Calling All Advisors: U Can Make Lyfe Ezier For Yourself ;)

I've been a financial advisor for two years. In a bittersweet way, the financial advisor route saved my life during the pandemic, though it came with its own challenges too. A sales role meant a potentially (though unlikely) infinite quantum with your income, but with increasing regulations on how you can market and prospect to the public and increasing competition from other industry players, it's pretty much trying to eat with your hands tied.

It Only Gets More Difficult

In the pandemic where death and critical illness is apparent and stock market opportunities abound, it may seem like insurance and investments are super marketable. However, restrictions on face-to-face interactions also led to the rising of different industry players. Disruptors, as we call them.

This is especially apparent on the investment side. Robo advisors became a buzzword for easy, simple and accessible investing. More importantly, robo advisors represents unbiased and low-cost investment solutions. This also aligns with consumers are becoming more woke and consumer buying behaviour have changed where they're more comfortable purchasing/transacting on a digital platform. Privacy is becoming an increasingly sought after commodity, perceived as, possible with digital solutions. Worldwide, digital insurance providers like Lemonade are becoming more popular with an increasingly tech-savvy population. Disruptors' marketing game is excellent, btw and you know it when customers are pulled, not pushed in. With these options, people can get what they want (or need?) without facing an advisor, without the possibility of "getting missold", without the probability of facing pushy sales pitches or awkward conversations.

Honestly.. it can be a win-win situation for human advisors and customers. Whatever the stigma is, financial products are solutions and we are merely paid to distribute them. But with this changing climate of how financial advisory is done and these industry disruptors, what are the odds of us surviving?

The Good News: Customers NEED Best Of Both Worlds

Post-apocalytic films of robots completely replacing human interaction is highly unlikely. No matter how advanced technology is, humans are in-built with a need for the human touch. It's the reason why we still visit the doctor for assurance or prefer a callcenter person instead of an AI speaker. It's why we consult our friends and families for an alternative opinion. Call it Creative Design if you like but that rings true for everyone. The human presence provides an assurance that we intrinsically resonate with. Whether we trust it or not is something else, and does not dispute our innate need for human interaction.

How do we reconcile the tension between customer's need for human interaction and their preference for technological platforms, and where do we come in?

Herein lies the good news: It's not an either-or conundrum for us advisors. The good news is that advisors can leverage on the perks of technology to augment their capabilities. There are three ways technology can augment the advisor's capabilities, even on the sales front.

Seeing Is Believing

Insurance is an invisible product: You won't be able to visualize benefits of it until something happens (by then, you will really be unable to visualize it). And that's why insurance is difficult to sell and conversations are awkward. Conversations about death and illness is pretty difficult in an Asian context and no one enjoys a doom and gloom conversation. While fear is an important purchasing motivator, it's really not sustainable. Here's where technology comes in.

With current technological advances, there are tools that provide rigorous stress-testing. By stress-testing your customer's financial position against personal and market risks, your customers can forecast how a product will work for them. This is crucial because this enables your customers to appreciate and verify the impact of your product solutions. Without you even having to broach the topic on death and sickness! Seeing is believing for the customers, and this allows them to create an intent for them to purchase.

As a side note, there's really nothing wrong with selling (unless you're doing that all the time with your customers). Everyone is faced with advertisements everyday and they are faced with a choice to buy or run which is within their prerogative. The key thing is to know that customers can't feel inspired to buy something they dont KNOW they need.

Real (And Perceived) Unbiased Advice

The public perception that advisors are biased with their product recommendations, whether intentionally or not, is real and partially explains the aversion towards advisors. The flip side is also true: Digital/technological platforms provide the perception of unbiasness with the absence of a human-facing advisor and it transcends financial planning. Think about how people check out food recommendations. If you could or knew how to, you likely would have sourced out ten different food blogs to make a decision.

Technological platforms provide a perception of unbiasness and advisors can use that to their advantage. On the other hand, some digital tools also follow a set of Advice Principles and algorithms to ensure that the right product solution is suggested depending on your budget, risk profile, time horizon and so on. This greatly reduces the risk of misselling due to conflict of interests and ensures the customer's needs are addressed. From there, you build better trust and relationship with your prospects and clients, even before the sales pitch has begun.

No One Likes Being Told What To Do

I imagine hearing my mom's advice when I was young and truth be told, I didnt like it. And in this day and age where I can access information myself, I really dont like being told what to do. Why? Because by discovering a solution myself, I feel empowered. Even if the solution I'm discovering isn't right but hey, customer perceptions can be illogical! The key to empowering your customers is to allow them to self-discover the solution.

It's one thing as an advisor to send a long whatsapp message or inundate your customers with verbiage of the importance of financial planning. It's another thing for them to self-discover how a solution meets their needs. Hence, digital tools help give customers a sense of control over their finances as they feel empowered to make a change.

What's Next?

Disruption can be a sobering, even painful wake-up call. However, adaptability is no longer a measure of success, but a measure of survival. The successful advisor yesteryear might not be the same next year because technology can radically revolutionize the way we do advisory. Times change, people change and this includes your customers. For those who adapt to changing times, there's hope and disruption doesn't necessarily spell the end of success for the advisor.

The future is still bright but it belongs to those who seize the day by leveraging on whatever digital tools they have to make a difference and make lyfe ezier 4 urself ;)

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Wordsmith by day here, hustler by night here

Calling out financial advisors: I'm looking for beta-testers for an InsurTech tool which comes with an incentive for that too. Hit me up at https://www.linkedin.com/in/samdonoh/ or @gethsemanefinance on IG to find out more!