated with Microsoft Outlook is often ideal for a small office or team of advisors, since Outlook is the contact management and email communication tool for most advisors. The CRM can then easily make use of contact information, calendars, reminders, tasks, notes, and client communication activity.
But a CRM has to extend these baseline Outlook capabilities to provide the financial data, document vault, and business management reports that are the foundation of a financial planning practice. All of the clients’ financial data, online documents, financial reports and compliance-related activity logs should be managed by the CRM.
Effective CRM system must be centralized applications where all team members can view, share and update information, such as client tasks, documents, data and portfolios. This ensures everyone has current and accurate information at a glance. CRM systems implemented as a hosted application (software as a service) act as a centralized repository of CRM information for the firm, sharing a common view of data as needed between advisors and teams. While this is also true of internally-managed server-based approaches, hosted applications provide further benefit by alleviating the firm from managing the applications and servers themselves.
Improvements in communication, collaboration and productivity should lead to tangible gains that justify the expense and overhead of implementing a CRM solution. If the CRM tool doesn’t fit the practice, even the greatest technology will not provide that justification and ultimately lead to poor return on investment. Hosted CRM applications that are tightly integrated with other software platforms and advisor applications provide the right approach for small office, independent advisors who are looking to maximize their efficiency and offer superior service to clients without a great deal of additional overhead and complexity.
Gary Kinghorn is the Director of Product Management at AdviceAmerica, Inc., a leading provider of financial planning and client relationship management solutions to major firms and independent advisors. Previously, he was a financial advisor with Smith Barney in Menlo Park, CA. He can be reached at . You can read his advisor blog on practice efficiency and technology trends at http://aablog.typepad.com/aablog.
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