Advice firms waste money and resources trying to link existing technology. Are you one of them?

By AdviceBridge

Many financial advice firms waste valuable time and money by attempting to improve their processes piecemeal using existing technology. They may gain a small improvement here and there but nothing as significant as reviewing a much larger segment (or whole) of their businesses operations.

Unfortunately, while the goal is laudable, taking this approach and addressing processes and technology solutions one at a time, can quickly lead to a lot of wasted time, effort, and money. 

Know when to leave old technology behind

There’s a well-known Buddhist parable about a man who builds a raft to cross a raging river. 

Safely on the other side of the river, the man picks up the raft that helped him over the water and starts walking into a forest.

The forest is thick with trees, and the raft begins to catch on their wide trunks, impeding his progress.

The raft is weighing him down and slowing his journey through the forest, but he refuses to let go of the raft. “This is my raft,” he says. “I built it, and it saved my life!”

To survive today, he has to let go of the raft that saved his life yesterday.

Leaving your raft may be painful and jarring. You’re accustomed to its foibles and know how to get the best out of it. It makes you feel safe and comfortable.

You have invested time and resources into building your raft of technology. And so, of course, the sunk-cost fallacy kicks in, prompting and persuading you to stay the course. 

But it’s time to say thank you to the raft and let it go.

Like Darwin said, “It is not the strongest species that survive, nor the most intelligent, but the ones most responsive to change.”

New technology could free up time and resources

It’s easy to “get stuck” and continue to use existing systems and processes, especially when you, and your team, are familiar with current software. 

However, investing in new technology could free up time and resources in a way you never imagined. This is especially true when you consider that new technology systems have supreme versatility and power, with an incredible ability to provide what many firms require. 

Read more: Advisers’ top 3 fears for adopting technology and how to overcome them

Of course, getting onboard with technology and updating and improving business processes will help provide a more digital experience to clients. 

Yet failing to do the research and investigate the technology on offer will almost certainly lead to a decision committing to the wrong solution. This is highly likely to result in an expensive disservice to both your business and your client, since you’ll probably end up investing more deeply into old-style technology, which, ultimately, won’t be able to compete with modern systems.

AdviceBridge can deliver sophisticated and streamlined processes, more cost-efficiently and in less time

Providing seamless integration with other elements of your business technology, AdviceBridge frees up more of your time to focus on the all-important client relationship.

The intelligent software replaces repetitive, complicated, and time-consuming tasks with engaging, insightful, and meaningful information and recommendations.

Through sophisticated automation, AdviceBridge enables you to effortlessly deliver compliant-ready financial plans to a wider range of clients profitably. The system helps gather information, and analyse what is held and how it should be structured before automatically producing a report ready to present to your client.

Technology that helps you to enhance your service offering easily

The engaging client-facing app has been cleverly designed to help your clients to feel more engaged with their financial futures – and allows them to interact with their financial plan 24/7. 

A built-in alert system will let you know when a change in circumstances requires intervention, allowing you to step in with on-point, timely advice.

On top of the client advantage, by digitising a lot of time-consuming and mundane tasks, AdviceBridge allows you to spend significantly more time having more meaningful – and potentially profitable – conversations with your clients.

Get in touch

If you’re ready to leave your raft behind and wish to find out how AdviceBridge could help you do this, please get in touch. 

Email hello@advicebridge.com, book a demo, or call us on 020 3925 3850.