Getting your Client Profiles in Order
This week we’re presenting MaxTips for Financial Advisors – a four-part series with key insights for Financial Advisors who are looking to a CRM to build and expand their book of business. Today we outline best practices for general and detailed client profiling and how a CRM can make this task easy, purposeful, and profitable.
Client profiling is, simply, categorizing customers with similar characteristics. A ‘birds of a feather’ notion, not only does this help better understand the needs of different groups of clients, but also aids advisors to spot trends for business expansion and growing the sales pipeline. Similarly, detailed client profiling can do more than just remind you when to send a birthday card – it can set in motion and automate a host of updates, events and actions to improve client contact, fine tune sales strategies and drive revenue growth.
Profiling for Productivity
If you follow the business adage “measure what matters” then the client data equivalent is “profile for productivity.” The most basic fields in the world of financial advising include, of course: name and address; household structure; insurance age and birthdays (especially the ones that trigger pension or other significant events); Know Your Customer (aka KYC) reviews or upcoming expiries and renewals. Importantly, this client data is an ecosystem that requires constant gardening – from sales calls and customer meetings to lead capture, surveys and more over time.
“Creating a team culture of data integrity benefits not only advisors and their pipeline but also instills customer confidence through better and more poignant communication,” explains Brad Hartfield, Financial Advisor Solutions Manager at Maximizer. “Operationally, you can rest assured that your CRM data is a ‘source of truth’, whereby all reps and managers can access accurate and consolidated customer information and can better serve their clients as a team. No more scrambling to find that important date or note when someone is away, or has perhaps left the company,” he says.
Let’s Get Personal
According to PWC, 73% of consumers say good customer experience helps to drive their buying decisions. Additionally, 86% of customers say that they’re ready to pay more if it means getting a better, more personal customer experience.
At both the group and individual levels, getting personal using targeted communication is fundamental to the rapport and loyalty that leads to greater “stickiness,” and opens the door upselling to build the book. The trick is to scale and strengthen that level of personalization, regardless of the size of your client base.
“You’d be surprised at the deep connections you can establish with clients by knowing – and tracking – personal interests such as favorite beverages, hobbies, TV shows they watch and their pet’s name,” says Hartfield. “In fact, it’s something clients now expect as part of modern customer service, response levels and the relationship in general,” he explains.
Equally as valuable or more, robust client profiles offer deep insight and predictions into customer’s behaviours. Paired with the more personal information, advisors can be offering up valuable advise before clients even ask for it. Advisors are in the driving seat of their customer’s financial needs as well as that of their own book.
Timely and Total Recall
For quick access to important information and events, an advisor’s CRM needs to operate like a powerful search engine. Retrieving any aspect of a client’s profile must be quick and convenient. For financial advisors, as an example, you should be able to see all household structures at the click of a button. Maximizer for Financial Advisors does this exceptionally well.
Read more in our MaxTip for Financial Advisor Series:
From Spreadsheets to CRM: Ensuring a smooth & successful transition
Connecting with Clients: Productivity for compelling and results-driven rep-client conversations
